July 2012 – Page 3

Transmedia Vs Cross-Media

One of the hottest trends
in entertainment marketing
is transmedia.

This is different from cross-media.

Transmedia is a story
told over multiple media
where each media makes a contribution
to the total story.

Cross-media simply means
using multiple media.
The media doesn’t interact
with each other.

Andrea Phillips has a number of tips
on how to make transmedia
work for your business.

One tip?

“When you launch something,
don’t just send someone a mysterious box.
Send them a mysterious box
if you have to,
but also send them a letter
with a URL
telling them what you’re doing.
Send out a press release.
Make sure people know
what it is you’re going to do,
and make sure that they know
before it’s almost done
or nobody will look at it.”

Your prospects are using multiple media.
Your marketing should also.
And if your marketing builds
to create a greater story,
that can be even more powerful.

The Meeting Binder

When I worked in new business development
for a major beverage company,
I had what I called
a “meeting binder.”

I had binders for specific projects
but I also had a binder for
those general, usually last minute meetings
I’d be pulled into.

These meetings were often
with the executive team
and the reason I was asked
to attend
was because I was expected to add value.
I was expected to KNOW.

This meeting binder
contained the answers to
the most recently asked questions.
Historic ingredient costs,
Past project performances,
Recent company financials,
etc.

Other attendees would rattle off numbers.
I could SHOW executives
the results.
This impressed the hell out of them.

As Karen Keller shares
“Have visuals on hand.
Even if it’s not a powerpoint presentation,
carry something in your pocket
or on your laptop
just in case people start asking
for more visual proof or answers.”

If executives can see your information,
they are more likely to believe it.

Seasonal Energy

Do you have more energy?
That’s normal.
Summer normally gives us all
an energy boost.

And as Anita Campbell explains,
we should use that boost
to help our business.

“Unlike the hibernation feeling
that can make us lag in winter,
summer generally gives us more energy
—and more time to use it.
Allow yourself to feel
how your natural rhythms change
at this time of year.
Try getting up an hour earlier than normal
and use the time for creative thinking.
Meditate on a business problem,
free-associate ideas or
think about long-term goals
for your businesses.
Capture your ideas in writing.”

Ride that summertime high
and get more projects accomplished!

Vacations For Entrepreneurs

Yesterday,
I mentioned that
many bloggers are taking vacations.

Not this blogger.

Why?
Because I’m an entrepreneur
and I have too many exciting projects
on the go
to take a vacation right now.

And even when entrepreneurs take vacation,
we ensure our businesses continue operating.

I blog every day.
I write every day.
I promote every day.
When I take a vacation,
I either delegate these tasks
or I complete them before the vacation
and schedule them for during the vacation.

If your business stops
while you’re on vacation,
your momentum stops.
Your business should work
even when you don’t.

Feed The Strong

It is July
which means
many bloggers are on vacation.
While on vacation,
these bloggers usually repost
or link to
their most popular posts.

Why?

Because they know
that views, like sales,
normally grow exponentially.
One view becomes two,
two becomes four,
four becomes sixteen.
They also know these posts are proven
to fill a need.

When I promote a story,
I promote my top selling story
for the exact same reasons.

That means my weak stories die.
They fail.
And that’s hard for me,
as the writer, to accept.
I want them all to succeed.

But I’m running a business.
I need the best return
on my marketing dollars
and that return is
to promote my strongest stories.

Feed the strong.
Let the dogs die.

Constant Innovation

Coca-Cola is one of the top brands
in the world.
The 126 year old company
has legions of devoted fans.
Yet Coca-Cola innovates,
bringing out new products
every single year.

My romance writing business is
much, much, MUCH smaller.
Yet I innovate,
trying new product lines,
new types of characters.

Companies and entrepreneurs
have to innovate and change
constantly
because our customers are changing
constantly.

That means
having a system in place.

As Vivian Wagner shares
“Businesses need to have
a process in place
that allows them
to continually evaluate current products
and come up with new ideas.
This means talking with customers,
soliciting feedback,
reading comments about your products
on social media sites,
evaluating sales and
otherwise gauging and
assessing customer opinion and demand.
It might also mean having idea meetings,
where you, developers and your employees
toss around ideas and
talk about what’s working and what’s not.”

You need to innovate
constantly.
They don’t have to be big innovations.
They don’t have to be innovations
affecting all of your processes.
But you DO need to innovate.

Which Superstar To Promote?

We’ve all seen it happen.
A superstar climbs her way
to the top
and then once she snags the leadership position,
she implodes,
taking company profitability with her.

So what are one of the signs
this superstar
might not be leadership material?

Justin Menke,
author of Better Under Pressure,
shares that
elevated narcissism and self-promotion
is incompatible to great leadership.

“Only an individual
who feels genuinely invigorated
by the growth, development,
and success of others
can become an effective leader
of an enterprise.
And it remains
the most common obstacle of success
for those trying to make that leap.”

What if that’s not you?
You have a couple of choices.
You can train yourself
to be happy for others
when they succeed.
OR you can maintain your superstar role
and leave the leading to others.

When you lead,
it isn’t about you and your success.
It is about your team’s success.

Outsourcing And Supervising

A loved one hired a contractor
to put in a flower bed
on the weekend.
The contractor was highly recommended
by a friend.

The contractor did a shitty job.

What went wrong?
The friend hired the contractor
and then supervised him closely.
The loved one hired the contractor
and then left for the weekend.

Outsourcing is a wonderful alternative
for time-crunched entrepreneurs.
It transfers the doing
to someone else.

It doesn’t transfer the supervising.

YOU are responsible for quality control.
YOU are responsible for
supervising your contractors.

Don’t Be Needy

We all know needy people.
They cling.
They ask for constant reassurance.
They irritate
and we tend to avoid them.

Needy salespeople are as bad.

As Bruna Martinuzzi shares

“Being needy is
an emotional advertisement
to others.
It is something that people sense
right away.
It will translate itself in
a myriad of behaviors
that will hinder rather than
help the sales process:
continuing to sell
past the buying signals;
anxiety if you are unable to make progress;
repeated contacts with the client;
lowering of your price below
what you are worth.”

Needy salespeople make us feel
more nervous about the prospective purchase
and nervous people don’t usually buy.

Be eager, not needy.

Twitter Tips

When I relaunched my writing career
under a new pen name,
I cut down on my social media.
I didn’t have a blog.
I wasn’t on Twitter.

My Amazon sales suck.
It turns out
most authors
selling well on Amazon
tweet.
This isn’t a coincidence.
Kindle users use Twitter.

So am I going crazy on Twitter,
tweeting fifteen times a day?
Nope.

According to Buddy Media,
“There’s an inverse relationship
between daily Tweet frequency
and engagement.
So the more you Tweet per day,
the less engaging your Tweets may become.”

The ideal number of Tweets being four.
The best time to tweet is
between 1 to 3 pm.
The ideal number of hashtags is two.

If you want to sell on Amazon,
consider marketing via Twitter.