Communities That Convert Podcast: Recent Episodes
Madalyn Sklar & Kami Huyse
At the seed of every good online program, there’s a community. Kami Huyse believes empowering that community is critical to lasting success. In this podcast Kami, along with Madalyn Sklar, will focus on the root of the matter — building online communities. Through this process, they'll share information, helpful tips and advice, and takeaways to help build your own community. Learn how to monetize, provide value, inspire others to take action, and make this a great experience for everyone. Kami and Madalyn will show you how to build a network on social media sites like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. Discover how to build a tribe of raving fans and hear ideas, advice and case studies you can use right now on growing your own community.
In the last episode, Madalyn shared how she launched her online course, the #TwitterSmarter Masterclass. In this episode, Kami is sharing a bit about her upcoming Smart Social Secrets course.
She'll talk about why she wanted to launch her first big course and give us an overview of it. Kami also shares how she'll promote Smart Social Secrets.
Podcast show notes available at http://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode127
The next two episodes are follow-on episodes to Episode 125: How to Create an Online Course for Your Community. We are going behind the scenes of our courses to talk about how and why we have created them. Madalyn is first up, sharing how she built and marketed her #TwitterSmarter Masterclass.
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode126
If you worry that you don’t know enough to teach something you’re knowledgeable about, just know there’s a course in everyone and everyone is a master at something.
In this episode, we share our five steps to creating your own course. We talk about choosing a topic and audience, outlining your course, how you'll give it, your learning platform, and ways to market it.
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode125
In this episode, we interview Andrea Weckerle, Founder of CiviliNation and the author of the book Civility in the Digital Age: How Companies and People Can Triumph over Haters, Trolls, Bullies and Other Jerks. We talk all about trolls and how you can deal with them in your community.
Podcast show notes are available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode124
In this episode, Madalyn and Kami share how they get things done faster by becoming super organized, putting a system in place, and asking for help.
Podcast show notes are available at http://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode123
In this episode, Kami Huyse shares how she is using StreamYard. She also answers a bunch of questions so you can learn all the ins and outs of this great live stream tool.
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode122
In this episode, we share six stumbling blocks to your success and how to remove them. We'll show you how to re-frame and channel that energy into the task at hand.
Stumbling Block #1: Fear of being criticized
Stumbling Block #2: Fear of being overwhelmed
Stumbling Block #3: Fear of change
Stumbling Block #4: Fear of the impact on loved ones
Stumbling Block #5: The feeling of being stuck
Stumbling Block #6: Imposter syndrome
Podcast show notes available at http://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode121
In this episode, we share 4 supercharged methods for reaching out to people on your list once or twice per year. You can change the method each time to keep it interesting.
Method #1: Handwritten notes
Method #2: Custom GIFs
Method #3: Send a Personalized Video
Method #4: Unexpected Gifts
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode120
In this episode, we show you how to grow your social influence in just two steps: two conversations and two comments per day.
Step #1: Commit to two conversations per day
Step #2: Commit to two replies or comments per day
Podcast show notes at http://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode119
We came up with 6 ways we like to create a welcoming environment for our community.
#1: Accountability Pairing 🗣️🗣️
#2: Friends of Friends 👭
#3: Livestreams 📹
#4: Ask for Opinions 💬
#5: Tagging in Your Groups 🏷️@
#6: Welcoming Committee (The Welcome Wagon) 🤝
Tune in to hear our take on this.
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode118
The best way to get praise from others is to praise them first. Plus, it builds a strong community. In today’s episode, we break down seven examples of how you can adopt this in your business, feature your community and grow your influence.
Podcast show notes available at http://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode117
This episode is a line up of the best tips on community building from guests we’ve featured in past episodes. It’s all right here– pro tips from Tyler J. McCall, Elisa Camahort Page, Jen Cole and Bella Vasta.
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode116
Every year, we like to choose one word to help guide us forward in the New Year. We shared our process with you last year in Episode 71 and we are sharing this information again to help you to establish your one word for 2020.
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode115
In this episode, we talk about hot trends for communities in 2020.
Hot Trend #1: Private Communities
Hot Trend #2: Pop-up Groups
Hot Trend #3: New Features That Support Group Functions
Hot Trend #4: Communal Watching
Hot Trend #5: One-to-one Communication
Hot Trend #6: Group Chats
Hot Trend #7: Privacy Issues are Front and Center
Listen to the episode to hear our BONUS hot trend.
Podcast show notes available at http://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode114
Warwick Brown is the founder of Account Manager Tips and helps organizations grow client revenue and retention by empowering account management teams with the tools and mindset to succeed. He is also the creator of his new membership community, the Kam Club, a private learning community helping busy account managers get results. Warwick is joining us to talk membership communities – how to build a profitable one that adds value.
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode113
In this episode we discuss nine questions to ask yourself that will kick off your 2020 planning for your social media strategy.
Podcast show notes available at http://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode112
It’s important to know how to best serve your community and you can do this by getting to know them on a more intimate level. You need to strike up a regular conversation with them. They can help you take your ideas to the next level which will allow you to serve them even better. In this episode, we are going to run through our 3-part framework for honing in on your ideal audience for your content and services.
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode111
In social media, slow and steady will often win the race, but when new features pop up in your social media platform of choice, it is often the first adopters that rise to the front. Strategically jumping on new social media trends and features can breathe new life into your social media presence and garner attention. In this episode, we'll talk about if and when you should jump on new trends.
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode110
In this episode, we’ll share the video, audio, light and live streaming technology we use for Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram. Plus, helping you to start with what you have, even on a budget.
Podcast show notes available at http://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode109
Why does live streaming help build community? People love a chance to connect with people they trust and like within their community. In this episode, we are talking about five reasons why live stream video will grow your community.
In this episode of the Communities That Convert podcast, we decided to live stream the episode WHILE we were recording. Talk about eating our own dog food!
We help people to build, grow, nurture and monetize their online community and build a tribe of raving fans. For the next 30 minutes, we are going to outline a 7-step script that you can follow to be prepared for your live stream and deliver value every single time.
Podcast show notes available at http://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode107
What is your biggest fear about live streaming? Let’s talk about the solutions to help overcome your fears and break down the barriers to live streaming!
Fear #1: I don’t feel comfortable or confident on camera
Solution: Practice, practice, practice
Fear #2: I don’t know what to talk about
Solution: Repurpose your content
Solution: Be Prepared and Use Notes
Solution: Use tools to make it easier
Fear #3: I am worried something will go wrong with the tech
Solution: Start with what you have.
Podcast show notes available at http://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode106
Todd Giannattasio from the Growth Suite joined us to share tips on what we need to include to make our website attract customers. He also created a strategy for you to use to map out your website. Download Todd’s Website Plan and follow along in this episode.
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode105
In this episode we come up with four steps to make your website your most valuable asset.
Step 1: Build Your Website as a Home Base
Step 2: Build Your Relationships
Step 3: Build buzz around your brand
Step 4: Measure Your Results
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode104
We are so excited to have Jen Cole on the show today. Jen Cole is a Social Media Specialist and Community Manager. She is a co-founder of the social media marketing firm Depict Media based in Wichita Kansas. She is also the Community Manager for Social Media Examiner and produces their #smechat. Jen has been a guest on a lot of Twitter chats, including Madalyn’s #TwitterSmarter chat. She co-hosts the Making A Marketer podcast with Megan Powers. Fun fact: Jen is also an internationally ranked pinball player.
Podcast show notes available at http://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode103
In this episode we talk about:
- Your Peers Usually Aren’t Your Customer
2. Popularity and Likability Don’t Pay Your Bills
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Demonstrate Your Expertise
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People Probably Aren’t Paying Attention to You
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You Need a Clear Marketing Plan
Podcast show notes available at http://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode102
We have a treat for you today. Bella Vasta shares her secrets for building a strong online community. She talks about how to add value to your paid Facebook groups, handling turnover and retention, the optimal size for a paid group, the best pricing strategy and more.
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode101
We are so excited to celebrate our 100th episode with you today and answer some of your burning questions.
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode100
Today we share 5 ways to keep up with the ever changing social media landscape: RSS feeds, alerts, industry news, Facebook communities and being curious about everything.
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode99
In this episode we interviewed Ali McGee Kelly from Social Media Examiner about her top tips for building a paid Facebook community. This episode is filled with golden tips!
Podcast show notes available at http://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode98
One of the best ways to get consistent interaction in your online community is to build a strong volunteer program to support your members. It also helps you to manage the needs of the community. No community is built by one person.
In today’s episode, we talk about the types of people who make great volunteers and how to get them involved.
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode97
We sat down with Kyle Hetrick and had a frank discussion about the benefits as well as the challenges of volunteering in your community.
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode96
Today we’re talking about how to make your email one of those that’s anticipated by your readers. We are working on upleveling our own email this year, so we’re sharing five of our favorite tips that will get you better results. Let’s go!
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode95
Did you know having the right tool can make email much easier? Email is so important to keep your business running and to connect with your community and customers.
In this episode we share the best email tools to build your tribe. We look at beginner tools like Mailchimp and Mailerlite as well as more advanced tools like ConvertKit and Active Campaign.
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode94
Did you know there is new data that tells you exactly where your audience is hanging out in social media right now? Pew Internet Research has its new data out from 2019 about how the average American is using social media. While this is US-based data, it is a large sampling and will give you some ideas, no matter where you are based. In this episode, we’re talking data.
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode93
In this episode we talk about 5 things to help you get unstuck and take action.
- Write out a plan
- Create a System that is repeatable
- Get your plan on the calendar and look for conflicts
- Get help
- Downsize your expectations
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode92
In Episode 89, we gave you 10 ways to build connections with your community. We wanted to go deep on one of those. Mentorship builds connections by adding accountability, creating community and increasing results.
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode91
As you build an online audience, you will be looking for ways to serve them better and to get them from point A to point B with specific results. In this episode, we are talking about a few ways you can structure that support.
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode90
When you build a community, it can sometimes be pretty quiet at first. People aren’t really sure where to start connecting and need easy ways to hook into the community. In this episode, we will share ten tried and true ways to turn your ghost town into a bustling square.
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode89
There are so many places that you can build your own online community. In this episode, we are going to share the ones that are on social platforms, ones that provide hosting and ones that you can host yourself on your own website. We will give you our picks for each category.
Podcast show notes available at https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode88
While there are no dumb questions, there are certainly better questions. We will share with you five of our favorite questions that help you get to the bottom of the needs of your customer.
Podcast show notes available here: https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode87
As community managers, we sometimes overcomplicate things when we set out to create programs, services, and content for our audience. So we created a three-step process to make it simpler.
Step 1: Develop a product or service idea
Step 2: Create a lead magnet that gives your audience a quick win
Step 3: Bridge the GAP
G – Grab their attention
A – Affirm their need for something more
P – Place their trust in you
Podcast show notes available here: https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode86
In last week’s episode #84, 5 Steps to Define Your Ideal Customer, we worked on defining our perfect customer. The next step is to find your customer or audience online in social media.
We walk through the four ways that you can find your customers and where they hang out online in social media. We also share some helpful tools.
Podcast show notes available here: https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode85
In this episode we are going to take a deep dive in how you can choose your perfect customer for your community. Customers can be defined as anyone with whom you might want to transact business, trade services, or even from who you want to enlist support, especially if you are a nonprofit.
Defining WHO you want to help is critically important to getting the results you need. There are several ways to pinpoint your perfect audience for your product, service or message. We share 5 steps to identify your ideal customer.
Podcast show notes available here: https://communitiesthatconvert.com/episode84
Community building on social media takes some strategy and work, but it is the best way to build your business. This is the first in a series to show you how to do it, step-by-step.
We are big fans of using a community to scale your businesses. Over the next two months, we are going to go over each step you need to take to build your online community and scale your business. Today we will share five reasons why community building is the best way to build your business.
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Reason #1: Loyal customers are better than new customers. Studies show that it costs five times more to get a new customer than it does to retain an existing customer and increasing customer retention rates by 5% will increase profits 25% or more. Your loyal, existing customers can grow your business when you nurture them, especially through your email list. Kevin Kelly, the Founding Executive Editor of Wired Magazine, did some simple math back in 2008 and showed that if you had 1,000 true fans that spent $100 a year, you could make a living at online business making $100,000 per year. A community is the fastest way to get to 1,000 true fans. Watch a video with Kevin Kelly here for more information.
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Reason #2: When you have a relationship with your community, testimonials and word of mouth come easier and are impactful. Don’t be afraid to ask your audience for a testimonial. Testimonials are really important. They serve as social proof and shows what you’re capable of. Within your audience, testimonials and good feedback provide camaraderie because people see your methods or products working for others and they get excited about it.
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Reason #3: Customer service is cheaper and better because the community connects and everyone helps and supports each other. You’re not an expert at everything, and your audience is full of a range of talents, knowledge, and abilities. Put that to use. We’re lucky to have social media platforms and communities, like Facebook Groups, and LinkedIn Groups. It used to be that you only had a website and email to engage with your audience. Everything changed with eGroups.com in 1997 which later became Yahoo Groups in 2001 and it was a game changer. Fast forward to today and there are so many platforms and tools to connect our communities. Take advantage of these powerful tools.
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Reason #4: As a community leader, you’re seen as an industry expert. Your opinion matters to the group. You need to be visible and engage. Being active in your community gives you a platform to build and grow your business and not feel like you are always selling.
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Reason #5: It’s the easiest way to help the most people possible and still see the impact first hand. If you are the type of person that really wants to help people and have a positive impact with your work, a community is the best way to do it.
Over the next few months, we are going to go over each step you need to take to build your online community to support your business. We are going to cover: * + Defining who you want to help + Where to find your tribe + What to offer them when you find them + The power questions to use to find their pain points + What platform to use for your community + How to build community connections + How to scale your business with a community and measure the results
Tools, apps and links mentioned: * Paul Jarvis * Acquisition vs Retention: The Importance of Customer Lifetime Value * HOW TO GAIN 1000 TRUE FANS - Kevin Kelly on London Real * How to Ask for Testimonials from your Community – Ep 48 * Communities That Convert Facebook Group
Take Action If you haven’t already, subscribe to the podcast so you don’t miss these next episodes where we walk you step-by-step through starting your community and getting 1,000 true fans. Then, join the Facebook community where we will be talking about each episode and answering questions weekly. Once you’ve joined the Facebook community, find an accountability partner to connect with and check-in with.
In this episode, we give you our quick-start mapping exercise to create content for your community that will wow your community and keep them interested.
It can be challenging to consistently create content and not run out of things to say. Even if you know what to focus on, you might still be looking for clarity.
In this episode, we will share our best tips and follow it up with a very practical exercise that will help identify your passions and expertise and ensure that you never worry about writer’s block again.
5 Tips to Choose Your Main Topic * Tip #1: Whatever topic you choose, make sure you have a passion for it because you have to create content on a weekly basis. Choose topics that you’re passionate about and for which and you have a deep understanding. You are going to have to talk about your topic often and in depth.
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Tip #2: Cater to your audience’s wants and needs by talking to them and asking them what they want to learn about. Pay attention to other influencers in your niche to see what they are talking about and what the people who follow them in their community are talking about and the questions they are asking. Quora can also serve as a tool to see what kind of questions people are asking about your topic. Just search for your topic and read the questions.
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Tip #3: You can always pivot in the future if the market conditions or your interests change. For now, just go with what you’re passionate about. Don’t let finding the perfect topic hold you up.
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Tip #4: Recognize when you are stuck and use the exercise we’re sharing with you to get unstuck, move forward and stay on track.
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Tip #5: Only teach what you know. There are always people that are a few steps behind you that would benefit from your guidance. Don’t overstep your expertise and you will feel more confident.
Simple Content Mapping Exercise Kami created this exercise for a brand looking to train their team on how to write for a corporate blog without sounding corporate, and to come up with ideas to write about In the podcast she runs through the process for using the mapping exercise with Madalyn. We have created a blank version for you to use. Fill out the form in our show notes at CommunitesThatConvert.com to download it instantly!
Tools, apps and links mentioned:
Quora
Ask Method by Ryan Lavesque
7 Types of Content to Rock Your Community – Ep 15
5 Ways to Quickly Create Relevant Content – Ep 18
How to Reuse, Recycle, Repurpose Your Content – Ep 24
Take Action Download the Simple Content Mapping Exercise worksheet and create your own custom list of content based on what you are both passionate about and good at. Then come and share with us what you came up with in our Facebook Community (use the secret word, ACTION, to get in).
The key to surviving the quickly changing environment in social media is to pivot quickly. So how do you overcome and survive those changes? We give you 10 ideas to consider.
10 Strategies and Tactics to Master Social Media * Build a community. If you have a strong community, you will notice when things are changing, when they are shifting to new platforms or trying different things and you can follow your audience. Things change and you have to go where your community is.
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Build an email list and keep in touch. Use social media to build your email list. An email list is yours, it’s not going away and it’s a good way to keep in touch with your audience directly. Email is still the best way to keep connected.
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Use new tools and tactics. Keep your eyes out for the tools that are being developed that connect people online, offline and through various social media platforms.
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Connectio.io connects Facebook advertising with your email list and targeted groups.
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Facebook and Google Location Beacons allow you to offer deals through the Facebook app when people are in your store. Retargeting Advertising has become a standard in advertising.
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Build redundancy into your plans. Don’t depend on API’s of the social media platforms and tools you use for your business. Social media is constantly changing and it’s best to be open to the changes and prepare for them so you can shift quickly.
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Shift your mindset. It’s normal to feel stressed out when things change, but there are shifts you can make ahead of those changes to help yourself out when they arise. Change is constant and you have to be able to adapt to keep up.
- Expect things to change and have a plan, like a crisis communication and business interruption plan.
- Learn to pivot instead of complaining about changes. Action takers turn these changes into opportunities.
- Don’t expect to do everything for free. All of the social media platforms expect to monetize.
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Be willing to go old school. Think about how you can connect with your community outside of social media.
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Some tactics for connecting with audiences have been left behind by some, but they still work.
- Websites are still a great marketing tool. It’s your real estate that you own and no one can take it away. Never give up your website. Run an audit and look for opportunities to freshen things up.
- Blogging is an amazing way to get people to your website. Blog posts live on and they aren’t going to go away.
- Email is and always will be important and a solid way to reach your audience.
- Forums are a great way to connect with your community, your audience and with people that are like-minded.
- Facebook groups are still a great way to connect, but there may be a time when advertising is needed to gain interest. Definitely build an email list of your group members.
Tools, apps and links mentioned: * The Growth Suite * Social Media Examiner * The Hive Model * Madalyn is Blogging About Twitter Weekly * Marketing Your Community with Email – Ep 17 * How to Build a Targeted Email List To Build Your Community – Ep 45
Take Action What is your plan for shifting your focus with your social media strategy this year? Come talk with us about in the CTC Community.
Live streaming is hot. In this episode, we cover the best live streaming tools we have found streaming to Facebook, YouTube, Periscope, Instagram, Twitch and RTMP.
Having the right tools to deliver your live stream content is key to building your community and brand. Here are nine of our favorite tools.
BeLive.TV Use BeLive.tv to stream on Facebook and invite guests to join you.
Pros: * A free account gives you 20 minutes, twice a week for streaming. * Paid accounts start at $15/month and removes BeLive branding. * Bring up to 4 people into your broadcast. * If you run into tech issues, you can refresh and don’t lose your session. * Your comments are viewable in the online platform. * Guests have the option to come on mobile or desktop. * Schedule posts and reminders. * Video orientation can be changed easily. * Simple to use overall.
Cons: * The quality of the video is not always the best. * You can’t initiate the broadcast from mobile. * BeLive only streams to Facebook.
Streamyard Use StreamYard to live stream on YouTube, Facebook, and any other network that accepts RMTP.
Pros: * It’s free with Streamyard branding. * Streams to Facebook, YouTube and RTMP Server, which lets you stream almost anywhere. * For $25 a month you can add overlays, remove branding and add your logo. * Schedule a post with information about your upcoming live stream on Facebook that also sends a reminder to your audience. * See and share live comments on the online platform.
Cons: * Currently in beta, but it’s an opportunity to have input on the features that are important to you. * Doesn’t stream to Instagram. * Not currently accessible via mobile. * Only lets you stream to one service at a time.
Zoom Use Zoom to stream to Facebook and invite guests to join you.
Pros: * Good quality video. * Very few technical issues. * Record locally to your computer without the extra step of downloading. * Can be used for online courses, webinars and online training. * You can stream with Zoom to Facebook Live for an additional fee.
Cons: * A $40/ month Pro Account is needed to stream to social media. * Doesn’t let you see comments.
Blue Jeans Use Blue Jeans to stream to Facebook and invite guests to join you.
Pros: * Great quality that allows you to put in text in the lower third of the screen. * Download a recorded video afterward. * “Green room” where you can connect with guests before you go live. * Conduct a regular video conference call or webinar. BlueJeans also had a telephone number attendees can call into.
Cons: * BlueJeans is $40 a month for its BlueJeans Streaming service and it only streams to Facebook. * It doesn’t allow you to schedule your broadcast on Facebook. * You can’t see comments. * Video screen display is limited.
Ecamm Live Use ECamm if you own and mac and want to stream to Facebook Live, YouTube Live, Periscope, and/or Twitch.
Pros: * All-in-one live streaming production platform. * Low cost, one-time fee of $79) and a 7 day free trial. * Streams to Facebook Live, YouTube Live, Periscope, and Twitch. * Comments viewable in one place. * HD quality using any connected mic and capturing device including a Canon DSLR camera and even multiple cameras. * Easy overlays and countdown timers. * Can play pre-recorded videos in your live stream. * Host up to 5 guests via Skype and record Skype calls.
Cons: * For Mac users only. * Requires some tech know-how.
Loola Use Loola to stream to Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, LiveMe, UpLive, and 17Live.
Pros: * Completely free platform. * Streams to Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, LiveMe, UpLive, 17Live and they are adding new features everyday. * Streams from desktop and mobile. * Stream to multiple social networks at once. * Promote Loola to remove their branding from your videos.
Cons: * Doesn’t stream to Facebook, Periscope or Twitter. * The ability to switch to a new mic or video isn’t clear. * You can only stream yourself and you can’t invite guests. * Clunky setup.
WebinarJam Use Webinar Jam to live stream to YouTube and Facebook.
Pros: * Built to create webinars, but you can also use it to live stream to YouTube and Facebook. * Have 1-6 presenters at a time. * Allows you to stream to 5,000+ people.
Cons: * It is more expensive than some of the other options at about $479 to $568 per year. * You can’t get info without going through their sales funnel.
Open Broadcaster Software (OBS) Use OBS to stream to RMTP, Facebook, YouTube, Twitch and more. OBS is a free software that allows you to capture video from a variety of cameras and computer screens, and composite them together into professional-looking productions.
Pros: * Free and open source. * Streams to multiple platforms at the same time. * Developers have created lots of add-ons for OBS to make it do almost anything you need. * With a tech understanding of how the platform works, you can add overlays, multiple cameras, and other features.
Cons: * OBS is very technical and takes a lot of computing power. * You need a rock-solid Internet or Wi-Fi connection with upload speeds of at least 10Mbps.
Wirecast Use Wirecast if you want to have a professional portable television studio to live stream to multiple social networks. Like OBS it allows you to use multiple camera and screen inputs.
Pros: * Professional live streaming software you can try free for 30 days. * It can simultaneously stream to as many locations as you need and your computing power and bandwidth can handle. * It has a great library of transitions and overlays. * Feature rich for pros and can handle multiple cameras.
Cons: * Can only bring in two remote guests at the Studio level. You can bring in seven guests at the Pro level, but it’s expensive.
How to Build Influence with Livestream Video Take Action Go to our show notes page and scroll down to the Take Action section. Once there you can enter your name and email to get our Livestream checklist to help you plan for before, during and after your live stream. You will also be subscribed to receive updates when our podcast goes out each week.
Communities can be pretty lonely if no one joins them. Read our tips about how to leverage social media to build an online community that supports your business goals.
You need a promotion plan for your content and products and services. Social media is a big part of that plan. In this episode, we cover how to create a promotion plan for Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, and a couple of niche communities that people often don’t think about using to promote their content and services.
Give People a Reason to Interact by Building a Community Not surprisingly, we are big fans of building a community before you start offering products and services. This builds trust and true customer loyalty.
- If you have a free community, start with something that drives your audience to download an item, and invite them into your community. Free downloads provide value to your community and offering a free community takes it to the next level.
- Once you capture an email address so can build your email list and communicate with people more directly and effectively.If your free community leads to a paid product, you need to have a more sophisticated promotion funnel. Keep providing value that eventually leads to an offer or sale.
- Many people create a community as a part of their paid product. This is a place to create more value for your customers.
How do you promote your community on social media platforms? Once you build your community, you want to choose the platforms you will use to promote your community and build your tribe. We went over our favorite social platforms and how you can use each one.
Facebook * Facebook Pages are still a great way to connect, and paid advertising makes them more effective. We recommend that you originate Livestream video on your business page, then share to groups and your personal profile to gain extra viewers. * Facebook Groups are a great place to get your community to interact with you and each other. * Your personal profile can be utilized to connect and bridge friends and personal connections. * Paid ads are a good opportunity to promote your content on Facebook. TIP: Retarget ads to people who watch your live stream videos. This is a warm audience that costs a lot less per click than cold traffic.
Twitter * Use Periscope to live stream to Twitter. Kami runs a live stream from both Facebookand Periscope, which streams to Twitter, for the Social Media Breakfast event every month. * Schedule tweets to promote your offers and gifts to grow your email list and community. * Invite people to connect with you and ask questions via a Direct Message on Twitter.
LinkedIn * LinkedIn’s feed has become an active platform for posting articles, information and videos. * Post on your personal feed and/or company page to promote what you’re doing for your community. * The LinkedIn Groups feature has undergone some changes to make it more integrated in the feed. Depending on your audience, it might be a good choice for your community. * New: Now you can use live video on LinkedIn
Instagram * Stories can be created to direct people to take an action or join you for something. Stories ads in Instagram allow you to insert the “swipe up” feature without 10,000 followers. * Direct messages are good for one-to-one.
Niche Communities * Avajunto, which is run by Mac Patel in our community, is an interesting tool for building a mastermind community and promote your content and share with each other. * Slack and Reddit both have a lot of large, active communities.
How do you get people to join your community? * Give them a sample. The Internet equivalent of a sample or a taste test is a free gift, lead magnet, challenge, webinar or something related to your product or service. * Mention it often. Tell people you have a group and how it can help them. Talk about your community and to spread your message. At every opportunity, mention how your group can help people. * Use opportunities like blog posts, emails, podcast episodes, events and in conversations to promote your group. Describe how people in your community are seeing results.
Tools, apps, and links mentioned: * Strategies for Staying Connected Through Social Media with Tyler J. McCall – Ep 68 * Build a Facebook Messenger Bot with Mikael Yang from ManyChat – Ep 59 * Avajunto * How to Share Calls to Action without Sounding Like a Parrot – Ep 76 * How to Build a Converting Community Using Content with Gini Dietrich – Ep 35 * Social Media Lab – Let’s See if Facebook Hashtags Get More Reach! * Social Media Lab – 1-5 Hashtags on Twitter: Which Gets More Impressions? * Social Media Lab – Using LinkedIn Hashtags in Posts- Does it Matter? * Social Media Lab – 30 Hashtags on Instagram Posts: Yes or No?
Take Action How are you promoting your community? Will you try any of the suggestions we talked about today or do you have one to share? Leave a comment here or come join us in OUR community to share. (The secret word to get in is, “Action”)
We share the three simple steps that you will need to take to build your influence and credibility and we go over how to get started.
If you want to be an influencer, you can get there by being a good listener and helping as many people as possible.
Here are three steps that we found to be critical to building our own influence over the years. In today’s episode, we’re sharing these steps with you. Read below to get the outline of what we talked about, then listen to hear the details.
Three Steps to Influence and Credibility Step One: Build a community of peers You need a tribe of peers, and of champions to get to the next level. No one ever got to the top alone.
- Interact online and get to know people and talk to people on a regular basis.
- Go to conferences and events. This is a great way to connect with others in your niche. Make sure to follow up and keep in touch to see how you can help them.
- Find the right events using word-of-mouth or an online search for local, national and international events in your niche.
- Listen to your community when they talk about the events they’re attending because those are the people you want to meet.
- Use the event hashtag to connect with community members ahead of a conference or summit.
- Check out local events through MeetUp and on the events tab within Facebook.
Step Two: Create valuable content Content draws people to you. You should be creating content regularly.
- Start a blog, podcast, YouTube channel, Twitter chat or local event and participate with others.
- Write guest posts, be a guest on podcasts and show up to Twitter chats to consistently create content that adds value and focus in a niche.
- There are so many ways to create content. The type of content that’s best depends on your interest.
- Consistency is hugely important, no matter how you share content. Experiment with the best time to content, what works for you and what best serves your community.
- Become known for one or two topics and continue to build on that. Don’t dilute your passion with too many things. Whatever niche you choose, you have to be passionate about continuing with it for a long time.
Step Three: Find a mentor Learn from someone who is already doing what you want to be doing.
- You can find a mentor a number of ways. Make a list of people and ask them. They may already have a program or opportunity you can benefit from.
- You can also join a course or mastermind. Adopt the mind of a student and be helpful. It really makes you stand out.
- A mentor can be someone you look up to and learn from without them actually mentoring you. Books and podcasts can be helpful as well.
- Paid mentorships are often worth it. You gain someone’s time gain a lot from the experience.
Quick Tips to build your influence and credibility: * Be consistent * Be present * Build relationships * Show you care * Realize you can’t do everything alone
Tools, apps and links mentioned: * Social Media Marketing podcast * Meetup * Company of One * Zirtual (tell them Kami sent you)
Take Action What are you doing to build your influence and credibility? What has been working for you and what hasn’t? We are having a conversation about this in our Facebook Group, so come join us! (Use the secret word “ACTION” to get in)
Planning on attending a meetup or conference soon? We've been to hundreds of conferences and we're sharing all our tips for helping you to prepare and get the most out of your experience.
6 Tips to Get the Most out of Attending Meetups and Conferences 1. Use the Hashtag * When you attend an event, be sure to use the official hashtag to connect with people on both Twitter and Instagram. It’s a great way to make new friends and you can use it to connect with speakers and event coordinators as well. It’s best to start using the hashtag to connect with others before the event.
