Here’s what I found.  She’s never posted a single tweet.  She’s got zero followers. 

And she just lost her credibility with me, and countless others.

Wise words of wisdom:  If you intrigue your readers, they will check you out.  And if they discover you’re a phony baloney, you could find yourself mentioned in a blog post just like this one.  With your name attached to it.  Trashed.  Impaled. 

Discredited.

Your social media credibility is precious.  Once it’s gone, it’s gone.  So here are some simple (though not necessarily easy!) things you can do to build and maintain it.

1.  Post your own photo on your profile.  Not your baby’s.  Or Brad Pitt’s.  Or a picture of a sunset or a dog licking a lollipop (thank you, Chris Tompkins of Go! Media International for that brilliant turn of phrase).  Your own mug shot tells your audience you’re a real, live human being. 

2.  Don’t create a username that screams “I’m an authority!” if you’re not (yet).  In-your-face handles like TheGeniusWriter or ImYourSocialMediaGuru are forgettable – and annoying.  Use your own name.  Then demonstrate, through your contributions, that you really are the genius writer or social media guru or whatever amazing professional you happen to be.  In the words of every English composition teacher you’ve ever had:  show, don’t tell. 

3.  Don’t create a username that screams “I’m an authority!” even if you are.  Again, use your own name.  Let your posts prove your expertise, creativity, and wisdom.  Yes, your name is your brand.  Respected brands generate sales.

4.  Interact.  Please.  In a recent post, I railed about Twitter robots and those who might as well be robots for all the spamming they do.  Don’t be like them.  Your posts are read by people.  People have interests, likes and dislikes, thoughts, feelings, and questions.  So share a solution from time to time.  Ask a question.  Give shoutouts and say thank you – often.  Sell, yes, but not incessantly or mercilessly.

5.  Complete your profile.  You don’t have to use every character allotted to you.  Make it professional and punchy.  Think of it as marketing collateral.  Give your audience reasons to want to know you.  Put in your unique selling proposition.  Do it well.

Any other steps you’d like to suggest?  Let me know.  I’m anxious to hear your ideas.

www.twitter.com/daphneroseknows

But projects can run out of gas for a variety of reasons.  New management, slashed budgets, market shifts, legal issues, and more. 

Maybe you were assigned to lead a process improvement team or were about to roll out the product to end all products.  Without warning, you’re bounced.  Sorry, we don’t need your help on this one now. 

You thought you were a linchpin.  Linchpins ship.  Now that’s been taken from you. 

So how, exactly, do you ship when you can’t? 

1.  Ship what you can.  Write a wrap-up report, giving kudos to those who deserve them.  Include thoughtful projections and recommendations.  Provide it to your stakeholders, or to the new PM, if you’ve been replaced.  Let them know you appreciate the opportunity to serve, albeit briefly.  Mean it.

2.  Take it as a compliment.  If you’re being pulled to work on something else, look on it as confirmation of your value.  Your expertise was simply needed elsewhere.  If there was some diabolical machination behind your removal, tell yourself it’s still confirmation of your value.  Easy to say, hard to do, I know.  Do it anyway.

3.  Speak well of the experience.  Yeah, I know it hurts.  Take it on the chin (as best you can).  For all you know, your next project, a much shinier one, could be on its way, based solely on the fact that you behaved like a stand-up guy or gal.  It happens more often than you might think.  It happened to me. It can happen to you.

You are indeed what you ship.  Get into the shipping habit, no matter what. 

And read Linchpin, as well as Seth Godin’s other great books.  Life-changing stuff.

Aim high in steering.  Think about the marketing connection.  Look up and see what’s waiting for you down the road, miles ahead.  A straightaway?  A hill?  A cliff?  An accident? 

Classic example.  Unless you’ve been living under a rock/leaf/bridge, you’ve heard there’s a population shift coming.  That by 2042, the face of America will be increasingly multicultural, and predominately Hispanic. 

This will affect not only how we market, and who we market to, but what we market.  If there was ever a time to re-examine your product lines for the long haul, ladies and gentlemen, this is it.  

As a Great Marketing (see my post of February 3, 2010, Seven Characteristics of a Great Marketer), your job duty is to take the long view.  Will the marketing campaigns of today still speak to the audience of tomorrow?  And, if not, what are you prepared to do about it?

