Getting Insight into Facebook

I serve as Admin over several Facebook Fan Pages -- one for my business, one for my church, and a few for clients. Lately I've been getting emails from Facebook reporting on how much traffic and other activity each Page gets:

• Fans this week
• Wall Posts, Comments, and Likes this week
• Visits to your page this week

After each item, it gives you the comparable number from the previous week. Thank you Facebook! I love it.

Another tool that is often overlooked is Facebook Insights. For a Page Admin, you'll find it in the left column of your page. Under Insights, click on See All to get more detailed reports on your page's activity.

From the Facebook Help definition, "Facebook Insights measures user exposure, actions, and behavior relating to your Social Ads and Facebook Page. By understanding activity and performance, fans and ad respondents, and trends and comparisons, you are better equipped to improve your business on Facebook and elsewhere. Insights is a free service for all Facebook Pages and Social Ads."

I recently read that there are more than 1.4M Facebook Pages, including 700,000 small businesses. There are just too many users to ignore unless you're convinced that your audience isn't on Facebook for some reason. But even if you think your audience is too old for Facebook, I just checked the Insights for my church Facebook page and for a church that is trending younger (certainly under 50), 34% are over 45 and 16% are over 55.

The useful data that Facebook provides lets you know whether you or being effective in reaching your target audience with your Page and any ads that point to it. Don't ignore this information!

Annoying Ning

I administer a couple different Ning social networks (which is a create-your-own network service). Ning offers nice features for groups to have their own social networking, such as pictures, video, blogs, chat, etc.

BUT BEWARE!

Anyone who is a member of your Ning can submit blog posts. You can control which ones get published if you're the admin, but it doesn't stop spammers from auto-sending loads of crap. I had to create a rule in my Outlook inbox that if the subject line says I "have a Ning blog post to approve" the email automatically goes to my junk folder. That folder had received about 60 of those emails today!

When I checked my Ning, I had 150+ first name members with gmail addresses. I deleted them all and reported them for spam, then changed my settings so that I have to approve all new members.

Ning needs to give the admin the ability to limit who can post to the blogs. I looked and there's only an option to moderate posts or not.

SEOing Press Releases

I've been a customer of PRWeb for years -- back when I first met the founder in his tiny Dallas office and tried to talk him into letting me do his PR. Back then, he didn't have a budget and I didn't have a clue. I remember he had one small server on the floor of his office. Now David is no longer with the company -- it was purchased by Vocus a few years ago.

PRWeb does a really good job, I think, of helping you to create press releases that are search engine optimized. You build-in hyperlinks, categorize your news, insert keywords (or at least you did...recently I haven't spotted that field) and pictures, and can change the name of the URL to include 2 keywords that might help to attract more search engine attention.

Regardless of the wire service you use, if any, your press releases should be written with search engines in mind. Most of the time, your news will be read online.

Benefits of an SEOed press release include:

• Improved search engine ranking
• Publicity in online media
• Increased website traffic
• Leads and sales!

When using PRWeb, I should say that you can pay them extra to get help with making sure all of the features you qualify for (based on the package you acquire) are used. I'd be happy to help as well, having done hundreds of them over the years.

In fact, check out our MobilityNewswire website. This site pulls in our PRWeb RSS feeds from press releases we set up for our mobile software development clients.

Pay to Play Journalism

A CNET writer that I work with from time to time sent me a link to a Wired article on the topic of "pay to play" review sites. The sites mentioned in the article, AppCraver and TheIphoneAppReview, both have sent me replies when I've pitched apps to them for review that I could get my app reviewed or expedited for a fee. This practice of editorial for a fee is common in mainstream media in other countries, but in the US we like to think that there is a firm line between editorial and advertising coverage.

I don't pay for reviews or any other kind of coverage because the practice is damaging to the credibility of the editorial review process which makes PR so much more, well, credible, than display advertising. The benefits of PR is that the perceived value of the information is so much higher because of the implied 3rd party endorsement of the journalist who is not compensated by the subject of the article. Simply put, rewarding this kind of media with revenue to get them to write a review will encourage this kind of "advertorial" business to flourish and, as a result, water down the advantage my service offers over other types of marketing communications.