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If you’re not sure what the official event hashtag is, reach out to the event organizers and ask. People make up their own and you’ll easily get caught up in others, not knowing which is the official.
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Tag people and companies when you mention them as a way to be seen and heard.
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Create an event within an event * Ask the coordinator if it’s okay and plan a live meet up with your community while at the conference. When planning for conferences, check to see if members of your community will be attending too.
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Create Twitter and Facebook polls to see who will be in attendance at the same conference as you.
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Create a Twitter List * Make a list of people who are attending the event that you want to meet or connect with, including the speakers. Once you’ve made a list, it’s easy to track everyone after the event by following the list.
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You can make a private and public list. Some events may already have a Twitter List of speakers that you can subscribe to and follow.
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Attend Remotely * Even if you can’t attend big events, follow the hashtag and interact with those who are there. It is a great way to keep up with the knowledge and connect with people, all while staying in your pajamas! It a powerful way to get the best benefit from a conference you can’t attend. Spend time monitoring the hashtag and you’ll make amazing connections as if you’re there.
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Get Connected on LinkedIn * Use the new QR code feature on LinkedIn to follow speakers and attendees with your phone by adding people’s codes. It cuts down on business cards and makes it easy to connect with them on LinkedIn after the conference.
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Follow up * Following up is so important and so few people do it. Be the person that follows up and do it as soon as possible after the event.
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Create a draft in your email to follow up after the event. Gmail has a feature called canned responses that you can set up and keep on hand to use after the event. Just add some personalized text to the top of each one and the general message can remain the same.
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Take a selfie with people during the conference and add it to the follow-up email you send to them. That will immediately jog their memory. You can also send them a personalized video.
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If it’s useful to have a follow-up chat, share your availability to meet with your connections.
Tools, apps, and links mentioned: * Social Media Marketing World * SMMW Virtual Ticket * Using a LinkedIn QR Code to Connect with Members * #TwitterSmarter Podcast: Tweeting Your Way Through a Conference with Madalyn Sklar [Episode 37] * Gmail Canned Responses * Buc-ee’s * Doodle * Calend.ly * Bonjoro
Take Action Which one of these tips are you going to adopt when you attend a conference or event? Come tell us about it in the Facebook group and also let us know which conferences and meetups you are attending this year.
Is your call to action falling short? We discuss how to improve your calls to action and get better results. We diagnose the problems with many calls to action and how to overcome them.
In Episode 75 we talked about the variety of calls to action you can use, but the devil is in the details and how you approach your call to action is just as important as the type of call to action you choose.
You don’t have consistent calls to action. You may not be adding in a call to action because you are afraid you will turn people off or come off as being “salesy” or out for yourself.
If this is you, it’s time to make a mindset shift:
- Give people a way to work with you. If you don’t give people a way to work with you further, you are doing a disservice to your community by not sharing your knowledge. Even if someone has something similar to you, you’re the only person that can offer that in the way you offer it.
- You feel guilty or unmotivated about making money. If you are making more money, you can make a bigger impact in the change you are trying to make and the people you are trying to help. The incentive is that you can provide more value to your community.
- You are worried what people think. If you are worried about what people think about you, you should know that no one really cares, or at least not for long. Plus, will the haters feed your family, or make the impact you were born to make on the world? Focus on yourself and don’t worry about anyone else.
“At age 20, we worry about what others think of us. At age 40, we don’t care what they think of us. At age 60, we discover they haven’t been thinking of us at all.” — Ann Landers
Are you just making announcements not creating conversations? If your content needs work, try these methods:
- Ask questions in your copy. Instead of just making an announcement that your content is up, use it as a way to start a conversation.
- Ask for micro conversions in all of your content. These small calls to action, like asking someone to respond to your email, or leave a comment, or ask a question, trains your audience to connect with and build trust.
- Put out content that isn’t completely finished to encourage conversation. Buttoned up content can feel so finished that no one comments, they just consume.
- Share success stories they can relate with. Use content that includes examples of how someone you have worked with has overcome an issue. You can highlight your clients and also get credit for helping them. Then, when you make a call to action, people trust you to help them because you have show that you have already helped someone else with the same issue or problem.
Tools, apps and links mentioned: * 7 Examples of Calls to Action for Social Media – Ep 75 * 5 Ideas to Get Your Community Talking – Ep 20
Take Action What call-to-actions are you using to engage your audience? What fears do you have about selling online and to your audience? Share with us in our Facebook community at Communities That Convert (Our Secret Word is “Action”).
Learn our seven favorite examples of how to use calls to action in your social media to build your community faster and get better results.
A call to action is meant to get someone to do something, getting them to act or to encourage engagement. Keep reading for some of our favorites.
7 Examples of How to Use a Call to Action: * Capture emails with lead magnets and free gifts. Offer valuable content. The free ebook is overplayed. Think about something else you can do that’s short, concise and offers useable information, like a checklist or a worksheet. * Ask questions in an email or on social media. This is a good way to ask for engagement and also good for research to know what people want and what kind of content you need to create next. Plus it gets people in the habit of talking with you. * Livestream video. Video is powerful, especially on Facebook. If people watch your video and you do Facebook ads, you can re-target to people that watched your video. * Get people to visit your website. Add pixels to your website and re-target those people. Get people to take action on your website. * Donate or volunteer for a cause. Get people to donate to a cause you support and take action to give back. * Watch a webinar. Put together a webinar full of amazing content, not just a sales pitch, and ask people to watch it. Help people, give value, then offer additional information without a hard sales pitch. Teach, don’t tease. * Get someone to buy. If you know who your customer is, you can make a well-targeted offer directly to them.
Calls to Action on Twitter Add a call to action to your tweets using Twitter Media Studio. In addition to your tweet and image, you can bold the headline and description- the metadata. This is a way to have extra information stored in the media. For a call to action, use a link to wherever you want to send someone.
Calls to Action on Facebook Facebook has a call to action feature if you have a business account, but it’s free to use. Using the manager, you post your content and metadata, schedule and publish. This tool provides you with an automated system to get people to take action.
Calls to Action on Instagram Instagram requires an ad in order to do a call to action. We interviewed Tyler J. McCall in Episode 68 to and he talked about how he uses Direct Messages on Instagram to connect with people.
How to Measure Your Results To learn how to measure the effectiveness of your calls to action in social media, you can take a look at Kami’s 5 A’s of Social Media Measurement.
- Activity. This measure is all about what YOU do.
- Attention. This measure is all about reach or “opportunities to see.”
- Awareness. This measure is all about engagement with you.
- Attitudes. This measure is all about a conversation about you.
- Actions. This measure is all about what they actually do.
Tools, apps, and links mentioned: * The Hirsh Marketing Underground Podcast * How to Build an Evergreen Funnel and Capture Leads with Lindsey at HelloBar – Ep 74 * How to Create a Sales Funnel to Grow Your Community – Ep 55 * The Growth Suite * How to add embedded call-to-action buttons to your Facebook posts without ads * Strategies for Staying Connected Through Social Media with Tyler J. McCall – Ep 68 * Kami’s 5 A’s of Social Media Measurement * Communities that Convert Facebook Group
Twitter Media Studio * Twitter Media Studio Check Out These Examples: * https://communitiesthatconvert.com/MediaStudio1 * https://communitiesthatconvert.com/MediaStudio2
Take Action What was the one ah-ha that you got from this episode about how to measure your social media effort? What did we miss that you think people should know? Comment on the post and come join us in the Facebook group to see what others are saying. The secret word in the Facebook Group is “Action.”
We cover step-by-step how to create an irresistible lead magnet to grow your community and build an evergreen funnel to capture leads.
We recently co-hosted a webinar with Lindsey Morando from HelloBar on how to create an irresistible lead magnet to grow your community. We’ve asked Lindsey to join us in this episode to tell us more about building an evergreen funnel.
Lindsey Morando is Hello Bar’s Director of Marketing. She has over 15 years of marketing and business development experience that spans multiple industries. Lindsey prides herself on the creation and implementation of engaging grassroots and online marketing tactics that convert fans into paying, happy customers. When Lindsey is not moving the marketing needle for businesses, she is a marketing professor at the San Diego Fashion Institute and the author of “It’s Just the Beginning, Break Up, Get Up & Walk Away.
Question: Tell us a little about yourself and why you are so passionate about helping entrepreneurs and companies build their email list? Answer: I started my journey in email marketing in 2002. One of the first instances where I started to see the value of email marketing was when I was collecting email addresses at a local bar for a Monday night football raffle. I would collect the email addresses, input them by hand, and manually unsubscribe all the bounces. I was able to see how email promotion filled the bar every week. That was one of the first instances where I saw the power of email marketing.
Question: What is the main problem that we all face if we have a website? Answer: The main problem is keeping people on the site and getting them to take the action you want them to take, whether it’s collecting their email address, taking your free trial offer or getting a sale. 98% of website visitors are leaving without taking the action step you want them to take, which means you’re spending a lot of time, money and energy between social media, ads and SEO to drive traffic to your website for them to leave. Websites are an afterthought, so you have to work hard to keep them there, engage them and making sure the site is in line with the overall marketing and strategy plan.
Question: What are your thoughts on using an exit pop-up to get people to take action? Answer: That one converts the best. The exit pop-up on our site has collected an extra 900 free trial sign-ups. It converts really well and there’s a reason it works really well. The pop-up only displays when someone is about to leave your site, so if someone is about to leave anyway, it’s not intrusive. You’re also giving them an added incentive. Google did a ton of user data research and they found people are far less annoyed with a page takeover upon exit then a model on the center of the screen.
Question: How can we set goals that make sense for our business? Answer: When it comes to setting goals that actually make sense for your business, you have to think about the ultimate action step you want people to take. Do you want to sell more courses? Do you want to sell coaching or consulting spots? Do you want to sell more e-commerce products? Start there. I suggest goal setting for 90 days instead of a year. So much changes in a year. Look at what you’re focusing on in the next 90 days and link that to your goal.
Question: Can you talk a little bit about what a lead magnet is and how to create a magnet that people want? Answer: You have your goal- what you want people to achieve. Next you need to determine what steps they need to take to get to that point. The lead magnet is a free offer, something that allows someone to get to know you, provide value to your community and ultimately gets people down the path you want them to go. Free offers are all around you, free pizza samples at Costco that lead to buying a whole pizza, the 14 day gym trial or hopping on a site and getting a free course, mini-challenge or book.
How do you create an offer? That’s the biggest question. It used to be that people would opt into a newsletter, but these days free offers are more prevalent online so people are more selective. You have to know your ideal client that’s coming to your site and you have to know why they are coming. What are they typing in Google and what are they looking for? From there, create the offer from the pain point. Give them a simple thing that gets them where they want to go. Once you’ve captured the pain point, you know why they’re coming to you specifically. Then, whether it’s a course or a challenge depends on what you already have. If you already have a course, take a small portion of it to create a mini-course or mini-challenge. You just want to get people some quick wins and results because if you can achieve that with your free offer, they are going to buy your product.
Question: How do you know when you’re doing well? Answer: On average, for every 100 visitors to your site, you should be collecting around 5 email addresses. If you have an amazing, enticing offer, you’ll collect a lot more than that. If you’re not getting a good rate, Hello Bar allows you to test offers, headlines and graphics. I suggest testing the headline first because that’s where you get the most traction and then testing offers after that.
Tools, apps and links mentioned: * How to Create the Perfect Lead Magnet to Grow Your List! * Google Analytics * Hello Bar * Canva * Design Wizard * Beacon
Take Action Download the webinar How to Create the Perfect Lead Magnet to Grow Your List! and Lindsey’s free offer and amazing bonuses!
If you are a community manager, you might wonder how you can balance the needs of your community while juggling everything else. We cover the key to doing this.
The Counterintuitive Secret to Being More Productive In this episode, we cover the key to getting everything done, and it is NOT to do more – but to do less and focus.
We all multi-task and many of us think we are good at it, but studies show we aren’t doing as well as we think. In today’s episode, we’re talking about strategies for limiting distractions and improving focus.
For community management, the most important tip is to schedule the times you will drop in on your community and let the members interact with each other. You do NOT have to do all of the interacting and work.
In the episode we talk about:
- Context Switching is what happens when you go from one thing to another thing and productivity or attention is lost. For every task you add, you’re losing 20% of your focus.
- Studies have found that multitasking reduces your overall productivity by 40%.
- A University of London study found that multitasking, when attempting to do cognitive tasks, lowered IQ scores as much as if study participants had used drugs or stayed up all night.
Tips to Overcome Time Loss * Use Trello with to-do lists * Use White Noise apps (see tools and links below for our favorites) * Turn off phone and desktop notifications * Prepare to accomplish 1-3 things per day * Block out productive time on your calendar * Set deadlines and understand what’s important * Limit checking email to 2-3 times a day * Drop in on your Facebook or LinkedIn communities at the same days and times * Appoint a moderator to be responsive to comments and messages
Tools, apps, and links mentioned: * The Horrifying Truth About Multitasking And Productivity * Is multi-tasking bad for your brain? * Multitasking Damages Your Brain And Career, New Studies Suggest * Focus at Will * Nosili App * Todd Herman’s 90 Day Year * The Full Focus Planner * The Eisenhower Method
Take Action Let’s talk about distractions and how you overcome them. Do you like to multitask? Has this episode changed your mind? Come join our community in the Facebook Group, and use the secret word ACTION to get in.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go to our Facebook group (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
If you don't plan to succeed, you plan to fail. In today's episode, we share the GOAL POST planning process that will allow you to create a quick start plan for growing your online community in 2019.
Be sure to download a copy of the GOAL POST Planning sheet (located in our show notes) so that you can go through your own planning process for your community outreach.
- If you want to start a community, fill out the GOAL POST Worksheet as a way to outline the overall strategy for your launch.
- If you already have a community, fill out the GOAL POST Worksheet for both 2018 and 2019. If you didn’t do much planning for 2018, recap your accomplishments and strategies for the year.
- If you aren’t ready to start a community yet, you can use the GOAL POST Worksheet to plan out how you will engage with other communities in which you participate.
In the podcast episode, Madalyn and Kami walk through their goals for the Communities That Convert community as an example of how you should use this form.
Planning Topics * Goal – Large overarching vision for your community. Should be something that people who join your community see themselves being a part of. + For 2018, our goal was to create content that is specifically geared to marketers who want to use community building to grow their online influence. + For 2019, our goal is deeper strategies, sharing step by step instructions and diving deeper into content from interviews. * People – Who does your community serve? Boil this down to one person. It will not alienate people, it will make them feel you are talking to them rather than at them. + For 2018, our podcast was geared toward online marketers, communication and social media professionals. + For 2019, we’re getting more focused on people who are working their way up in social media marketing, who are ambitious and creative, cares about their community and who is a go-getter action taker. * Objectives – Set some objectives for your community. What do you want to accomplish with it? How will you know you have achieved them? + For 2018, our objectives included putting out the podcast consistently, starting a Facebook community and creating Facebook livestream. + For 2019, we want to double our podcast downloads per episode, double our CTC Facebook group by March and launch a digital product that will help our community members reach their goals by Q2. * Strategies – How will you support the people you serve? What services, coaching, webinars, and online training will you offer? + For 2018, we focused on the podcast episodes and some Facebook livestream training. + For 2019, we want to focus on a coaching or mastermind service or mentoring and bi-weekly livestream training to widen the audience. * Tactics – What channels of communication will you use to connect with your community? One-on-one conversations, speaking at conferences, online campaigns, social media, etc. + For 2018, we used social media promo on Twitter and Facebook, promo on our personal pages, a wide distribution of the podcast and a speaking opportunity – Houston Social Media Day for Blog Elevated. + For 2019, we’ll use strategic Facebook Ads with the most helpful content, including worksheets and downloads from email and Messenger and do pop-up free livestream trainings.
Your implementation should include a timeline, budget and allocate the people and other resources to each task. If it isn’t on your calendar, it is not going to happen, so be sure to get everything on a calendar of choice.
Also, make sure you measure your success by looking at your numbers.This measurement should match with your Objectives.
Other Episodes You Might Like * Episode 67: How to Start a Meetup in Your Local Area * Episode 68: Strategies for Staying Connected Through Social Media
Tools, apps, and links mentioned: * Bonjoro
Take Action Download the GOAL POST Worksheet and fill it out. It's located in this episode's show notes. And then come and talk about what you are planning to do in 2019 in the Facebook Group! (Secret word is ACTION)
Kami and Madalyn have used one word to focus their work every year and they have created a worksheet to help you to choose your one word for 2019.
Madalyn first learned about the One Word method from Jon Gordon (see link below).
Settling on one word for all areas of your life can seem hard to do. We have created a method to help you narrow it down. Take a minute to download the worksheet at the bottom of this post.
Come up with the top three things that you want to accomplish in 2019 in your personal, relationships, and professional life. Write down a verb (or doing word) that describes what you would have to DO or BE to reach that goal.
- Personal: Your health, mindset, overall knowledge and skills, spirituality and your relationship with yourself
- Relationships: Relationships with others like your significant other, family, friends and community
- Professional: Your current job or business, income level and accomplishments
Once you settle on a word, write in on a post-it note and put it on your computer, add it to your social media profiles, and make it public. Keep it at the forefront of everything you do this year and see how much further it takes you.
You might not hit every goal you make, but having one word that you see readily every day will help guide you through the year.
Tools, apps and links mentioned: * Jon Gordon: What’s your one word?
Take Action Download the One Word Exercise worksheet over on our show notes page. You'll gain instant access to it. After you fill it out, come share your 2019 One Word with us in our Facebook group. (Secret word is ACTION)
You often have to look back to move forward and so we created a podcast and worksheet that outlines the 5 Essential Questions you need to answer to set you up for success in 2019.
Kami and Madalyn also share their end-of-the-year processes that can help you plan, make goals, and determine clear actions for what you want to do in the New Year. Listen to find out what they are.
We have got your back! We created a free downloadable spreadsheet to help you get ready for a successful New Year. Get it instantly by filling out the form at the bottom of the post in the Call to Action section.
Top 5 Questions You Need to Answer to Be Ready for the New Year 1. What were your goals in 2018? 2. How far did you get with each of these goals on a scale of 1-5? (1- not started, 2- just started, 3- started a little, 4- over half-way done, 5- completed) 3. What were your biggest wins in 2018? 4. What one thing did you really want to complete that you didn’t? 5. Have a brainstorm session of the projects you want to complete in 2019.
Planning Tips * Write down your wins so you can look back at them and feel accomplished and re-energized. * There will be goals you don’t get to and that’s okay. * Give yourself time to think about what you want to accomplish in the New Year. * In planning the New Year, use a poll or survey to ask your community what they want from you.
Tools, apps and links mentioned: * Episode 44: Surveys and Polls to Get Community Feedback * Gusto * Todd Herman’s 90-Day Year * Michael Hyatt’s Best Year Ever
Take Action We have your back. We have taken the questions above and created a free worksheet that will get you on track to have the best year ever. Fill out the form and instantly download the guide, then come share what you found out in our Facebook group.
This past month we have been exploring how to build a successful online community and scale it to grow and support your nonprofit cause or your online or offline business. This episode is a wrap up to these recent, can't miss, episodes:
- Episode 65: How to Promote Your Community
- Episode 66: Why Niche Communities Work Better
- Episode 67: Launching a Community When You are Brand New
- Episode 68: Strategies for Staying Connected Through Social Media with Tyler J McCall
- and this one, Episode 69: 5 Steps for Building a Successful Online Community
Today, we are going to talk about the five steps you can take to build a successful online community, including how to define your ideal members, ask questions, create content they want, choose a platform and engage and grow your community.
Step 1: Define your ideal online community member * Use social listening to hear what your ideal community member or customer is saying about their problems. Even if you don’t have a community of your own yet, join similar communities who have your ideal customer in them and observe what people in that community are saying about their challenges and desires. * Think of products that you can offer all along the growth path of your ideal customer by solving a current problem, then solve the next level problem, and so on. Create a ladder of products for your customers to climb to your higher level products. * Ask yourself what your life’s purpose is and who it is you are here to serve. Don’t waste your time on things that fall outside of that purpose.
Step 2: Ask your online community lots of questions * Ask questions within a group. Go all-in to find out exactly what your audience is looking for and then test your solutions to that problem to gauge interest. * Talk to people one on one. Reach out via DM, email or phone. Don’t sell them anything, just ask them questions to learn how they describe their challenges and concerns as it pertains to the topic of your expertise. Take note of the language they use. * Utilize polls and surveys. Use Twitter and Facebook to ask the community questions that help you gain a better understanding of them and know their wants and needs.
Step 3: Create content that answers your online community’s questions * Create content that directly answers a single question. This is great for Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and also lets you see which content strikes a note with your community before you build it out into something bigger. * Create content that teaches instead of teases.
Step 4: Choose a platform where you will engage your online community most often * Find out where your ideal online audience is hanging out the most: Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, Pinterest, Snapchat or somewhere else? (You can get some demographic statistics on this chart from Spredfast) * Focus on that platform and build out an online community around the topic of your business, organization or expertise.
Step 5: Engage and grow your online community * Create a plan for engagement. It doesn’t happen unless you plan for it. * Have a private group or page to interact and engage with your community. * Promote your group to grow your community.
Tools, apps and links mentioned: * Episode 15: 7 Types of Content to Rock Your Community * Episode 18: 5 Ways to Quickly Create Relevant Content * Episode 24: How to Reuse, Recycle, Repurpose Your Content * Episode 30: How to Build a Converting Community on Twitter with Adel de Meyer * Episode 31: How to Build a Converting Community on Instagram with Sue B Zimmerman * Episode 32: How to Build a Converting Community on Facebook with Zach Spuckler * Episode 33: 6 Steps to Promote Your Business Without Being Spammy with Kirsten Oliphant * Episode 34: How to Grow a Loyal Community Online and Offline * Episode 35: How to Build a Converting Community Using Content with Gini Dietrich * Episode 36: How to Build a Converting Community on YouTube with Sunny Lenarduzzi * Episode 44: Surveys and Polls to Get Community Feedback * Episode 46: Making Your Content Evergreen with Tim Fargo from Social Jukebox * Episode 49: Madalyn Sklar’s Tips to Build a Twitter Community * Episode 54: How to Define Your Ideal Community Member * Episode 64: Overcoming Content Block * Spredfast 2018 Social Audience Guide * Pete Vargas Stages to Scale Program
Take Action Who is your ideal community member and what platforms are you going to use to connect with them? Share a tip for how we all can engage and grow our online communities in our private Facebook group. You can join us by clicking on the button below and using the secret work “ACTION” to join us. **How to reach Kami:** If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go to our Facebook group (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Connecting with the people that matter the most to your business is essential. We talk with Tyler J. McCall about the best ways of staying connected with your community through social media.
About Tyler J McCall Tyler J. McCall helps creative entrepreneurs use Instagram with the intention to grow their community online and grow their business. When he is not buying everything in Target’s Dollar Spot or binge-watching Real Housewives, he spends his days teaching entrepreneurs how to grow their business by turning their Instagram followers into raving fans. With nearly 10 years of marketing experience – for businesses and causes – he knows what it takes to build an audience online, get people excited about what you do, buy your products and book your services.
Get in touch with Tyler: Instagram @TylerJMcCall
Editor’s Note: Tyler J. McCall has grown a huge community over the past few years using Instagram. Many of his tips are universal, but if you are looking to use Instagram to grow your community, there are some great ideas in this interview.
Question: How did you get started with social media? Answer: Back in college, I used Facebook as a student, but then began using it to connect with other people around the country. Before what I do now, I was in the nonprofit world doing political and community organizing. I spent time with the YMCA, working nationally and internationally connecting with students on Facebook. After college, I worked for the YMCA for 6 years and ran their social media. In 2011, I got involved in online political action and that is when I discovered Twitter as a magical place where I could connect with people all over the place, host Twitter chats around political issues, causes, and community issues. Then I made my way over to Instagram. In 2015, I started my own handmade business, selling at trunk shows, craft shows and on Instagram. In 2016, I started doing that full time.
Question: Why do you use Instagram as your one channel for building a community? Answer: I’m pretty all in on Instagram. I do have a Facebook Group I use sometimes for promotional materials and ads. I’m on Twitter tweeting about politics and Real Housewives, two of my favorite things, but I don’t use it for business. Twitter is a carefree platform and I love that. Instagram always stood out because I love the community nature, that it’s really easy to connect with other people, easy to go out and find other people. Unlike Facebook, Pinterest or YouTube, it’s easy to look up shared interest or shared location on Instagram. I also love, from a business perspective, it’s one of the more engaging platforms so you can really see the engagement coming through on your content. That’s why I have really focused on it.
Question: What have been some of your results that you didn’t expect to happen? Answer: There’s three in particular. The first is revenue generation in my business, which has been huge. I run an online community where we teach marketing strategy using Instagram and we even see that in the businesses of our students. The second thing is the ability to build mailing lists using Instagram. It’s just so simple. Many people aren’t fully using Instagram to do this, but with the introduction of Instagram Stories and the ability to use direct messaging, you can build your email list fast and effectively. Lastly, the opportunity for partnerships, and collaborations. Things like this, being interviewed on other people’s platforms, podcasts, and channels. All of that comes through Instagram, connecting with people, having real conversations, and all these opportunities are organically happening. I see a ton of value in that for Instagram.
Question: What are the best ways to engage with your community on Instagram? Answer: Getting people to direct message you and responding to comments to continue building and nurturing those relationships. Think about how you are engaging outside of your own account. How are you going out into hashtags, other people’s accounts and engaging with new people to introduce them to your brand? Especially on Instagram, people complain about stagnant growth or a decline in followers, but they’re only posting content with hashtags and logging off. If you want to see the results on Instagram, you need to post great content, use hashtags, go find new people, bring them into your account and engage with them.
Question: How do you find the people you want to engage with? Answer: It starts with complete clarity about who you want to attract to your community. The next thing to consider is using the hashtags that are longtail or niche hashtags and not using the ones with millions of posts. Engage in these more targeted hashtags and it can get you a lot further. User habits have changed and people are spending much more time watching stories on Instagram and less time scrolling the feed, but they’re still using hashtags. Even if people aren’t finding you through hashtags, you can find others through those hashtags. Another space on Instagram is locations. That’s a valuable place to look for content to engage with, especially for location dependent or brick and mortar businesses.
Question: How did you decide what you were going to sell online? Answer: I was doing social media management, running Instagram accounts, creating content and then people started asking me to run their accounts. I realized I could teach what I knew, so I started doing coaching and consulting. I started talking to my clients and talking to my followers to see if they’d be interested in a membership option. I started collecting names on a waiting list, had a solid waiting list in place and then launched it to the world. The first launch, we had 80 people join and in a little over a year, we now have 600 members. Talking and having that conversation and getting their feedback first was important.
Question: Why did you choose a membership community as a vehicle? Answer: Typically, I’m teaching about a platform that is rapidly changing and I wanted to make sure I could continue to support my students. I was looking for consistent revenue because the coaching was very feast or famine. The same is true for a course, especially when live launching. I love the community, connecting with people, having conversations with people. Our community is great — so engaged, so supportive and I’m so grateful every day. I’m still surprised every day that this community exists and people are cheering each other on. It’s called marketing, it works.
Question: How do you nurture people through email? Answer: Our membership experience is high touch, so when someone joins they get the standard welcome emails. We also use Bonjoros and a postcard by snail mail and a welcome gift. Then we do an email welcome sequence for about 8 weeks. We are clear on ground rules, specify boundaries of what they can and can’t expect us to do, introduce them to content, give them a clear roadmap of what to do. We also do a weekly email to the members, feature member of the week, highlighted posts from the week, what you missed and what’s coming up. We also highlight our most engaged members publicly in the group and by using email. We do a lot to nurture that community. We get them on-boarded with a high-touch experience and then keep them connected.
Tools, apps, and links mentioned: * Bonjoro * Tyler’s Instagram Roadmap
Take Action Tyler J McCall has agreed to share with us his Instagram Roadmap with six steps to create your very own Instagram marketing strategy, the three big mistakes you’ve gotta avoid to make Instagram work for your business, and a four-part system that gets your follower buying what you are selling (with a lot less work). It is free to download. Click here.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go to our Facebook group (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Are you looking to start a meetup in your local area but don’t know what to do to get one started? In this episode, we talk with Sandy Mentzel who shares how she recently started a social media meetup in her new hometown.
Madalyn and Kami talked with a Sandy Mentzel, a freelance digital marketer who just moved to Savannah, Georgia, where she started a new chapter of the Social Media Breakfast, even though she knew no one in town. Read along or listen to the episode to get some ideas and inspiration as you start your own meetup community.
We love action takers and Sandy is certainly an action taker. We have asked her on the show today so her story can inspire you to take action and start something that will be of service to your community.
Question: Why did you choose to launch Savannah SMB? Answer: When you move to a new community, you learn some things. You learn that if you just sit in your house, it’s not going to bode well for you. You have to get yourself out there. I experienced a great community in Houston and didn’t want it to end. I wanted to get out and meet people and have great interactions. You can get the full backstory here.
Question: What steps did you take to launch the breakfast? Answer: I went through the motions of getting the infrastructure in place (see the Quick Start Guide below). Then, I got out there and met people through existing meetup groups. Volunteering is a good way to get out in the community and offer useful help like running Facebook videos and live streams. Networking is also a no-brainer. When you meet people in person, you can give your pitch. That’s how I met a person that was one of my first presenters.
Question: What results have you gotten? Answer: I’ve had a blast talking to people. I love doing this and love bringing this value to the community. There’s no denying that the organizing is time-consuming. I try to stay in the ready, aim, fire mindset to keep things rolling and learn as I go. I’ve held two meetings and there have been about 15 people at both. The Facebook page has grown to 75 likes in two months and I’ve gotten some email subscribers as well. I’m not making money, but I’ve spent very little money to establish the community. Being a freelancer has made me aware of the free and low-cost tools out there and it’s possible to start building your community without spending big bucks.
Question: Have there been any challenges and how have you overcome them? Answer: I’ve been told that, even though it’s not a sexy superpower, I have an organization superpower. I can take the idea of something and put meat on the bones of it. Organizing is time-consuming, but I knew how to do it (see Sandy’s gift below with step by step instructions about how she started the Social Media Breakfast Savannah). It was challenging to understand how Social Media Breakfast would be different from other groups in the community. There are other groups, but I wasn’t seeing the educational component. I’m hoping the other people in Savannah don’t see sharing knowledge as a threat and that everyone is built up by it. Presentation skills are not one of my superpowers. I’m introverted and would rather walk on coals than speak in front of people. I’m overcoming that challenge through practice.
