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More Discussion and Analysis of That Pesky Twitter ROI Question

More Discussion and Analysis of That Pesky Twitter ROI Question

My post yesterday triggered a lot of discussion including worried cries from lots of Twitter afficianodos. Sorry, I didn’t want to dampen your enthusiasm or blind devotion.

It’s that pesky ROI question that I’m wanting to focus on specifically and strategically.

If you are getting ROI and it’s worth your while, then keep doing it. I want to see facts and data and learn how people do it profitably.

I would like to see what you say, understand who you say it to, and what happens specifically and over what period of time. I’d like to learn the connections to your landing pages and your fees to see how the ROI is generated.

My experience and that of many many many repeat many many many of my clients, invest time and energy and even create huge numbers of followers and even they see very little for it in terms of real ROI. Oh a few do, but very few indeed.

I think there are many reasons for this.

First is that the ability to communicate meaningfully so that you persuade and achieve action is very limited by Twitters brevity and that no matter what you give, getting through to people so that you achieve action is really hard.

Second, I think that at least in lots of businesses, successful people do not make decisions that entail or rely on or are even remotely influenced by what they can learn from Twitter conversations.

Sure, there are success stories and they are galvanizing. But they are actually rare. The data on ROI for bread and butter people and businesses is lacking.

Personally, I don’t mind Twitter at all. To me it is another tool in the arsenal. Like all the others, the technology has special communications requirements.

Some people don’t want to look at it as a marketing tool. They say to me “I don’t get it”. It’s just for communicating with people.

I think they are missing my point. Clients want to use it as a marketing tool. It’s a given fact. So it is the use of the tool for marketing that I want to focus on.

There are many people who think it’s the greatest thing since sliced bread. Obviously, there are people who are growing up using these technologies, and even building their lifestyles, and their livelihoods and incomes and the way they communicate with their clients around the technologies they use. To them, Twitter is just a wonderful extension of what they do and feel.

Like it or not, there are plenty of people who do use it and with text messaging and the ease of use on cell phones and blackberries, it is important to keep your options open. My kids use it. My doctor doesn’t. I do sometimes. Some people live and breathe on their iPods. They may have nothing better to do with their time.

I like being able to search and ascertain who’s talking about what. Although it has limits and doesn’t compare to the Internet for quality content and reliable detailed information searches for real problem solving data or information.

It’s a great tool for finding out “what’s happening” and searching for news and following real time events. Put in the word ‘tornado’ and you’ll find out exactly what’s touching down where and within seconds of it happening.

It has a valuable function for businesses who monitor what people say or who need to respond to a crisis.

All these things are true and all it takes is money and take time and effort and skill.

So I’m not giving up on it at all. I’m not averse to using it.

My questions are how much money, how much time, and what skills?

I am a scientist and a former attorney and a consultant who seeks to provide service and value. I think in terms of systematic processes to achieve success. The processes have to be capable of being reproduced for me to recommend them to clients and to teach with them.

So my search is for valid guidelines and tactics. Hence, what I hope for is not hope and hype, but statistically proven tactics with some documentation of the ROI.

I’m looking for guidelines in how to use it wisely and what messages work best for what purposes.

That’s my point. To measure the ROI with Twitter is very difficult. It varies phenomenally.

The number of followers to me is a dubious metric. You can develop a following and be in communications with thousands of people. You can tweet to them three times a day or three times a week.

But does it produce sales? Does the time and effort and money you invest yield a net income and is it worthwhile?

That is the question I want to focus on.

The time it takes to do this well competes with other income producing activities you can be doing. How you spend your time is a choice you make.

I am very cognizant of the power of targeted communications. The right message in front of the right people can be truly amazing. I do this with media day in day out.

But what if the people you reach using Twitter don’t react in a way that lets you profit from the time effort you invest in it.

You have to determine that yourself.

I want people to succeed when they use Twitter or any other medium of communication.

I see that people have to be careful though that they don’t replace productive income producing activities, with less income producing activities. That’s one of the risks here.

