MackCollier.com

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Do you REALLY want more traffic on your blog?

We’ve had two #Blogchats so far in 2011, and the focus of both has been to help us get our blogging house in order for 2011.  Figuring out what we want to accomplish on our blogs over the next 12 months.

We also spent a lot of time talking about goals for our blogs in 2011.  Probably the most common goal that #Blogchat participants had for their blog in 2011 was getting more traffic.

How many of you nodded because you have the same goal for your blog this year?  Did you know that’s one of the worst goals you can have for your blog?

Let’s say your goal for today is to get an extra 100 visitors on your blog.  Let’s say you reach that goal, and 100 new visitors that have never read your blog before today, visit it.

And let’s say every single one of them stay for 10 seconds, leave, and never come back.

You met your goal of getting an additional 100 visitors to your blog, and yet you got zero CONVERSIONS from those 100 visitors.  This is why I don’t want you to think about getting more visitors to your blog, I want you to think about getting more conversions.  What do I mean by conversions?  That means that you want your visitors to perform a certain action(s) on your blog.

Some examples of conversions you could want from visitors:

  • A comment
  • Signing up for your blog feed via email
  • Signing up for your email newsletter
  • Buying a product directly from your blog
  • Leaving the blog to visit a product page on your website

I have been harping on this topic a LOT in the past couple of weeks on Twitter.  Because I want you to have a real PLAN for your blog in 2011.  I want you to know WHO you are targeting and what actions you want them to take on your blog.

Let me give you examples from my own plan for this blog in 2011.

I have two goals for this blog, primary and secondary.  The primary goal, is to generate more training and consulting business directly from the blog.  The secondary goal is to use the blog to build awareness and visibility for myself and my services.  Here’s how measure the effectiveness of the blog in helping me reach these goals.

Primary goal – Generate more training and consulting business directly from the blog.

What I look for – Clients contacting me directly asking about my speaking/training/consulting services.  After that, I look at how many times my speaking/training/consulting pages are being viewed.  For example, notice the ‘Need Social Media Training? Click Here’ banner I have on the top of the 1st sidebar?  That was created specifically to see if I could drive interest in my social media training services.  It’s been up for about a month now, and is generating views every day, but so far not any business directly.  So I am getting views on that training page, but no conversions.  See why just having traffic isn’t enough?

Secondary goal – Build awareness and visibility for myself and my services.

What I look for – This is where I look for how y’all are reacting to the content I am creating.  I track comments, but also number of RTs and where traffic is coming from.  Because if I am creating valuable content that’s generating interaction and being shared, then it boosts my visibility.  Which means I have more exposure to potential clients.  Email subscribers to my blog’s feed is another thing I look at.

And this isn’t perfect, and I constantly look at what I am tracking and what my goals are.  But the point is, I have a plan.  I have an idea of what I am trying to accomplish, and how it fits into the larger strategy I have for the blog and what I am trying to accomplish.

What’s your plan for your blog in 2011?

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Thoughts and Images from CES 2011

Last week I was able to attend CES (The Consumer Electronics Show) for the first time.  I was in town working with TMG on a Citi Webcast for its Citi 2G and Thank You Card programs, and decided to spend an extra day in Vegas to check out CES.  I wanted to see the pretty toys, but also wanted to see some of the marketing tactics that companies were using to drive attention to their setup.  And, of course, I was hoping to meet a few of my friends in the social media space.

The 1st thing I noticed about CES when I arrived at the Convention Center is that I had a LOT of walking ahead of me.  Partly because the show is so spread out, and partly because I am directionally-challenged and couldn’t find anything.  I seriously believe I lost 2 hours on Friday walking in the wrong direction looking for a session or an exhibit hall.  And the fact that CES was an absolute madhouse didn’t help, there were about 3 times as many people as SXSW, confined in a smaller convention center.

After catching a couple of social media sessions, I headed to the exhibit floor.  I quickly learned that almost every exhibit had at least one of the following:

  • A pretty car
  • A pretty girl
  • iPad/iPhone skins

The 3rd one surprised me, but accessories for the iPad and iPhone were the most common products I saw.  Also saw a lot of 3D technology, especially for TVs.

After walking around for a bit, most of the booths started to blend together, and many were setup as having a small desk area where a couple of people were giving info about the products.  But I did notice a few booths that at least had interesting visuals, such as this one for a product that claimed to ‘clean your music files’:

As you might expect, the big brands had huge exhibit spaces and splashy guests.  As luck would have it, I missed the biggest guest of all, as Lady Gaga showed up at the Polaroid booth on Thursday, while I was at The Mirage working on the Citi Webcast.  But I did get over on Friday to the Sony area to see the ESPN crew doing a live remote:

And I think Panasonic had an exhibit space larger than some of the towns in North Alabama.  Probably the coolest thing I saw at CES was this huge sand sculpture that the artist was finishing up as I found it.  Not sure this makes me any more likely to buy a Panasonic product, but it was cool nonetheless:

The biggest problem I had at CES (and it was a problem for a lot of the people I talked to) was getting around and also finding where I wanted to go.  This is where I think companies missed some opportunities for connecting with attendees and influencers.