Question: What are your goals for the breakfast in 2019? Answer: Understanding my target audience better so I can learn how to best serve them. That’s the key thing I need to figure out as the breakfast continues and I meet new people. Tourism, history, and shipping are big here so I would like to be introduced to some key people in the community. I’d love to connect with someone with expertise in social media etiquette and fitness. I want to connect with those people and bring them in as presenters. I dream of a calendar filled out in advance with topics and speakers. I’m hoping to have 25 attendees per meeting, 100 emails on my list and 200 Facebook Likes by the end of the year.
Question: What do you want people to know about taking action? Answer: Don’t be afraid to share your knowledge. Have the abundance versus scarcity mentality. If you have an abundance mentality, you realize there’s plenty for all to go around. If you have a scarcity mentality, you’re afraid that sharing your knowledge may hurt you in some way. Being in a community enhances everyone and sharing your knowledge helps you and also helps others around you.
About Sandy Mentzel Sandy Mentzel is a freelance digital marketer who develops, creates and promotes any product or service that involves electronic devices, specializing in organizing Webinars, Email Campaigns and Events. She began this digital journey after learning Mailchimp as a Race Director for a non-profit in 2012. Prior to this, she earned a BA from Rutgers, worked in the accounting and securities industries, stayed home raising kiddos, served two terms as a school board member and also worked as an Event Coordinator. After a move to Savannah in May 2018, she began a community called Social Media Breakfast Savannah in July 2018. She’s looking forward to bringing value as a Digital Marketer and discussing the business implications of social media with other professionals in her new community.
Learn More About SMBSAV * Social Media Breakfast Savannah * Social Media Breakfast Savannah Group
Take Action What are your takeaways from our interview with Sandy? Are you inspired to start something too? Click here to download Sandy’s quick start guide for starting a community.
**How to reach Kami:** If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go to our Facebook group (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Learn the five top reasons why niche marketing strategies work. Many people worry about limiting or narrowing their focus because they are concerned they will limit their reach. In reality, when you focus on one audience, your message isn't watered down and you can reach more people.
It might seem counterintuitive, so why do these niche marketing strategies work? Read on to learn how smaller audiences might mean bigger results.
1 – A Focused Audience Is Easier to Find * It is easier to target your audience if you have a really good idea of who they are. Your solution might be helpful to numerous audiences but resist the temptation and just choose one. * Social ads are much easier to target when you have narrowed your scope and audience. * Being clear on who you’re trying to reach will bring down the cost of running Facebook advertising over time.
2 – It Solves a Specific Problem and Attracts More Customers * If you can discover and solve a specific pain point of your audience, you will have an easier time getting people to take action and join your community or buy your course. * It helps you to be more mindful and attentive to what your community is telling you. and allows you to serve them better by eliminating confusion about what they want. The broader the audience, the more confusion.
3 – It Builds a Tribe of People with a Lot in Common * People who have common pain points and needs tend to connect better in online communities. * Certain discussions don’t happen when you have too wide of an audience instead of a niche community. * Having a narrow focus grows a community that knows, likes and trusts each other.
4 – It Helps You to Be More Specific With Your Content * One of the hardest things to do as a creator is to determine exactly what to offer and create new content. If you know what community you’re speaking to, it’s much easier. It also helps you to know what to leave out.
5 – It Creates Clarity * You will be much more clear on every aspect of your business if you have an ideal client, customer or community member in mind. * You can add people later, but start with just one audience so that you know exactly who you’re reaching and how to serve them. Ninja tip: Think of them as one person instead of a large audience.
Tools, apps and links mentioned: * Communities That Convert Facebook Group * Are You Losing Sales By Giving Customers Too Many Choices?
Take Action Head over to this episode's show notes to download our “How to find your ideal audience worksheet.” The worksheet is designed to help you clarify WHO you are trying to reach. For extra credit come and share your results in our Facebook group. (Hint: The secret password for our Facebook group is “ACTION.”) **How to reach Kami:** If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go to our Facebook group (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Here are some of the best ways to promote your online community. You have a lot to offer them, but you can’t make the impact you want to make unless you grow your community.
In this episode, we shared the best ways we have found to grow your online community.
1. Smart sharing on your social media channels * In Episode 46, we interviewed Tim Fargo from Social Jukebox and we talked about evergreen sharing. Having evergreen content on social media really works and Social Jukebox does an amazing job. * Start using livestream on your social media platforms to deliver valuable content. It’s a great way to get your content in front of people. * Change your profile link (especially in Instagram) for whatever you’re promoting or launching.
2. Create bonus content * This gives people a taste of what you’re offering and also helps to grow your email list. * Email and chatbots can be helpful in delivering content to people who are interested in it. We have an episode about how to use Chatbots effectively from the founder of ManyChat.
3. Nurture the people already on your email list * Todd Giannattasio from The Growth Suite was on Episode 55 talking about building a funnel to grow your community. There’s a lot to learn from him in how grow and nurture your email list. * Bundle your content thematically and share them in your drip email sequences to warm up your list and add value.
4. Use testimonials to show value * Social proof is incredibly important because people want to see how you got results that they relate to. * We talked about this in Episode 48. We went in depth about how to get and use testimonials.
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Create a Twitter Moment “buzz from others” when other people say something good about you. This is a great way to showcase testimonials and also let the other person know you find their feedback as valuable.
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There’s nothing better than people saying nice things about you or your services. Madalyn’s process is to ask to use someone’s comment as a testimonial.
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Screenshots are a smart way to establish social proof in your community. Just be sure to get permission from the testimonial author.
Tools, apps and links mentioned: * Episode 46: How to Promote Your Evergreen Content with Tim Fargo * Episode 48: How to Ask for Testimonials from your Community * Episode 55: How to Create a Sales Funnel to Grow Your Community * Ep 59: Build a Facebook Messenger Bot with Mikael Yang from ManyChat * The Growth Suite * Hello Bar * Snagit * Madalyn’s new website built by Todd Giannattasio from The Growth Suite * About Twitter Moments * Kami’s “Buzz From Others” Twitter Moment * James Wedmore
Take Action If you have a community, how are you currently promoting to them? What promotions have caught your attention from communities you have joined? Head over to our Facebook group (Secret Word is “Action”) to share at or on Twitter or Instagram using our hashtag, #CTCPodcast.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go directly to our Facebook group (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Creating content can be overwhelming, we cover six causes of writer’s block and how to overcome them so that you can create amazing content.
There are a lot of reasons why you might struggle to create content and get writer’s block. The stories we tell ourselves about why we aren’t creating at the level we would like. Today, we're talking about the most common barriers that cause writer’s block and how to overcome them.
6 Reasons You Might Have Writer’s Block and Strategies to Overcome Them Reason One: How do I find the time to create content? One of the most common reasons people have writer's block is because they don’t have the time to create quality content on a regular basis. Here are six strategies to overcome time limitations.
- Plan ahead. In Episode 18, we went into detail about creating relevant content. We outlined ways to put together content for 6-8 months in just 2-3 hours.
- Use content you've already created. In Episode 24, we talked about evergreen content and how to reuse, recycle and repurpose your content.
- Use live stream video. This is a quick, easy way to get content out. This is also a good way to build an audience and build ads around them. Live streams can be done in 30 minutes, where a blog post may take hours or days to write. They're a huge time saver.
- Speak it. Use an audio recorder and record your content that way. Have it transcribed and turn the transcription into a blog post or other content.
- Podcasting is fun and easy. Podcasting is easier than creating a blog post because you only need a general outline of what you're going to talk about.
- Get a Partner. Working with someone gives you a partner to bounce ideas off of, generate ideas and assist with content creation. It's easier to produce content when you have someone to talk to about it
Reason Two: How do I get my mind from getting distracted why I am creating content? If you are having trouble concentrating and it is contributing to writer’s block, try these three strategies.
- Create blocks of time. The Pomodoro Method is creating in shorts bursts in blocks of time. You create for a small block of time, then take a short break which helps with distractions and content blocks. There are apps that can assist with this process, but you can also do it manually with a timer.
- Block all social media. Turn your notifications on your phone and computer off for a short time so you can focus on content without the added distraction.
- Use Rescue Time. This is a time management software for the desktop to stay productive. It shows you how you spend your time on your computer and shares your daily habits. Analyze how you're using your time and ensure it's in a productive way.
- Use White Noise. Playing white noise or different types of music puts your brain in a flow state, making you hyper-focused and exponentially more productive. Find what works for you, because it may just be the tv playing in the background.
Reason Three: How can I figure out what to write about? One big reason for content block is not knowing what to write about. Try these two strategies to get clarity on your topic.
- Find Your Passion. Know what you're passionate about because it comes across when you're talking or writing about something and people feel and hear that and connect with your content. If they don't, they get bored. Use Kami's “future self” tactic, writing down what would you say to yourself if you could meet yourself in the future and tell yourself about the accomplishments you made up until that time.
- Niche Down. If your subject is too broad, you need to get more specific. You will grow an audience faster with a very specific topic, but if you're also less likely to get distracted if you're not covering a broad subject. Later on, you can always branch out, but when starting it helps to get and stay focused.
Reason Four: How do I get over feeling burned out? Creating content takes focused effort, and you can get that if you are burned out. You have to take a break to overcome this. Paradoxically, taking a break can help you break through to your inner content ninja faster.
- Change Your Focus. Change your environment, go outside, take a walk, get a breath of fresh air, take a vacation, just take a break from creating. Get out of that space and that can help to re-energize and refocus and get back on track.
- Plan breaks. You should take planned breaks to give yourself mental space.
Reason Five: How do I get over my perfectionism to create more content? Perfectionism is the enemy of done. Letting go of our preconceived ideas about how something “Should” be done is critical to getting things done. You can be excellent, but you can also get nothing done while holding yourself to an impossible level of perfection.
- Scale back expectations. If you have the idea that you must do everything perfectly or not do it at all, it becomes overwhelming and distracting. This state of mind can prevent you from starting at all. Just get started and great mini-goals that you can get done easily. Use the elephant method to break down tasks into digestible pieces.
- Do “B-” Work. Sometimes you just have to get content out, then make corrections, tweaks, and refinements later on. Be willing to just get it out there. Don't let perfectionism stand in your way of getting things done.
Reason Six: How can I overcome the feeling that I am not an expert? If you can talk about a topic for an hour, off the cuff, or advice someone one-on-one and get good results, then you are most likely an expert in that field. Here are two strategies to overcome imposter syndrome, which is a feeling that you are an imposter, which can keep you from creating the content you need to feed your business.
- Imposter Syndrome. We all suffer from this from time-to-time. In Episode 58, we talked about ways to overcome imposter syndrome. Don't let it block you or interfere with creating content that you need to get out there and share with the world.
- Don't worry about other people. It's easy to worry about what other people will think. But you don't want to get caught up in that way of thinking. Remember that you will attract the people you need to attract and repel the people you need to repel– both are desirable. It doesn't define your self-worth.
Tools, apps and links mentioned: * Dynamic Facebook Ads: Interview with Emily Hirsh * The Pomodoro Method * Rescue Time * Quality Time * Focus at Will * Noisli * Luke Brawner * Brooke Castillo and Amy Porterfield: Why You Aren’t Taking Action * Episode 18: 5 Ways to Quickly Create Relevant Content * Episode 24: How to Reuse, Recycle, Repurpose Your Content * Episode 58: 6 Ways to Overcome Imposter Syndrome Anxiety
Take Action What is one thing that you think is holding you back from creating content? Share with us in the Facebook group and tell us how you might use one of these strategies to overcome it. (Secret Word is ACTION)
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go directly to our Facebook group (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
You can use a pop-up community to build your brand. A pop-up community allows you to capture momentum during a launch or campaign then disappears or goes dormant.
These communities have a lot of energy around them but don't require you keep them going all the time.
We have a couple of ways for you about how and why to use them.
Pop Up Communities for Events * The PRSA International conference recently used an app called Pathable which connects to your LinkedIn contacts and Twitter and allows you to connect with people you know (or want to meet) who are attending the conference. * The Social Media Marketing World Conference (#SMMW) uses a pop-up Facebook community once a year for the conference. They also use a mobile app service called Bizzabo. The app provides information about the speakers, provides the schedule and allows you to reach out to people in attendance.
Pop Up Communities for Courses * Todd Herman’s 90 Day Year is active only when he's in full-launch mode and during the program delivery period. The community goes dormant between launches. * Madalyn's Video Like a Rockstar has a private Facebook Group for each group of students in the program. It's the place to be during the program, it doesn't get shut down afterwards and it's kept open for the students as a mastermind environment. * Programs that have private Facebook Group pop-ups may get archived as soon as the program is over. Keep in mind that when you sign up for programs with pop-up communities, you may want to ask ahead of time what will happen to the community afterward.
Pop Up Communities for Affiliates * When Marie Forleo’s popular B School program is active, her affiliates offer their own companion pop-up communities. For example, Amy Porterfield, who is one of Marie’s affiliates and a popular podcaster, offers bonuses. * James Wedmore, Rise of the Digital CEO, also has pop-up communities and affiliates that are driving people to his community. * Pat Flynn was an affiliate for Michael Hyatt's Best Year Ever and offered bonuses. One bonus was a private Facebook Group he kept open during the program. He did a Facebook Live each week and also does another Facebook Live quarterly during the program.
Tools, apps and links mentioned: * Pathable * Bizzabo * Social Media Marketing World 2019 * Todd Herman’s 90-Day Year * Madalyn Sklar, Video Like a Rockstar * Marie Forleo’s B School Program * James Wedmore’s Rise of the Digital CEO * Michael Hyatt's Best Year Ever * Pat Flynn’s Smart Passive Income
Take Action Share which Pop-Up groups you have been a part of or tell us if any of these tactics sound interesting to you to try with your own community. Share with us in our Facebook group, where we have all the fun! (SHHHHH, the secret word is ACTION)
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go directly to our Facebook (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
In Episode 61, Working With Influencer Communities to Build Your Brand, we talked about how you can leverage the audience of an influencer to build your brand. Be sure to listen to that episode as well to make the most of the connections with influencers that you make using these four methods.
Method 1: Join Influencer Community * Many influencers have Facebook groups, both public and private. The private groups are a better way to get on the radar with influencers because there are fewer people and they are easier to approach in these groups. * Interact within the group to let influencers know that you're there and you care, especially during live video streams. Be front and center so you stand out and when you approach them, they'll be more familiar. You're more likely to get seen, be heard and have an opportunity to approach the influencer. * If you have value to add to the conversation, speak up. It helps the influencer, but also helps the others in your community and makes you look like a leader within the community.
Method 2: Connect with Influencers and Be Helpful * Check and see if you are connected through mutual friends on Facebook or LinkedIn. Do you see anyone you know connecting with the influencer you are interested? * When approaching an influencer, come from a place of helpfulness. Volunteering and helping is the smartest tactic to get in front of people because it's appreciated and people will remember you.
Method 3: Reach Out to Influencers Through Social Media * Use Twitter to reach out to influencers. Madalyn shares how she reached influencers for her #TwitterSmarter podcast when it first launched in 2015. * Right now, Instagram is a great way to reach out to influencers through comments on stories or direct messages. Many influencers have said they are still personally checking these, even if they have a team handle other channels.
Method 4: Ask Friends for Recommendations * Ask friends which influencers they follow and listen to and then start showing up, using the steps above.
Take Action Take the dream list of ten people who you would love to collaborate with and use the techniques above to start reaching out to one or more of them. Come visit us in the Facebook group and share how it goes.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go directly to our Facebook (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
In this episode, we focus on working with influencer communities to build your brand by using collaborations, workshops, Facebook Live and even your own platforms.
Back in Episode 19, we went into depth about How to Build Your Community Using Joint Venture Partnerships. We recommend that you listen to that episode as a companion to this one
Building Community Collaborations * Lee Odden from TopRank Marketing often works with trade shows and associations to create ebooks for download before a conference. He collaborates with tradeshow attendees who download the ebooks and share it with their companies and friends. He also creates lists every year, starting with the list 25 Women That Rock Social Media. Every year, he asks those featured for their recommendations for the next list. He has done this very successfully for a number of years. * The #SocialROI Chat Madalyn hosts each week is presented by ManageFlitter. They've created an ebook based on the Twitter Chat. They collaborated with 25 social media and digital marketing experts to cover 25 topics.
Using Webinars to Activate an Influencer's Community * Work with an influencer to create a content-rich webinar for a win-win. This works well for affiliate partnerships. * For Madalyn's Video Like A Rockstar mastermind program she is doing webinars to promote it. A great way to do this is to connect with influencers and invite them to be a guest on your webinar. You can also have them as an affiliate too.
Using Facebook Live to Build Community * Kami uses this every month for Social Media Breakfast and it builds a community beyond the live event. Facebook Live allows more people to attend online than at the live event. * Madalyn hosts Facebook Live sessions after her TwitterSmarter Chat and Social ROI every week. It's a great way of opening it up to a wider audience and bringing communities together. * Social Media Examiner does a weekly talk show through lilive streamThrough the talk show and podcasts, they highlight thought leaders and guests who usually become speakers for their annual conference, SMMW. They provide speakers with a link for the conference to track who they bring along.
Inviting Influencers to Appear On Your Platform * Invite people that have communities that match your potential customers to appear on your podcast or YouTube channel and they might share it with their audience as well. Plus, you get some social proof from it as well. * Here’s are a few of the people who have appeared on the Communities That Convert podcast:
- Kirsten Oliphant, Create IF Writing, Creative Collaborations How to Form Lasting and Lucrative Partnerships
- Elisa Camahort Page, How I Built That and BlogHer, Inside the Career of a Master Online Community Builder
- Mikael Yang, ManyChat, Build a Facebook Messenger Bot with ManyChat
- Tim Fargo, Social Jukebox How to Promote Your Evergreen Content
- Sunny Lenarduzzi, YouTube Expert, How to Build a Converting Community on YouTube
- Sue B Zimmerman, Instagram expert, How to Build a Converting Community on Instagram
- Gini Dietrich, Spin Sucks, How to Build a Converting Community Using Content
- Dorie Clark, Speaker, Author, and Marketing Consultant, Leveraging Community to Build Income Streams
- Adel de Meyer, Twitter Expert, How to Build a Converting Community on Twitter
- Zach Spuckler, Heart Soul and Hustle and Marketing Expert, How to Build a Converting Community on Facebook
Tools, apps and links mentioned: * Episode 19 * Lee Odden's List “25 Women That Rock Social Media” * #SocialROI Book * Social Media Examiner's Talk Show * Madalyn’s link to Social Media Marketing World * Get a custom short domain like my Sklar.ly * Past Communities that Convert Interviews
Take Action Make a dream list of ten people who you would love to collaborate with. Of these people, five should be at or about your level and five should be above your level. Come visit us in the Facebook group and share your list with us.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go directly to our Facebook (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
We are sharing seven of our best strategies to inspire word of mouth marketing from your community. Getting your community to spread the word is one of the best ways to get a steady stream of customers and save money.
Here are 7 Strategies to Inspire Word of Mouth Marketing 1. Put the interests of the community first before your ownCreate helpful and shareable content that really addresses the needs and pain points of your community. Don’t just blast messages without that consideration. 2. Acknowledge your active fansIf someone comments or interacts with your content, be sure to acknowledge them. If they’re a happy customer who loves your content, ask for a testimonial. Refer back to Episode 48 for more information on how to get testimonials from your audience and community. 3. Feature your community in your contentOne of our most popular episodes was about #VideoReplyDay, because the community behind the hashtag got excited and shared it. This is a great way to bring the community together and have them spread the word. 4. Always have a call to action in your contentIf you don’t ask people to do something, they won’t do it. That asks people to take some kind of action. (ask a question, join a group, download a resource, etc). 5. Ask your community to like, comment and share your posts on social mediaWhen you’re doing live events, the share button is a great way to spread the word and you’ll get an awesome snowball effect when your audience uses it. Ask people to share and invite friends if they find your content to be valuable and often they will do it. 6. Create an affiliate program for superfans of your productThis goes beyond the influencer idea and more into your customer fan base. We know lots of companies that have used this with great success. 7. Create a sharable experience for your communityDifferentiate with shareable experiences like a live gathering, an online event, a video or other content that features them.
Bonus Tips From Our Fans * Tip from Stacey DePolo: Ask nicely and share a reason why you’re asking to spread the word (launches, mentions, asking for community input , fundraising, etc). * Tip from Simon Zaku: The strategy I use is I always mention influencers in my content. Then I reach out to them, telling them about the mention. Most times they tweet it, exposing my content to thousands.
Tools, apps and links mentioned: * Telegram Messenger * Episode 48 * Episode 3 * ConvertKit * Pat Flynn’s Affiliate Course
Take Action Create one idea to get your community to spread the word. If you get stuck, join us in our Facebook community (Secret Word is ACTION) to get some more ideas or run yours by all of us.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go directly to our Facebook (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
We talked with ManyChat Co-Founder and CEO Mikael Yang about how to build a Facebook messenger bot with ManyChat for your community. It may seem counterintuitive, but Mikael built the ManyChat Facebook Chatbot to help you be more human rather than less.
ManyChat is a tool that can help businesses and professionals engage their audience through messaging apps, but like any tool, it has to be used to further community building rather than just sending out messages. Mikael has revolutionized how businesses communicate and engage with audiences through messenger apps and chatbots. ManyChat allows businesses to create a Facebook Messenger chatbot within minutes and interact with prospects on a personal level. We asked Mikael how you can use a chatbot to be more human.
Question: Tell us about ManyChat and how it works. How is it different from other chatbot competitors? Answer: ManyChat allows users to conduct sales and marketing through Facebook Messenger. They automate what their Facebook page is saying to their customers on Facebook Messenger. Businesses are doing this because people are getting much higher open rates and click-through rates. With these higher engagement rates, businesses are able to accomplish more to drive higher ROI. ManyChat prides itself on making chatbots accessible to solopreneurs and small businesses and those that aren’t as tech oriented. We’ve built a visual system that is easy to use with drag and drop functionality. Anyone without coding or technical knowledge can create their messenger automation and drive results for their business.
Question: What gave you the inspiration for ManyChat? Answer: We started ManyChat when Telegram Messenger (a popular messaging app with a focus on speed and security that syncs seamlessly across any number of devices). I wanted to do a telegram newsletter and send a broadcast out to my subscribers. I spent a few hours trying to set up the database and get the code to work. It became obvious that there are thousands of other people wanting to do the same thing and who may not have the technical knowledge. We wanted to solve our own pain, but also realized there were so many things you can do with messenger apps.
Question: What is the future for using chatbots in marketing? Answer: Messenger marketing will consist of building messenger subscribers, converting subscribers, messenger broadcasting, manual support, sales and marketing automation, and business tasks. This means of marketing is going to be the most popular form of marketing in the next 3-5 years because it’s the way people are communicating, which is all that matters. People are using messenger apps every day. Until now, there was no way for businesses to be part of those conversations. Now, with platforms like ManyChat, your business can become a part of that conversation and can use messaging apps to get business results. There are over 2 billion people using messaging apps in the world every month. Messaging apps have surpassed social networks in terms of popularity. Since 2016, messenger apps are the number one apps in sales. Businesses don’t decide what marketing channels they use. Businesses have to respond to what customers are using to be successful in marketing.
Question: How do suggest you use a chatbot or messenger app to make it feel less impersonal? Answer: I think messaging apps feel more personal than email. The more customization and detail you can provide to the user that makes them feel like the bot is talking to them specifically based on the actions they have taken in the past and based on the information the bot has on them, the more personal it becomes.
Question: How can we not create fatigue for customers and how much is too much in chatbot or messenger marketing? Answer: It’s important to understand your audience and segment them. Get people on your list that want to read your messages and want to interact with you. Understand what’s interesting and relevant and send that content.
Question: What is the current click-through rate for a bot and how do they compare to other marketing communications? Answer: The open rates are typically 80-90% in terms of people opening the messages and the CTR’s are anywhere from 10-30%. The open rates are 4 times higher than email and CTR’s are 10 times higher.
Question from Susanne Hemet: To what do you credit the self-confidence you have to just go out there and disrupt the marketplace? Where do you get your best ideas and/or do your best thinking? Answer: When we were starting, we were just trying to solve our own pain. It was a gradual process before there was a realization that we were disrupting something. Sometimes things grow to bigger than you imagine them to be. Our best ideas and best thinking typically come from talking to users, reading community posts, reading about other startups, talking to the team and meditation.
Question from Jim Fuhs: Do you have any concerns about the data issues that Facebook has been facing? Do you think that they will make it more difficult for businesses to use ManyChat or other messaging programs to integrate with Messenger? Answer: ManyChat is already integrated. The only thing that could happen is that permissions could be revoked from platforms. It’s not about the information, the thing businesses are excited about is the ability to connect and build meaningful relationships with their customers. Facebook is interested in businesses doing that, so their gain is to become the ubiquitous platform that powers human connection and communication. To make that happen, they need businesses on board to provide useful services to end users. That’s where platforms like ManyChat comes in to provide sales and marketing support and bring businesses into the platform.
Question: How do you support businesses that want to use ManyChat? Answer: We build the product and help them to leverage the product to drive their business results. We also have a free community where people can get a lot of help and feedback. We released a free course as well with over 10 hours of marketing content. We hosted the first-in-the-world messenger marketing conference in Austin, Texas, on September 22nd, 2018. We talked about strategies and tactics to be successful.
Tools, apps, and resources mentioned: * ManyChat Website * Free Course: Messenger Marketing & Chatbot Mastery * Messenger Marketing & Chatbot Conference * ManyChat Conversations2018
Take Action Sign up for a free ManyChat account and test it on your business Facebook page and click over to the Communities That Convert chatbot to get an example of how it works and get messages about new episodes.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or click here to go to our Facebook (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Are you a very successful person that feels like you got there by chance? Despite your achievements and education, do you fear you are missing some qualification? We have put together 6 Ways to Overcome Imposter Syndrome to help you get over the anxiety, and have included some specific examples.
The Psychology of Imposter Syndrome The psychology of imposter syndrome was first observed by Dr Pauline Clance and Susan Imes who noticed during therapeutic sessions with high achieving women that many suffered from anxiety and feelings of inadequacy, despite the evidence to the contrary. In fact, up to 70 percent of women they treated reported that they felt like an imposter when they succeeded. This was later documented in the The Journal of The Journal of Behavioral Science in a paper titled The Impostor Phenomenon by Sakulku, J.
If you are trying to do important things, chances are you have experienced imposter syndrome. Many of the qualified experts on the planet have probably experienced it from time to time, so you’re not alone. People like Sheryl Sandberg, these 25 Celebrities, and these notable people.
Reasons you feel like an imposter * You have high expectations for yourself and others * You feel the need to learn more before getting started * You think that if it doesn’t come easy to you that you aren’t an expert * You feel you must do it by yourself, and if you need help, then you aren’t legitimately successful * You feel you must succeed in all aspects of life and business or your success in another area doesn’t count * You compare your success to what others are achieving, this is especially prevalent on social media
How to Overcome Imposter Syndrome Anxiety Acceptance is the first step. Acknowledging that you have these thoughts and then reframing them. Below, we have taken the reasons we listed above and came up with examples of how to reframe your thoughts for each one.
Imposter: I have really high expectations for myself and others.
Winner: I’ve set a good enough, good and very good goal and I will be happy with whichever goal I achieved.
Imposter: I need to learn more before I get started because I am not an expert yet.
Winner: I will learn as I go, I just need to get started.
Imposter: If it doesn’t come easy to me, I am not an expert.
Winner: Working hard is how I become an expert.
Imposter: I have to do it all by myself or I am just pretending to be an expert.
Winner: Finding and assembling a competent team reflects well on my expertise.
Imposter: I need to succeed in all areas of life or I am a failure.
Winner: We are all a work in progress and I celebrate even my small wins.
Imposter: Compared to my other peers, I am way behind.
Winner: Everyone has personal and professional challenges, even if I don’t see them. Like Oprah said, don’t focus on your competition, focus on your purpose.
Tools, apps and links mentioned: * TIME: Yes, Impostor Syndrome Is Real. Here’s How to Deal With It * Oprah 2: Skinheads And Scented Candles * Being Yourself Is Marketable! Quit Pretending To Be Someone You Aren’t
Take Action The Imposter Syndrome Test Go to http://bit.ly/CTC58quiz to take the Imposters Syndrome Test, then share with us how you scored and which of the reframing exercises above most resonates with you. **Challenge:** invite a friend to the Communities That Convert Facebookgroup to talk about this.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or click here to go to our Facebook (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Learn how to measure your success with some of our Best Social Media Analysis Tools. We discuss some of the tools we use and share insight into how we use them and what we measure with each of these social media analysis tools.
Listen to last week’s episode to learn the 4 Essential Community Engagement Metrics You Should Be Tracking – Ep 56
What is the Best Way to Measure Twitter? * Log into Twitter on desktop, use the menu at the top right to access Analytics. Very quickly, you can see a 28 day summary of how many tweets, tweet impressions, profile visits, mentions and followers you’ve had. It’s important to do this once a month and draw a lot of helpful information. * The most important number is your profile visits because this tells you how many people looked at your profile and how many times your profile was visited in a month. That tells you is what you’re doing is working. If you’re using video on Twitter, you can also get your video activity. * Socialert, a paid service, can be used to collect the posts, users and reach impressions and use the metrics to see who the top influencers are, what country they’re in and a lot of other helpful information to measure your Twitter community.
What is the Best Way to Measure Facebook Groups? * On desktop, Facebook Group Insights on the left side of the screen when you’re in your page. On mobile, Admin Insights are under the circles with the people in your group. * Group Insights shows you the new members that have joined in the last 28 days, your posts, comments, reactions, percent of growth, total members, membership requests, top members, popular days and times and top group posts. * Your metrics can be set to 7, 28 or 60 days so you can look at whatever range suits you.
What is the Best Way to Measure Instagram? * You need a business account to measure your analytics, which requires you to have a Facebook Page. Go to the profile on mobile, click the hamburger menu at the top right, access your Activity, Content and Audience sections. * The Activity section provides measurements of interactions, profile visits, reach and impressions. The Content section is the number of posts you’ve done for the week. The Audience section is the number of followers, top location, age range, gender, days and hours they’re online.
