On August 15th, 2011 Mark Bandte wrote:
So I'm one of those people who is kind of good at many different things. I been around, y'know? So these things I can do, be it making some films for the web, selling snow to eskimos, consulting people on social media, or even fixing a broken roof - they are things that I can do here and there for customers or friends, and sometimes even make some money from it (or barter for services and products). But how is it that I could promote myself as "singer, internet extraordinaire, filmmaker and roof fixer"? These things are quite different, and anyone who knows anything about SEO will tell you that it would be pretty damned hard to get a site going with all those things combined, but hey - I don't really care about that so much. This is where word of mouth comes into play, and that good ol' word of mouth is my bread and butter, especially when it comes to Toothless Tiger and social media in general.
After all - social media is just amplifying the word of mouth market. Getting the message across to more people than you would normally talk to in person, simply because they are on you contacts list. I have actually gotten some cool jobs merely by an acquaintance noticing my
photos (which I have neither studied nor proclaimed that I am great at), and me saying 'Yeah…I can do that' and them telling a friend who books me. What luck! Or is it? Is it not a way of promoting ones self simply by doing? By living? By showing yourself, and your abilities? It's especially the 'showing' that's important here, I think - because if you aren't showing the world what you do, how is it supposed to know?
So I figure that if I just do these things as they hit me, and do them as well as I can [as well as being as charming as possible while doing so ;) ], that I might just get remembered in those certain conversations where other people or companies need the same. Remember the olden days? Someone would hook you up with the fix-it guy who would come to your house do your plumbing, your lights and your tv. I like that. But more like a modern version, where I can drop by, take some photos and film, make you laugh and sell you some snow….and sing while I'm doing it And in the end, hopefully you will have some information, some inspiration and a film that you can put on your website and sell a gazillion whatever it is that you sell.
[social, media, word, mouth, film, web, photos, consulting]
[0 comments]
On April 27th, 2011 Mark Bandte wrote:
I've been thinking a lot lately about the cost of advertising via conventional methods - ie. newspapers, magazines, billboards etc - as opposed to social media.
I've previously worked with design furniture, where, in the beginning we used to put in our monthly advertisements, and give our money and just trust that it worked. I mean - hey, that's just how we do it, right? After a while, we started to ask our clients where it was that they had found us, and we were quite shocked at how little people had seen us in magazines and such. Most people had either found us online, or had been referred by friends or family. Good ol' word of mouth never fails, I guess. Well, who would you trust more? Someone you knew (even if you didn't know them very well), or a random picture with some writing in a magazine or newspaper? It's not like the magazine is really putting you in there only because they think you're cool- you have to pay through the nose for that space. I think that maybe people get a little desensitized after a while (I know I have). Don't get me wrong - it's great for visibility, but if you are a small to medium business, it's not the easiest thing to throw €1500 - €4000 for a page which someone will see once or twice and then throw away.
So why not invest €5000 or so, and learn how to use something which is essentially free (albeit the time used) , and use it well?
Learning how to post great and epic content, how to be visible and accessible to your customers, how to build your brand and show the personality of the employees, and sharing your work and products with your clients, directly, is pure gold! Imagine: The beauty of word of mouth, fused with advertising! And all it costs is your time.
Keep on rockin' in the free world!
[advertising, social, media, conventional, magazines, newspapers, billboards]
[5 comments]
Im just back from next09 in Hamburg and Disruptive Media in Stockholm (you can find my talk here). It has been a hectic but really learningful week, filled with great people, great talks and new insights. This morning I watched one of my favorite speeches in a long time again: Brian Solis on "putting the public back in PR" - the reason I guess I find this talk at the top of my conference experience is because Brian is so right in my opinion. It leaves me to touch on something that I mentioned in my own talk at disruptive media - why should we ever engage ourself in a brand ? I mean:
1. a brand is not a person
2. brands are normally really boring
3. they normally don't do anything in this world if they can't measure it or can't make money on it.
aka. they're not human.
So why should we engage ourselves in brands ? Well first of all because of the utility and convinience they provide. but I think that Umair Haque (or Jeff Jarvis ? don't remember) said it very well at next09. "the only reason we engage ourselves in brands is because they make us better". The experience of the brand is giving us some sort of value that we didn't have before. The experience of the brand get's us closer to our own personal truth (whatever that is)...
The great thing is that with social tools - it is so much more fun to create this involvement in the brandexperience - it's not really easier, it still has to be a brilliant creative mind that comes up with the call-to-action for the involvement. The hardest thing is to find that magic something in your brand that people loves - and it might not be the thing you think it is - what are people saying about you - and where?
Now the thing that people are already saying - might be what you need to start out with =) - now go ahead and engage some people
[branding, disruptive media, human, return on involvement, social, user experience, value, social marketing]
[651 comments]