Don’t kid yourself.  You won’t wake up one morning to discover a demographic shift mysteriously transpired overnight.  Change is gradual.  Over the next four decades the non-Hispanic white population will not only age, it will decline between 2030 and 2040.  If you want painstaking details on where American diversity is headed, look to the Data Book of the US Census Bureau (which is busy collecting even more data as I write this).  

I’ve said all that to say this:  here’s an opportunity to get a head start on serving a market unlike any you’ve served before.  It’s not too early.  Study your particular market’s projected demographics.  If you have to pay for it, pay for it.  It’s an investment in your future, and the future of your customer base.

So to Great Marketers everywhere:  Be brave, look ahead, and…

Aim high in steering. 

But some don’t.  Over the past 90 days, I’ve found myself besieged by “followers” who spew the same sales link and/or message over and over and over and over and over and over again.  I have an important message for them: 

Zzzzzzzzzzzz……

To be fair, in a few cases, a pitch would get my attention, and I’d want more info.  So I’d DM the person.  No answer.  Time would pass.  I’d do it again, thinking maybe their traffic was high and my first request was overlooked.  No answer.  So another pause and another DM.  Same silence.  Finally it dawned on me that communication wasn’t their goal– they were scattergunning flimflam.  Result?  No sale. 

I’m not saying all senders of wow-look-you-too-can-make-a-million-see-my-website messages are hustlers.  But there are many of them.  Too many.  Way too many.

I used The Twitcleaner  to weed out the rogues and scoundrels.  The report showed who was trying to sell me crap (The Twitcleaner’s terminology, not mine), who tweeted nothing but links, potential spammers, and those who rarely tweet.  It also showed me that I was following a bunch of people who weren’t following me back.

You can have The Twitcleaner auto-remove followers based on criteria you select, or you can do it yourself.  Just to be on the safe side (and because I’m crazy), I elected the manual method.  It took a loooooong time to say “buh-bye” to my horde of invaders, but I did it.  And this morning, I see I’ve lost followers.  Boo hoo.  Do I need to be followed by a plethora of sales-pitch snarling robots or shills?  Do you? 

Life is too short to read garbage, even if it’s only 140 characters long.  And none of us needs to be mindless pitch machines.  Believe me, there’s so much noise on Twitter, people will turn you off if all you do is babble.  It only takes a click to unfollow.

 If you want to do this tweeting thing right, read Joel Comm’s Twitter Power.  He tells you how to get the most out of this ever-mutating medium and how to build relationships in the process.  Kudos to him for his common-sense approach to survival and prosperity on the new frontier. You can follow him on Twitter – he’s @joelcomm.

Also visit www.thetwitcleaner.com when you’re ready to give the riff raff the old heave-ho.  They’re also on Twitter @thetwitcleaner.

…which is not strictly true.  Fear of success really does exist.  Don’t believe me?  Let’s play “imagine this”. 

Let’s say you set some new standard of greatness at your company.  You saved them a bundle or invented something fantastic.  You get recognized for this feat of derring-do.  Maybe you get a commendation in front of all your peers.  Maybe it’s delivered by the CEO. 

You think:  Yippee!

Now the CEO shakes your hand and says, “Congratulations, ________.  We’re proud of you.  You’ve just set a new standard for our entire industry.  I’ve got my eye on you.  Can’t wait to see what you do next.”

Uh oh.

Now fear of success makes sense, doesn’t it?  The late Phil Capka – Philadelphia Phillies pitcher, chef extraordinaire, and top salesperson – said it best.  The usual thinking is this:  “You’re only as good as your last game.”

(Sure, many claim that quote as their own, but I’m going to credit Phil because he was a swell guy. RIP, buddy.)

So there you stand, thinking yourself into a lather over how to top your own stellar performance.  What to do? 

1.  Acknowledge the well wishers.  Let the big fella know you couldn’t have done it without him.  Be sure to let him know you look forward to great things from him too. You’ve got your eye on him!

2.  Thank your friends and supporters.  Be honest. You probably didn’t make it to the top on your own.  Yes, you yourself may have done X wonderful thing, but Team YOU had your back all the way.  Riddle me this, Batman:  When is it ever bad to have a fan club?

3.  Give a nod to the glowering souls who now yearn for your downfall.  Thank them for believing in you, even if they only inspired you not to be like them.  In the words of my (not late) ex-husband, “Some people are only good as a bad example.”  Thank them anyway.  It’s hard to want to destroy someone right after they’ve credited you with being part of their success. 

