My photo was on a billboard, so what?

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Susan Weiner, ProfNet, #ConnectChatMy headshot photo loomed larger than life on a Times Square Billboard on March 11, 2013. It was a rare moment of achieving what might be considered fame. But so what—what does this mean in the larger scheme of things?

How I made it onto the billboard

In the old days, you had to be a model or famous to make it onto a billboard. That’s no longer true.

My headshot photo went up on PRNewswire’s electronic billboard because I was featured the featured guest on its ProfNet unit’s Twitter chat for journalists. ProfNet doesn’t pay its guests, but it offers this unusual photo opportunity.

Immediate results on Facebook

A big fat zero. That’s what the benefits of my Times Square photo would have been if I hadn’t shared the news via social media. After all, what are the odds that a prospect, client, or other interested party walked through Times Square and looked up at the billboard at the right moment?

I pumped out a link to my photo via Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook. I received many nice comments from my social media connections. In fact, people mentioned the photo in emails to me one month after it appeared.

Facebook is where the photo had the greatest impact. On my Investment Writing Facebook page, the photo had been viewed 647 times as of May 11, 2013. That’s huge for me.

So what?

What does this mean? Facebook views won’t pay my bills. They may not even bring me new clients or buyers for my new book.

Part of social media—and marketing—is throwing stuff out there to see what sticks. In the past, I’ve made connections that have taken as long as seven years to pay off. If my photo caught the eye of one person who becomes an advocate for me, perhaps it has done its job.

Lesson from sales training

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Marketing that focuses on the client, not the seller, is the most effective. The following story, told by Dave Dyer about his training as a rookie salesman supports this point.

The trainer said that you should assume that the prospect you are talking to is saying to himself “What’s in it for me?” during your presentation.  Then, we had a class exercise where each salesperson had to do a presentation to the rest of the class while all the other students interrupted him with comments like, “Who cares?  So what? What’s in it for me? Why should I care about that?”

As you can imagine, the students had lots of fun giving every presenter a hard time and the lesson sure stuck with me.  The product is not important; the prospect only buys what he thinks the product will do for him.

Before you brag about your firm, services, or products, you’d do well to consider this lesson.

If you like how Dyer tells stories, check out his latest book, Steel’s: A Forgotten Stock Market Scandal from the 1920s.

Simple tip for boosting your guest posts’ effectiveness

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Guest blog posts are a great way to expand your network. This tip will help you get more mileage out of your appearances on other people’s blogs.

Photo: BrittneyBush

When you guest-blog, ask your host to insert your headshot photo, byline, and brief bio into the post. Without this information, your readers may not notice that the host is not the author of your post.

I know this because a friend of mine was a guest blogger. However, at first I attributed his opinions to his host. I finally caught on after the friend tweeted his authorship. Don’t let this happen to you!

I follow my own guidelines when I host guests on my blog. I also introduce them briefly. You can see examples by clicking on the many links in “Guest bloggers: 2011 in review.”

I’m mulling over another insertion: the guest blogger’s Twitter handle. I like how Mridu Khullar Relph included @SandraBeckwith in the byline for “Platform Building for Non-Fiction Writers.”

Unsure about how to find guest-blogging opportunities?

You can learn how to find guest-blogging opportunities from my blog posts on “How to guest-blog on personal finance or investments, Part I: Your approach” and “Part II: Blogs that accept guest posts from financial advisors.”

P.S. Why I’m no longer labeling guest posts as “guest posts”

I used to put “guest post” in titles of the posts other people wrote for me. However, I’ve stopped doing that after reading “Why Blogs that Allow Guest Posts Will Be Penalized in 2013” on the ProBlogger blog. The gist of that post seems to be that blogs that abuse guest posts as part of the authors’ attempts to raise their rank in searches will be penalized by Google in 2013.

I think I’m in good shape because none of my guest bloggers are inserting keywords or links solely to boost their Google rankings. However, the first tip of the ProBlogger post was “1. Stop telling people it’s a guest post.” I figured that was a small step worth taking.

Financial marketing lesson from Northern Trust: Focus on “you”

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Northern Trust gets it. Financial marketers should focus on their prospects, not themselves, as reflected in this ad in the April 16, 2013, issue of Wall Street Journal.

The ad links to a landing page at http://www.northerntrust.com/plan.

I highlighted Northern Trust’s advertising in an earlier post, “Northern Trust’s plain English ad.” That ad sparked some conversation in my blog’s comments section. What about the company’s latest ad?

Can mediocre blogs succeed?