First, when I landed in Las Vegas, I made my way outside and to the longest taxi line I had ever seen.  I was in this line for at least an hour.  I was updating my movement on Twitter, when @Sue_Anne had a great suggestion:  Branded shuttles.  A company could have provided shuttle runs for 50 or so attendees at a pop, and for the next 15-30 mins, they could give us a commercial for their products while we were on the shuttle.  We would have arrived at our hotel happy because we would have avoided the taxi line, the taxi fare, and we’d know exactly where their booth was at CES, and probably would have showed up.  At least I know I would have.  Oh and we would have blogged and tweeted about how amazing the company was for helping us out.

Another problem I had when I arrived at CES was that I had no idea where anything was.  Even the few maps I could find were very hard to read, and when I finally found an information desk, they weren’t sure where the conference track was located that I was trying to get to.  So I needed help getting around and figuring out directions, sounds like a great opp for brands such as Garmin and Tom Tom (Who both had exhibits at CES), right?  I think I lost at least 2 hours on Friday simply walking around aimlessly LOOKING for a session or exhibit hall.  If a smart brand could have helped me and saved me those 2 hours, I would have gladly promoted them during the event, and I would be blogging about them right now.

All said, CES is an event that seems to be very hard on first-timers.  I talked to a few CES veterans, and they told me that after you’ve been a couple of times, the event is much easier to navigate.  If I had been able to stay one more day, I probably could have seen a lot of people and things that I missed.  But I did get to see plenty of new and old friends:

If you were at CES, what stuck out to you?  BTW here’s all the pictures I took at CES on Flickr.

PS: For those of you that are interested, here is a link to watch the Citi webcast.  After a quick registration you should be able to view it.  I won’t give it away, but the technology behind the Citi 2G card is VERY interesting and something that will instantly get your attention.  As I told Jeff, credit cards don’t normally get me very excited, but the technology behind the Citi 2G card is obviously a big deal as soon as you see it.  So check it out if you like, but I do have to apologize for not wearing the cowboy hat 😉

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How much does Social Media cost companies in 2011?

Click here to get the 2012 Price Update to this post.

Last February I wrote a post about the prices companies could expect to pay for basic social media services.  It ended up being the most viewed post here in 2010, by more than a 3 to 1 margin.  And interestingly, it gets a TON of search traffic, terms like ‘social media cost’, ‘cost of a blog’, ‘social media fees’, etc.  That tells me that there’s still a lot of confusion and a lack of clarity about what prices companies should expect to pay for basic social media services.

So I wanted to update that post for 2011, with a bit more information, and greater clarity around the numbers. These figures come from rates shared with me by fellow consultants and agencies that specialize in social media marketing, in addition to my own research, as well as what I charge for similar services.   Last year I only included ranges for each service, this year I’ve added a Most Charge distinction to give everyone a greater idea of what they will probably pay.  I’ve also added a few more services, such as training workshops, speaking, hourly consulting rates, and even ghostwriting fees (yes companies pay for this).

As I mentioned last year, when you are trying to set your social media budget for a project, there are several questions you need to ask yourself, such as:

  • What are your goals for using social media?  Brand awareness? Generate sales or leads?  This greatly determines the tools necessary to achieve those goals
  • What are your resources?  Can you handle everything in-house, or will you need to outsource some of the work?  All of the work?
  • What is the length of the project?  Obviously, a 6-month project will cost more than a 3-month project.

When you contact a consultant or agency, they should be asking you questions as well.  They should want to know why you want to use social media, what are you trying to accomplish.  If they try to give you prices without asking you questions, that is a red flag.  They really can’t give you prices until they know more about your company, your resources, and what you are wanting to accomplish.

Here’s the prices:

Blog:

Launch a blog from the ground-up, outsource all content creation (including customer interaction, handling responses to comments, etc) – $1,000-$12,000 a month

Most Charge – $3,000 – $5,000 a month

Launch a blog from the ground-up, outsource some content creation – $1,000-$8,000 a month

Most Charge – $2,000-$3,500 a month

Restructure an existing blog to improve your efforts – $1,000-$5,000 a month for 3-6 months

Most Charge – $2,000-$4,000 a month for 3-6 months

Ghostwriting blog posts – $50-$500 per

Most Charge – $100-$250 per

Twitter:

Launch a new presence on Twitter and outsource all content creation and customer interaction – $1,000-$7,500 a month

Most Charge – $2,000-$4,000 a month

Launch a new presence on Twitter and then provide ongoing training for company – $1,000-$6,000 a month

Most Charge – $1,000-$3,000 a month

Restructure an existing Twitter presence to improve your efforts – $1,000-$4,000 a month for 3-6 months

Most Charge – $1,000-$2,500 a month

Limited coaching to improve your existing efforts on Twitter – $1,000-$4,000 a month

Most Charge – $1,000-$2,500 a month

Facebook:

Launch a Facebook Page from the ground-up, outsourcing all content creation and customer interactions – $2,000-$9,000 a month

Most Charge – $2,500-$5,000 a month

Launch a Facebook Page from the ground-up, with limited ongoing training – $1,500-$7,500 a month for 3-6 months