4.  Be humble.  You can even be a little “aw, shucks” in how you accept accolades.  People rarely recall arrogant one-hit-wonders.  They do, however, remember the nice guy who did something great.

5.  Plan your next success.  And the next.  And the next.  Revisit your goals and career plan.  Sure, you just made a major milestone, but do you need to modify anything to get to the next one?  Get creative.  Get a little silly, if that helps.  Argue with yourself.  Expect answers from yourself.  Above all, do it for you.  And don’t expect to be showered with praise next time success happens.  Simply expect that it will.  And it will.

It’ll be OK to be scared then too.

1.  Bond

You already know bunches of professionals. Take them into your confidence – tell them your marketing goals, and ask for their sage advice. A brilliant coop marketing effort could come out of it, if not today, maybe tomorrow. If nothing else, you’ve expanded a relationship, which is always a very, very good thing.

Then there’s social networking.  If you’re not on LinkedIn, start today.  Don’t think you know anyone there?  Send me an invitation.  Same goes with Twitter. Follow me @daphneroseknows, and I’ll follow you back. I’m not as big on Facebook, but add me as your friend and I’ll accept. 

2.  Present

Go to Google (or Bing).  Type in your city, town, or metropolitan area + “associations” or “societies”.  You should get quite a list.  Simply decide which groups might benefit from your message.  Call them and tell them you’re an expert in X field and would like to speak at one of their functions.  Tell them when you’re available, and offer to speak for free.  Don’t be surprised if someone comes up to you after your presentation and asks you to speak at one of their company functions.  In addition to adding to your marketing mix, paying gigs could be in your future.

Still petrified?  Join Toastmasters.  There’s bound to be a chapter close by.  They’ll cure what ails you.

3.  Blog

Oh yes, you can.  It’s easy to set one up.  I clearly did.  WordPress isn’t the only game in town.  There’s also Typad, Tumblr, Google Blog, and many others.  Post at least once a week.  Daily, if you can manage it.  Stumped for of topics?  Ask your newfound pals on LinkedIn/Facebook/Twitter/whatever for ideas.  You’ll get suggestions galore.

4.  Guest blog

As you build your contacts, you’re bound to build relationships with established bloggers.  Don’t be afraid to ask if you can be a special guest star on their blog.  Or get gutsy and send them a finished blog post asking if they’d be willing to upload it.  Always worth a shot. Builds your credibility too.

5.  Get interviewed

…on local radio and TV.  You know which talk shows you like.  E-mail the host about your area of expertise, and pitch him/her on why you think listeners or viewers would love to know your viewpoint.  There’s a dearth of positive news right now, so you’ll be doing the host, the audience, and yourself a favor. 

Reach out to established podcasters too, and ask to be interviewed.  It’ll take a little while to research who’s who, but the internet is always there to guide you on your path to enlightenment.

6.  Be seen

If there’s an appropriate social event, be there.  Try to attend events your targets are likely to attend.  Glad hand, for sure, but don’t go with the expressed purpose of doing the hustle.  Be a joy to meet. 

7.  Be free

Offer your product or service to a charity – pro bono.  Taking it one step further, you can also sponsor a charity event.  That’s not cheap, but if you can swing it, it’ll give you tons of mileage. 

And in addition to knowing you did something good for your fellow man, this tactic can make for some mighty fine PR.

Now that you know all this…go!

I read Seth Godin’s Linchpin over the weekend. Great book. Love his other books more, but this one has some terrific points. One is the very topic I’d planned to discuss today: generosity in the world of marketing. Fancy that. The great master actually scooped me. He didn’t spend a lot of time on it, but he discussed it all the same. So I tip my imaginary hat to him, and add my two cents’ worth to the mix.

Since childhood, most of us have been taught that it’s more blessed to give than to receive. Then we entered the business world.

It’s still possible to be generous. In fact, it’s a requirement if you want to differentiate yourself.

Business generosity is as real as personal generosity. It doesn’t mean giving away something worthless, like a dead lead or a cheap plastic trade show goodie or a 10 page eBook full of inane platitudes. You can’t fool your audience. They know a shill from a success.

I once had a boss whose favorite line was, “There’s no value to free.” His belief was that clients don’t appreciate something that’s just handed to them. This is absolutely true.