Especially egregious is when these reviews don't disclose that they've been compensated for the article so the reader can judge for themselves whether or not the writing was biased in favor of the subject.

The line between advertising and editorial is one that gets blurred now in every form of media. Until recently, I published my city's business magazine and of course those who spent money advertising in the magazine wanted to be our quoted experts in the feature articles.

So how is a website or other form of media supposed to generate revenue? I personally think having ads and editorial that happen to feature the same companies just isn't the same kind of crime as making them pay for editorial coverage. Sure, all things being equal, if someone I worked with as an advertiser in the magazine happened to be a great source for an article, I saw no harm in quoting them because I knew them and their expertise couldn't be questioned just because they also placed a display ad somewhere in the magazine.

But the "pay to play" practice where payment for editorial coverage is required is bad for my business and the journalism business because it reduces the credibility of both. Everyone knows that websites and other media are supported by advertising, so the media company should clearly state its policy on the line between journalism and advertising and let the consumer judge the veracity of their content.

The End of Publishing?

Check out this very clever video that demonstrates how much we may be misunderstanding the upcoming generation and how it speaks to the publishing industry in the era of the Nook, Kindle and iPad.

Getting noticed on the web

I've spent a bit of time over the past few days looking at church websites. Man, they're bad! Of course, that's why there's a website called Church Marketing Sucks! As the communication team leader at my church (charged with internal and external publicity), I want our church website to look good, offer usable content, and be easily found by people looking for a church home. Unfortunately, our website comes with a subscription-based church management system that offers a really grand "behind the curtain" online community for members -- and while better than most church websites, ours still sucks.

We're going to take matters into our own hands and develop our own website that looks much better, is written for the web, and is search engine optimized.

When you put together a great looking website, how do you get people to find it? If you're looking for local traffic, you can advertise it to your local market in the newspaper, on Facebook or Google, or on radio or TV (if that makes sense to your kind of business). Don't forget the obvious: put it on your business cards, stationery and brochures!

There are important steps you need to take that will pay off in much bigger results for building your web traffic. Include target keywords and phrases that your prospects would be using to find you online. If you don't overwhelm your pages with meaningless words, the prominent use of keywords will make the page more appealing to the search engines and more meaningful to potential customers.

Carefully evaluate the benefits of online advertising (banners and pay-per-click). The nice thing is you can tell pretty easily if your investment is paying off and then adjust your budget to those ads that get the best results.

And use a blog and social media (Twitter and Facebook are no-brainers for many kinds of businesses) to connect with and keep in touch with customers -- and remind them about you and your website.

Google, Kansas

Over at my Kevin in the Kan blog, I've been writing about my hometown's efforts to woo Google to select it as a test site for its high-speed fiber optic network (which would bring surfing speeds of 100x faster than what most people have now).

I thought I would mention it here too because of how viral this grassroots effort has become. It is really a grand lesson in the power of social media and word of mouth (and how a community can work together WITH its government toward a common goal).

The latest PR move is when the mayor proclaimed that during the month of March, Topeka shall hereby be known as Google, Kansas. A silly move to attract Google's attention? Perhaps. That's what some are saying, but it's getting noticed! Here is some of the press attention Topeka (err...Google) has picked up:

CNBC
Wall Street Journal
BusinessWeek 
CNN (I like this one a lot...good job Mayor Bunten)
Christian Science Monitor
San Jose Mercury
The Week
The Register (UK)
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
San Francisco Business Times
Washington Post
Computerworld/Networkworld
Kansas City Star
CNET
National Post
Associated Press
Examiner.com
Barron's
Connected Planet
Newser
Los Angeles Times
Digital Trends
VentureBeat
TMCnet
NBC Bay Area
TechCrunch
PC World
 

The local effort has been pretty much exclusively through Facebook and other social media, plus local get-togethers. Check out the ThinkBigTopeka site for more info on the campaign.

Funny video

Enjoy this video of a dialogue between a hapless PR fellow and a blogger who covers social media, just not B2B. So funny.



If you're offended by the F-word, it is used frequently. I stopped using it as part of my day-to-day vocabulary when I was 17, and don't normally like to hear it in a professional setting especially. But, ok, it's kind of funny in this case.