My recommendation is to track exactly what you do and make an objective determination and compare it to other dedicated marketing activities that produce sales.

Decide based on the income data.

If it works do more of it. That’s common sense.

But if you find it’s eating up your time and the hits don’t ripen into sales and ROI, then perhaps you should do something else.

If you spend just half an hour a day on Twitter, you’ve made a decision that results in you giving 15 hours a month to it. Are you making ten dollars an hour for your time? Did you by any chance just lose 15 hours at $100 an hour doing that?

That’s the type of choice I face.

Like it or not, much to the dismay of those who have jumped on the Twitter bandwagon, lots of people are finding out that Twitter can be a demanding time eater, and it may produce very little in the way of tangible and reliable income.

In fact, it can take them away from other proven activities that are needed to produce income that they rely on.

Everyone has to make the choice for themselves and decide how to spend time that produces income.

I think that given how difficult it is to survive and make an income these days, it is really important for people to document what they really experience carefully, so that they can make good sound decisions.

That’s what I’m really interested in. Hard data. Not theory. Fact.

How much time do you need to invest to develop a following?

How do you really reach the people who really matter to your business?

How do you communicate with them?

These are simple but important questions.

The number of dollars per unit time expended is something more interesting to me since I can compare it directly to how I spend time and the income I presently receive.

The way I spend that time is very important since I can compare it to how I know I spend my time now and the income I presently receive for that conduct.

What messages are best for what purpose is also a subject I’m very interested in because I can compare it to how I communicate now and what income those communications produce for me.

That’s what I’m after.

I think it would help others to find out these things as well.

Realistic chances of success for a memoir

Tips on how to help guide an author of a self published memoir

Here is my November 21, 2008 response to a post to the online discussion group Small-Pub Civil at Yahoo groups:

>>Hello, everyone! One of my authors has written a 250+ page book about his open-heart surgery. The bulk of it is autobiographical, including childhood memories, interviews with
everyone from the surgeon down to the cleaning staff and an entire chapter of get-well emails from his friends (he has their permission, BTW). Since he produces and hosts a long-
running regional TV show with a reasonably-sized fan base and is promoting the hell out of the book, I am confident he will sell a few thousand copies. But he’s expecting big-time
national success, including being stocked in the chains and selling on QVC. He is seriously counting on coverage in the NYT.

>> When I try to point out that this is unlikely he accuses me of negativism. Am I just being negative?

———————————

I encounter this with authors all the time. It goes with the territory. It could be a truly remarkable memoir. It might contain experiences that can make people smile, cry and laugh as they read. But then again, he may not yet have gotten any meaningful feedback from people, or the feedback he has received may be designed to make him feel good and congratulate him on his effort and accomplishment with having written a book.

I wrote an article to try to get people to grasp the significance of their dream and what it means to them if they really want to see other people appreciate their writing, especially if they really intend to now use that writing to achieve fame and financial success.

I work with hundreds of authors and publishing companies each year and really and truly, very few of them have really created a book that it good enough to achieve fame, glory and financial success for the author. Most are labors of love. There’s a sizable financial investment and personal emotional investment that’s required to go from “author” to “best selling author” and few really have what it takes to make it through the gauntlet of the marketplace.

What I recommend people do is go slow. Show and tell one on one. It’s possible to learn how to sell. That’s the miracle of the microcosm. If you learn what you need to say to people in your little neck of the woods, chances are you can then say the same thing anywhere and everywhere you go and you’ll be equally successful selling your products wherever you go.

But you need to learn those magic words first.

You have to write to sell, and the job of writing isn’t done until the book sells. This is where most self-publishers go astray. They publish their book without verifying it was really ready for market.

You have to test your ideas and test your product and test your mar-com (marketing communications) on real live people. You need to identify your end users and the people who will buy the book for your users. Then you need to learn what to say to get these people to take the action you want.