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“…Mediocre marketing with commitment works better than brilliant marketing without commitment,” says Jay Conrad Levinson, as quoted in C.J. Hayden’s Get Clients Now! The idea is that marketing on a regular basis is more likely to succeed than a rare but great form of outreach. After all, steady activity makes it likely that your name will appear in front of prospects when they’re finally ready to act.

How does this apply to blogs? Again, posting regularly is key. It would be great if every blog post boasted originality, helpful insights, personal passion, and excellent writing. Few people can hit each of those targets with every post. Despite my love of writing, I believe that your insights and passion are more likely to distinguish you.

If you post consistently, then when readers have questions in your area of expertise, they may seek you out.

Of course, if your idea of posting consistently is to blog once every three months, I doubt that’ll deliver much marketing punch for you. However, if that’s realistically how often you can write original content, then I suggest you turn your piece into a newsletter that you make available on your website and circulate via social media. You may do better as a content curator—a person who shares other people’s content, ideally while adding their own insights—than as a content creator.

How often is often enough to blog? Consider what your readers want and what you can deliver, as I discussed in “Three tips for how often to publish your newsletter.”

What do you think about the trade-off between consistency and mediocrity? Please share.

Image courtesy of imagerymajestic / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

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5 PR tips for financial advisors

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Public relations can be a powerful tool for financial advisors. In “How to Get PR Without Hiring an Agency,” Mike Byrnes shared many tips tailored to advisors in his presentation to the Financial Planning Association of Massachusetts on Feb. 27, 2013. I share some of his tips below, with an emphasis on the lesser-known tips.

1. Use Skype, FaceTime, or Google+ Hangouts

You know how you make a deeper connection when you meet someone face to face? You can achieve a similar connection with tech-savvy reporters who use Skype video, FaceTime, or Google+ Hangouts to communicate using video in addition to audio.

Google+ Hangouts have an added advantage. You can offer a video recording of your call to the reporter. These days even traditional print publications are hungry for video to display on their websites.

However, don’t try to force these technologies on reporters who don’t use them. You’ll just annoy them.

2. Hire an intern who’s a journalist

You need content to feed your PR effort. If you’re on a tight budget, but need help generating content, hire an intern who’s a journalist so she or he writes well.

The intern’s lack of industry knowledge can be a plus. How’s that? You’ll need to explain things in simple, nonfactual terms. This is the language your clients and prospects will respond to.

Just make sure you allow plenty of time to educate your intern. He or she will have a steep learning curve.

3. Provide hyperlinks to your website

If you publish an article on an outside website, be sure to provide a hyperlink to your website. This makes it easy for readers to find you. In an interesting twist on this strategy, Byrnes also suggested commenting online (with an appropriate link) on articles or blogs that your target audience reads. This could introduce you to people who read those comments.

4. Reduce the potential for misquotes

You will be misquoted or misinterpreted at some point in your PR experience. It won’t be malicious. It may be something you can avoid by taking an extra step.

The extra step is to email the reporter with key points after your conversation. If the reporter shares questions prior to your call, you can prepare and send your key points in advance.

A  note from my personal experience as a reporter: Don’t expect reporters to send you articles for your approval prior to publication. They may let you check the accuracy of your quotes before they submit the finished story. However, the more demands you make, the less attractive you’ll be as an interviewee.

5. Follow reporters on social media

It’s much easier to interact with reporters on social media than by traditional means. If you retweet and make positive comments on their articles, you’re helping them look good on the job.

Have these tips worked for you?

If you’ve tried these techniques, I’d like to hear from you about your experiences.

The Six Keys to Confident Presenting

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Beverly Flaxington knows the investment and financial advice industry and she knows how clients and prospects think. I still remember how her explanation of personality types riveted the audience at a Boston Security Analysts Society presentation that I organized. I’m delighted to feature her advice below.

The Six Keys to Confident Presenting

By Beverly D. Flaxington

 

There are many very smart people in the investment business. It takes a lot of dedication, intelligence and discipline to obtain a CFA, or CFP or other investment industry
designation. Unfortunately when it comes to delivering the knowledge to others, many very smart people are sorely lacking in their ability to communicate effectively.

As a college professor I watch students struggle with this, and as a consultant and coach to the investment industry I watch advisors and portfolio managers, among others, struggle with this daily. It’s important to know how to communicate, and how to present because excellent information can get lost on the audience.

There are six keys to confident presenting to think about before the next presentation of any type, to one person or to many, you need to make:

(1)    Know why. Think about what you want as an outcome. Why are you delivering this material? Don’t just focus on content, think about purpose.