Increasing Twitter Followers

When it comes to social media, everything has its place:

Facebook is MOSTLY for my personal friends, acquaintances, and a bunch of people that I know somewhat. In retrospect, I wish I would have limited it only to people that I really know, instead of the 450+ people that I'm sure I've met at some point.

LinkedIn is where I prefer to network professionally, and I have this blog connected to it so that anyone following me on LinkedIn can easily see my thoughts on any given day. I've joined a number of business groups on LinkedIn and have made some good connections there.

Twitter is the odd one I was never sure what to do with. I'm not one of those who wants to tweet when I go to the bathroom or have a bologna sandwich, or how cool so-and-so was on such-and-such awards show last night. I pretty much use it to tweet about successful media placements for my PR clients so that more people can discover how awesome they are, and of course that will hopefully make me look like a good PR guy that others will want to use. In order for that approach to be a success, I need followers!

To increase the number of followers, I've been finding people who tweet about topics I tweet about -- mobile technology -- and begin following them. I often get followed back, and people discover me on those Twitter pages and begin following me because they too like learning about mobile apps.

I have heard that around 30% of the people you follow will follow you back.

I just downloaded something new to help me greatly expand my number of followers. It's called Twitter Adder, and it is supposed to help me manage Twitter followers, auto follow, and auto unfollow. I'll let you know how it goes!

Doesn't Google Buzz just sound like a great PR thing?

I signed up for Google Buzz -- because what PR guy doesn't like anything that has the word "buzz" in it.

Buzz turns my Gmail into another social networking opportunity. Woo hoo! Just what I needed. Here it is in a nutshell:

* Automatic friends lists (friends are added automatically who you have emailed on Gmail)
* "Rich fast sharing" combines sources like Picasa and Twitter into a single feed, and it includes full-sized photo browsing
* Public and private sharing (swap between family and friends)
* Inbox integration (instead of emailing you with updates, like Facebook might, Buzz features emails that update dynamically with all Buzz thread content, like the photo viewer we mentioned above)
* "Recommended Buzz" puts friend-of-friend content into your stream, even if you're not acquainted. Recommendations learn over time with your feedback.

But, much to Google's chagrine, the "buzz" has been mostly bad. I've heard from several of my friends who have nixed it after a brief trial run.

This article highlights some of the most notable negatives:

Buzz seemed to have a mind of its own, picking names in your email inbox , and selecting them randomly for you to follow in your "Buzz" network.

"Thanks Google Buzz, I'm automatically following 3 ex-girlfriends. #fail," wrote Tony Pitluga of Pittsburgh in a tweet that was widely re-tweeted last week.

Another problem users discovered is that Google makes public everything you do in Buzz in its search engine, unless you set the privacy settings ahead of time.

Can Buzz bounce back? Google announced some improvements and should get credit for reacting quickly -- but as for me, I'll turn it off. I have Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter, and that's enough social networking for me. Why add one more?

Don't be a pain in the Wave

I've been looking at Google Wave as a PR tool. Wave was introduced last year as a way to streamline communications into a single "wave" - it streams email, instant messaging, wikis, web chat, social networking, and project management into one platform.

What can you do on a wave? Your friends or colleagues can hold discussions, share files, chat, or comment on any of your post on any forum.

For PR pros, Wave changes the game. Anybody can contribute to the story with links, wikis, pictures, etc. BuzzMachine summarized it nicely here: "It combines the notions of a process as people add and subtract and update; it has the benefit of a wiki – a snapshot of current knowledge; it can be live; it can feed a blog page with the latest; it can feed Twitter with updates; it is itself the collaborative tool that lets participants question each other."

What I like is that Wave may return PR agents to communication agents versus just emailers of information. They can employ creative and engaging communication with anyone who joins the wave to get the word out about company news.