Write to sell and test, test, test. Do this in small doses till you get the right buy signals. Reliably. Not just once or twice, but repeatedly and reliably.

Do 25 to 50 POD versions and test it with these important people.

You’ll know by their behavior and response whether you are really ready to publish the book.

If you can’t get people to even look at it, then you’re not done.

If they look at it and put it down, then you still have work to do.

If people look at it and grab it, you might be done. It depends what happens when they then pick it up and peruse it. If they put it down, then you’re not done.

You may have to redesign and re-write it till you know you are done. You have to work with your prospective audience to get real feedback, and you must listen to what people say and address the issues you receive.

This may take a lot of reiterations.

But one thing is for certain, there is a point that you will reach when you know that you are done. It’s a wonderful thing when you get to this point and know it.

Here’s what I’ve observed and experienced.

You know when you are done…

When people look at it, grab it, look at it again, look up to see where the cashier is, and then head to the cashier.

You show your book someone and they hold it close and won’t give it back freely.

You show them the book and they reach for their wallet.

They pick up one book, look at it, and grab four or five of them and head to the cashier.

One person picks up the book, grabs it and heads to find and show his or her friend the book, and they both grab one for themselves and buy it.

You know that you have something when kids pull it off the shelf and haul it over to their mothers and fathers with a look of desire and wanting and excitement in their eyes that says please????!!!!

I call this the hoarding syndrome. What you are witnessing I call a clutching response. It occurs when people touch something and decide that they want it.

This behavior in people clearly indicates to you that the book or object they are holding has such inherent value and importance that they are willing to pay for it. They know it and you know it instantly. They clutch the object of their desire in their hot sweaty hands and pull it in close to their body as if to possess it and protect it.

I know you’ve seen this and even experienced it yourself. You see it in stores and shopping centers all the time. I see it when my wife and teenage daughters shop. I know from their behavior when I’m toast. There is no arguing with them once they’ve experienced certain hormonal reactions to objects that they’ve been in close physical contact with. That’s they way we humans respond to certain material experiences.

Other people here have no doubt experienced this in a variety of ways. It would be very cool to hear from people about when they knew that they were done.

I work with a lot of authors and publishers, and I see success a lot less frequently that I wish I would see. I attribute this to people rushing through to publishing their books without making sure they have created a product that people will actually buy.

So this is my bottom line advice:

Write to sell. Don’t stop writing and re-writing till you know it sells, and sells easily and continuously.

Prove it with small test POD numbers. Use the technology that is available to all of us wisely. Then move it up through the publishing and promotion chain level by level.

In most cases, the author thinks the book should excite and grab people. But it doesn’t always happen that way.

So to me, they still have work to do. But they can’t speculate about what’s wrong, they need real data.

This is what I tell people to do – get the data. Figure out what you need to say and do to produce action that will satisfy your stated goals and objectives:

Go ask your candidate customers. Ask until you are blue in the face and get the hard difficult data and feedback you need to redesign and redo your project.

I had a recent publisher come to me with a book which presented his ideas on how to have a successful marriage by using a marriage contract.

Myself, I’m a former attorney and I would not pick up a book that had a marriage contract in it.

Do people want to run their marriage off of a contract? Like it’s a job or a construction project? Do they want to reduce communications and relationships to policies, procedures and stipulated provisions?

When we looked at our marriage vows, my wife said “strike the obey” and I said “and add in this here dispute resolution clause”.

And that’s what the minister did, and we still live by those words.

And that was the oral vows.

Put it in writing? Something doesn’t fit in the picture. Like ‘what’s love got to do with it?’

This is the type of process most people go through when they contemplate buying a book.

Do I want to get married to this person and his or her ideas? Even if I can get divorced from them later?

You are not done until people fall in love with your creation. You’ll know it only when it happens.

What Happens When You Stop Helping People

What Happens When You Stop Helping People

Andy Andrews posted an absolutely brilliant story in his blog today. (Goodbye Mr. Foster) tells the wonderful story of what happens when not so smart management people ignore what’s really happening down in the trenches.