What is the Best Way to Measure Your Website Using Google Analytics? * Access your Google Analytics dashboard which provides a ton of data. And it’s free! * The social media dashboard tells you how many people visited your site through different social media platforms, which can help you figure out which campaign is working the best to drive people to your website. * The Unique Users tracks how many people come to your website uniquely, only counting them once even if they visit multiple times. * Goal Completions allows you to set goals and Google Analytics will keep track of how many goals were completed. * The Returning Visitor Rate is an engagement rate and shows you how many people visit your site over and over again.
Tools, apps and links mentioned: Be sure to listen to the episode to hear about other tools we use to measure social media and explore the links below for more of the Best Social Media Analysis Tools.
- Socialert
- Google Analytics
- True Social Metrics
- Bitly
- Buffer
- Hootsuite
- Sprout
- Klear
-
Buzzsumo
Take Action Come share your favorite measurement tools in our Communities that Convert Facebook Group.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go directly to our Facebook group (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Learn about the four essential community engagement metrics you should be using to measure the health of your online community.
Knowing where to start to measure the health of your online community can feel overwhelming. We recommend using these four essential community engagement metrics, or KPIs (Key Performance Indicators).
Four Essential Community Engagement Metrics These are my go-to metrics and are also important for most campaigns:
- Overall growth rate of the community and the percentage of growth of the community from month to month.
- Engagement rate and how many people are engaging with materials, conversing, applauding and amplifying your content.
- Benchmarking and how you’re doing against yourself and your competitors in your niche.
- Conversion rate and how many people take action or purchase something.
Is there one more metric that is more important than another? Answer: It’s hard to pick one, but your conversion rate is hugely important. However, with tweaks to other items, it may impact the conversion rate, so they’re interconnected and interrelated. You have to understand how they play with each other.
Take Action Choose your KPIs and share them with us in our Facebook group which metrics you choose to track so we can help you with step 2, which is choosing a tool. We will cover the tools in next week’s episode. sign up below to get a reminder.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go directly to our Facebook group (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Todd Giannattasio breaks down how to create a sales funnel in four easy steps. If you have been looking for a quick guide on how to create a funnel, look no further. You can also download Todd’s free guide to get even more support.
About Todd Giannattasio Todd empowers entrepreneurs to get their business properly established online in 30 days with the right tools and strategies so they can build their brand, grow their email list and leads, and drive sales. He is also the Founder & CEO of Tresnic Media, which provides online solutions for small to mid-sized companies ranging from web design to internet marketing and social media management as well as search engine optimization and content development.
If you enjoy Todd on this episode, be sure to listen to How to Turn Strangers into Customers on Episode 23.
Episode Highlights: Question: How can funnels help build your online community? Answer: If you have a business, you have already have a funnel. If it’s intentional and well planned, you have a successful funnel. If it’s unintentional and the experiences aren’t well set up for your customers, you’re going to be inefficient and ineffective which is hard to measure and improve. There are four steps to creating create a sales funnel to grow your community.
Step One: Awareness create awareness and a target audience.
Step Two: Engagement engage with them with quality content
Step Three: Subscription Bring them into your world with a lead magnet or other valuable subscription-only content
Step Four: Conversion Continue to connect with them and offer them a paid product that solves their problem
This helps with building an online community by using the community as a lead generation tool, but also building relationships and having conversations within the community that lead to sales.
Question: What are the benefits of a structured funnel? Answer: When you intentionally create a funnel, you can be more efficient with your time and resources. Reverse engineer from your main product offer. Think about the target audience, what they’re trying to achieve and what their main objective is. Think about how your product helps them and offer a lead magnet to educate them and set them up to engage with the main product offer.
Question: How do you decide what type of sample product or lead magnet to use in your funnel? Answer: Connect your lead magnet with your main product offer. If your lead magnet isn’t related to your main product or next offer, you’ll have a big email list of no buyers.
Question: What are the parts of a funnel and what are the steps to build one? Answer:
- Awareness is getting in front of your target audience. Join other groups where your target audiences is, engage, join the conversation and add value. That creates awareness and engagement.
- Engagement is where you deliver more value and creating a relationship so they know you, like you and you have credibility. You’re positioning yourself as an expert or authority in a topic.
- Subscription is where you build your email list through offering a lead magnet that gives someone insight and value and gets them interested in your brand.
- Conversion is within your email follow up where you offer a higher level course or product.
Question: How much time does it take to build and maintain a funnel? Answer: It depends what tools you’re using and how savvy you are. When you’re a passionate expert, you can create the content pieces of the funnel quickly. When it comes to measuring, look at reporting on a weekly or monthly basis. Once your funnel is set up, your job is to go out and educate the marketplace and be an evangelist for your brand and topic. You can best serve your audience with a funnel since it solves their problems while setting up a strong monetization strategy for your business.
Question: What if you are multi-passionate? Answer: You really need to have separate funnels for separate audiences, especially when they’re distinctive.
Question: How can a funnel help you build an email list and grow your business? Answer: In the subscription stage of the funnel, you want to offer some sort of lead magnet that gives free value up front. You can then use your awareness and engagement on social media to drive traffic of interested people back to your free offer and email list. Build your list, so you can build a relationship and a community.
Tools, links and apps mentioned: * Marketing 101 Delivered In 37 Tweet-Sized Lessons * How to Turn Strangers into Customers on Episode 23 * Message-Market-Match Template
Take Action Need more help? Todd put together an easy-to-follow guide to build a funnel without feeling overwhelmed. Your call-to-action is to download the funnel and come to the Facebook group for our funnel building challenge. Go to http://TheGrowthSuite.com/CTCFunnelGuide to download the guide and then meet us at the FB group to discuss it. If you need more help with how to define your audience, you can also download Todd’s Message-Market-Match Matrix Template.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go directly to our Facebook group (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Learn how to create target market strategies that sell themselves and help to build your online community. Learn to define your offerings and find the pain points of your community so you can create products and services that sell themselves.
Strategy One: Define your offerings by asking yourself these questions: * Who do you want to serve? * What do you want to do to help them? * Who do you like to work with the most? * What are the biggest pain points of those you help?
Strategy Two: Solve the problems of your community by identifying and solving their pain points * Eavesdrop and listen to people inside your niche. * Focus on posts and responses in Facebook groups where your niche is active. * Get feedback by conducting polls and surveys in social media and with current or potential clients. * Send a direct message or email to someone in your target audience and ask them directly. * Make phone calls to people to ask how you can help. * Create an “ask me anything” session and open up the conversation to people through a post, livestream or Instagram Live. * Ask for testimonials when your customers happy and pay attention to where people say they got the most value. Then provide more of that service.
Once you have a better idea of your ideal community member, you can start to test promo copy, email, visuals and video and other tactical elements when you know what motivates them.
Once you know what your community needs you can create products and services that will sell themselves.
Tools, links and apps mentioned: * Quora
* How to Use Instagram Stories to Grow Your Email List with Tyler McCall
* Jenna Kutcher Goal Digger Podcast
* Rich Roll Podcast
How to Ask for Testimonials from your Community – Ep 48
* Asking for Feedback from Customers with Polls and Surveys – Ep 44
Take Action Create a “help statement” which clearly states how you can serve your market. Fill in the blanks on this sentence:
I help (your target market) get (tangible benefit). Share it with us the Facebook group or on Twitter with the hashtag #CTCPodcast.
Examples * Kami’s Help Statement: I help brands and entrepreneurs build a meaningful online community and brand awareness to drive measurable results. * Madalyn’s Help Statement: I help marketers achieve rockstar results with their social media, especially Twitter, and I inspire them to take action.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go directly to our Facebook group (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Learn why social media marketing is a marathon and not a sprint, why it works better in the long game and some of the steps you need to take to play the long game.
One of the biggest mistakes people make is to think of their social media marketing plan as a sprint. Sprints work great to launch a program or for a campaign, but true success comes when you treat it more like training and running a marathon.
To run a marathon you have to consistently train, fine tune your diet and push your limits over a very long period of time. Social media marketing is a marathon and not a sprint because like a marathon, you have to consistently show up by posting and connecting everyday, fine-tune your approach and push your limits over a long period of time.
Why do people feel they have to run a social media sprint? * People want to become an overnight success, an idea which we discuss in detail in The Myth of Overnight Success – Ep 40 * Fear of Missing Out (FOMO) drives people to hit their goals, driven by the fear of being left behind. We discussed this back in Episode 47. How to Overcome the Fear of Missing Out (FOMO) – Ep 47 * Things are always changing and it’s hard to keep up. Don’t over-invest in any one platform, but experiment with multiple platforms to see what works for you and your audience. * Some people may be early adopters and want to be omnipresent with everything. There’s always new people coming in and succeeding faster or going further and they feel they need to sprint ahead. Consistency is more important than lots of activity, then the dropping off.
Why is social media really more like a marathon? * Social media is more sustainable over a long period of time if you’re controlled and consistent. If you’re running a sprint, you’re going to wear yourself out. * The long game requires the ability to reinvent yourself and pivot. Look at megastars like Madonna, Britney Spears, and more recently Beyonce and Jay-Z (The Carters) they have all reinvented and rebranded themselves where changes needed to be made. * Every person will changes careers an average of five to seven times in a lifetime. Kami and Madalyn shared their reinvention and pivoting stories:
- Madalyn Sklar started in the financial industry and sold annuities and mutual funds to college professors for for 8 years before becoming an entrepreneur. She was an early adopter web designer and pivoted to become self-employed. She also started her music community, GoGirls Music. Madalyn pivoted again in 2015 and today is a Business Coach and Social Media Coach focused on Twitter and is well known as a Twitter marketing expert. Now she’s now doing social media as a business, podcasting and leading masterminds for women.
- Kami Huyse started in nonprofit public relations and then worked in a trade association, becoming the national spokesperson. She then became the editor of a national trade publication. She pivoted in 2002 to become a consultant. She continued to get clients and build her business. In 2005 she started her blog and then pivoted again in 2008 when she started the Social Media Breakfast Houston in 2009. Finally, she started her current agency, Zoetica in 2010, with several partners. Today, she focuses on creating content, helping people through this podcast, and launching a few other companies. She feels she’s pivoting again with more online training and other ways to help communicators connect with their online communities.
How do you stop sprinting and become a marathoner? * Be consistent. It’s incredibly important to be in the long game, plan, create content and post every day. * Pivot as needed. Watch where your community goes and follow them. If they change platforms, be there, too. * Notice Your Passion. This can change over time, but put emphasis on what your current passion is, turning a hobby into something that can benefit your business. * Sprint when necessary. Sometimes you need to run a sprint to get something done, but never for more than 2 weeks – 30 days, otherwise you will fall out of the longer race. * Use SCRUM. Break your work down into actions using Trello or Asana. At the end of the 2 week to one month period, create a product, even if it’s “B-” work.
Tools, links and apps mentioned: * Career Change Statistics: You Will Change Careers 7 Times in Your Life? * Asana * Trello
Take Action How have you changed over the course of your career? Come join the conversation in the Facebook Group.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go to our Facebook group (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
This is the 52nd episode of Communities that Convert and marks our one-year anniversary teaching you how to build a stronger online community and create content for your community.
We dug through the archives and looked at our most popular downloads and choose five episodes to share with you from the past year. The most popular episodes centered around how to create great content, so we bundled the best tips together for you.
5 Ways to Quickly Create Relevant Content for Your Community – Ep 18 In the full episode, 5 Ways to Quickly Create Relevant Content – Ep 18, we shared three ways to quickly create relevant content for your fans. In this episode, we focus on the highlights these steps and what you can do to create content that people love.
How to Reuse, Recycle, Repurpose Your Content – Ep 24 And as long as we are talking about content creation, How to Reuse, Recycle, Repurpose Your Content – Ep 24, In this episode we talked about how to reuse your Keystone Content, such as social media, books, blogs, videos, podcasts, presentations, white papers, reports or speeches.
How to Start a Podcast for your Community – Ep 27 In the full episode, How to Start a Podcast for your Community – Ep 27, we walk you through how we started ours and we put together a free quick start template to help you get started. You can also click over to the full episode to download a free quick-start template to help you get started. In this episode, we pulled what we discussed about an how to create an editorial calendar.
Steps to Start a Twitter Chat Community — Ep 9 This full original episode, Steps to Start a Twitter Chat Community, is worth listening to in its entirety if you want to learn to start a Twitter chat. For this episode, we pulled out the clips about how to find and choose a hashtag for your community or your marketing campaign. Hashtags are especially important to get right since they help with discovery and connecting people.
Leveraging Community to Build Income Streams with Dorie Clark – Ep 13 Dorie Clarke is a marketing strategy consultant and professional speaker who has worked with high profile clients. She’s a regular contributor to the Harvard Business Review and the author of a brand-new book called “Entrepreneurial You.” We invited Dorie to come on the podcast to talk about how she leverages her community to build income streams. Listen to this week’s episode (above) to hear a clip about how to create a lead magnet to build your online media list. You can listen to the full episode here: Leveraging Community to Build Income Streams with Dorie Clark – Ep 13.
Click here to binge-listen to all of our favorite episodes on this playlist.
Take Action What was your favorite episode this year and why? We’ve already started the conversation in our Facebook Group. Join us. We’ll be listening.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go directly to our Facebook group (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Social media is a great strategy for growing a strong community around your brand or cause, but you need community engagement strategies to keep it going. Here are 8 of our favorite community engagement strategies to keep your community going strong.
Here are our 8 Community Engagement Strategies to keep your online community growing strong. This episode is about how to get your people talking, keep them engaged and how to promote other collaborations from the relationships they build.
Episode Highlights:
- Activate super fans to help out ^ Reach out to people who are super fans. We define a super fan as someone who consistently shows up and participates in an online community. Invite them to be a part of a smaller group of people that reaches out to other members. Madalyn discusses how she uses ambassadors during her Twitter Smarter chats to help warm up the crowd and welcome people.
^ Create Direct Message groups on Twitter, Facebook Messenger, LinkedIn or Instagram, where your small VIP group can connect, check-in and communicate.
^ Be sure to regularly show appreciation to your small group for their service.
2. Use Twitter Lists to Organize ^ Create a private Twitter List of super fans. When you talk with someone that is an obvious super fan, add them to your list. Keep track of who those people are because you may need to reach out to them at some point, and they will help to spread the word.
^ Create a public Twitter List of people that engage and make an effort to connect and engage with those people periodically to grow those relationships.
3. Post a welcome message ^ When people join your community, encourage them to introduce themselves. That gets them in the habit of posting in your community.
^ People can be nervous to talk and may wait to speak until prompted by a post. Show them that it’s a warm place and a great place to connect. It’s important to foster collaboration and sharing in your community and make everyone feel welcome and comfortable.
4. Use live stream video ^ Use video and live streaming to connect your groups.
^ There are so many reasons to live stream. People care what you’re doing and you’re allowing them to have a front row seat.
5. Find an accountability partner ^ If you haven’t already done so, you should have an accountability partner. You should also encourage others to do the same.
^ Create an accountability partner system within your community where everyone chooses their partner and has someone to buddy up with. This will increase engagement as people in the group get to know each other better.
6. Use email ^ Send an email with a link to a specific post in your Facebook group and ask for feedback.
^ This tactic works well for people who may miss activity, but have a lot to offer to the community.
7. Create hot seat opportunities ^ Create opportunities for people in your community to ask you anything and interview individuals. This works well as a video in a private Facebook group.
^ Creating “Hot Seats” in your group, where you help one member solve a problem while others watch, provides a learning opportunity and gets people talking to each other.
^ Also, having an individual in the hot seat introduces you to the other person’s community.
8. Conduct surveys ^ Use the polling and survey functions in your social media networks to listen to and understand the challenges people are facing, how they can overcome them and what’s motivating them.
^ Refer back Episode 44, Asking for Feedback from Customers with Polls and surveys, for more in-depth information on this topic.
Tools, links and apps mentioned: * Appear.in * Skype * Zoom * Slack * She Podcasts * Facebook Live * Communities That Convert Livestream: 11am CT on Thursdays * The School of Greatness * The Growth Suite * Marisa Murgatroyd * Biz Chix Podcast
Take Action Come comment on our post in our Facebook Group and tell us which of these 8 Online Community Engagement Strategies (or even some we didn’t mention) that you will try this week to connect with your online community.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go directly to our Facebook group (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Master community builder Elisa Camahort Page shares her insights and the ups and downs to starting and running a successful business that is built on community power.
Can you make a career out of building online communities? Our guest today has done just that. Elisa Camahort Page has been at the forefront of the social web revolution. Elisa has built value for women online and is a model for how to build communities. She co-founded BlogHer Inc. in 2005, which was bootstrapped for two years before successfully raising four rounds of $20M in funding, eventually achieving exit by acquisition to She Knows Media.
She is now the owner of ElisaCP. She’s a community builder, public speaker, board member, business catalyst, consultant and so much more. She’s also writing a book right now called Road Map for Revolutionaries: Resistance, Activism, and Advocacy for All.
**Question: You helped to build the biggest community of women bloggers in the world at the time. What gave you, Lisa Stone and Jory Des Jardins the idea for BlogHer?** **Answer:** Back in 2005, there were a lot of conversations about having more women represented in tech, business and politics. Jory des Jardins, Lisa Stone and I came together somewhat serendipitously to start BlogHer. We were so tired of all the excuses for why women weren’t speaking and women weren’t being quoted. We had this idea to have a conference that was like any other tech or blogging conference, but all the experts would be women. There was always that kind of activist nature to what we were doing and we wanted to validate for these women who were finding a mode of expression. It turned out they were really good at building and influencing their community. The idea was to create opportunities for women to get their piece of exposure and community and at the same time, help them learn more about how to do it well and bring about some economic empowerment. A lot of the women were stay-at-home parents who were looking to contribute to their household income and do something that had meaning to them.
Question: BlogHer was acquired by She Knows Media in 2014. How did that come to be and what did you do afterward? Answer: We bootstrapped for two years and we grew organically, but in that two years, some traditional women’s media companies were starting to recognize there’s gold in women bloggers. They had deep pockets we didn’t have. Everything we were doing was really based on bootstrapping, bartering, going through our life savings and taking out personal debt. We realized that we could keep organically growing and have a nice business, but we didn’t want these folks to pay money to leapfrog over us. We worried that these newcomers didn’t come from the community and wouldn’t really serve the community. We had some fire in the belly, we wanted some world domination and we were thinking very big. That’s when we decided to go out and get venture funding. Every time you take outside investment, whoever is investing in you or giving you capital has expectations and an expectation of an outcome. You sign up for that when you take the money. Debt is not a dirty word. Most businesses fund themselves at some point through debt. The expectation for what you do to settle your debt is a lot different than the expectation of what you need to do if you take venture funding. Once you take venture funding, the expectation is you’re going to have an exit for that company that’s going to pay your investors back, and hopefully you, too.
Ultimately what happened and why we eventually did sell was because we’d been doing it almost 10 years at that point. We had done four rounds of funding. The reason we ended up taking more funding is because of two macro things. In the beginning, we were a little cocky and a little naive. We thought we knew what was going to happen and we thought we had a plan. We saw a path to profitability and we didn’t want to give up more ownership than we needed to, so we didn’t take that much funding. Less than one year after we took our first round of funding, the bottom fell out of the economy and we had the recession and we didn’t control that.
When we started BlogHer, the smartphone didn’t exist, there were no mobile websites, there was nothing. Think of all the things that happened in digital over the last 12 years and you could imagine that we had to reinvest in developing mobile solutions and video solutions. Those were macro dynamics of the market and the economy that affected us. After 10 years, we were looking at another point of inflection. We were creating video content when the sponsor was paying for it, but we weren’t set up to just be a video content company. We were looking at that point of inflection saying, are we going to reinvest to do this or do we find a partner who’s already invested in this but doesn’t have what we have?
We had a community and conferences in a distributed network, so we fit the pieces together and it made a lot of sense. After 10 years we said, let’s share the load a little bit, let’s join another company, let’s get more resources that will help the community and will help them continue to make money and help them continue to get exposure for their work. Not only did we sign up for finding an exit when we took the money, but at a certain point of time it made sense for where the business needed to go and where we needed to go as founders.
Question: You started ElisaCP and started working with entrepreneurs and with the NPR Podcast, How I Built This. You helped them build an online community and also organize an upcoming conference. How did that come to be? Answer: Our first executive hire at BlogHer, who opened up our New York office, was Gina Rubo who is now the President and CEO of National Public Media, which is the selling arm of NPR. She heard they were thinking of doing a conference and she recommended before they do anything they talk to me. So I was brought in for a one-day engagement to do a strategy session and then write a report with some best practices and recommendations. Then they hired me for a couple of months to do more due diligence, and scope out the budget and plan.
I happened to know a whole team of amazing events, people from my career, and it was a win, win, win. NPR needed this help, my friend needed the contract, I needed the contract, so we all played together. That was just a couple months and then they came back and said they were pulling the trigger. What would it take for you guys to just help us produce this and build the program?
BlogHer started as a conference and then we said, oh there’s a community. What else can we do for this community? How I Built This started as a podcast, but they began to get so much feedback from people sending in their own companies and that’s how they started having at the end of every episode, the How I Built This segment, where they feature some of their community.
Question: You talk about harnessing the power of people as one of your skills. How have you done that to build successful online communities? Answer: People desperately want to connect, to feel a connection, to feel validated, to feel purposeful. The other thing is they want to feel a sense of consistency. They also want a sense of expectation meeting reality. And I think that’s where a lot of people go wrong.
First of all, one of my cardinal rules of community isn’t about giving people a way to talk to you. I think that’s how people kind of interpret it. Not everyone’s going to get the answer they want, but they get an answer and they get some transparency about why things are the way they are. They can rationalize and say either, well, I understand I didn’t get what I wanted here, but I get why it is the way it is and I’m cool with that. So that’s sort of my cardinal rule number one is that you have to have some sense of call and response that they can talk to you and you answer even if the answer is no.
But the other seemingly contradictory rule thing is that people don’t always want you chiming in. I see brands do this all the time. Like anytime someone mentions them online they have to chime in. And actually, that starts to feel a little like big brother or big sister like. You may think it’s stupid, but a lot of us feel like we’re having private conversations even in public social media threads. So if I’m talking to someone on Twitter or on a public thread on Facebook, it’s still a conversation and I find that too many brands or organizations interrupt the conversation and make it about them in a way we didn’t intend when we were having a conversation. So a lot of times the hardest part of managing an online community is controlling yourself, that your input is not always required or necessary or desirable. They’re allowed to have their feelings. They’re allowed to be disappointed in you. They’re allowed to be mad at you. They’re not asking you a question or they’re not asking you for action. And I think it’s really important to recognize when people are asking you for information or action and when are they not, what are they’re just expressing how they feel.
Question: What are your tips for those of us looking to grow an engaged online community to support our businesses? Answer: I would say be human. Talk about human things. Don’t be afraid to say feeling words.
Be Responsive. Be Consistent. When you’re managing the community be transparent about why it’s managed the way it is. Really live that ethos of reciprocity, that nobody owes you.
Community is not a fixed asset. It’s a constantly living organism and it needs tending.
The last thing is to have a stated policy. What’s the code? What are the community guidelines? Then enforce it evenly and fairly. You can’t make everyone happy, but you can make everyone feel understood and heard even if in the end you agree to disagree.
Some people are going to be nasty. That happens all the time, but that’s their prerogative. If someone is going to leave your community because they think you’re doing it wrong, in the long run, you’re probably better off. If you start to see an exodus of your community, that’s a problem you need to look into. What have you changed? What have you done to alienate the people who were your community? That’s a very important thing to figure out.
Tools, links and apps mentioned: * She Knows Buys BlogHer, Expanding it’s Reach Among Women * ElisaCP * Road Map for Revolutionaries: Resistance, Activism, and Advocacy for All * How I Built This * How You Built That Facebook Community
How to reach Elisa: Website: www.elisaCP.com
Twitter: @ElisaC
Instagram: @elisacp
Take Action 1. Join the How I Built This Community
- Buy Elisa’s book
- Pick an issue that most touches you and be a little braver and integrate civic participation into your brand
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go to our Facebook group here (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
In this episode, we're talking with Twitter expert Madalyn Sklar about how to use Twitter effectively and how you can build a bigger, better community.
If you ever wished you could find a friend who really understands Twitter and pick her brain, this is the episode for you. We learn five top strategies that Twitter expert Madalyn Sklar shares to help us get more out of the platform and to build a stronger community.
Question: How do you create a strategy for using Twitter? Answer: It doesn’t have to be a fancy, drawn-out strategy, just have a clearly defined plan in place. Have clear, trackable actions that are tied to your business goals. Write down your thoughts and put them into action so that when you’re building your community, you have a better chance of building influence and reaching people when you have a plan.
Question: What is the best kind of content for Twitter and how do you plan your content? Answer: It’s important to do a variety of things – tweets, blog posts, images and videos. In addition to your tweets, Moments is a great feature to utilize. A Twitter Moment is a set of curated tweets, like “best of” tweets, chats or evergreen content that were tweeted about a topic. You can create a Moment in Twitter that appears in the menu of your profile. Evergreen content can be put into Social Jukebox on an autopilot schedule. Think about using Twitter to storytell using video. Twitter allows 140 seconds (that’s 2 minutes and 20 seconds) of recording. Live shows are also a great idea when it comes to using video on Twitter. You can do recorded video or livestream and connect it through Periscope.
Question: What are the best ways to use Twitter Lists? Answer: Twitter lists are an under-utilized feature that is incredibly powerful. You have the ability to take a group of people and make your own stream of tweets. If you follow a lot of people, you can create a Twitter list as a way to create smaller feeds of information. Twitter Lists can be public or private. Make lists for “your eyes only” and set them as private for your reference. Or you can make them public which can be seen by anyone and it also allows for people to subscribe. As an example, Social Media Marketing World creates a Twitter List of the speakers every year which you can subscribe to. POWER TIP: If you’re placed on a Twitter list you don’t want to be on, go to the creator’s profile, block them, then unblock them and that will remove you from the list. As you can see, the possibilities are endless with the Twitter list feature.
Question: Why do you think Twitter chats are the best way to build an engaged online community? Answer: There’s no better way to connect with like-minded people on a regular basis than with Twitter chats. You’ll meet people faster in a Twitter Chat than anywhere else. When you’re surrounded by other people that are like you, talking about the same topic, you’re going to make connections. If you would like to start your own chat, it’s important to choose a hashtag that represents what you’re trying to do. You can start a chat with or without guests. When you host a Twitter Chat, you can connect with people all over the world, which is awesome. See Madalyn’s list of The Very Best Twitter Chats for Social Media & Marketing.
Question: How do you measure your impact on Twitter? Answer: Twitter browser analytics shows you a 28-day summary of tweets, impressions and profile visits. Make sure your profile is amazing so when people are viewing your profile, you’re capturing them as a follower and they’ll click to your website. Have a good profile picture. Your header is the prime real estate, so make sure your image says who you are and what you do. Your bio is 160 characters and should include a description that’s reflective of what you do. Use hashtags sparingly and methodically to send people somewhere, like to your website, registration, event, etc. You can update and change your bio as often as needed.
Take Action Sign up for Madalyn’s Secret Sauce to Boosting Your Twitter Presence. Also, tweet us your biggest takeaway using the hashtag #CTCPodcast
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go to our Facebook group here (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
In this episode, we're talking about how to ask for testimonials from your community and we have some great suggestions for how to get them without feeling uncomfortable.
Natural Ways to Ask for a Testimonial * Just Ask. You can’t be afraid to ask for testimonials. Ask students, clients and colleagues whenever you’ve worked with them, completed a session or training and ask right away before much time passes. * Written Testimonials. Ask for testimonials that are both written and on video, but understand that people are busy and you may not receive both. Written testimonials are easy to tweet, post on Facebook and share. Video testimonials are even more powerful. * Incentives. Consider an incentive when you ask for testimonials, like an offering or gift certificates. Marisa Murgatroyd in her Experience Product Masterclass offered $25 Experience Bucks for future products from LiveYourMessage.com for people who sent in a video testimonial at the end of her course. * Case Studies. Put together a case study and use it in a presentation or article. Case studies are a great way to showcase your work and don’t require you to ask for testimonials. Create a case study after each client interaction which demonstrates the challenge and goals, the approach and the results. This gives insight into how you work and provides a measurement of success. * Surveys and Ratings. Send your customers a survey after a course or event and ask for testimonials when they rate and review you on their online service of choice (such as Yelp, Google, Amazon, Trip Advisor and many others, depending on your industry). You can also use a direct survey to ask for a testimonial and get permission to use it. * Facebook Groups. Use Facebook Groups to connect with your community and ask for testimonials within your group. Create a win-win for others where you can to obtain a testimonial, but also showcase someone else. * Live Events. Get testimonials at live events by bringing a camera and asking people to speak about what they got out of the event on the spot. * LinkedIn Recommendations. Ask for recommendations from former colleagues and clients on LinkedIn. You can then ask for permission to feature them on your website. * Email and Verbal Feedback. Look out for the opportunities right in front of you in the form of an email, tweet or post where someone says something nice about you. Ask their permission to share it publicly before sharing it as a testimonial.
Tools, links and apps mentioned: * Experience Product Masterclass * Twitter Chat Case Study: #ChatSnap * Nusii * iPhone Live Photos * Madalyn Sklar Instagram Channel * Quik Video Editor * Thinkific * Kami’s LinkedIn * Kami’s Twitter Moments * Madalyn’s Twitter Moments * LinkedIn Recommendations Overview
Take Action Make a list of 2-3 current or former clients and ask for a LinkedIn testimonial. We have already started a conversation in the Facebook group. Come and share how you are getting testimonials and get advice on getting more.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go to our Facebook group here (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Our brains are wired to respond to the Fear of Missing Out (FOMO) on Social Media. Learn how to overcome the naturally occuring negative bias in your brain that predispose you to FOMO.
In this episode, we are talking about FOMO, anxiety caused by a desire to stay continually connected to what others are doing. We’ll discuss ways that you can reframe the Fear Of Missing Out to the Freedom Of Making Optimism.