So leave it to PR people to already start getting a bad rap with a new technology tool. In my research, I found Jennifer Leggio's post highlighting some low-lights of how PR people have been violating the rules of engagement via social media:

1. Adding a journalist / blogger on Facebook and entering into a trusted network only to blatantly pitch said journalist / blogger on his or her “wall”
2. Spam @ messaging a journalist / blogger on Twitter multiple times to get them to review / write about your news or technology
3. Commenting on unrelated FriendFeed posts to try and get the writer’s attention

In a related post, Jason Perlow noted an early violation of Wave "PR Protocol" (if there's not such a thing, there soon will be). A pomegranate juice company I'd never heard of added him to their Wave -- you're not opted in, you're forced in.

Jason said: "As if using and trying to get used to Google Wave was bad enough, the PR agencies and marketing firms of the world have decided to start taking advantage of us, because we’re a captive audience and if they’ve ever contacted us in the past via e-mail on GMail, they now have a full contact database of people to torture by Google Wave if they were able to get an invite onto the system."

PR friends, Google Wave has a lot of potential for us, but let's respect the space of those influencers we want to connect with. Let's not be a pain in the wave and enlarge the credibility chasm our industry has with many in the media.

I'm back

Wow...I really ignored the Winning Rules blog didn't I? Since I last posted, I published 2 more years of TK Magazine and just recently divested myself from the magazine publishing business. I still own and operate The Business Center, which is Topeka's executive suites and virtual officing center.

But my true loves and main interests (in biz anyway) are still TalonPR and Talon Communications Group; the former offers public relations and social media support for mobile software developers while the latter offers graphic design, web marketing and public relations for any kind of business or non-profit.

I've been doing my personal blogging over at KevinintheKan.com, where I dump whatever random thoughts that cross my mind on the ills of our country and my state.

Back to WinningRules, though, I want to return to highlighting the "Winning Rules" and best practices of Web communications and marketing. There's already good blogs out there that cover it, of course, but hey, this is what I know so hopefully you'll find practical info here you can use in your own business.

Subscribe to this feed and please share your own thoughts.

Breaking News Backstab

Jonathan Zaleski, the director of The PR Collective, a nationwide consortium of boutique PR agencies (to which I belong) has started a new blog called SpinisIn. It's all about the "PR lifestyle."

I particularly enjoyed his entry entitled the Breaking News Backstab, about the times in which his big PR events were eradicated by breaking news stories, such as the Pope dying right before his big event at Dodger stadium. Give it a read and enjoy.

How corporations should deal with blogs

Recalling the story of how Sony blew it with bloggers when one such blogger discovered secretly installed Sony software on his PC (and then discovered that it was transmitting his music selections to Sony over the internet), this OpinionJournal column gives some pointers for how corporations should deal with bloggers.

Firing bad customers

We know about the cost of obtaining good customers, but what about the cost of keeping bad ones? Sometimes the best thing for business is (perish the thought!) firing customers that cost you more than they're worth. Awhile back I heard about how FedEx would send notices to costly customers that they were no longer going to be doing business with them, and (going one step further) pointed them to the nearest UPS store location. So they got rid of people who were drains on their business and dumped them on the competition. Brilliant!

Today I read in ComputerWorld where Sprint is firing customers.

The First Wiki Novel

From ComputingUnplugged:

Publisher launches Wiki novel
British publisher Penguin has launched a Web-based, collaborative novel that can be written, edited or read by anyone, anywhere thanks to "wiki" software, the technology behind Web encyclopedia Wikipedia. The novel, "A Million Penguins," went live on Thursday and its first lines are already being written, edited and rewritten by enthusiasts. Penguin, which embarked on the project with a group of creative writing and new media students, says it is using the novel as a test of whether a group of disparate and diverse people can create a "believable fictional voice."

What is a wiki? According to TechTarget.com:

A wiki (sometimes spelled "Wiki") is a server program that allows users to collaborate in forming the content of a Web site. With a wiki, any user can edit the site content, including other users' contributions, using a regular Web browser. Basically, a wiki Web site operates on a principle of collaborative trust.

The best known wiki is Wikipedia.org, an online encyclopedia in which anyone can contribute or edit content.

The idea of publishing a story with a wiki is certainly novel (sorry, couldn't resist). It will be interesting to watch how the story changes as the contributors create plot twists. Is that a story destined to go nowhere because a huge committee is involved in writing it?