Sad but true, this appears to be what is happening in all sorts of companies. They not only cease to pay attention to what matters to their customers, but they also kill the spirit of the employees who are the very lifeblood of the culture they’ve created.

We need more Mr. Foster’s. We need to see and notice people who are selflessly devoted to making others happy.

How not to do a talk show interview

How not to do a talk show interview

Here’s are the links to a couple of clips to show you how not to do an interview on a talk show.

The videos are from Fox TV interview episode of “The Wendy Williams Show” on Fox, where she and Omarosa (2004 contestant from Donald trump’s reality show The Apprentice) get more than a little testy with one another.

http://weblogs.newsday.com/entertainment/celebrities_blog/2008/07/wendy_williams_vs_omarosa.html

I thought Wendy Williams was more than kind. It amazes me she lasted as long as she did. She demonstrated more patience and respect that this guest deserved.

Omarossa demonstrated that she is basically vane, self-centered, obnoxious, and disrespectful, and has very little good advice helpful for anyone. She insulted the host repeatedly and showed she can’t be trusted.

Why anyone would ever want to go near her or read her book escapes me.

They say that there’s no such thing as bad publicity. But this interview indicates that maybe, just maybe, it is possible to commit publicity and interview errors that are more detrimental than good.

Time will tell.

Key questions for a galvanizing interview news release or problem solving tips article

Key questions for a galvanizing interview news release or problem solving tips article

OK you’re ready to write a news release or have me send one out for you.

Now what do you do?

The goal is to now get people interested in you and your writing. To do this we need to make you interesting, newsworthy and entertaining. We need some exceptional material. We need your best material.

This is what I need from you so that we are successful together.

Here’s what I recommend you do:

First go to Google News and study what’s being published YOUR KEY WORDS

http://news.google.com/

You may also want to do this at my newly patented custom search word pro web site. It operates like a channel changer for search engines:

http://www.searchwordpro.com/quick.src?Action=&T=130

Once you see the existing coverage think how we can use this knowledge to create similar coverage about you. We have to interest media by giving them what they are accustomed to producing entertainment and education-wise. Look at what the best authors and entertainers do and in response to what questions or issues. Learn and take notes. Find a few examples that you really are envious of. These become your models.

Now build a presentation like this:

Imagine being in front of 20 to 30 of the very best people you think would be most interested and who in your service. Describe these people to me.

Identify the most important and interesting topic, challenges, or problem situation that will interest the maximum number of people you can think of, that relate to what you can speak about based on what you have created.

Think about being entertaining and informative at your story telling best. Use what you learned to guide you. You can use my 3 I Technique. Identify a success story. Imitate it. Innovate with your own information.

Then give me your ten best tips, problem solving actions or stories and ideas or lessons learned for your target audience. Can you give these people your ten commandments? Your best quips? The most important things you learned by writing?

I want you to pretend you have three to five minutes to give these people ten absolutely phenomenal show stoppers. That means for ten items, you have less than 30 seconds for each one, plus a one minute
intro and a one minute ending.

The goal is to create a vision for the media that clearly illustrates and allows them to visualize in their minds — How you can help them put on a good show and entertain and educate the people you can help the most.

Focus less on ideas than on actions that people can take to deliver immediate or tangible real time or near term benefits, impacts, or predictable consequences. Use real stories about things that happened to you or other people to add human interest.

These show stoppers should be “Do This Today” types of actions if it is advice you are giving to solve a problem or “Get a Load of This” type of emotionally engaging stories that are dramatic and personal and illustrate some achievement in the face of adversity.

This forms the core content to the news release/show proposal pitch.

These will also be publishable as an article with some caveats we can add to the beginning and ending of the core content to turn it into a proper news release offering. It will also become the core script
for a Q & A style interview, so they serve many purposes.

You can do five do’s and five don’ts or whatever. I just want you to be your wittiest and most galvanizing self. You can be humorous and/or serious, just be good and make them memorable. Keep them G Rated.