How to Overcome the Fear of Missing Out (FOMO) on Social Media Episode Highlights * There’s been a lot of neuro-research conducted around negative bias. Your brain responds and reacts more strongly to negative stimuli and thus, you focus more on negative instances. * When exposed to negative stimuli, there is a greater surge in electrical activity in our brains. As a result, our attitudes are more heavily influenced by downbeat news than good news. * As research relates to FOMO, we tend to focus more on what we’re not accomplishing rather than what we are accomplishing and what others are accomplishing that we aren’t. * Mirror neurons mirror the behavior of others that we observe. These neurons fire up the premotor cortex of our brains which prepares us for motion, and parietal lobe that grabs our attention. This is why there are contagious actions and feelings and why we want to be like others.
FOMO is in the brain, so how do we overcome it? * Law of Attraction. The Law of Attraction is the belief that by focusing on positive or negative thoughts, people can bring positive or negative experiences into their life. * Reframing. Get away from trying to exercise self-control, because willpower is limited. Studies show that willpower is an expendable resource and you only have so much every day. Instead, reframe the way you think. Replace the subject or matter of frustration with another thought. * Avoidance. Stop focusing on competitors which will slow you down. You do you. Spending time reflecting on the competitor is a waste of time and only hurts you.
Tools, links and apps mentioned: * FOMOFanz podcast with Brian Fanzo * Our Brain’s Negative Bias * Is There Scientific Evidence for the “Law of Attraction”? * Law of attraction (New Thought) * The Secret * Making Oprah
Take Action Share with us which of the ways you are going to use to put FOMO to bed or share how you already have so we can all learn from you. Go to our Facebook Group or share on Twitter with the hashtag #CTCPodcast.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go to our Facebook group here (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
If you wonder how to promote your evergreen content efficiently, you might want to check out Social Jukebox, a tool that allows you to share your content over and over again on Facebook, LinkedIn or Twitter.
In this episode, we talk with Tim Fargo from Social Jukebox. He is a two-time Inc. 500 winner, an entrepreneur, an international speaker and bestselling author and the creator of Social Jukebox. We are paid users of Social Jukebox and use it on a daily basis to promote the Communities That Convert podcast. It may even by why you are here.
Tim shares with us some of his best tips and practices to get the most out of your evergreen content.Social Jukebox is an automated content delivery system. So it’s essentially Buffer that just keeps on going, When you get to the end of one of your content databases on Social Jukebox, the content will keep recycling over and over again like an hourglass that just keeps turning over.
Question: What is Social Jukebox and why did you create it? Answer: In 2013, I published the book Alphabet Success. I was trying to build an audience to promote the book and found the process of scheduling posts to be mind-numbing things. You could carve your tweet on a granite tablet and send it on horseback to be delivered. The person receiving it on Twitter will have no idea that ever happened so they don’t care how it got there.
As a result, I started looking around for a more efficient way to deliver the content. I ended up calling my former head of IT from Omega, that I sold in 2003, and asked him to build a tool to help me deliver my content to the social media sites.
I didn’t intend to sell it, but I quickly found people were much more interested in why I was posting 24 hours a day then they were my book. I thought maybe it’s time to abandon the book and try the software business. So here we are.
I just shared it with a few people in the beginning and it had a lot of utility. It just didn’t look very nice. So for people that are thinking about starting something, don’t get too hung up on getting it perfect. Just go for “good enough” when you’re getting started.
Question: When you started, it only worked with Twitter, but now you have added a few more platforms, correct? Answer: We added the other two biggies in my mind, which are Facebook and LinkedIn, where most people have at least some presence. Almost everybody I think has a favorite go-to platform whether they’re doing a lot of Facebook marketing or whether they’re Twitter-centric. So we added those two platforms and, of course, we continue to look at other platforms to possibly add in the future.
Question: What is evergreen content in your mind? Can you give us some examples? Answer: World Cup scores are great to share live or comment on. I have a connection with Sweden because my kids are half Swedish and Sweden’s actually South Korea right now as we are speaking. So that’s a great thing to live tweet because the game is happening now. It’s not a great thing to put in Social Jukebox because in a couple months it’ll be like, yeah we kind of know what happened with that event (Sweden won that match 1-0).
Things that make great evergreen content include a social media tip, a great graphic, podcasts, blog posts are very often great, especially if they cover leadership or management.
A good example is a plumber that creates videos about how homeowners can take care of jobs that are super easy, like how to tighten the washer onto someone’s sink can then be put in a Jukebox to be shared on Facebook and Twitter to develop a social community.
It’s anything that would resonate with your audience on an ongoing basis.
Today everyone’s their own media company. Media companies have editorial calendars and you can have an editorial calendar, too. You can create a Jukebox to share seasonal items only at a certain time of year.
For instance, you could have content in a Jukebox for Black History Month, if that is something that would resonate with your audience.
Question: For people that have not been on the tool yet, can you describe how it works? Answer: Jukeboxes are basically miniature databases of content that post over and over in a random pattern.
When people quiz me as to why I chose to do it this way, I tell them that every time I tried to accurately predict the perfect time for the perfect content I was almost universally incorrect. If you have a particular kind of content that you want to share at a certain hour of the day, then that’s great, but don’t get too hung up on it being a specific post. In the Jukeboxes, the content is randomly going, and we also have a calendar for targeted posts where you’ve got a greater level of control.
There are actually three different ways to schedule things:
- Auto-schedule allows you to decide how many times per day you want something to post from each Jukebox. It does it all for you and spaces out the posts.
- You can set a specific schedule for an entire Jukebox to be used over a specific period of time.
- You can also visual schedule, which looks like a giant excel spreadsheet. You can move posts around on that for people who want to tweak and get more specific with the time slots. What I recommend for those people is to use auto-schedule to create the massive schedule to start with and then go into the visual schedule and pinpoint different times.
Question: What is the effectiveness of the system? Answer: The effectiveness and engagement will depend on the content. If you have a post that’s great, it’s going to get picked up and shared, but if you have a post that sucks, it’s not going to go anywhere. No amount of wizardry is going to make and uninteresting piece of content resonate with people.
Think back to the TV shows Friends and Seinfeld. The whole idea was to get eyeballs and once you have those eyeballs, have enough trust generated that those eyeballs will stick around and watch the commercials.
There’s lots of different ways to skin a cat and I think driving engagement comes from different ways, right? Some of the ways I have seen work include:
- Helpful content
- General interest content
- Things people find interesting or amusing.
Interesting content could be just facts or something that you share that might be relevant to your audience and develop some pickup. Other things could just be pure entertainment. The key is going to be in what does your audience care about.
Take the home shopping network, for instance. By my estimation, that whole channel is spam, right? But it’s a business. They don’t exist for no reason. There are people who sit at home and call the place up and order stuff. If they didn’t they go off the air.
So it’s all about serving your audience and that’s the key. All that my tool can do is deliver that message to the audience you have.
You can automatically add a hashtag to every post in a Jukebox by just adding it once in options instead of adding it to every post in the jukebox, which is much more efficient. But it does always go back to don’t try to put lipstick on a pig.
If you don’t have good content you need to focus on fixing that because getting a new tool isn’t going to take you across the goal line.
Question: Twitter has new policies in place when it comes to duplicating tweets. Does your tool violate any of these new rules? Can you talk a little bit about the new Twitter policy? Answer: Twitter has had a no duplicate policy since 2009. I don’t want to tempt fate, but the amount of resources that it would require for them to check every post that’s coming on against everything that’s been posted on your account before–you’re talking about a gargantuan amount of overhead.
We run an algorithm now to make sure that people aren’t duplicating content too quickly as it goes out because we’re enforcing a 72 hour rule. I’m sure that if I contacted people at Twitter, they’d say it’s absolutely forbidden. But I haven’t heard from anybody that’s having a problem.
My impression about these rules and what they were trying to combat is the rise of fake news. Particularly on Twitter where we’d see trends pop up and it was a six word phrase. How does the six word phrase trend? The only way a six word phrase trends is because a bunch of accounts are coordinating the posting.
I could add a wrinkle to Social Jukebox where you could update a thousand accounts because you’d have a shared jukebox between all 1000 accounts or 10,000 accounts for 100,000 accounts. There really isn’t an upper limit as long as you have the server resources and you can automatically have that post go out to all those accounts more or less simultaneously.
That is something Twitter specifically talked about when they were reaching out. And I’m sure it was the same for everybody that has a posting tool for Twitter. They were very keen to know how you could move content back and forth between accounts, how quickly it could be shared, things like that. So my impression, and I think it’s correct, was they really wanted to find a way to limit people who are trying to make something look as if it was news. And if and if you can have something trend and the articles look newsworthy, people only read the headline and don’t necessarily click on the link but that message becomes the takeaway.
I think from Twitter’s perspective, you don’t want to be caught in the middle of this kind of chaos, with people putting out things that are just patently false on your platform.. I’m pretty sure what they were really after was to prevent that kind of thing.
And by the way, they don’t like repetitive stuff, so I do think there’s going to be a higher level enforcement where you have to maybe wait, say six or seven hours before you can repeat a post and I’m sure the time table is going to continue to increase. But the idea that you could never share the same post again, I’m not saying never. I said I don’t want to tempt fate, but I don’t see that happening.
Question: What makes Social Jukebox standout over similar services on the market? Answer: I like to keep the platform somewhat simple. I think there’s a tendency among almost all software tools to keep adding stuff until you have a product that is so complicated that you need a master’s degree to turn the thing on.
It’s great to add features, but at the same time you add overhead to the process, you add complexity to the product, and as a result it very often it becomes intimidating to use it for the simple task that it was made for from the beginning.
I’m much more interested in having it be really effective at the things that it’s really meant to do.
I’d even include in that having a predictive tool about the best time to tweet is an idiot’s game. All you do is take everyone’s followers and tell them that at 8:00 AM in your area, most of your followers are online.
Wow, that’s a real insight.
And by the way, it’s not like you’re buying super bowl airtime. You’re adding posts, so why wouldn’t you post around the clock just with the idea that maybe you’ll get a great client from Malaysia? Maybe you’ll find somebody that’s really interested in what you do in New Zealand.
Don’t be parochial and think that just because your existing audience is in a certain time zone that you should restrict yourself to that. In the ideal world, you’re not just serving who you’re talking to now. You’re expanding the number of people you’re talking to. At least that would be my key to marketing.
I would say really our key is just keep simplifying the tool. I’m not saying take things away, but just try to make it easier and easier to use. If you ever have a support question for Social Jukebox, you get me, there is no support department.
If you create a support department, they will do what you’ve mandated them to do. They will give great support on the product. Right? Very rarely are they going to try to figure out a way to eliminate their own job. And the reality is clients don’t want great support. They want a product they understand.
And if you keep getting the same questions from customers, don’t figure out a great support answer, figure out a way to redesign the product so that the person doesn’t have a question anymore. That is my mindset. I’m incentivized as the entrepreneur because not only am I the one who’s going to have to ask the questions, but I’m also the person that can affect change. For me that’s a really important distinction, making sure that you’re constantly trying to eliminate the number of questions people might have about something rather than just try to find great ways to answer those questions.
Tools, Apps and Links Mentioned: Social Jukebox
How to reach Tim:
Take Action Make a list of your own evergreen content and tweet it out with the #CTCpodcasthashtag so the community can see your best content and share it. We will retweet some of the best ones from our Twitter accounts. You can also go to our Facebook community and share your best content in our share thread. To get in, use the secret word: ACTION
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go to our Facebook group here (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Learn how to build a targeted email list, why bigger isn't always better and why a smaller email list might even save you money.
Pair down and target your email list * It may not seem very intuitive, but you actually want people to unsubscribe from your list. Sometimes people sign up for the freebies but they don’t open your emails after that. * The more targeted your list, the more deliverable your email and the better open rates you will get. * Paring down your list saves you money and helps you make more money, especially if you are paying by the contact on your list. * If you are spamming people that aren’t engaging or opening your emails, over time it may hurt the deliverability of your email.
How small is too small? * We all start at zero. Start building your list and today. You’ll own your list and no one can take that away from you. * If your average open rate is about 30% and you have a good conversion rate of 2-3%, think about how many people need to come into your funnel, opt-in, open your email and convert. * Obsess about your open and conversion rates, not necessarily the size of your list. The larger your list gets, the lower your conversion and open rates will be. Work on the quality of content you’re sending and the way you’re segmenting your list.
Attract the right people to your list * Build really good lead magnets and freemiums that will attract your ideal community and audience. * Know who you want to attract and what they want. Ask them or do a poll and build lead magnets around that. * You want to attract the right people. While your product may have a broad appeal, it’s not good for everyone. You’ll be more successful if you can appeal to a specific audience and speak to an individual when you’re writing copy. * Attract the right people and repel the wrong ones. It keeps your list smaller, but it has a better opt-in rate, open rate and conversion rate which leads to more income.
Engage with your list * When people trust you and look forward to your emails, you’ll have better open and conversion rates. Focus on adding lots of value to your emails. * Smaller lists make it easier to connect with your audience, but you don’t have to turn people away. * In general, keep your list tight and small and limited to the people that are really interested in your content and potentially being your customer. This will make it much easier to engage and interact with them.
Tools, links and apps mentioned: * How to Hit 1M with a List Under 20K * 10 Time Tested Ways to Increase Open Rates
Take Action Download our free spreadsheet (Google Sheets) for that allows you to plug in your own numbers to determine how big of a list you will need to meet your goals. Sign up here for our weekly updates and we will send you free gifts like this one, plus our weekly episode reminder. Fill out the form below and you will be sent to the form instantly!
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go to our Facebook group here (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Do you need more information about how to ask for feedback from customers with polls and surveys on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram?
In this episode, we are talking about how to engage with your audience through surveys and polls to get community feedback and to get people talking.
Customer Feedback on Facebook * Whether it’s business related or just for fun, engaging questions are an easy way to get community feedback. Ask a question and use one of Facebook’s graphic backgrounds. * Facebook polls allow you to gather information, interests and preferences from your community. The information gathered can be very valuable to you. Facebook Polls allows you to create multiple answers and people can add their own answers and responses. * You can use Facebook Ads to run A/B tests with varying copy and photos. The ones that get the best engagement and responses give you an overview of what most resonates with the people you’re aiming to reach.
Customer Feedback on Twitter * Twitter polls are under-utilized, likely because they are so basic. * The question in your Twitter polls can include a maximum of 280 characters, and each poll choice can be up to 25 characters with up to 4 choices. You cannot attach an image or GIF. * Twitter poll hack: To add emojis to your poll choices, create the answers with emojis in the Twitter composition box, then copy/paste it into the answer lines. * Unlike Facebook, Twitter allows participants to vote anonymously and responses are private. Not even the poll creator can see the source of poll responses. * The poll can be run for as little as 5 minutes (too short for most uses) and up to 7 days in length. We usually choose 24 to 48 hours. You can also pin the poll or re-tweet your poll to keep it in the feed or retweet it once — which Madalyn refers to as the second pinned Tweet.
Customer Feedback on Instagram * Instagram polls can we created with Poll Stickers on Stories, which can be used with a photo or video. By default, the poll answers are “yes” and “no”, but you can also customize the responses. Refer to Episode 41 for more details on Instagram’s features. * Participant’s answers on Instagram polls are not anonymous and can be viewed by looking at the stats. * The Emoji Slider Sticker is another way to engage with people in Instagram Stories. Participants slide the poll option which displays poll results in emojis.
Apps, Tools and Links Mentioned: * About Twitter Polls * Survey Monkey * Google Forms * Convert Kit Tags in Email * Typeform * Apester * Playbuzz
Take Action Pick one of the methods we discussed to interact with your community through a poll or a survey. Then, share the link to the poll in the Communities That Convert Facebook Group so we can all participate. (Password is ACTION) **How to reach Kami:** If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go to our Facebook group here (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
One of the hardest things to do is set a price for your digital products. In this episode, we talk about the psychology behind digital product pricing strategy and methods. We also have included a pricing calculator and PDF.
Listen to this episode to learn the psychology behind digital product pricing strategy and methods and how you can use them to set your own prices.
- Tactic 1: Leveled Pricing.
Using three prices usually makes the middle price more attractive, no one wants the cheapest and no one wants to pay the most. This is a powerful pricing strategy that tricks your mind to pick the middle option.
- Tactic 2: Graphic Design Choices
Using a smaller font is usually more attractive and placing the price at the bottom left also creates the perception of a smaller price tag. Removing the comma in the price removes the fluid reading of the price, making it seem smaller. Punctuation stops the eye on the price.
- Tactic 3: Anchoring
Let people know how much it would cost if they paid full price, then give your much lower price, along with the reason why you are offering it at this time. Alternatively, if something isn’t selling, create a better product and double the price, offering your original product at the lower price.
- Tactic 4: Just Noticeable Differences
Make small price increases more frequently to raise prices. This tactic is often seen in the form of a countdown timer when a product is launched at an introductory price which will be raised after a set amount of time. This tactic creates an urgency to buy.
- Tactic 5: Down-Sell
Offer a smaller package for a lower price after a launch. Have something in mind before your launch which has fewer features, but will still capture sales.
- Tactic 6: Reduce the Left Digit By One
For decades marketers have used charm pricing — prices that end in 9, 99, or 95. Charm pricing is most effective when the left digit changes. For example, the one dollar difference between $200 and $199 will make a psychological sales impact.
- Tactic 7: Display Prices in a Small Font Size
Your brain has a universal conceptualization of size where there’s a blurred overlap between visual size and numerical size. That’s why customers perceive your price to be smaller if you display your price in a smaller font size. The reverse works for discounts. Since you want to maximize the size of discounts, you should display those numbers in a large font size.
- Tactic 8: Offer Payments in Installments
When you give people the option to pay for your product in smaller increments rather than one lump sum, you anchor people on the smaller price. They’re popular because they are visually lower even though they are paying more.
- Tactic 9: Follow the “Rule of 100”
When you offer discounts, maximize their perceived size so people feel like they’re getting a better deal. Give percentage discounts when your price is under $100 and give absolute discounts when your price is over $100. In both cases, you’ll be choosing the discount with the higher number which inflates the perceived magnitude of your discount.
Tools, apps, and links mentioned: * Complete Guide to Psychological Pricing * Paul Lee: The Williams-Sonoma Bread Maker: A Case Study * Bump Sale * Pricing Psychology
Take Action Download our pricing calculator to work through an exercise to help you determine a pricing structure using the tactics we discussed today.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or to go our Facebook group here (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Are you looking for the best social media promotion tools in 2018? We share our favorite social media scheduling tools, graphic design tools, and video creation and editing tools.
Listen to the podcast to hear about what we consider the best social media promotion tools in 2018 to help you manage post scheduling, design graphics and promote and create your videos.
Scheduling Tools * Buffer – Allows team sharing in the pro version for an overview of what’s going out and who put them in, but they also have a free version for individuals. It also suggests the best times to post. One drawback, Buffer doesn’t offer the ability to connect with your followers through one dashboard. * Hootsuite – Allows you to follow keywords and hashtags and jump into the conversations in social media. The pro account allows you to add team members. * AgoraPulse – Great for different types of scheduling, evergreen tweets and recurring tweets. * ManageFlitter – Analyzes your Twitter account to tell you the best time to tweet. They also have a lot of amazing features beyond scheduling. * SocialJukebox – Great tool for scheduling evergreen tweets where you add it once and and it resends periodically on autopilot.
Graphic Design Tools * Canva – Use this tool to put together banners, graphics and social media posts. They have great customizable templates you can use to create any graphics you need. They also have a lot of stock photos to choose from that are free or cost only $1. * Adobe Spark – They have an app and desktop version. This tool is great to create graphics with quotes, but they also have many templates to use and make designing graphics really easy. * SnagIt – This tool allows you to grab screenshots, crop and adjust photos. Plus you can make short screen recordings and edit photos. * DepositPhotos – A photography and stock photo collection for purchase to use in your content. If Advances Tip: If you watch for them, AppSumo offers a pack of 100 photos at a discount a few times per year and the credits never expire.
Video Creation and Editing Tools * Lumen5 – It automatically takes your blog RSS feeds and Lumen5 creates quick video promos you can pin. This is a great tool do create a quick and easy promo video. * iMovie – Comes with Mac products and is really easy to use. * Apple Clips – This is another Mac product. You can make a video through the app and as you’re talking, it creates the captioning. * YouTube Captions – Upload your video to YouTube and use the “add captions” setting, then download it back out of YouTube. * Filmora – A great editing package that’s really easy to use and very intuitive. They also have free editing packs available to download. * Camtasia – A great, robust video editing tool available on PC or Mac. Videos can be uploaded, saved as an mp3, strip the audio and convert it to a podcast. * Viddyoze – They have a marketplace where you can find an intro / outro bumper for a fee. * BlueJeans – Beyond going live on social media, this tool is great for streaming at a low bandwidth. You can also add guests to your video. * BeLive.tv – This is a great tool for streaming to Facebook. It’s affordable and easy to use. It has great features and also allows you to add guests.
Apps, Tools and Links Mentioned: * Buffer * Hootsuite * AgoraPulse * ManageFlitter * SocialJukebox * Canva * Adobe Spark * SnagIt * DepositPhotos * AppSumo * Lumen5 * iMovie * Apple Clips * YouTube Captions * Filmora * Camtasia * Viddyoze * BlueJeans * BeLive.tv
Take Action Join us in our Facebook community and share YOUR favorite tools for promoting your community online.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go to our Facebook group here. (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
There have been a number of changes at Instagram that impact your community. Learn about all the new features and the ones that are coming up in the near future.
Instagram is burning it up with new features. The changes at Instagram seem to be coming almost every week. If you aren’t using Instagram regularly, you need to get started. Instagram is a fun platform with a lot of fun features. In this episode, we’ll go over some of the newest features and talk about the best ways to use them.
List of Changes at Instagram that Will Impact Your Community Re-sharing Feature in Stories This is a new feature that allows you to re-share within your account without using a third-party app. It’s similar to a retweet in Twitter. It shares the post to your story.
- It turns a photo into a sticker and inserts it into your stories.
- It’s a great way to connect with people more.
- The tagging feature doesn’t always work, so you may have to do it manually if it doesn’t do it automatically.
- Access your settings from your profile screen if you don’t want others to share your photos in their stories and turn the feature off.
Story Camera Features It’s challenging to perfect the art of the perfect 15-second story, but there are apps like Storeo that can help with recording it. Here is a list of some of the features inside the Instagram camera.
- Type allows you to create a screen with text to describe what you’re talking about in your story. This can be added to a highlight (see the bottom of story for more about highlights) and serve as a cover page to tie your stories together, get responses from people and spark conversation.
- Live, which is the livestreaming option, can also be saved into your highlights which will build your relationship and help with community building.
- Boomerang is an oldie but goodie. It records for 2 seconds and then loops.
- Superzoom zooms in on something and adds special elements like stars and colors.
- Focus is a portrait feature which blurs the background of your photo or video and makes the subject of the video stand out.
- Handsfree is a feature that gives you 15 seconds handsfree video without having to hold the button down.
- Rewind allows you to play a recorded video backwards.
- Stop Motion takes bursts of pictures and strings them all together.
Stickers in Stories After you’ve taken a photo, you have a number of options you can use “like” stickers, freehand drawing, and text. You can use stickers or text to mention someone in your story. Clicking on the @mention will take you to the person’s profile.
- Slider Polls allows you to insert a basic “yes or no” poll in your story. You can also input your own short answers to choose from, but you’re limited on space and may only use two.
- Hashtag Stickers allows you to quickly add a hashtag to your story. Also, you can now follow a hashtag on Instagram.
- Location enables you to share your location wherever you’re at- your neighborhood, a place of business or event. It gives people in the area the ability to see your posts based on your location. If people are looking at stories by location, it’s likely they will see yours.
Instagram Highlights This new change at Instagram is available, but underutilized. The Highlight feature allows you to extend your stories past 24 hours. Highlights appear as a circle on your profile page under your bio. People can see about 4-5 of them, though you can add more that people can swipe to see. You can use a text or emoji title up to 11 characters. Use Highlights to show off your very best content.
Upcoming Features Instagram will likely be launching the following changes at Instagram in the near future.
- Time tracking app
- Online Payment Market
- Muting users
- Tagging Facebook
- Video Calling
- Slow-mo
- Calendar View
- Floating Emoji Reactions
Listen Now We recently interviewed Sue B Zimmerman, who specializes helping business owners to grow their Instagram accounts, about how to use Instagram for communities. Listen to her insightful episode.
Links to Tools and Resources Mentioned: * Instagram Now Lets You Share Other People’s Photos in Stories * Instagram is letting users share posts directly to their stories * Instagram officially launches re-sharing of posts to Stories * Storeo for Instagram * What Is Instagram’s Emoji Slider Poll? This New Feature Is Making Stories Even More Interactive * How to use the ’emoji slider’ on Instagram * Instagram will soon show users how much time they spend in the app * Instagram is Bursting into the Online Payment Market * All the new rumored Instagram features that might kick Snapchat’s…
Take Action We have been testing these new features and have made them into a Highlight on our Instagram. Check out our IG profiles and look for CTC Podcast to view them. @kamichat @madalynsklar
**How to reach Kami:** If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go to our Facebook group here. (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Have you ever wondered why someone that seems new on the scene seems to come out of nowhere to become an overnight success? Or is it just a myth of overnight success?
In this episode, we talk about the myth of overnight success and share some examples of people who appear to be overnight successes in social media marketing, but who really built their skills the old-fashioned way. By hard work.
Episode Highlights:
Here are a few people that Madalyn and Kami watched as they came on the scene and heard people say were “overnight successes.” You can read their back stories on the links to see that they were anything but. They did leverage all of their experiences before, and some were even well known in other industries.
- Brian Fanzo got his start in Meerkat, which was a live stream program that was crushed by the release of Periscope. Brian took advantage of the live streaming technology to get widespread recognition. He was at the right place at the right time, getting seen by all the industry experts. They took notice of him, and next thing you know, he was speaking across the world. Before he broke out on the online marketing scene, he has a successful career in Cybersecurity.
- Sunny Lenarduzzi is a YouTube star doing business to business videos starting her career in news media. She started working for a news organization and knew how to be on camera in a good way. Moving away from that, she used Periscope and YouTube to talk to her audience and expanded into the videos she does today. She collaborated with others to do a promo with Applebee’s which was marketed really well and was really successful with over 1 billion impressions. (Related: Listen to a recent episode with Sunny about how to rock YouTube).
- Mike Stelzner rocketed to the top and is known as the CEO of Social Media Examiner which is a blog dedicated to social media marketing. He also has the largest social media podcast called The Social Media Marketing podcast. Here is what Stelzner did before he took the social media blogging world by storm. He was known for being the Whitepaper expert, and he helped many companies write these persuasive essays to build their business and wrote books about it. Hard work made it easy to pivot into a new, but closely related industry.
Are you ready to find your path to success like Brian, Sunny and Mike. We went over a few keys to get there, but it probably won’t get you there overnight.
Be Consistent * If you lose your consistency, you lose your voice. * Choose your platform and show up every day. * Check in on your secondary platforms and find a frequency you can adhere to.
Let Your Work Speak for Itself * Keep your work at excellent levels and people will take notice. * People are always looking for good content, fresh ideas and things to talk about.
Don’t Compare Yourself to Others * You have something specific to give. Figure out what that is, then share it. * Look at your competition, audit them and find a gap that isn’t being covered, rather than compete with them.
Be Head Down and Focus on You * What can you bring to the table that’s different? * Take courses and listen to books to better yourself and learn more.
Collaborate, Collaborate, Collaborate * Find opportunities to partner up with someone in your network and collaborate on something together. That is how we started this podcast. * Build on your relationships to find common interests. * Tap into your network to start a new project, write a blog post or start a podcast.
Tools, links and resources mentioned: * Audible * Blinkist * 10th Annual Social Media Marketing Industry Report
Take Action Come and discuss overnight success with us in the Facebook Group. Who do you think of as an overnight success? Do some research and get the backstory and we bet that you will find years of work behind them.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go to our Facebook page here. (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
We cover the latest Twitter changes and how they will impact your business. There have been many tweaks to the service over the past few months as Twitter works to solve its persistent spam and trolling issues.
Episode Highlights: * Twitter is growing again, adding 6 million users over the last quarter. They have now been profitable for 2 quarters–the first time they have been profitable in the company’s history. * During the first quarter of the year, Twitter says it removed 142,000 apps using its API that violated developer rules and were responsible for 130 million “low-quality” tweets in that three-month period. * Twitter also started enforcing its new terms of service on Friday, March 23, 2018, which prohibits cross-posting the same tweet across multiple accounts, “with an intent to subvert or manipulate the topic, or to artificially inflate the prominence of a hashtag or topic.” + Service providers have changed how they work to comply with these rules. + Duplicate tweets on a single account repeatedly using the same hashtag or text in a spammy manner isn’t allowed. + Using multiple accounts to artificially inflate a specific tweet or hashtag will not be allowed.
- Major changes to the API are coming which has left developers and third-party app developers worried about how the changes will affect streaming and push notifications. Twitter has stated that they will provide a 90 day notice.
- Auto DM’s are out. Third party tools that offered this had to deactivate it effective October 12, 2017.
- It’s rumored that Twitter is opening up to verification of all users to combat the bot problem. Verification will be indicated by a blue check mark.
Account users that don’t log in and accept Twitter’s new terms may be deactivated. If you’re using a lot of third-party apps and don’t often go into your native Twitter account, look for a notice from Twitter in the next few months.
Are the Twitter changes a good idea? * Twitter has needed some changes to combat the bots and other spammy issues like auto DM’s. * Too much auto DM spam leads to missed opportunities. You can look forward to spending less time cleaning filtering through those messages. * There’s a good opportunity to have better communication on Twitter if automation is more limited and it makes you think more about what you’re sending out. * One concern is that the shelf life of a tweet is very short and the percentage of followers that will see any given tweet is low, leading people to want to send out multiple duplicate tweets several times per day to hit all of the time zones and reach more people. This approach will need to be rethought, perhaps Twitter will give tweets with more interaction a longer life in the feed?
How will Twitter work to eliminate spam and bots? * Twitter uses an algorithm where if you’re reported as a spammer or you trip one of their machine learning algorithms, you may not show up in the feed. * The amount of time that must exist between identical tweets isn’t clear, from 24 hours to a week. No one really knows and Twitter has been silent about it. Either they don’t want anyone to know or they can’t police it. * They’re trying to avoid Twitter farms where people use multiple accounts to reinforce other accounts or mount an activist campaign. * When Twitter turned off auto DM’s there was an obvious change, but other changes haven’t seemed as noticeable.