If you just hand it to them.

Go a step further. Whatever you give to your prospects, make sure they know what they’re actually getting – the magnitude of its value. Do this and you’ve changed the conversation.

Let’s use the eBook example. Don’t make the book a small gift. Get a little daring. Have it contain at least one thing that can change your reader’s life. Maybe one thing that changed yours. Share your personal story. Maybe the knowledge you’re giving away once made you a thousand bucks, or saved you hours of research, or reduced your gas bill. Make sure your prospect knows this “freebie” is worth a lot.

Make your gift an awesome one. Give of yourself. What you get back will have monetary value, to be sure. It might take a little longer. But you’ll gain positive PR, customer trust, and the potential for their loyalty. These can go a long, long way.

Be generous and your prospects will come back for more. Nex time they’ll be more than willing to pay fairly for it.

Segmentation…taught in business schools everywhere.  Practiced in businesses around the globe.  Tried and true.  What makes a successful segment?  It’s…

• Measurable (so you can tell how successful your campaign and resulting sales are likely to be)
• Easy to communicate with (for obvious reasons)
• Stable (stays around long enough for you to market to them)
• Relatively good sized in comparison with your overall customer/prospect base

 Companies sort their customers and prospects in a lot of different ways:  by where they live, their values and lifestyles, their buying habits, and a host of other criteria.  But how does doing that make you look different and more appealing to your identified markets?  It enables you to focus more specifically on their unique attributes. 

Now let’s do a 180.  Take the group you just created and treat them as individuals.  Again.

Before you decide this is wackadoodle thinking on my part, let’s consider two retailers who did the very same thing, with exceptional results (rotten economy notwithstanding).

Brilliant target marketer Best Buy is after “Jill”, the suburban mom; “Buzz”, the young technology nut; “Ray”, the cost-conscious family man; “Mr. Storefront”, the small business owner; “Carrie”, the single professional woman; and “Helen and Charlie”, curious empty-nesters.  Right now, Jill, Buzz, Ray, and Mr. Storefront are the segments they’re focusing on the most.  (No, I’m not going to tell you which segment I fall in.) 

I sign up for their rewards program.  I buy their stuff.  They e-mail me, congratulating me on being awarded new rewards points.  They make not-so-subtle suggestions about how to use them.  I like their local store too – which, by the way, is designed for my segment (i.e., me).  Say what you will, it works.

Then there’s IKEA.  Their “Death Star” is automated online assistant Anna (a pleasant looking interactive avatar).  I visit their web site.  Anna speaks to me.  She asks me intuitive customer service questions.  She’s so conversational and curious, I eventually confess my real buying interests.  Anna dutifully records everything in her CRM database. 

The resulting communications are compelling.  I mean, doggone, how did she know to e-mail me that Vreta is back in stock,  and available in Mjuk red? Anna’s even got her own Facebook page now.  Another smart place for her – and you – to do market segmentation.  Another place to reach the individual within the group.

Yes, I know….the examples I used are massive retailers.  Your business might be B2B (same principles apply, though).  You probably don’t have the marketing budget or staff that Best Buy and IKEA have. So what can you do to be unique, given your budget and staffing constraints?  You can take a page from Best Buy’s and IKEA’s respective books.  You can use the tools and technology you already have to identify your targeted groups.  Then see them as individuals again. 

And let those individuals know that’s how you think of them.

Today I’m going to wax eloquent about niche marketing.   Good old Wikipedia defines it as “the subset of the market on which a specific product is focusing; therefore the market niche defines the specific product features aimed at satisfying specific market needs, as well as the price range, production quality, and the demographics that is intended to impact.”

[Deep breath goes here.]

Like Pooh, I am a bear of very little brain. I like things simple. To me, niche marketing is offering the specific solution or product for a specific high-profit segment of your marketplace.  After all, it’s been said by long line of sages that 20% of your market provides 80% of your profit.  This being the case, you might do best to focus more of your efforts on that 20%.  Right?

But what if you don’t know your niche?  And what do you do with it once you figure it out? 

All rocket science aside, the path is really pretty straightforward. 

1.  Know unquestioningly what unique product or service you offer and why it – and you – are the best of breed.  Know it waking or sleeping.  Bottom line, this is the most important step of all. You don’t have this down cold, forget going any farther. 