(2)    Know who. What is the make-up of your audience? What do they already know about what you are presenting? If you can research before the presentation, it’s great but even during the presentation ask for a show of hands of how many people know certain information. Or go around the room and ask what people know, and what they want to learn.

(3)    Create flow. This means chunking the information down. Have sections, or groups of material. Too many times a presentation is a mish-mash of all kinds of data, charts and background information. Look at your information for themes and categories.

(4)    Provide context. Adult-learning principles tell us that adults learn best when they can interpret information through a lens that they understand and recognize. Show the audience why they should care and the “so what?” about the material Don’t ask them to figure it out, make the link for them.

(5)    Understand your style of communication and that of your audience. Talk fast but your audience is more slow and thoughtful? Modify, and match to your audience.

(6)    Provide closure. What do you want the audience to do as a result of your presentation? What’s next from the meeting? What is the follow-up? State it. Get commitments.

Review your next communication in light of the six steps and see if there is anywhere you can improve for greater success.

Beverly is co-founder of The Collaborative and Advisors Trusted Advisor, consulting businesses devoted to the financial services industry. She is a human behavior expert, a college professor, an award winning and bestselling author and investment industry expert.

 

Learn what works in winning clients

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Are you about to embark on a new marketing campaign that will cost you a lot in money or time? Take a step back! It’s time to assess what’s already working for you.

There are marketing firms that will help you conduct an assessment. But you can get a quick sense by analyzing your most recent new client wins. After all, as Shakespeare said, “What’s past is prologue.” In this case, it means you can learn from your history.

Create a table of new clients

To illustrate what I mean, I created a table analyzing some of the new writing clients that I picked up in 2012. I looked at the following criteria:

  1. Client type
  2. Initial contact
  3. Whether they subscribe to my e-newsletter, which has been a key element of my marketing strategy
  4. Social media connections
  5. Time from initial contact to hire

Here’s a screenshot of my table:

 What worked for me

So what was most important for me in gaining new clients? On the basis of this table, plus some notes that I haven’t shared, I decided on the following:

  1. Word of mouth from people who know me well–In two (possibly three) of these cases my colleagues played a key role.
  2. LinkedIn visibility complemented by my blog/newsletter to keep me in front of prospects until they’re ready to move–The role of social media would be greater if I analyzed how I’ve found students for my blogging class.
  3. Clearly defining my target market on my website–I nearly missed my shot at one of these clients because it wasn’t clear that I worked with vendors to the asset management industry. I’ve since modified my website copy to make that more evident.

What about YOU?

Have you tried analyzing your recent new clients to identify trends? What has helped or hurt your new business development?

 

Why I’m lucky clients didn’t flock to me

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I reluctantly launched my career as a freelancer after getting laid off from a wonderful investment communications job at an investment management firm. After I decided to freelance, my phone didn’t ring with eager prospects. On the other hand, as an introvert, I didn’t do much to market myself. Cold calls? Heaven forbid.

Blessing in disguise

So, how was this a blessing in disguise? Because I developed a style of communicating that fits social media.

I wish I could say I foresaw social media. It might be nice to be a guru. But, I simply acted like myself.

I started an email list to stay in touch with the nice people at my old company. Rather than make my emails all about myself, I started writing up the presentations I attended at the Boston Security Analysts Society, where I networked regularly. I wrote about the bits that interested me, similar to the way I wrote up “How Merrill Lynch and US Trust stay relevant to clients, according to Justine Metz.”

When former colleague Tom Manning emailed me that he looked forward to my emails, I’d realized I’d stumbled onto something good. I turned my emails into a monthly e-newsletter, and I invited my networking contacts to subscribe. Those newsletter articles evolved into blog posts.

Back then, I looked jealously at writers who immediately landed steady work with earlier employers or their vast pool of contacts. But, if I’d done that, I wouldn’t have developed my newsletter, which has become the foundation of my success.

Lessons

I learned a style of marketing that works for an introvert like me, especially in the age of social media. Its components include the following:

  1. Give away useful content.
  2. Send mass emails only to people who agree to receive them.
  3. Keep your name in front of prospects on a regular basis. You can’t sell them until they’re ready to buy.

A veteran of the cold calling, hard sell school of marketing once told me, “You’re lucky you know how to write without always asking for the sale.”

I think I’m lucky the world has swung my way. I’m also grateful for the wonderful readers who have supported my e-newsletter and blog.