How does duplicate tweeting impact Twitter chats? Well, we aren’t sure yet, but…
- There aren’t many duplicate tweets in Twitter chats outside of the generic duplicate, reminder type tweets from the host.
- Twitter chats with trending hashtags and retweets may become a gray area which will present questions.
- And perhaps new machine learning will cut down on hashtag spam in chats.
Tools, links, and resources mentioned: * Twitter Makes Changes to Combat Spam: Here’s What You Need to Know * The Twitter Rules * Automation and the use of multiple accounts * Twitter changes may bring major issues for third-party apps * Twitter’s user numbers are growing again * Twitter Wants to Verify All Users as a Way to Prove Identity * Twitter can’t decide if it wants to kill third-party apps * API changes will break Tweetbot and Twitteriffic alerts and streaming, Twitter not yet sharing new solution * Madalyn’s FB Live with Emeric * Important Update On Statusbrew For Twitter * Twitter takes new measures to quiet trolls, spammy content
Take Action Share with us in our Communities That Convert Facebook community and tell what you think about the changes on Twitter. And we’d like to know how are you consuming Twitter. Are you using the native app and website or 3rd party tools? We have a poll in our Facebook group. Please take a moment to let us know how you’re using Twitter.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or just click here. (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
We cover the latest Facebook changes that will impact your business. There are some big changes happening on Facebook right now, so you know how, when and if they will affect you.
What happened with Facebook January 11th and what has been the fallout? * Mark Zuckerberg made a big announcement that has since changed the way that posts are shared with your friends and family. * With the change in the algorithm, came some revealing issues that have Facebook in some trouble. * Data has been misused by third-party applications like Cambridge Analytica, and Mark Zuckerberg had to answer to Congress about how that information was shared. * The privacy settings on Facebook were overhauled to make them easier to use so you can now see all of your privacy settings in one place. Click here to review your privacy settings on Facebook.
How does this change at Facebook impact you? * Outside of Facebook, you may experience less functionality to engage with friends in third-party apps. * Facebook ads will still be available and unchanged. * Other non-US countries may move more quickly to protect privacy. GDPR is a new standard in the UK where certain rules apply to recipients in the UK. For more information, read Kirsten Oliphant’s great post about this and listen to the Podcast, see the link below. * Facebook is shifting to a focus on groups, community building and authentic connections. They’re pushing for tighter connections and an extra layer of relationship beyond sales. * The more you build relationships, the better you’ll perform in any social media channel
“At its best, Facebook has always been about personal connections. By focusing on bringing people closer together — whether it’s with family and friends, or around important moments in the world — we can help make sure that Facebook is time well spent.” – Mark Zuckerberg
What are authentic connections on Facebook? * If friends join communities together, they will get notifications when their friends post in the group. * Asking questions on Facebook is currently driving engagement, but currently, adding links lowers the effectiveness of the post. * It is important to make sure the people in your groups understand that they are an essential part of the group. * Live streaming video drives engagement right now, especially when there is a lot of engagement such as comments, likes, and shares. * Non-salesy educational Facebook Ads or ads against already well-performing content will be served more often and better. Look at your well-performing content and run an ad against it.
What are inauthentic connections on Facebook? * Apps using your friends’ data to sell them stuff * Anything that requires an O-Auth with Facebook * Spammy or Sales Groups: Hate Groups, Low Quality, and Spammy Groups, Pay to Join Groups. * If you have a group as an add-on, make sure you have your course materials set up somewhere else like Thinkific or Kajabi, even if your community isn’t leaving Facebook to get the material. * Using Facebook Messenger in a spammy manner * Using Facebook Ads in a spammy way * Product and service sales groups
What is coming up in the near future on Facebook? * Rumors of a fee structure or ad cost for business groups. * Facebook will continue to be under pressure to clean up their act as it pertains to privacy and data. * Facebook will be making any changes needed to avoid regulation, so keep an eye on your account and in the Communities That Convert Facebook community for changes.
Tools, Resources, Apps, and Links Mentioned: * Facebook Privacy Basics Page * See where on Facebook you have been tagged * Facebook Announcement * What Facebook Says It Is Doing to Protect You * GDPR FAQS. Kristen Oliphant * Tips for GDPR Compliance and Why Data Matters * BeLive * Facebook Is Shutting Down Its API For Giving Your Friends’ Data To Apps * Thinkific * Disqus * Kajabi * ManyChat * Messenger Limitations for Chatbot Developers * Facebook is Not Allowing New Chatbots on It’s Platform * Announcement: The Messenger Bot Pause is Over
Take Action Share with us in our Facebook community what is working and what isn’t working in your Facebook marketing right now. Have you noticed a difference?
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go here. (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Have you been wondering how to launch paid communities and courses? In this episode we talk about a process to find the best idea for your paid and online courses, how to test and validate it, and build your communities and courses as you go.
You might want to launch a paid community or course but only have a general idea of what to teach. Listen to this episode to get tips on how to find your idea and develop it into a successful online course.
Discover the Perfect Idea for Your Paid Online Communities and Courses * Look to the questions that you are asked most by coworkers, clients, friends or in your community. * Look for trends. Madalyn discusses how she picked up on the number of women she talked with who reported they had never done a live stream video. She launched the Video Like a Rockstar program to help them master the technology and overcome their fear. * If you don’t already have a community to ask, join a group to see what others are talking about. You can also run a poll on Facebook or Twitter or search your niche on Quora see what questions people are asking. You can also read through complaints in your existing groups to see what questions and answers people have.
Beta Test and Validate Your Pilot Program * Test the idea by quickly launching a mastermind and ask people to validate it by charging a fee. * It’s easy for someone to say they’re interested in what you want to offer, but not everyone will be interested enough to pay for it. You validate your ideas by charging a fee, stepping back and waiting to see what happens. * Charge a lower fee to validate the idea, ask for testimonials and most importantly, feedback. Be flexible when doing your pilot program and listen to your students.
Build Your Perfect Paid Online Communities and Courses as You Go * If people want to continue beyond the initial offering, create a follow-up course or community that builds on the learning from the Beta launch. * When you’re launching, it’s a lot of work on the front end and you’ll spend a lot of time building your course. The beauty is that if you’re going to continue the course in the future, or build upon it, you’ve already done all of the hard work. * Poll students taking your course or students who have already completed your course what they would pay for it and let them guide you on pricing.
Repeat and Improve Your Paid Online Communities and Courses * Learn as you go. Start the Mastermind again, then feed into the ongoing community. Make changes as needed, repeat and build as your community leads. * Ask the community how they would like to proceed and grow. Listen and your students will help you. * Look at the big picture. People may sign up in mass initially, but you need to build a solid program and keep adding to it to make it better. Eventually, it’ll become a sustainable income source.
Take Action Go to our Facebook group and tell us what ideas you have for your own paid communities and courses. Let’s start a dialogue about your topic and get feedback from the group.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/communitiesthatconvert (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Today we have Sunny Lenarduzzi here to share her insights on how to build a converting community using YouTube. This is the final interview in our 6-part series about how to build a converting community online.
Sunny is an award-winning video, social media, and online business strategist. She’s worked with hundreds of clients across multiple industries – helping Hootsuite develop a YouTube series that increased subscriptions by 75% and Applebee’s hit 1 billion impressions in 1 day. Sunny was named one of 20 Must Watch YouTube Channels That Will Change Your Business by Forbes and she’s been featured on national radio, television and online platforms like Entrepreneur.com and The Huffington Post.
Question: Why do you like YouTube as a marketing tool? Answer: I ran a consultancy for years and was doing just Twitter and Facebook at the time and built successful campaigns. I had so many clients that I was feeling burned out and incapable of answering everyone’s questions.
At the time Periscope was the rage and my clients wanted to know how to integrate it into their strategy. I filmed a video to teach them what they needed to do, sent it to my clients and I woke up the next day to a couple thousand views of my video, hundreds of inquiries from across the world and inquiries in my email from people referencing my video on YouTube and wanting to work with me. It was a lightbulb moment and I started doing the videos each week based on my client’s questions about social media.
The next thing I knew, I had 50K subscribers in 12 months and I had reached over 3M people with my videos. YouTube changed my life and changed my business. In that one year I went from a tiny $50K consultancy business to a place where I hired a team of 10 people, we’ve launched a course and we continue to do high-level consulting. YouTube allowed me to reach the people on a mass scale and share my knowledge on a mass scale.
Question: How do you get people to follow you on YouTube and how do you build a community there? Answer: I always lead with education. I focus on the entrepreneur to help them build online businesses and market their businesses easier. The theme of the channel is to “be your own boss and build your own life” and I focus on a few factors each week to get found and build my subscriber base.
First and foremost is to answer Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ’s), which is how he whole channel started. I also focus on trending topics and hot content, books or materials that I can leverage to build traffic.
Going back to Periscope, I was the first person to make a video about it when it was trending which made the video popular. I also look to what my community is asking on a regular basis and what they’re talking about on other platforms to incorporate into my intel. Finally, I focus on keywords and crafting titles in a way that people are searching for them.
Question: How do you get people to take action and convert to a customer from YouTube? Answer: I have created a foolproof formula for entrepreneurs using YouTube to leverage their traffic and viewers and turn them into customers. You tell people what to do with a specific call to action that tells them where to go next and where to find you so you can nurture those leads to conversion.
Question: How are you using the various features of YouTube? Answer: When new features come out, I test them and try to think of unique and creative ways to use them. Because I don’t own YouTube, I don’t monetize my channel, but I leverage YouTube to build an email list that I do own and drive people to my products and services.
Be sure to join our Facebook group for more insider tips. Sunny has recorded a few tips just for our online community. Head over to the page to request access. The secret password is ACTION.
How to reach Sunny: * Website * YouTube * Facebook * Twitter * Instagram
Tools, apps and links mentioned: * Boss YouTube Checklist * Sunny Show Podcast
Take Action There are two key factors to succeeding on YouTube and every entrepreneur should be leveraging them. First, create a list of FAQ’s from your community, customers or clients and use those to create video topics. Grab Sunny’s Boss YouTube Checklist to get your YouTube Channel setup for success.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go here to our Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/communitiesthatconvert (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
One of the best ways to build a converting community by using content is still blogging. Our guest today talks about how she has used the Spin Sucks blog and the Slack App to build a vibrant community that converts into customers.
As part of our series on how to grow and monetize your business by providing huge value to your online community, we invited Gini Dietrich on the podcast to share her insights on using content to grow a community.
Question: Why do you still like Blogging as a marketing tool? Answer: It’s two things- it’s a creative outlet for me and it’s become its own brand and people expect it.
Question: How has blogging changed over the years? Answer: Blogging is a huge undertaking. I spend about 25 hours a week of my time with a team of four supporting the blog. But you don’t have to blog. You need to weigh it against the results you are looking to obtain.
There are other ways to build your brand awareness and credibility that you can use in addition to blogging, or even instead of it, like video, Facebook Live or Instagram Stories. You can embed these on your website or even on a blog-like news site.
Question: How do you build a converting community using content? Answer: Think PESO, starting with O for owned. Create content that answers the questions your audience has? What are competitors doing? What things do your sudience pay attention to?
The PESO (paid, earned, shared, owned) model was developed by Gini Dietrich and is now used widely by the Public Relations industry to describe the mix of communication that businesses should consider creating (see the links for more about the PESO model).
Question: What are some tips you have for someone who wants to start a blog? Answer: Consistency, consistency, consistency. If you decide to blog, choose a day or days of the week or month that you’re going to do it and be consistent.
Question: What would you say is the biggest advantage of blogging with all of the other channels available to us out there? Answer: It’s easy to optimize search results, but it allows you to think through issues and solutions and provide your best thinking which puts a human behind the brand and establishes credibility.
Question: How are you using Slack with your blog to drive conversions and engagement? Answer: I was looking for a way to engage the community and introduced Slack to test it and see if engagement and community could be built there.
The conversations on Slack are deeper, more thoughtful and respectful than on other social platforms. It has taken about a year to grow the engagement, but the conversion from the free community to the paid membership is 40%.
Question: What are you working on that you would like to share? Answer: The Slack community is free, growing and has great conversations happening. To join, go to https://spinsucks.com/spin-sucks-community/.
How to reach Gini Dietrich: Gini Dietrch is the Chief Executive Officer at Arment Dietrich, Inc., a virtual PR firm headquartered in Chicago. Inventors of the PESO Model, the agency educates PR pros and evolves the industry. She is also the author of Spin Sucks, a popular PR company.
- Website
Tools, apps and links mentioned: * PESO Model https://spinsucks.com/communication/pr-pros-must-embrace-the-peso-model/ * Spin Sucks Slack Community https://spinsucks.com/spin-sucks-community/ * 10 Ways to Come Up with Better Content Topics https://spinsucks.com/communication/content-topics-better-writer/ * Feature Content that Answers Questions for Better SEO https://spinsucks.com/communication/feature-content-that-answers-questions-for-better-seo/
Take Action Figure out what your audience is searching for, what questions they have and what their issues are and create content like a video, or guest post on someone else’s blog. Share what you are doing with us in the Communities That Convert Facebook group (request access with the password, Action).
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or just go here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/communitiesthatconvert (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
One way to grow a loyal community online is to take it offline. Social media can help you to build relationships with customers and fans, but there comes a time when that means you will need to bring it into the real world.
We came up with tips for how to grow a loyal community online and offline in a few different real-world scenarios and how you can use social media to build business relationships.
How to Grow a Loyal Community while Attending a Conference * When attending a conference use the designated hashtag on Twitter and Instagram. It’s a great way to connect with people in attendance and strike up relationships. * If you can’t attend a conference, use the hashtag to attend virtually, gather information and connect with speakers and attendees. Don’t be spammy, look for ways to add value. * Identify people you want to meet ahead of time to connect with them. Look at the speaker and attendee lists and monitor the hashtag before, during and after the conference. Make a Twitter list or subscribe to the event organizer’s list where available. * Do a really good job of “covering” the session of a speaker you want to meet with live tweeting, use their Twitter handle, and introduce yourself afterward.
How to Grow a Loyal Community at Monthly Professional Development Gatherings and Meetings * If you’re organizing a conference or event, be sure to research and identify one official hashtag to be used which will help bring everyone together. * Connect with attendees between events on social media. * Create a special Facebook or LinkedIn group to connect between meetings, speaking events or breakouts.
How to Grow Online and Offline Relationships with Your Work Team * Highlight the great work of your co-workers. This brings great recognition for the both the company and the employee. * Start a Slack Channel to connect with employees, quickly share information and build bigger communities among your team in a less public way. * Plan events and highlight them in Instagram or Facebook Stories so the public feels the company is relatable.
How to Grow a Loyal Community During Cultural or Sporting Events * Use the hashtag associated with the event, if one was provided by the organizer or is adopted by people attending, to connect and build community. * Connecting during these events is an easy way to build relationships with people with similar interests.
How to Grow a Loyal Community While Watching a Television Program * Television shows really get the fact that people love to watch shows “together” on a second screen using a hashtag and are starting to encourage it by providing the hashtags in a lower third during the program. * Use the show’s hashtag to chat with people in real time while watching a show. * Look for opportunities to connect with television cast members between episodes. Marcus Lemonis from CNBC’s “The Profit” does Facebook Live posts from his Facebook page in between commercial breaks to chat with his community. * Make a Twitter list of people whom you connect with as you watch your favorite show and reconnect week-to-week.
Take Action At the next upcoming event, whether you are going in person or not, follow the hashtag and interact in one of the ways we mentioned in this episode.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or go directly to our Facebook group (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Most people feel a little uncomfortable about promoting themselves or their business. We asked people why they felt that way and came up with the following 7 Steps to Promote Your Business Without Being Spammy.
Why are we so uncomfortable promoting ourselves and our businesses online? We asked entrepreneurs, “Are you uncomfortable promoting yourself and what you are doing on social media channels? If so, why?”
These are some of the responses we got:
- I’m getting over being camera shy
- I’m not worth it
- I always get nervous to over-share
- Impostor syndrome
- I don’t want to sound braggy
- I really thought people didn’t care about what I had to say
- I didn’t want to add to the noise
- Fear of what others will think
- Fear of rejection
- I’m not doing much special
- I hate feeling markety and self-promotional
- Those who self-promote seem less genuine
- I’m very cognizant of making sure I’m contributing more than I’m asking for
- Self-deprecation is my superpower
Do any of these reasons ring true for you? Let us know in the comments.
“I hear this so much, especially from women. I try to gently remind them that they are really promoting the good they can do in the world, not themselves as selves per se.” — Laura J Fitton
Do we have the wrong idea about promotion? If so how do we do it the right way?
What steps should you take to feel more comfortable about promoting yourself? 1. Practice in a safe environment like a sandbox or private group 2. Get an accountability partner 3. Get clear about your message and what you want people to do to help themselves and help them overcome their challenges 4. Ask how you can help others, rather than asking them to help you 5. Always add value first 6. Keep it short, clear and to the point 7. Practice daily because practice makes perfect and with time, you will get more comfortable
Don’t hold back if you’re nervous about doing video. Practice really helps. Remember, we all have something to share with the world. Just do it!
“You have a light and you have a responsibility to spread that light.” — Kim Garst
Tools, apps and links mentioned: * Facebook Post That Created This Episode * Madalyn’s Video Like a Rockstar Program
Take Action Write down one thing that people usually come to you for help about, even if you think it is nothing. Then jot down your best advice and come share it with us in the Facebook group. Share your light with us!
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or join our community on Facebook, https://www.facebook.com/groups/communitiesthatconvert. (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
This episode is a part of our series on how to build a converting community on Facebook. Zach Spuckler outlines how you can effectively use Facebook, even with the recent changes.
Kami is a part of Zach’s paid private Facebook community and asked him to join us and share some of the things that he is doing to maintain a thriving business using Facebook, and how he uses this platform to build a converting community on Facebook.
Read the details in our show notes. You'll also get access to all the links we discussed in this episode.
About Zach Spuckler, Heart Soul and Hustle Zach Spuckler is an online business strategist.
- In under a year, he built a 6-figure business that allowed him to leave school, quit his job, and become a full-time entrepreneur;
- He coaches clients to create 5-figure launches by leveraging Periscope & Facebook Ads; and
- Serves as a consultant to 6 and 7-Figure entrepreneurs who are ready to grow their businesses using social media and live streaming.
Take Action
Head over to Zach’s page to get his free Facebook ads training heartsoulhustle.com/fbads. And if you know you need to be doing live Facebook video, but don’t know where to start, sign up for Madalyn’s Video Like a Rockstar wait list.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or “Join Our Free Community” here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/communitiesthatconvert. (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Continuing with our series on how to build a converting community and monetize by providing huge value, we invited Sue B Zimmerman to share her incredible insights on how to build a converting community on Instagram.
We asked Sue some questions about how she built her business using Instagram and she shared some of her secrets below.
You are also going to want to hear some of the extra things she shared in our our free Facebook community. You can listen to those extra “off the script” tips here.
Question: Why do you like Instagram as a marketing tool? Answer: It was born organically out of a small business I had on Cape Cod. I didn’t just wake up and decide to be an Instagram expert- I used it in my store to grow an authentic community around the products that I was selling. Back then, I used all social media, but specifically focused on Instagram because my kids were on it at the time and I knew that they were setting the trend. I just loved it for so many reasons. I’m a visual person, artistic, creative and I love connecting with others and really growing an authentic community. There is no other platform that can set your community on fire if you do it right.
Question: How do you get people to follow you on Instagram and do you build a community there? Answer: It’s not straightforward. I’ve been on this platform for over 5 years and I’ve done a lot of trial and error in terms of posting strategy. I finally figured out the groove that works for me. I have a personal account that depicts a successful small business owner in Boston. On my business account, I teach daily Instagram tips, strategies and tactics.
You have to understand your hashtags and have a posting strategy that aligns with your business, brand and core values. The gold is in the engagement, not the posting. Otherwise, you’re missing out on the community building opportunity. The one to one conversations is what leads to conversions. Building that trust makes people want to do the thing or call to action I’m requesting.
I want people to feel like I’m leading with nurturing. Nurturing is building that trust, caring, listening and telling that person what they need based on the way they’re engaging with you. This is not a tool you can automate or systemize, you need to keenly focus in on people.
Question: How do you get people to take action and convert to a customer from Instagram since you can only use links in your profile? Answer: There are a few opportunities to convert. If you have 10,000 followers or more on a business account, you can swipe up. In Instagram direct messages, links are live. If you have a conversation with someone and they’re interested in something, you can drop a link there. You need to have a real conversation, not just send them a message to sell.
Question: Why are hashtags so important on Instagram and how do you use them? Answer: Check out the Hashtag Handbook. The riches are in the niches. You don’t want to use general hashtags with a lot of views. You want to find the ones that match up to the number of likes you’re getting on your pictures. Hashtags related to locations or events you attend are good options. Follow a hashtag to see what content is being curated to test if it’s right for you and your business. General or popular hashtags attract spammy people, comments and bots. Typically, 7-12 hashtags are enough for an account, but it will vary based on your business, so experiment to see what works.
Question: How are you using the various features of Instagram: Lives, Stories and Highlights? Answer: I am that entrepreneur that like to be the first one to try everything. I love highlights and I’ve branded mine in both my personal and business profiles. Highlights sit right below your bio and is the best real estate on Instagram. You need to strategically think about what you business highlights should be. I have my blog, tips, my show, a free download to my guide that gets you going on Instagram, my latest blog post and “Meet Sue B”. I want people to know who I am and I highlight based on that. Every blog day, I do an animated GIF and then I go live on Instagram at 9pm EST. I condition my audience to tune in live and get about 200-400 people. With stories, you don’t want to do heavy graphics and posts just to do them. You have to figure out what your voice is and show your true personality. If you’re going to do promotional in your stories with highly curated graphics, you should get on a video and show your audience your personality.
Question: Can you tell us about your new Facebook show? Answer: I decided in year five of teaching Instagram that I don’t just teach, I actually do more coaching and teaching business strategies. We created something around that part of my personality, and what I love doing, which is helping people make money. It took us a year to plan The Social Sip. It is a high-energy, fast-paced 30 minutes with segments and a theme for every show. We want people to walk away and take action on what I’m teaching.
About Sue: Sue B. Zimmerman is an insightful, energetic and in-demand social media educator, speaker, and business coach. Sue’s blog was ranked as one of the Top 10 social media blogs in 2017 by Social Media Examiner. She is also one of the most popular CreativeLive instructors and has been named by Huffington Post as one of the “Top 50 Must-Follow Women Entrepreneurs”. Sue is driven to help business owners leverage the power of Instagram to meet (and exceed) their business goals. As a lifelong entrepreneur, she has over 30 years of business experience. And, with her extensive knowledge and implementation of social media, it is Sue B.’s mission to teach, mentor, and empower others.
Take Action Go listen to an episode of the Social Sip episode by subscribing here. Share one of the things you learned from the show on Twitter or in the Communities that Convert Facebook group.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or just “Join Our Free Community” on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/groups/communitiesthatconvert. (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Adel de Meyer shares her tips to build a converting community on Twitter. She shares tools and techniques she has used to build a strong online brand and company.
This is a part of our series on how to grow and monetize by providing huge value to your online community. Today, we have a special guest for you. We are excited to have Adel de Meyer with us today to talk about Twitter.
Adel de Meyer is a Social Media and Brand consultant, brand ambassador, author and mentor with a top-listed digital and tech blog. She’s recognized as a leading Instagram and Twitter influencer on social media and business in Australia and around the world.
You are going to want to join our Facebook community too because, in addition to this value-packed episode, we will also share “off the script” tips ONLY in the Facebook group.
Question: Why do you like Twitter as a tool to build a Converting Community? Answer: Twitter is a mindset that people are friends, they’re open and approachable. It takes time to get adjusted to the platform, but once you’re comfortable you can utilize Twitter as a tool to build fantastic friendships and also to generate leads and convert people into customers.
Question: How do you get people to follow you on Twitter? How do you build a converting community there? Answer: You have to start with a strategy, deciding you want to use Twitter as a lead generation tool, take time to really engage, find people to follow, start conversations, find amazing content to share and look up Twitter chats in your niche. People pick up on your engagement, so it’s more than pushing content. You have to actually engage so the Twitter algorithm favors you so you’re more discoverable. Always be yourself and provide value, not showing up to sell or self-promote. Engage in chats and ask questions, making time to become part of the community. With constant engagement, you can slowly build on that support and see the results of your engagement.
Question: How do you get people to convert to a customer from Twitter? Answer: They key is starting with a good bio and intro. Then make sure any links you share for your website or other site are working by periodically testing them. Think about if a person wants to work with you, where do you want to send them? Optimize your profile with a good banner and profile picture. Use tools like Hootsuite, Talkwalker or Twitter Advanced Search to search for conversations and keywords that you can jump in on.
Question: How are you using the various features of Twitter: Moments, Lists, Polls and Video? Answer: Adel talks about the power of a feature on Twitter called “Moments” (see links to all of our Moments at the bottom of the post) and how Twitter algorithms are working to provide feed notifications for given topics. You can make moments about your fan shout outs or portfolio. Lists can be used to keep track of friends, influencers and clients. Nimble is CRM software that can be used with a Chrome extension while you browse Twitter. It will pull through all of a person’s information and build lists to email or track them. Polls are used for business questions, fun questions or research to find out what people are interested in. Videos are automatically played through Twitter Ads. Of all the Twitter features, Adel finds the most value in the List function and how it can be used with other integrations.
Question: Is there something you’re working on that we can highlight? Answer: Adel recently kicked off a new partnership with a social media peer, Shane Barker who offers content and influencer marketing solutions. They’ll be offering content solutions such as infographics, PR, copywriting, block content and the whole overall package. Check it out here at Content Solutions.
About Adel Adel de Meyer is a Social Media Specialist, live streaming show host, author and mentor. Adel works with entrepreneurs, startups, personal brands and business owners to identify opportunities within Social Media and how to use Social Media as a marketing and relationship building tool. Adel is listed as a Top 10 Social Media influencer in Australia and in the Top 100 Social Media influencers globally. Adel is ranked by Dr Jim Barry as a Top 20 Social Media Coach. Her blog is recommended as a Top 25 Social Media blog by Post Planner.
How to reach Adel: If you’d like to learn more about Adel de Meyer, visit her website at http://www.adeldemeyer.com. You can also tweet her @adeldmeyer
Take Action Build a private Twitter List of 20 people that you’d like to get to know in the next 20 days. Make a goal that every day, you communicate with one person on that list.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or “Join Our Free Community” at https://www.facebook.com/groups/communitiesthatconvert (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
We are starting a deep dive into what you need to know about how to make money on social media by monetizing your community.
This episode outlines the overall philosophy for building a HUB Community, which will give you platform from which to eventually sell your product or service. We will cover specific tactics from four major social media platforms: Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and YouTube. In each episode, we will teach you strategies for how to make money on social media by growing an engaged online community.
We have already interviewed a few of these well-known experts, including Adele DeMeyer, Sue B Zimmerman and Zach Spuckler. All of these experts have built vibrant online communities and have monetized them in different ways.
The HUB Community Building Approach In the HUB Approach, you will build a niche online community around a single idea or need and provide all of the tools your community members need to succeed with the following four strategies. By doing this, you create a community that is willing to pay you for your knowledge and assistance.
Strategy 1: Create a Path of Value * Define what you want people to do, then build a path of value that leads them there. * Start with the end in mind and what outcomes you want for your community or problems that you want to solve. * Whenever you’re creating something, keep the outcome in mind, think about any objections people in the community may have for not achieving that outcome and build that into your product. * Building lead magnets, create free trainings or run challenges that will help the community overcome any objections. * Position your end product as the next logical step. * Consider smaller products that assist in getting people to the end product. * In each positive interaction, you are building a relationship so that people get to know, like and trust you.
Strategy 2: Condition Your Community to Respond * People tend to be passive receptors of information, but they can be trained to be responsive. * Ask easy questions about specific things which encourage people to share or help someone else. * Ask them to respond to your email. Try different things to see what works best. * Send people personalized responses to model the behavior you want from them, and to indicate that you want to interact with them. * Dig deeper into a person’s responses by asking them to provide more context and ask follow-up questions that let them reveal what is truly holding them back in a specific area.
Strategy 3: Create Just in Time Systems * Create products and services that are highly responsive and meet a specific need in real time. * If you develop systems that make it easier for people to succeed, people will pay to learn them. * Solve one problem for your community at a time. You might not know the endpoint in advance and that’s okay. * As you solve problems, you will get a clearer picture of what people really need and you can create new products for them just in time.
Strategy 4: Monster Value Strategy * Create such a huge value that you have no problem asking for the sale and people will pay. * If you know what you have will help people and solve a real problem, it is much easier to charge for it. * It’s all about creating value, creating something that helps your community. * Have confidence in your skill, knowledge, and ability to offer value to your community. * Listen to what people want and only create products that people are asking you to create * Offer a beta, pilot or low-cost opt-in to a training or product to gain feedback and co-create the experience.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or “Join Our Free Community” to head straight to Facebook (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)! https://www.facebook.com/groups/communitiesthatconvert
Looking for how to build a brand community? In this episode, we look at how to humanize your voice to amplify your brand and build loyalty and brand advocates that buy your product or service.
Brands are people too.
Well, they aren’t really people, but they are made up of people, and understanding this fact is the key to building a community around your brand.
In this episode, we talk about how to humanize your brand on social media and go beyond the logo.
Introduce the people behind the logo.
- People want to talk to people, even if using the brand logo or avatar. This is especially true on social media.
- On Twitter, brand managers will often sign with their name or initials, which is a nice way of humanizing the post, even where multiple people are using the account. It’s nice because people know who they’re talking to.
- Brands can use and share user-generating content. Humanizing your brand to your community is likely a trend we’ll start seeing more of. For instance, Kraft used consumer-generated content for its Super Bowl ad this year.
Why do people associate with your brand?
- Companies brand phrases really well, like Nike’s phrase “Just do it”. Madalyn talks about her tattoo, which reads “Just Do It. This is a slogan for Nike, and when people see it, they take notice of it and associate it with the Nike brand.
- The feeling people get of association and connection is interesting. Connecting with someone in such a way that they tattoo a logo on their body is powerful. Not that you have to get people to tattoo your logo on the body, but it help to look at companies like Nike and Harley Davidson, to see what they are doing to ignite the passion of their fans around their brand.