Wikis hold great promise for practical business applications, from collaborating on projects to developing policy and procedure manuals to enabling users of a technology product have some control and input into the formation of a users guide.

The second rule of kayaking

As a kayaker, this ditty that I received from Merge Gupta-Sunderji caught my attention. It's also makes a great point about good communication:

The second rule of ocean kayaking

Just a couple of months ago, I went ocean kayaking for the very first time. Not only was the experience thrilling, but I got an unexpected lesson in the importance of communication.

As my husband and I climbed into our two-person kayak, the instructor gave us the simple instructions. "Just two rules," he said. "Get a rhythm going, and verbalize your intentions to your partner at all times." "Piece of cake," I thought as I climbed into the front seat. And I was right, until we stopped for a snorkeling break a couple of miles from shore. My spouse, with the best of intentions, turned around to grab my snorkeling pack from behind him. Except ... he didn’t tell me what he was planning to do! If you’ve ever kayaked, you know what happened next. One moment I was staring at the blue sky, and the next moment I was treading water and looking at the underside of orange polyethylene. When the kayak tipped, everything -- people, snorkeling gear, sunscreen and sunglasses -- was now in the ocean. I spluttered my way to the top. "You’re supposed to communicate your intentions," I reproached my husband. "I thought you knew," came his chagrined answer.

Do you sometimes assume that people can read your mind? That your employees know what results you expect of them, that your co-workers will meet your unstated deadlines, that your supervisor will magically understand why you had to leave early? Whether it’s your employees, your co-workers, or even your significant other, don’t get so caught up in the rhythm of what works well that you forget to communicate your plans and rationales. Instead, remember the second rule of ocean kayaking: verbalize your intentions.

Merge Gupta-Sunderji helps turn managers into leaders. Through engaging keynotes and workshops, she gives people specific and practical tools to achieve leadership and communication success. Contact her at www.mergespeaks.com or 403-605-4756. I saw her speak at a IABC conference. She's very engaging and informative...so much so that I actually signed up for an e-newsletter (something I typically avoid).

Game du Jour

Ah...the Internet. Filled with great information and tools to increase our productivity, right? No, it is the biggest productivity killer ever invented--but it's so darn wonderful we can't get enough of it.

One of the biggest time killers of the Internet is searching the world wide web for "bargains." You pit our desire for a good deal with our penchant for friendly competition, and you get massive successes like eBay. First there was auction sites, and then later came "one deal a day" sites such as Woot.com.

For most "one deal a day" sites, you are in a rush to get in on the deal before supplies run out. There's a new one that will really kill your time--and supplies are unlimited.

Game du Jour offers one heavily discounted casual PC game per day. It starts at midnight and the deal lasts for 24 hours and then a new game is available. If you are into "casual games" and not necessarily the action-packed assassination and warfare games, this is a great site for you.

So what does this have to do with our favorite topic? Essentially, Game du Jour is a marketing company that helps software companies get a rush of sales of their product and increase brand awareness. They introduce your game to people that might not otherwise know about it. Considering how enormous the game development sector is, this kind of publicity can help to really boost awareness of that product and get gamers interested in the rest of your line.

Study: 2 of 5 bosses don't keep word

The Office is a great show. I think it's just so funny because the boss is such a doofus...and yet many of us can relate to his character because of bosses we either have or have had.

Now there's a study that shows the impact of bosses truthfulness and its impact on those they supervise. "Nearly two of five bosses don't keep their word and more than a fourth bad mouth those they supervise to co-workers."

The result of bad managers are poor morale, bad communication, a rumor mill, a revolving door of incoming and outgoing personnel, etc.

Will it Blend? Great viral marketing

Looking for another time waster on the Internet (other than this blog)?

Go have some fun at WillitBlend.com. The PR geniuses at Blendtec have produced a series of videos in which they blend a variety of everyday household items and answer the question I'm sure we've all asked ourselves: Will it blend?

Check out the iPod! And, in time for Christmas, see what happens when he tries to blend a couple Nutrackers!

This site is great fun...and a good example of how a business came up with a viral marketing approach that draws attention to their website, gets people to talk about it (like I'm doing now), and shows off the features of their product. Very, very savvy!

Now excuse me while I go buy a Blendtec blender!