2.  Identify your potential buyers.  If you know your unique product/service, you already have some prospects.  Now focus into that target market like a laser beam.  Research the daylights out of it.  Get an understanding of their “hot buttons”.  Warning:  don’t be surprised if you have to revamp your company’s face (logo, tagline, marketing mix, and maybe even its name) in order to hit home.

3.  Get involved with the social networks of your choice.  Deeply involved.  Personally, I get more sheer mileage out of LinkedIn and Twitter than anything else.  You might find that Facebook’s where you need to hang out.  Or somewhere else.  Doesn’t matter.  Find other entrepreneurs who have the same concerns and interests and pain (although hopefully not your precise marketplace!)  Don’t expect to get advice without giving something in return.  Offer best practices you can afford to share.  You clearly don’t want to give away the store.  Just never forget:  them that gives gets.

4.  Know what your competitors are doing.  Find out first what they’re doing right, even if it makes you feel like a lesser mortal.  Use the essence of their successful marketing as the inspiration for your even better campaigns.  Look for weaknesses in their product, advertising, and delivery systems.  Cruise their web sites.  Even call their sales and customer service departments and do a little spying.  While you’re at it, analyze what they’re doing wrong.  Learn from it.  In the words of my ex-husband, “some people are only good as a bad example.” (I knew that quote would come in handy someday.)

Now that you know what to offer, who to offer it to, and who you’re marketing against, don’t delay.  Get cracking.  The world moves a heck of a lot faster now. 

This is your moment.  Carpe that diem.

So you know your customer and you’ve created your value proposition.  You’re feeling pretty good about your differentiation.

Not so fast.  How current are you?  You might feel a little undereducated about future marketing channels.  Maybe you work in an industry where the rules of marketing don’t change much (whether or not they ought to is another matter).  Or you could be so busy keeping the marketing machine humming that you’re slightly out of step with advances in your marketplace.  Solutions?

There are plenty, but here’s the most creative one I know.  Get a reverse mentor. 

In order to demonstrate differentiation to your clients, your peeps, and your betters, you have to demonstrate a desire to change with the times.  Hooking up with a reverse mentor is a tremendous opportunity to do just that.  What you learn can make you the most techno-savvy senior marketer in your herd. 

So how to start?  First off….

1.  Get over your fear of taking risks.  You weren’t afraid of doing that before, which is how you became a marketing star in the first place.  Square your shoulders and look on this as the learning opportunity of a lifetime.

2.  Develop your list of learning goals.  What do you want your mentor to teach you?  Your list doesn’t have to be greatly detailed.  Be general.  And be honest.  If you don’t know Technorati from Facebook, be prepared to admit it to your mentor.  You will not die.

3.  Identify good candidates.  Say that shiny new MBA who tells time by his iPhone.  The sharp young saleswoman who thinks Twitter is so last week.  Meet with them and explain, in brief, what you want to do and why you think they’re the perfect person to help you.  Just remember they lead their lives at the speed of light.  While they may have the skills and the perspectives you yearn for, they may not have the time.  Keep asking.  Eventually you’ll get a surprised, enthusiastic “Yes!”

3.  Set up regular meetings times and topics.  In short, devise a class syllabus.  Understand that milestones may have to be fluid, because technology moves with frightening speed.  Set up ways to confirm your progress.  Determine what constitutes success.  Work with your mentor to clearly scope it all out.

4.  Speak to his or her manager before you even start, to make sure they understand the plan.  It isn’t likely you’ll meet with disapproval, but it’s always good to have an understanding from the start.  It’ll go a long way toward making sure your new friend is rewarded well at his or her next performance appraisal.

 5.  Thank your mentor.  Do it at the start.  Do it as you go along.  Do it at the finish with a letter of recommendation, or an introduction to someone influential.  When appropriate – and especially if asked – share the wealth of knowledge you’ve accumulated with your mentor.  There’s nothing wrong with information-sharing.  But don’t stray from the purpose of your project:  sharpening your skillset, mindset, and knowledge base…and ensuring your differentiation from your peers and competitors.

You may want to consider setting up a corporate reverse-mentoring program.  This can be quite an effective tool to retain bright young talent.  Or you might think about working with a local university to tap into their business school brain trust. 

I’ve been a mentor, and I’ve mentored.  It’s time consuming, but the rewards for both parties are undeniable.

Besides, you never know what you might learn.