"We find that the best way to build a brand community is by becoming a friend vs. just a follower."
How do you become a brand friend?
How Brands Can Be Friends with Followers: * Show your human side and connect with people person to person. Ditch the cold brand voice for a more personal tone. * Brands can become friends with their audience through creating delight and having genuine connections.
How followers can be friends with brands: * Kami and Madalyn discuss instances where people have used tweets to large brands, like Wendy’s or the Milwaukee Brewers to connect with some surprising outcomes. * When you tweet to a large brand, you’re talking to and connecting with someone behind the brand. You have to make your comment in a way that stands out.
Apps, tools and links mentioned: * Kraft Wants to Feature Your Family Photos In the Super Bowl * HELP ME PLEASE. A MAN NEEDS HIS NUGGS * Cookie-selling Girl Scout hits home run on Twitter * Social Connection Makes a Better Brain * The Center for Humane Technology
Take Action Share with @MadalynSklar and @Kamichat a brand that you think is really doing a great job of humanizing itself in social media. Tweet it to us using our new hashtag, #CTCPodcast
**How to reach Kami:** If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or click here to join our free community (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Have you been thinking about how to start a podcast? In this episode, we walk you through how we started ours and we put together a free quick start template to help you get started.
People have been asking us about how to start a podcast, so we have dedicated this show to sharing our insights after 6 months of running this awesome podcast.
How to start a podcast? * Choose a good topic and niche audience * Choose a launch date and stick to it * Create a title that will resonate with people * Research to ensure you can have a unique URL
How do you brand a podcast? * It’s important to have branding when you’re starting something new * Create artwork that reflects the podcast * Think about whether you want to use a graphic or a personal photo * You can always change artwork later if you decide to re-brand * Create a color palette * Look at other podcasts to see what grabs your attention and strategize what branding stands out
Where do you create a home for your podcast? * Consider if you want a website, using the URL you initially secured * Research platforms and consider the flexibility and functions you want
Do you need a team? * Think about the tasks you can assign to a team * Consider if you will do the podcast solo or with a co-host * Determining the format of the podcast with dictate the type of team you need * Your podcast production team may consist of a co-host, a virtual assistant, an audio engineer and/or a graphic artist
What kind of podcasts can you do? * Solo- Just you * Cohost- Conversational * Interview- Podcast guest speakers * Storytelling- NPR Style * Episodic- Seasons of topics * Sponsored – Advertisements built in
What tech needs to be in place? * If you have a computer or a phone, you can podcast. * Sound matters, it needs to be clean and crisp. For starters, you can look for the Audio‑Technica ATR2100 microphone. * You will need the ability to record video and audio recording. Try some of the tools below. * A hosting company is required for your podcast where you put your podcasts when they’re recorded. This is how your podcast becomes available for everyone to listen to. * You may want to hire an editor to edit and finalize your podcast before publishing.
Do you need an editorial calendar? * In episode 18, we talked about 5 ways to quickly create relevant content and make a great editorial calendar. Have an idea of what you’ll talk about well in advance. https://communitiesthatconvert.com/5-ways-to-quickly-create-relevant-content-ep-18/ * If you do a weekly or monthly podcast, you don’t want to reach the deadline and not have a topic prepared. * Without an editorial calendar, you’ll be inconsistent with publishing your podcast.
How do you promote your podcast? * Send an email out to your list
* Use social media to share with your community
Take Action Download the free Quick Start Podcast Template and share with us what type of podcast you plan to launch on social media, or in our Facebook group. https://socialstrategy.lpages.co/podcast-quick-start-template/
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or just click the “Join Our Community” below to head straight to Facebook (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
If you want to build an online community, first ask yourself these 5 questions. They will help you evaluate your current participation in online communities and help you find a niche to build your own.
If you are asking yourself if you should I build an online community, this episode is for you.
Remember, you can always find an existing community and in Episode 4, Getting the Most Out of Participating in a Community, we outline a few ways to do that. In the meanwhile, if you are feeling pressure to build an online community but aren’t really sure if you should, be sure to ask these five questions first.
5 Questions to Build a Community 1. Are you building an online community because everyone else is doing it?
- If you start something just because you feel like you should, you may later become resentful and lack the passion to make it move forward.
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It takes a lot of time and planning to build a community. Just because everyone else is doing it, doesn’t mean it’s right for you.
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Do you have a compelling reason to build an online community?
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It’s important to have a “why.” or an overreaching reason you are starting a new community – be it advocacy or business building.
- If it doesn’t come to mind exactly why you need to have a community, you may not need to have one.
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Surround yourself with the right people to build a community.
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Is there an already existing community that meets your needs?
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If there are already communities in existence that meets your needs and other’s needs, determine whether another community is needed.
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Consider not starting a community, but instead participating and investing in an existing community.
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Do you want to the be the market leader?
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If you aren’t the leader type, maybe you don’t need to build a community on your own. Instead become integral and useful inside an existing community.
- Helping a leader with their community is an opportunity to learn a lot, get a lot out of the experience and be seen.
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You don’t have to lead to become really well-known for what you do.
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Is the only metric you care about Return On Investment?
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When your primary goal is to make money as fast as you can, your community will recognize that you’re only trying to sell to them and they and won’t feel valued.
- It’s okay to make money from your community, but for the long gain, not the short gain.
Take Action Click here to get a copy of our Community Participation Audit Cheat Sheet to evaluate the communities that you are currently in and develop ideas for new communities that might add value. Share what you learned on our Facebook community page, or on Twitter. **How to reach Kami:** If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or just click here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/communitiesthatconvert. (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
Do you ever wonder how to find and participate in the best Twitter chats out there for your niche? In this episode, you will learn that and also how to participate in a Twitter chat once you find the right one.
Madalyn Sklar has started two successful Twitter chats and she shares her knowledge with us about, how to participate, etiquette and business benefits of participating in and starting Twitter chats. She’s also giving us access to a free resource, so tune in!
Question: What is a Twitter chat? Answer: A Twitter chat is a group of people coming together during a set time to have a conversation that revolves around a hashtag. As long as you include the hashtag in your tweet, you are part of the conversation. A Twitter chat is a way for people to meet up and have a conversation about a topic they are interested in. It’s bringing like-minded people together at a scheduled time, usually for an hour each week. Imagine you’re at a networking event with hundreds of people. In an hour you have the ability to walk up and say “Hi” to everyone.
Question: How do you find the best Twitter chats? Answer: It’s not always easy and there’s no single directory that has every Twitter chat in it. Just Google search for the topic you’re interested in. Madalyn has compiled a list of the best Twitter chats for social media and marketing. Another way to find chats is through word of mouth or other friend’s tweets or a Google “Your Topic + Twitter Chat.”
Question: How can participating in a Twitter chat benefit your business? Answer: If you’re not participating in Twitter chats, you’re missing great opportunities to connect and engage with people in your industry. It’s a place where you can learn valuable information, share your expertise, be recognized as an expert, grow your visibility online and build your audience and community.
Question: What are some helpful Do’s and Don’ts? Answer: There’s a definite etiquette. Listen before jumping into the chat and you’ll learn quickly how to chat. Follow the lead of the chat host because they dictate the flow of the chat. Use an A and the number of the question before each of your responses. Don’t promote, this is not a place to sell. Instead, have an incredible Twitter bio and profile. Do share your insights, show off your knowledge and expertise. Be friendly to everyone on the chat. Have a browser tab open to the chat host.
Question: What are the benefits to starting your own chat? Answer: Running a Twitter chat gives you the opportunity to get seen as an industry expert and thought leader. It helps you to build authority and boost your brand awareness. Do research first to see if there are already Twitter chats in your market. If no one else is doing something that you’re an expert in, be the one to get out there and start the best Twitter chat in that category. If the market is oversaturated, go watch, participate, see what’s missing. You can still be successful by putting your own spin on it.
Question: How can people learn more about how to start the best Twitter Chats to build their online influence? Answer: Madalyn is building a free mini-course for that called, “Building Your Influence with Twitter Chats.” We will add a link to the show notes once it becomes available. In the meanwhile, you can visit her online courses page.
Tools, apps and links mentioned: * TweetChat * Hootsuite * The Very Best Twitter Chats for Social Media & Marketing * ChatSnap Twitter Chat * Building Your Influence with Twitter Chats * Madalyn Sklar’s Online Courses
Take Action Find the best Twitter chat related to your industry with topics and guests that resonate with you and participate in the chat. Be sure to tag us when you do @kamichat and @madalynsklar. How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join Our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join or click here to “Join Our Free Community.” (shhh. The codeword is ACTION)!
In this episode we talk about content and how reuse, recycle and repurpose content you've already created into brand new content across social media channels.
Keystone Content is content you’ve spent a lot of time working on and thinking about and delivering through social media, books, blogs, videos, podcasts, presentations, white papers, reports or speeches.
Reusing Content * Repost your content from your blog onto LinkedIn Pulse (Pro Tip: Be sure to reference where it was first published) * Repost a video from YouTube directly into Facebook * Upload a video from YouTube into directly into Facebook * Embed a YouTube video into a longer form blog post and crosslink * Embed a Facebook live video in a blog post (Pro Tip: You get credit in Facebook for views that happen on your blog) * Use clips of audio or videos from longer-form recordings * Promote all of these things across all social media channels
Recycling Content * Look for content on your blog or website that has done well and update it (use Google Analytics to find content that performs well) * If original content has great traffic, leave it in place and let people know it is updated * Write a new post with updated and link to it from a post that is getting traffic * If there’s no traffic on an old post, refresh the post and recycle it to use again
Repurpose Content * Capture shorter quotes from other long-form content * Make GIFS from a series of photos using GIF Maker * Use video clips from longer videos and live streams or audio clips from podcasts to use for social media * Put together a one-page cheat sheet from courses for a great piece of content based on something you’ve already created * Repurpose content from blog posts, webinars, podcasts or courses and think about how you can use it in other places.
Take Action Choose one piece of content you’ve already created and reuse, recycle or repurpose it to create new content and share it with us in the Facebook group. **How to reach Kami:** If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join!
Are you wondering how you find and engage and convert an online community strangers into happy and satisfied customers? In this episode we talk about how to determine your own niche market, create an interconnected community, and overcome the technical challenges.
On the podcast to help us with this discussion of how to turn strangers into customers is Todd Giannattasio, Founder of The Growth Suite, a company that helps businesses turn strangers into customers over at TheGrowthSuite.com.
The Communities That Convert website is set up on the GrowthSuite platform discussion has been helping us to set it up and get it running as Beta members of his community. We felt our audience would enjoy hearing some of his tips for getting started as an online entrepreneur.
Episode Highlights: Question: Tell us a little bit about Growth Suite, what it is and why you started it?
Answer: It’s a combination of membership training and tools for entrepreneurs and marketers who need to get their business going online. Todd has another done-for-you agency called Tresnic Media that offers high-ticket retainers to clients where we do all the marketing for them and that’s a struggle for many businesses to pay but the need is still there. TheGrowthSuite is a culmination of the same value proposition of Tresnic Media, helping businesses turn strangers into customers, but it’s at a lower-ticket subscription and available to virtually any entrepreneur to sign up and access.
Question: Can you talk about how you boil down your market niche and who you are helping?
Answer: Todd discusses how you provide the most value to people by narrowing down your niche. But it’s also important to do this one audience at a time, starting narrow, but expanding from there, starting with a specific audience and building audiences from there. Ask yourself, where can you provide the most value the fastest and who is going to be the most passionate about what you’re doing? Todd created a Message to Market Match Matrix worksheet for the Communities That Convert podcast audience. This tool will allow you to map out your audience, their problems, the outcomes you want to create for them and the transformation or benefits you can provide (see the links below to get to this resource).
Question: You are really great at making people feel like they are seen and valued. What is your philosophy for this?
Answer: Listen to your community to give value back and understand there’s a feedback group that helps you improve your business and your community. When you pay attention to what people are asking for, you make everyone feel like they’re part of something and the feedback helps build a better product.
Question: What do you think the hardest part is for entrepreneurs and what do you think they need help with to succeed?
Answer: It depends on the entrepreneur and the industry they’re in. Everyone’s entrepreneurial hurdles are different and that’s how TheGrowthSuite was born– as an answer to the entrepreneurs who have trouble with the technical setup and understanding of how to market their business.
Question: Can you talk a little bit about the service you’re providing to your community?
Answer: TheGrowthSuite offers a service which is essentially three parts to success: the toolset, the skillset, and the mindset. Todd is combining all those and bringing them together with TheGrowthSuite. The business gives access to its website platform, video training on website set-up and marketing campaigns, a marketing fundamentals masterclass, and worksheets and exercises. He also hosts a Facebook page and community where you can ask questions and join discussions.
Question: What are some of your tips for getting people to engage in your online community?
Answer: Todd says that you have to connect with other experts in the space to get in and ask questions, creating that a practice for members. Use email to fuel discussions and ask questions within the group that anyone can jump in and answer.
Guest Info Todd Giannattasio, Founder of The Growth Suite
- Facebook: Todd Giannattasio
- Instagram: @growthsuite or @tresnic
- Twitter: @growthsuite or @tresnic
- Todd’s Free Resources: Message to Market Match Matrix
Take Action Go get Todd’s free gift to our community, Message to Market Match Matrix. Do the exercise, then share how it went on our free Facebook Community. Click here, then give us the secret phrase (shhhh, the phrase is, “Take Action”)
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join!
To automate or not, that is the question?
Actually, it really isn’t the real question. The real question is how do I automate without losing my audience?
In this episode, we take an old measurement acronym and adapt it for how to automate SMART. See what we did there?
Automated Episode Highlights: Set it up. * Define what you are hoping to gain from the automation and choose tools that help you achieve your goals. * It’s not a good idea to set up your automation and forget about it. * Never automate your interaction with people. * Social Jukebox, Bulkly, RecurPost and CoSchedule are all tools that integrate with most social media platforms to help organize and automate your content. * Try video as a way to thank people for their engagement and connect with people.
Measure it. * Your automation tool should include measurement so you can see how it is working. * Before you start, have a measurement plan in place. * If you missed it or need a refresher, we discussed measurement in episode 21.
Activate and Automate. * Part of activating an automation is to watch it closely to see how it performs, which relates to your measurement plan. * Be on hand to interact with people. Be an active part of the automation and engage with people. Your participation shouldn’t be automated.
Refine it. * Make changes to what you are doing based on the results you are seeing. * Look at what is working and what isn’t to refine and further refine your automation. * Social media platform algorithms are ever-changing and what people see changes with that, so you may have to refine your efforts as a result.
Test it. * Check new ideas against the old and A/B test for best results. * Try different types of posts, different times of the day and different platforms to test what works best. * Never set it and forget it.
Links, Tools and Apps Mentioned: * Social Jukebox * Bulkly * RecurPost * CoSchedule * Commun.it * Episode 21: 6 Ways to Track Sales
**Take Action**
Set up an automation plan and let us know what tools you have decided to use and for what parts of your social outreach. Extra credit for a video!
**How to reach Kami:** If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join!
Don’t be afraid of the numbers, knowledge is power!
In this episode, we share the tools and methods to measure how well your community is doing.
Episode Highlights: 6 Ways to Track Sales Create an email list * Creating an email list helps you measure the movement of the needle. It helps you connect with your community better and grow relationships, but also helps you measure community analytics. * You can use your email list to measure analytics and experiment with what gets more clicks, different headline styles, images or no images, open rate and also track if your audience is responsive to your call to action. * Email is not dead and is a must for your marketing efforts.
Use UTM codes * See the link below to Google’s UTM Code builder by Google Analytics. Drop your website URL, a campaign source (your newsletter name) and campaign medium (set to email). You’ll want to include a note or slogan in your medium so you can associate and track where the traffic came from. * Another tool is PixelMe, a URL shortener you can use with retargeting campaigns on Facebook and Twitter, building a retargeting audience list in the background of people who have engaged or interacted with those accounts.
Set up a funnel * Kami has created a tutorial video for setting up a funnel in Google Analytics. See below for a link to the video tutorial. * Set up a funnel, establish a goal and monitor outcomes and measure the results of your goals.
Create supplemental content and measure download and conversion rates * Create supplemental content and measure the success of your sales from that content. * People want to work with you and they want to know how they can work with you. Madalyn discusses how she uses freebies and giveaways through Thinkific. * Adapt this to what you do, whether your product is a service or something physical. Think about who you’re trying to reach and what you can offer them. It doesn’t have to be a sale, it can be a download, a sign-up, changing behaviors or any actionable that you’re asking your audience to do.
Ask and keep track of how people heard about you * This may sound old-fashioned, but it works. You can ask on a prospect call or include a question in a web or sign up form. Kami uses this method of information gathering on the Zoetica website contact form. * Madalyn discusses how she connected with Jay Busselle and how he found her through the speaker list for Social Media Marketing World, looking for Twitter experts. He followed the Twitter chat and was inspired to start his own chat, Promo Chat which has been successful for over a year.
Create coupon codes * Creating a special coupon code for your community and using different ones for each touchpoint, especially for events, allows you to track the audience as they relate to the code. * Codes can be used with Thinkific for courses, Eventbrite for events and most merchant providers work with codes for sales as well.
Links, Tools and Apps Mentioned: * PixelMe * Buffer * Google Analytics * The Secret Sauce to Boosting Your Twitter Presence * Thinkific * Eventbrite * #PromoChat started by Jay Busselle
Call to action:
Tell us what method you are thinking of using, or already using, to track your sales for your community?
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join!
The more your community talks, the more they act. Today we’ll discuss strategies to get your community talking.
Episode Highlights: 1. Ask them questions
- Madalyn discusses how she uses this tactic using Twitter and Facebook polls to gauge what her community interested in, especially when working on new online courses.
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Ask your community what they want before you create things. Work on the offer that’s attractive to your community, something they really need and want.
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Create a Challenge Contest
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You can get people to act in a short period of time and get results.
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Madalyn discusses her experience taking part in Facebook challenges where the leader brings everyone together in a live discussion on the Facebook page and how it’s beneficial in making her feel like a part of the community.
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Live Streaming
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Congregate your community in one place using Twitter, Facebook live streams or Periscope, to get your community talking to one another.
- Madalyn hosts live streams after her #SocialROI and #TwitterSmarter Twitter chats. After the chat is over, she discusses the topic in more detail with a guest over the livestream.
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Kami highlights that moving a community to a live stream brings people together in a more intimate setting where they can more closely connect.
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Create a Leaderboard
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Kami discusses how she uses Grytics to create a group leaderboard and reward people for their participation. Leaderboards are a form of gamification, encouraging your community to connect. It also serves as a reward for the people that are active in the group.
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Social Media Marketing World conference uses a leaderboard based on the use of their official event hashtag. Madalyn talks about her experience at last year’s conference being in the top 10 of their leaderboard and how it gave her a sense of validation in her career.
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Hot-seat coaching
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Feature someone in your community to the rest of the community and then outline how they also can be featured.
- Use live video so your community can interact and ask them questions. Others can learn a lot from the interaction between you and a hot-seat coaching participant.
- Mastermind groups have hot-seat sessions to present issues and problems and the community will help by presenting ideas and opinions.
- Pat Flynn has a podcast called Ask Pat, where he answers questions from the community. To celebrate hitting 1,000 podcast episodes, he plans to do impromptu Q&A sessions in live coaching sessions in his Facebook group.
- Kami discusses a class a class she’s taking called The Experience Product Mastermind. She discussed a hot seat session she witnessed, and how everyone listening worked together to help come up with a name for the company of the student.
Links, Tools and Apps Mentioned: * Grytics analytics tool * Ask Pat Podcast * Social Media Marketing World * #SocialROI chat * #SocialROI “After” chat (Authentic Storytelling) * #TwitterSmarter * The Experience Product Mastermind * Todd Brown
Call to action:
Join the Communities That Convert Facebook Group to find out WHY they call Kami “Kamichat”. Go to www.communitiesthatconvert.com or sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join.
How to reach Kami:
If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn:
If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join!
In this episode, we are going to go a little deeper about how to build your community using joint venture partnerships.
In episode 8, we touched on using a Joint Venture as one of several other ways to grow and monetize your community. Then in episode 13, our guest Dorie Clark brought up Joint Venture partnerships as a way to get a lot of traction to build an income stream and grow your community fast.
Episode Highlights: For the purposes of this episode, we thought we would define the way that we are defining a Joint Venture partnership:
A joint venture partnership, or JV, is a business arrangement in which two or more parties agree to pool their resources for the purpose of accomplishing a specific task. This task can be a new project or any other business activity.
Four Types of Joint Venture Projects 1. Creating a New Brand or Product with Joint Ownership * Kami discusses how she has done this with Texas Travel Talk, working with a legal contract between two companies, Zoetica and Fran Stephenson’s company, Step In Communication. * Lisa Fraley provides online DIY collaboration templates to purchase for the protection of JV partners. You may also want to hire an attorney to be sure the contract meets the legal requirements of your municipality. 2. Offer a Free Webinar or Podcast to Someone Else’s Community * Madalyn talks about her recent JV with Marketo, teaching Twitter marketing on their webinar. * These opportunities can also lead to future ideas and content spinoffs. For Madalyn, the VP lead to writing for their blog and also taking a presentation and turning into a paid course. 3. Creative Collaborations * The idea for Communities That Convert was born on June 9th, 2017. Kami and Madalyn discuss how they came together and partnered for this podcast. * As you meet people, always be on the lookout for how you can collaborate and work with others. Don’t pass over potential opportunities. 4. Create an add-on as an affiliate * Build a community with someone else’s community and create or participate in an affiliate program. * Create supplemental content and offer it to another group for the “cost” of an email. * Kami highlights how GrowthHacks4Women grew from a Microsoft conference by offering a three-part mastermind and how a TexasTravelTalk.com community grew from scratch and used a more formal JV.
Tips and advice for establishing a JV * Don’t go it alone, expand your circle.
Look for ways to give to potential partners before asking for a partnership.
- Start small by doing a test or pilot and go from there.
- It doesn’t have to be a commitment.
Links, Tools and Apps Mentioned:
- Lisa Fraley Legal Templates
- Top Tips For Successful Community Building on Twitter
- June 2017 Social Media Breakfast Video
- November 2015 Social Media Breakfast Video
Call-To-Action:
Come up with a list of people who you’d love to work with. Send a tweet or email to each of these people. Send us a tweet about one of these people and why you admire them. Hint: this will get their attention. You can thank us later. Tweet us @madalynsklar and @kamichat. We want to hear from you!
How to reach Kami:
If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn:
If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join!
In this episode we share 5 ways to quickly create relevant content for your fans to share with you.
Episode Highlights: Mission Statement * What is your why? Who are you trying to reach? What are you trying to accomplish? * Have a clear and centralized theme to give people a reason to listen to what you have to say. This also helps you to create relevant content for your blog, social media channels, or videos.
The Communities That Convert Mission Statement:
Communities that Convert teaches online community leaders how to build, sustain and use a community platform to build their businesses.
Define who you serve. What do they need? * Who are you and who do you help? What problems are you solving for which audience? * Madalyn helps her community of social media marketers and managers through her Twitter Smarter brand. She discusses how her audience isn’t who she originally thought it would be. She emphasizes how important it is to listen to your audience.
Create Content Categories * Sub categories to your main topic for your blog, podcast or video program helps you to create content ideas and a calendar fast. It is also great for Search Engine Optimization as it consolidates your knowledge into buckets (hint: Google likes that) and allows you to cross-post between similar ideas. * In most WordPress sites your categories can be used as a sort of blog within the blog. Here is an example of how Kami uses categories to set aside posts about the Social Media Breakfast of Houston. * As an example, for Communities that Convert Madalyn and Kami created the following five categories to organize and plan content. You can click on the links below to see how the categories are starting to add up over time:
- Building and Managing a Community
- Sales and Marketing
- ROI and Measurement
- Participation and Engagement
- Tools
- Interviews
- Case Studies
Brainstorm Content for Each Category * Create specific content for each category. Organizing content categories helps create content that’s consumable by the people that care about it the most and in the ways that matters to them. * This method is a great way to see where there’s a lack of content, spread out content and share content in a methodical way. * Start Creating in Batches * Batch content ahead of time, writing a series and breaking it into separate releases for example. * Madalyn and Kami batch podcasts two at a time to stay ahead, do the background work, plan content, batch posts and plan social media.
Call to action: Tell us what your content categories are for your audience. Be sure to tweet us @madalynsklar and @kamichat and share your progress with us. We want to hear from you!
We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join.
Links Social Media Breakfast Category Blog
In this episode, we are going to share ways to build and market your community using email.
You would think that with the rise of social media, email would become less important. However, it is now more important than ever. Social networks are constantly changing the algorithms that deliver your content, but email, if done correctly, gives you a direct path to your audience.
Episode Highlights: * Connect with Your Tribe You have to have a way of connecting with your community and email is the best way to do it. Social media has visibility limitations and is always changing, whereas an email has a better chance of grabbing someone’s undivided attention.
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Make Sure Your Email Tribe Opts In It’s a privilege to land in someone’s email box. Be sure you have permission from the recipient and they have opted in. Don’t opt someone in and add them to your list automatically based on an email conversation or because they are a new client. Fewer open rates through your email provider equate to lower delivery rates. You want to attract people to your list that will open your emails so your overall delivery is as successful as it can be.
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Email Tools to Use Madalyn’s favorite email provider is MailChimp. They have a free account for people with 2000 or fewer subscribers and offer perks for small businesses that are just getting started. Kami also uses MailChimp for reminders, social media, and marketing events and ConvertKit for business-related email.
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Setting Up Your Email List Funnel Set up an email list funnel specific to your community. If you need a sense of how to set it up, sign up for our list and note the signup process. Also, see the four-step funnel process below.
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Using a Lead Magnet How do you get people on your list? It works best to offer people something when they sign up, like an e-book, checklist, lead magnet, freebie or another incentive. Think about what you can offer people to draw them in and encourage them to sign up. One example that Madalyn uses is her Secret Sauce as a Twitter lead magnet.
4-Part Quick-Start Email Funnel 1. Set up a Form Use your email provider to set up a form and place your sign up on your social media platforms or website. Promote it across your channels and ask your followers to sign up. 2. Welcome Email Set up a welcome email that is automatically sent to subscribers when people sign up for your list. Use this as an opportunity to tell them what to expect from you. 3. Thank You Page Create a “thank you” page on your own blog or website that has information about the community and provide a lagniappe or freebie for people. Also, you can add a goal on Google Analytics to see how many people convert and how effective your marketing efforts are. 4. Email Schedule Create a regular email schedule to send out to your community and be consistent.
Links, Tools and Apps Mentioned: * Leadpages * MailChimp * ConvertKit * AWeber * Infusionsoft * Drip * Communities that Convert Sign-Up * The Secret Sauce to Boosting Your Twitter Presence
Call-to-Action: Set up an email account with Mailchimp, ConvertKit or another provider. If you already have a list, set it up to send an automated email when people sign up if you haven’t already done that. Check your process by signing up yourself so you don’t miss anything. Be sure to tweet us @madalynsklar and @kamichat and share your progress with us. We want to hear from you!
How to Reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to Reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Join our Community We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join.
Today we have Kirsten Oliphant on the podcast to talk about collaborations. She is an author and blogger. She has a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing and is the leader of the CreateIfWriting podcast, website and online community. She is the author of 5 books, including her latest Creative Collaborations: How to Form Lasting and Lucrative Partnerships without Being Smarmy.
Episode Highlights:
- Kirsten has built a number of online communities. The first community she built was before Facebook communities were prevalent. From a call out on Twitter, she started a support group of women writers to talk weekly about what they were writing and what their struggles were. Kirsten feels the Facebook Groups platform lends itself well to growing communities and moderates several groups. Kirsten’s two most active groups include CreateIfWriting and The Profitable Blogging Summit. She also maintains about 30 other private and pop-up communities.
- What are some of the top tips you have for building a strong community? Kirsten talks about the most important note, being present and active in the group as the leader and moderator.
- What is the ideal group size? For Kirsten, she likes to stay between 5,000 and 10,000 people to serve her audience and remain hands-on. Above those numbers, people don’t know each other, it’s difficult to maintain the quality of the group and it’s hard to keep spam under control.
- How do you approach selling to your community without being smarmy? You have to build a community in which you authentically engage and create value. Different income streams determine how you can sell to your group. Kirsten has products, coaching, courses, books, and affiliates. When doing large promotions, be mindful of scheduling. Be upfront and honest with your community about selling and promoting. Find your sales voice, plan and build a trust with your community.
- Have you collaborated with others to build your community? Kirsten discusses her different levels of collaboration in her communities. She emphasizes that there has to be value and trust in collaborative relationships to make it work because it’s a commitment. Keeping the lines of communication open, aligning your time and ensuring you have similar goals is also important for collaborative success.
Links, Tools and Apps Mentioned:
Profitable Blogging Summit
Matt McCarrick, One Verse Devotional Podcast
Paula Rollo
Bryan Cohen, Author
Create If Writing Website
Book: Creative Collaborations: How to Form Lasting and Lucrative Partnerships without Being Smarmy
Free Training Giveaway: Best Practices for Facebook Groups
Call-To-Action:
Your call-to-action for this episode is to get Kirsten’s book: Creative Collaborations: How to Form Lasting and Lucrative Partnerships without Being Smarmy. For a limited time, she has lowered the price to $0.99 on Amazon for our community! Also check out the free training Kirsten gave us. Tweet to us @madalynsklar and @kamichat or visit our Facebook page, Communities That Convert, and let us know what you think of Kirsten’s book.
How to reach Kami:
If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn:
If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
In this episode we are going to dive into 7 Types of Content that you can use to build a community that keeps coming back for more.
7 TYPES of Content to Deliver
- Webinars
- Pre-Recorded Video with or without slides
- Mini Class
- Live Video
- Challenges
- Pilot/Beta Courses
- Flagship Courses
CALL TO ACTION: Tweet to us @madalynsklar and @kamichat or visit our Facebook page, Communities That Convert, to tell us what kind of content you think you will try first. We might even go deep on one or more of these if there is enough interest.
How to reach Kami: If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
In this episode, we discuss content. The most important thing you can do as a community leader is to create good content that your community will enjoy and benefit. We’ll talk about the 4 best places to host your content.