If you follow these instructions, please do send me these in an email message. No more than a single bullet plus a single one or two sentence inspirational explanation per bullet.

I’ll do the rest.

And then we’ll get you a bunch of media publicity, in the right place, so you are viewed and seen as helping the people you can help the most.

Paul J. Krupin Custom Targeted PR
Helping People Reach the Right Markets & the Right Media, with The Right Message
www.DirectContactPR.com 800-457-8746 509-545-2707

Andy Andrews asks “what’s the smartest thing your dad ever did?”

Andy Andrews asks "what's the smartest thing your dad ever did?"

Andy Andrews, camera in hand, asked a number of people “what’s the smartest thing your dad ever did?”

The answers he got were quite remark-able. In this short but incredible video, you’ll meet some truly normal people and a few well known celebrities as well.

Andy points out the value of having a mentor. Mentors do more than just offer advice. They invest in the outcome. They participate in the development personally. They make sure that some steps are taken and some expereinces and results are achieved.

We could all use and benefit from having a mentor or two. Quality advice and strong active supporters makes a whole lot of difference in a scary world filled with challenges and risk of disaster.

The real question then becomes is what do you do when you receive guidance and help from a mentor.

So the next question I wish Andy would ask of people, is this:

What the smartest thing you ever learned from your dad?

I know my dad would love to hear the answer. Even though I’m in my mid-fifites, he might be really surprised and happy to hear me share this with him.

Seth Godin on smart marketing

Seth Godin teaches smart marketing, the power of storytelling, and purple cows

Seth Godin looks at the world and sees things differently than the most people. He also has a remarkable talent when it comes to communicating what he observes and concludes.

There are a whole bunch of very important and insightful statements that he makes in this video, which he gave speaking to Google in 2007. This 48 minute segment covers material from his book “All Marketers Are Liars”.

One of the crucial ideas he conveys here is that technology simply doesn’t matter as much as marketing. Smart marketing is what creates success.

Who do you tell your friends to go see? Who do you tell your colleagues to go to for help? Who do you recommend when someone needs something?

This is where you need to be.

Another question is do you deliver your messages to people who want it when they want it? This is the essence of his permission marketing.

Then the real meat of this presentation (and Seth is a vegetarian) is all about how successful marketers convince people to believe a story.

Stories convince people because they make people feel a certain way. This is the challenge of marketing — to deliver on the story.

Another idea he covers is how the goal of creating a purple cow, that amazing remark-able product, that is so incredible you share it with ten of your friends because it is just so cool.

One superb nugget he delivers is that he compare how a super successful company spends ten times the money they spend on marketing on the design of the product. The average company spends ten times the money they spend on design on marketing and advertising.

Which one is more remarkable?

I see the same thing with people who write books. In my situation, the best book is easier to achieve success with. Want to get lots of publicity? Write a good book.

Jeff Slutsky demonstrates the value of asking questions

Jeff Slutsky, author of Street Smart Marketing, describes how to improve sales success by asking questions

Jeff Slutsky, author of Street Smart Marketing, is not only educational, but he is hilarious. His stand up and go for it tactics are based on years of experience in retail.

What a hoot! He’s a great salesman and a great teacher.

In this wonderful short video, he explains and drives home one of the most valuable things a sales person can do. Look at how you can improve sales success and the dollar value of a sale by focusing intensely on serving the clients needs, wants and desires.

Now in the world of targeted PR that I operate in, there are several really basic questions that I ask my clients which I use to help identify the right market, the right media and then the right message. For example, think about who your customers are. Then ask yourself “what do they read, watch or listen to, especially when they are in the mood to buy what you are selling?” This is how we target the right markets and the right media. The next key questions is “how can you help the people you can help the most?”

Then you can develop the best topic and the key talking points for an interview or a problem solving tips article.

If you want more helpful guidance, go to the free articles section of the Direct Contact PR web site.