Episode Highlights: 1. Closed Facebook Groups and Pages * Kami talks about streaming content to a private Facebook group. You can do this directly or use tools that allow you to stream into a closed group. These tools even allow you to invite a guest speaker to present to your group without joining directly, which eliminates the awkward problem of adding someone then dropping them afterward. * Recommended tools: BlueJeans, BeLive, Crowdcast and Zoom (see links below).
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Email List and Webinar Software
- Madalyn recommends inviting your email subscribers to attend a webinar. Using webinar software, you can present your webinar live, record it, then offer it in replay later.
- Just a few of the webinar tools you can check out are WebinarJam, GoTo Webinar, Zoom, Easy Webinar, Webinar Ninja, BlueJeans and GoTo Meeting (see links below).
- All these programs have a free trial, so you can test them out and see which one works best for you and which have the integrations that are most important to you.
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Open Live Streams
- Facebook Pages/Profiles, Periscope/Twitter and YouTube are great places to livestream and deliver great content to your community.
- A tip from Madalyn: If are just starting and aren’t yet completely comfortable with livestreaming, you can set your stream to private instead of public until you’re comfortable doing it. Kami started a Facebook group to play around with the tech that only includes herself and a few people from her team.
- Stream on more than one platform if you can because different platforms attract different audiences. Address and acknowledge each audience to let them know you see and hear them.
- At the Houston Social Media Breakfast live event, Kami uses her computer to stream to Facebook, and her phone to stream to Twitter.
- Course Platforms
- There are quite a few Software as a Service (SaaS) companies that will house your online training content, or you can build it yourself on your website. These platforms aren’t free, but they give you the ability to deliver content in a professional way.
- Some platforms you might want to look into include Thinkific, Teachable, Kajabi and Ambition Ally, which you can use to build a community on your own website (see links below).
Call to Action: Tweet us @madalynsklar and @kamichat or visit our Facebook page, Communities That Convert, to tell us which platform most appeals to you to deliver educational content to your community. In the next episode, we’re going to dig in a little deeper and talk about the 7 types of content to deliver.
We have a new community on Facebook. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join.
Tools to Try * BlueJeans * BeLive * Crowdcast * Zoom * WebinarJam * GoToWebinar * Easy Webinar * WebinarNinja * GoToMeeting * Periscope * YouTube * Thinkific * Teachable * Kajabi * AmbitionAlly
How to reach Kami:
If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn:
If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Check out our website at CommunitiesThatConvert.com.
In this episode, we have a special guest, Dorie Clark.
Dorie is a marketing strategy consultant and professional speaker who has worked with high profile clients. She’s a regular contributor to the Harvard Business Review and many other great publications. She’s the author of a brand-new book called “Entrepreneurial You.” And she’s also written two other widely popular books, “Reinventing You” and “Stand Out.”
We invited Dorie to come on the podcast to talk about how she leverages her community to build income streams. So here is our interview with Dorie Clark.
Building Income Stream Episode Highlights: * Dorie discusses that she started to realize just how important community building was during the research for her book, Standout, which is about how to become a recognized expert in your field. She realized that for the wide range of experts she interviewed about building a following around your ideas, a three-step process emerged– build your network, build your audience and build your community.
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Building your network consists of forming a small tight-knit group of people around you who can help advise you, steer you and discuss your ideas.
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Building your audience requires you to start creating content, giving speeches, writing blog posts or doing a podcast to spread your ideas and gain circulation in the marketplace.
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Building your community starts to happen when your ideas gain momentum and other people start talking about and spreading ideas.
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Email is an important marketing resource and powerful tool you own compared to social platforms like Twitter. You can download the free 42-page Standout Self-Assessment to help in create a good lead magnet and build a following around your ideas.
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Dorie discusses how she builds her own community by working with other influencers and communities. Your first broad launch should be a small pilot to your own email list and audience. After you’ve proven the process you can approach partners and ask for a joint venture promotion.Joint ventures involve recruiting partners that agree to promote your product or course for a commission.
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Regarding income streams, how can you create income from an online community and not feel like you are selling too much or taking too much or being too pushy? Dorie talks about the email list building tool she uses (and we use it, too) called using ConvertKit for segmentation and targeting to your community. This way only relevant information and ideas reach potentially interested community members. This system allows her to avoid hitting people with marketing they don’t want.
- When someone is trying to build their own community from scratch, what can they do to build it? Dorie gives an overview her methodology of how to become a recognized expert in your field. There are three key components: content creation, social proof and your network. Pick one, get momentum and then work to build the rest out. Content creation is of significant importance because no one will ever know you for your ideas if you never share them. Social proof is your credibility and the reason people should listen and trust you. Your network is important because you need people to amplify and share your ideas.
TAKE ACTION Buy Dorie’s book or download one of her assessments below. Tweet to us, or leave a comment on our Facebook page about what content from Dorie most resonated with you.
Links, Tools and Apps Mentioned:
JVMM Group (Joint Venture Marketing Mastermind) by Dov Gordon
ConvertKit
Recognized Expert Evaluation Toolkit
Speak and Spill
Reinvent You
Stand out
Entrepreneurial You
88 question Entrepreneurial You self-assessment
42 page Standout Self-Assessment
How to reach Kami:
If you’d like to learn more about Kami Huyse, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticamedia.com or tweet to @kamichat.
How to reach Madalyn:
If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn Sklar, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Check out our website at communitiesthatconvert.com
When you have a community, you are guaranteed to have conflicts. It’s how you handle them that matters. In this episode we talk about the four main types of conflicts that usually arise within groups and how to handle them as a community leader.
Episode Highlights: Issue 1: When People Feel They Aren’t HeardThe most common conflict arises when people feel they aren’t being heard by the leader or by other members.
- Feelings of not being heard or being misunderstood are the most common conflicts that arise in communities. The best thing to do is to take it offline and take avoid having a discussion in the open group – try to understand why the person doesn’t feel heard.
- Once you have an understanding, see if you can come to an agreement with members.
- Build in ways for community members to be heard, like a regular sharing post.
Issue 2: When There are Disagreements among members
Over time, as in all groups, cliques tend to form. It is natural that people gravitate to each other and interact outside of your group. As a result, sometimes, one group will have a problem with a particular member or second group.
- Disagreements among members can happen when people gravitate into subgroups. Work to dismantle the issue before it festers into something bigger. Don’t take sides, hear everyone’s point of view and find a solution if you can.
- People may quit your group and feel it’s not for them anymore, but don’t take it personal. Focus on helping people and stay the course.
Issue 3: When You Have Trolls in Your Community
Hopefully, you will carefully monitor who is allowed in your group. As we mentioned in Ep 11, you should have people opt in to a mailing list before you let them in your online group. However, that may not be your model, and even if it is, trolls or determined detractors will go through the process to get into your group and cause issues.
- Trolls may pop up and turn on the community. Deal with it privately to find a solution. If it can’t be resolved, you may have to ask them to leave or remove them from the group. Your community expects you to deal with trolls in a constructive manner but may also join in the fight against them.
- Take the proper responsibility, take screenshots and maintain records for reference in case you need to report a troll or even involve the authorities.
Issue 4: When Your Community Has Drama
People may suddenly quit a community very vocalized manner and may continue to post negatively for a group, which becomes a reputation crisis for the leader. Don’t create any additional drama by begging someone to stay or come back. If they want to leave, let them leave.
- Social media is so much like texting and people can’t see the emotion behind things that are said. People sometimes take things the wrong way or perceive things as mean or rude. Things can be taken the wrong way, so the way you deal with it is what really matters.
- Where you can, speak to people that leave your community to understand what you can improve and do better within your community.
- As a leader, don’t defend yourself publicly by openly arguing with your detractors because it makes you appear very defensive. Stay above the fray and only respond in a constructive manner
Call-To-Action Create a mini-crisis plan for how you’d deal with one or more of these conflict situations and send us a tweet @MadalynSklar and @kamichat.
Join Our Mailing List and We’ll Send You An Invite to Our Private Facebook Group Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP
How to Reach Kami Huyse: If you’d like to learn more about Kami, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticmedia.com or tweet to @KamiChat.
How to Reach Madalyn Sklar: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
Today is all about sell, sell, sell! In this episode, we discuss selling to your community and highlight the tactics to engage your community with your products without overselling. We also discuss the truth that there will be people in your community that use the platform to sell their ideas and products, and how you should deal with that.
Episode Highlights: But, what if I hate selling?
- Even if selling isn’t something you like to do or something you fear, it’s important to let people know how you can serve them in your community.
- It’s important to know what your community wants and how to fulfill their needs. Always be on the lookout for the challenges your group say they are having. Sharing your knowledge and build products that fill a need in your community. By doing this you make it less about selling and more about serving.
What should I do when others try to sell/promote in my group?
- Other people selling within your community can become an issue. People should be qualified and on your mailing list or participating in a group challenge so that the purpose of the community is clear.
- Published guidelines in your community are important, so that members know what’s acceptable when it comes to selling or promoting. Facebook will allow guidelines to be pinned and easily available.
- It’s not as simple to share guidelines in Twitter, but Twitter chats have an unspoken rule that you don’t go into a chat and heavily sell or promote. It becomes the moderator’s responsibility to handle a situation where that’s happening. Some moderators create a tweet with the “rules” and share it at the start of each chat.
- Delete posts that violate the ground rules. Be ready and willing to remove and ban people from the group if necessary. Be firm because your community members rely on you to take charge and make the community a pleasant environment.
- Facebook has a new feature that allows you to mute a person, essentially putting them into a temporary “time out” and can be used as a way to manage groups, an alternative to permanently remove someone.
- Creating a time and place when it is okay for people to talk about their projects in your communities is a smart idea to incorporate into your guidelines so everyone has a dedicated time to share and be heard. It’s also a good way to find out what people in your community are doing.
How can I get people to convert to paying customers?
- What are some tactics to get people to convert from your group as a community member to being more involved? Build a mailing list, ask your community what they want, offer a free version to help people realize what they don’t know, sell your idea to validate it and do a joint venture (with another influencer) or create an affiliate program to build your community.
- Ask your followers in social media to join your mailing list. You have a better chance that people will see your message with an email vs. a social media post, regardless of the amount of followers you have.
- Ask what the community needs and offer content and products that cater to the community. The more they are invested in the product, the more likely they are to purchase a product that’s been tailored to them and share your product with others.
- Sell an idea first to validate it and get a feel for the success of it. Before investing time and creating content, share the idea with the community to see if there’s interest in the product. If there is significant interest, build the content and invest the time. Starting with an outline is a good way to start and promote an idea. Ask your community to buy and incentivize them to share with friends.
But, what if I don’t have a large community, yet?
- If you haven’t yet built a large community, create a joint venture with someone who is aligned with what you’re doing. It’s a good opportunity to get in front of their community, gain interest and build your own community.
- Creating an affiliate promotion is a good way to generate a stream of income for yourself. Alternative, reach out to friends and colleagues to ask them to share your product, offering them an affiliate percentage.
Links, Tools & Apps Mentioned in this Episode: * Entrepreneurial You * Communities that Convert mailing list
Call-To-Action If you have a group, review current guidelines in light of this episode and revise or make a guideline post, if you don’t have one yet. If you don’t have a group yet, go to a few groups in which you’re already a member and see if they have guidelines, read them and compare. How would you do it differently?
You can check out our pinned post in the new Communities That Convert Facebook group. We will extend the conversation from each episode and deliver bonus content. Sign up for our email list at http://bit.ly/CTCVIP to get an invitation to join.
How to Reach Kami Huyse: If you’d like to learn more about Kami, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticmedia.com or tweet to @KamiChat.
How to Reach Madalyn Sklar: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
In this episode, we cover the steps for starting and building a strong Facebook group and administering it in a way that leads to true community.
Episode Highlights: * We talked the different types of Facebook groups, open, closed and secret, and when and how to use the different types for different applications. * Secret Groups require people are friends of you or someone in the group to be added. As the administrator, you control who is added. * Closed groups are similar to secret groups in that permission is granted to join by the administrator, but people can see who is in the group. * Open groups can be joined by anyone. Open groups require a heightened administrator control because everyone has access. * Think about your purpose and goal with a Facebook group and how it ties into your mission. Administrators must engage and connect with any group, not just set it and forget it. * Offer value in your group by creating an environment where people feel safe to interact, post questions and thoughts. * Use a posting schedule so people know what to expect, know that you’re present and can reach you. * Group rules can be pinned to the top of the group page so everyone can easily see the posting and sharing guidelines. People want to share, so let them do it in a controlled way that’s conducive to the group. * Allowing a group to grow too big can result in a loss of control unless you enforce the rules. Smaller groups are friendlier, but if a group is growing too large, you can consider breaking it up into sub groups or hiring someone to help moderate. * Grytics is a great tool to track group statistics and see who is most active. It also gives you a leader board and a photo wall to share in the group. * When you’re forming a group, make ambassadors out of your active participants. Work with them to help connect with other members. * Kami designating suggests one moderator for every two hundred group participants.
Links, Tools & Apps Mentioned in this Episode: * Blue Jeans * Todd Herman 90 Day Year * She Podcast Facebook Group * Dunbar’s Number * Why It Sucks To Have 4,999 Facebook Friends * Grytics * Buffer
Call-To-Action We are starting a Facebook group for the Communities that Convert Podcast! Join our email list to get an invitation to join the Communities That Convert Facebook Group: http://bit.ly/CTCVIP
How to Reach Kami Huyse: If you’d like to learn more about Kami, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticmedia.com or tweet to @KamiChat.
How to Reach Madalyn Sklar: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
We can also be reached through our website at www.communitiesthatconvert.com.
In Episode 1, we gave you some general tips about starting an online community. In this episode, we are going to get down into details about starting a Twitter Chat community. Twitter communities usually form around hashtags or Twitter chats. So we will focus on how to start a Twitter chat. Kami interviews Madalyn to share her experience around starting and running Twitter chats. We thought we would write our show notes in the traditional Twitter Q&A Chat format. Enjoy!
Episode Highlights:
Q1. How do you know if your idea is a good one for a Twitter Chat?
A1. One way to find out is running a Twitter poll. Twitter polls can gauge what your community wants. Another way is to reach out to colleagues and friends for input on the topic. Sometimes it works to just dive in with a clear idea and start holding the chat consistently.
Q2. How do you establish a seed community?
A2. Telling friends and supporters about your mission and asking for them to attend the chat and help to spread the word leads to word of mouth and building excitement about the chat.
Q3. How do you know what time of day works for your audience to host a Twitter Chat?
A3. Do a poll, find out if daytime or nighttime is better to start. Then fine tune the results. Do some research to see what similar chats are happening at the same time. Once you have a day and time, be consistent and lock that time in. Compile a re-cap for the community and especially for members that can’t attend.
Go to the show notes to read more.
communitiesthatconvert.com
Call-To-Action
If you’re thinking about a starting a Twitter Chat, research chats in your niche and look at the hashtags they use. Attend each of these chats to see what they do and what you can do differently. Tweet us and let us know what chats you like. Tweet to us using the #CommunitiesThatConvert hashtag.
Check out Madalyn’s list of The Very Best Twitter Chats for Social Media & Marketing. www.madalynsklar.com/chatlist
How to Reach Kami Huyse:
If you’d like to learn more about Kami, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticmedia.com or tweet to @KamiChat.
How to Reach Madalyn Sklar:
If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
In this episode, we talk about how to measure the ROI of your community. Let’s face it, building a community take a real investment. At the end of the day, you want to know how your efforts pay off in the real world. And while community building is about so much more than the money, it certainly is important to measure.
We also talk about both the tangible ROI as well as the intangible benefits of a online community.
Episode Highlights: * There are two ways to measure success of a community that supports your business goals — revenue generating and influence generating activities. Kami likes to call it “Top of Wallet” and “Top of Mind.” * Tangible revenue generating activities include referrals, new clients, current clients, previous clients, sales, ad revenue and funding generation platforms. * Affiliate partnerships are a great way to generate revenue. Madalyn discusses how she uses this method to generate revenue and how to use affiliate partnerships at events and speaking engagements. * Joint venture partnerships are most successful when the collaboration allows each partner to bring skills to the team that help to build a viable business model. * Some of the questions you can ask to measure ROI include: How many new clients are coming into your community through your calls to action? How many leads are your community bringing in? Are people signing up, and converting by purchasing what you’re selling? How much does it cost to capture these leads? * Current clients are important in your community. As a business, repeat business is critical to bring in income. Connecting and interacting with clients on a regular business helps to stay at the top of their mind when they have a need to be filled. * Nurturing previous clients goes hand-in-hand with connecting with current clients. Being present in social media and engaging helps previous clients see you more often and keep you at the top of mind, perhaps even leading to referral. * Ad revenue is another way to measure the ROI of your community. Advertising is the financial model of the internet and can be used on your online real estate. * Courses and online products are another tangible way to add value to your community and turn a profit. * Patreon, Kickstarter or a similar platform can be used to generate funding. * The size of your community isn’t as important as the stats and if your community is engaged with your offering. * Intangible revenue generating activities include invitations to speak, guest speaking on a podcast, interviews and media experiences, lists and links. * Unpaid speaking invitations are a great way to get visibility, connect with other speakers and possibility of partnerships. * Visibility, new followers and product promotion opportunities are just a few benefits of guest speaking on a podcast. * You gain visibility through visibility. As you become part of a community, be helpful, prove yourself as an expert in an area and collaborate to teach your community. As you grow, people will notice and add you to lists of experts, or to a roundup post. * To measure your ROI, ask people where they found you so you know where to spend your time. Track your costs in a spreadsheet and look at how that relates to your income, taking out costs and labor.
Links, Tools & Apps Mentioned in this Episode: * AdSense * Patreon * Kickstarter * Madalyn’s Patreon: Madalyn Sklar is creating Podcasts & Sharing Her Insights * Kirsten’s Patreon: Kirsten Oliphant is creating The Weekly Create If Writing Podcast * Bitly * Google Analytics * Campaign URL Builder
Call-To-Action Your call-to-action for this episode is to make a list of 10 people to collaborate with. Reach out to at least 2 of them this week. Ask how you can help them. If they have a community, join it. If you have a community, invite them to join. We want to hear from you. Reach out to us on Twitter and at the #CommunitiesThatConvert hashtag.
How to Reach Kami Huyse: If you’d like to learn more about Kami, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticmedia.com or tweet to @KamiChat.
How to Reach Madalyn Sklar: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
In this episode, we discuss the free and paid resources you may need when building a community. We also provide tips on how to be resourceful and economical when investing financially in your community.
Episode Highlights: * Social media isn’t free and it’s going to cost a little money to get started. What you want to get out of a community dictates how much money you should spend on it. * Communities are an investment. If you want a professional platform that will last through time, you’ll have to financially invest in your community over time. * In addition to the financial investment, we discussed the time investment and the value of your time, or the opportunity cost when you must choose between what you are doing and what you could be doing. * Kami discusses having an online community versus an offline community. She says start with an offline community to get an idea of the demographic and what the community wants and needs. Investing time in people face-to-face can attract people to your online community. * Madalyn gives examples of how you can use online resources to meet people and start building your community using the power of the internet. She stresses you can connect with people locally but also across the world. * There are resources at your disposal you can use to build your community that are free and accessible. Madalyn uses hashtags and explains how she started #TwitterSmarter in 2013 to build an online training course and community. A few years later she launched the #TwitterSmarter podcastand the #Twitter Smarter chat soon followed. Kami uses Facebook pages and groups and talks about how she used a Facebook page to build Social Media Breakfast Houston and a group for Texas Travel Talk. * Blog categories can be used as a landing page with a corresponding URL that takes you to a page within your site. This is an economical strategy and is also great for SEO. You can check out the one that Kami built for SMBHOU here. * YouTube Channels can be used to display groups of videos on your channel, and it ranks high on Google searches. Madalyn discusses how to organize YouTube playlists so people can easily access videos. You can check out the SMBHOU playlist here. * Kami and Madalyn discuss how building a community can cost money and how expenses add up. They break down the costs for building a website, buying a domain, obtaining graphics, running Facebook and Instagram ads, reserving event locations, using course platforms and an email list provider. * When purchasing your URL, be sure to find out whether you can transfer it if you’re using a template website building tool and wish to move your site later. * Madalyn discusses her experience in finding sponsorships vs. doing in-kind trades. Many potential sponsors want to see what you can do first, so trades are better when starting out. Sponsors may provide t-shirts, services, space or free swag to give away to your audience.
Call-To-Action If you’re thinking about a starting a community, will it be paid or free? If you’ve already started one, do you charge for it? Tweet us and let us know- we want to hear from you @kamichat and @madalynsklar.
In this episode you’ll get ideas to come up with the perfect community and we’ll share a list of tools that will help you find them.
Episode Highlights: * It’s important to know who your audience is and who you help or who you want to reach. * We talk about the Help Statement. The formula is: I help (AUDIENCE) to (WHAT YOU DO) in order to get (RESULT). * Kami’s Help Statement: I help business leaders how to harness the power of social media so that they can make a difference by connecting with their community to get better business results. * Madalyn’s Help Statement: I help social media marketers and business owners exponentially grow their brand in an authentic and impactful way so they can get seen and heard. * Think about your avatar and niching down because when you talk to everybody, you talk to nobody. * Find your audience using the tools we cover in this episode. * Facebook ads allow you to create an ad and target specific people and boost content. Lead magnets allow you to build a mailing list or get validation. * Twitter bios and advanced search are great tools for gathering information using keywords * Google search is a good way to find Twitter Chats using key hashtags. * Building an email list helps to know what the community’s need is. * Email segregation is key to targeting your audience with the right content.
Links, Tools & Apps Mentioned in this Episode: * Facebook Ads * Twitter bios * ManageFlitter * Followerwonk * Twitter Advanced Search * #MobileChat * Twitter Chats for Social Media and Marketing List * Rebekah Radice (her new weekly newsletter is called Branded) * ConvertKit * Ryan Levesque
Call-To-Action Your call-to-action for this week is to write your Help Statement and comment it below OR tweet it to us using the #CommunitiesThatConvert hashtag.
Help Statement: I help _____ (which audience) to do _____ (what you do) in order to get _____ (what result).
How to Reach Kami Huyse: If you’d like to learn more about Kami, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticmedia.com or tweet to @KamiChat.
How to Reach Madalyn Sklar: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
This is a special edition of the Communities That Convert podcast.
We just went through an unbelievable experience. So we decided to record our thoughts and share them with you. We survived Hurricane Harvey and the effects it had on the Houston area.
In this episode, we’d like to share our thoughts on connecting with your community when YOU are in crisis.
Episode Highlights: * Social media plays an important role during a disaster. * Understand when to pause your social media. Buffer made it easy for us to pause our accounts during Harvey. * See article: How to Pause Your Buffer Queue (feature only available on the Awesome and Business plans) * We both paid close attention to social media and noticed helpful hashtags popping up during Harvey:
#Harvey
#Harvey2017
#HarveyStorm
#HarveyFlood
#HarveyRecovery
#HoustonStrong
- If you’re not in immediate danger, there are ways you can help out others. Kami categorized these into 4 different buckets of response:
- Initiators — People organizing their own outreach efforts: rescues, shelters, housing people.
- Aggregators — People organizing on the fly with Interactive maps of shelters, donation points.
- Amplifiers — People who share what other people have created.
- Participants — People who volunteer when requested. They responded to the initiators, aggregators and amplifiers.
- During a time of crisis, stay tuned to your local media — tv, radio, etc — for the latest updates.
- Use Facebook’s “disaster check-in” to let your friends know that you’re okay.
- Important — Take breaks from your computer and tv. Take a mental break. Clear your mind.
How to Connect with Us:
Go to communitiesthatconvert.com to connect! You can also reach us on Twitter twitter.com/madalynsklarand twitter.com/kamichat.
In this episode, learn about live events for your online community and how it brings everyone closer, giving you the opportunity for a win-win-win.
Episode Highlights: * Live events are a great way to bring an online community together. Madalyn talks about how she brought members from her #TwitterSmarter chat together in person at this year’s Social Media Marketing World conference in San Diego. * Live events can be an important part of building your online community and strengthening membership. * When meeting members of your online community for the first time, it’s like meeting an old friend. We have a need for connection. It’s important to have that physical face-to-face contact. * Is it okay to hijack or take over a large event and host your community there? Like say SXSW or Social Media Marketing World? * The big draw of a great community is having the members connect with each other. They love meeting each other. * Consider how connections can be beneficial and how people fit and mesh with each other. It’s a great way to hit it out of the park, as Kami says. * Live events give you the opportunity for a win-win-win in a way that online communities don’t. * Events are most successful when you find a need and can fill it with what the community needs or wants. And that’s what Kami did with Social Media Breakfast Houston and Madalyn with the #TwitterSmarter chat and podcast. * What if you start an event and no one shows up. Madalyn makes a great point with this: The idea is the seed and the roots are the event. * The riches are in the niches because when you talk to everyone, you talk to no one.
Links, Tools & Apps Mentioned in this Episode: * Social Media Marketing World * South by Southwest (SXSW) * Big Give Houston * Social Media Breakfast Houston * Growthli * GoGirlsMusic * Podrover * Create If Writing
Call-To-Action Your call-to-action for this week is to meet someone locally in one of your online communities. We want you to reach out to someone nearby and have a face-to-face (or Skype) conversation. You can alway use someone in our #CommunitiesThatConvert or #VideoReplyDay community. Take a picture (or screenshot) and tweet it, Facebook it, or Instagram it with our super long hashtag (LOL!), #CommunitiesThatConvert. We’ll be monitoring it and we’ll call you out in a future podcast episode.
How to Reach Kami Huyse: If you’d like to learn more about Kami, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticmedia.com or tweet to @KamiChat.
How to Reach Madalyn Sklar: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
In this episode, we discuss how to be a good community member. We break it down, talking about how to participate and be part of a community, the benefits and some do’s and don’ts.
Episode Highlights:
- Jump into a community, introduce yourself and familiarize yourself with group rules.
- Benefits of joining groups: making friends, building relationships, training, courses and market research.
- Facebook is the most popular for groups, but there’s also Facebook Messenger, Slack, LinkedIn and Twitter DM.
- Do’s of participating in a community: Show up and be consistent, volunteer, create opportunities for yourself, have community mindset and network.
- Don’ts of participating in a community: Don’t hard-sell, promote, hijack threads, or troll.
Call-To-Action Your call-to-action for this episode is to pick a group, join it and be a helper — help one person every day for an entire week. Go to CommunitiesThatConvert.com to connect! And be sure to reach out to us below.
How to Reach Kami Huyse: If you’d like to learn more about Kami, visit her website at www.zoeticamedia.com. You can contact her by email at kami@zoeticmedia.com or tweet to @KamiChat.
How to Reach Madalyn Sklar: If you’d like to learn more about Madalyn, visit her website at www.madalynsklar.com. You can contact her by email at madalyn@madalynsklar.com or tweet to @MadalynSklar.
In this episode, Madalyn shares with Kami her new initiative on Twitter using the hashtag #VideoReplyDay. She encourages people to use video by tweeting video replies. Listen to this episode to learn how this strategy can help you connect, engage and strengthen ties with your community. Madalyn also shares a cool ninja promo tip that’s a sure-fire way to connect you with lots of like-minded people.
Episode Highlights:
- Madalyn talks about her strategy: Ready, Fire, Aim — pull the trigger and go. Take your idea and run with it!
- Video is underutilized on Twitter. Madalyn is on a mission to help get more people using this feature.
-
VideoReplyDay was launched on 7–18–17. Madalyn replied to all her tweets with a video for a total of 40 videos. In one day she grew a close-knit Twitter community by sharing videos.
- Black Croft was inspired to go “all in” on the initiative and he replied to every tweet that had the #VideoReplyDay hashtag. He sent over 70 videos over the course of 6 hours! He made lots of new friends and business connections. Some tweets led to business opportunities just by sending a video.
- “I believe in the power of community, the power of relationships and the power of people.” — Black Croft
- In this initiative, we had people stretched out across the globe — Slovenia, Greece, Britain, Ireland, and all over the U.S.
- Kami advises: “Experiment and see what works.”
Call-To-Action
Your call-to-action is to send us a tweet using the #VideoReplyDay hashtag. Be sure to tag us at @kamichat and @MadalynSklar and say “Hi.” Go to CommunitiesThatConvert to connect. Show us your world!
In this episode, we discuss how to monetize your community and uncover the ways to convert communities in monetary ways.
Episode Highlights:
- Earn money directly from your community through paid memberships or courses.
- How to maintain community character through membership levels, add-ons or paid options.
- Earn money from brands who pay for access to your community.
- If using sponsors, make sure the brands are relevant, fits the community and adds benefit.
- Collaborate with others to leverage their communities and co-branding projects.
- Value is a result in a community knowing, liking and trusting you.
Call-To-Action:
Start taking steps towards monetizing your community. We want to hear from you. Go to CommunitiesThatConvert.com to connect with us!
You can also reach us on Twitter at @MadalynSklar and @KamiChat.
In this episode, we discuss how to build an online community. From making a plan, choosing a community, selecting space and managing growth—we touch on the first steps of building your community.
Episode Highlights:
- Build a community from a community perspective and bring something to the community that matters.
- It's important to think about who you're serving and build a community around a topic you're passionate about and interested in.
- Large online communities, change, evolve and sometimes move on. Sometimes features you rely on can be discontinued or removed.
- There are three different Facebook group settings: secret, open and private (rented land).
- Online resources like Thinkific, Teachable, Udemy, Zippy Courses or Kajabi can serve as your platform and meeting space.
Call-to-Action:
On Facebook or Twitter, use #CommunitiesThatConvert and share your thoughts. What are your favorite communities? Are you part of any online communities and what are they?
Get in touch with us at CommunitiesThatConvert.com and on Twitter @MadalynSklar and @KamiChat.
At the seed of every good online program, there’s a community. Kami Huyse believes empowering that community is critical to lasting success.
In this podcast Kami, along with Madalyn Sklar, will focus on the root of the matter - building online communities. Through this process, they’ll share information, helpful tips and advice, and takeaways to help build your own community. Learn how to monetize, provide value, inspire others to take action, and make this a great experience for everyone.
Kami and Madalyn will show you how to build a network on social media sites like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. Discover how to build a tribe of raving fans and hear ideas, advice and case studies you can use right now on growing your own community.
Get in touch with us at CommunitiesThatConvert.com and @MadalynSklar and @KamiChat.