Most Charge – $2,000-$4,000 a month

Social Media Strategy:

Comprehensive Social Media Strategy Creation, assuming outsourcing of all content creation through all channels(minimum 2) – $3,000-$20,000 a month

Most Charge – $4,000-$7,000 a month

Comprehensive Social Media Strategy Creation, assuming limited outsourcing of content creation and/or ongoing training –$3,000-$15,000 a month for 4-12 months

Most Charge – $3,000-$6,000 a month

Audit of existing Social Media Strategy Including Recommendations for Improvement – $2,000-$10,000

Most Charge – $2,000-$5,000

Social Media Consulting:

Hourly rates – $50-$500/Hr

Most Charge – $75-$200/Hr

Note: These prices are based on buying just one hour of a consultant’s time.  Many consultants also offer their consulting time in blocks of time.  These hours are usually offered at a discounted rate.  For example, a consultant might charge $100 for one hour of her time, but if you buy 5 hours of her time, she’ll give you a 25% discount to $375 for 5 hours.  Progressive discounts are sometimes offered as the volume of hours bought increases, with final discounts being as high as 33-50% off hourly rates.

On-Site Training/Workshops (All fees excluding travel expenses)

1-2 Hours – $500-$5,000

Most Charge – $500-$2,000

Half-Day (4 hours) – $1,000 – $10,000

Most Charge – $1,000 – $4,000

Full-Day (6-8 hours) – $2,000 – $50,000

Most Charge – $2,500-$5,000

Note: Keep in mind that consultants (at least the ones worth hiring) will invest several hours of prep time in assembling and customizing their training materials for you.  So while you might buy a full-day workshop, the total time investment for the consultant (including the workshop) could easily be 20-40 hours.  Plus they will likely lose at least a full day in travel to and from your company.

As with volume discounts on hourly consulting rates, many consultants will charge more at an hourly rate for workshops shorter than a full day.  For example, one consultant might charge $2,000 for a 2-hour workshop, and $5,000 for an 8-hour workshop.

A final word about prices: Don’t be afraid to negotiate.  If the quoted price is past your budget, ask for a break, especially if the project will be longer than 3 months.  A consultant might not be willing to give you a 15% discount on a 2-month project, but they might for a 6-month project.

So hopefully this post will be of some value to you as your company finalizes its 2011 budgets.  And if you need help fleshing out your own social media strategy, or if you need social media training, please email me for a custom quote.

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How adding one plugin boosted my blog traffic by almost 700%

That graph is the hourly traffic here on Saturday, New Year’s Day.  There’s a pretty obvious spike that happened at 2pm, and raised the traffic level for the rest of the day.

But what triggered that spike?  This tweet did:

@TweetSmarter currently has over 225,000 followers.  Within the 1st hour of @TweetSmarter RTing the link to my post on Five Reasons Why No One Likes You on Twitter, I got 363 visitors here and 36 RTs.  In 60 minutes.

On New Year’s Day.

But that post was written about 18 months ago.  So how did @TweetSmarter find it?  My guess is they saw it at the top of my blog under Popular Posts.  That is a plugin that I added here several months ago that pulls the 5 most popular posts here (based on views, I believe), and links to them.  Here’s the plugin I use.

This is about the 5th time this year that a major site/tweeter has linked to one of the 5 posts served up by the Popular Posts plugin.  Each time has resulted in a major traffic spike, which means more awareness and visibility for this site.  My combined traffic here in the WEEK before New Year’s Day was 573 visitors (76 visitors on New Year’s Eve), and the traffic for JUST Saturday was 575 visitors.

All from adding a simple plugin.  Not a bad deal.

The bigger lesson here is, don’t bury your blog’s best posts.  If certain posts are resonating with your readers, find a way make sure that NEW readers can find these posts as well.  Maybe it could be via a plugin or widget, or maybe it could simply be by linking to your older posts, when you write new ones.  Remember, most blogs have a high percentage of 1st-time visitors, so you want to let them see your good stuff.

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Heading to CES & Digital Marketing World

Hey guys, I hope Santa was good to everyone (even if you were a bit naughty), and hope everyone is excited about 2011!  I have a big January on tap, and I wanted to let you know about a couple of events that I’ll be participating in.

Next week I am heading to Las Vegas for the Consumer Electronics Show (CES).  I’ll be there on the 6th and 7th.  On the 6th, I will be moderating a live webcast, a collaboration with Tami McCarthy of TMG Brand Communications who works with Citi Cards.  This webcast will feature an interactive discussion on the latest news from Citi Cards, such as its next-generation Citi 2G card which gives cardholders the choice to use either their reward points or their credit line toward their purchase by simply pressing a button on their credit card wherever a credit card is swiped at the register.  We’ll also be having a discussion with Jeff Mullen, who is the CEO of Dynamics, Inc. which provides the technology that is behind the Citi 2G card, and is also being honored asThe 2011 CES Best Innovation in Personal Electronics .  Additionally, we’ll also chat about these offerings and the innovative technology behind them with several expert panelists, including:

It should be a great discussion and if you’ll be attending CES, please stop by as we’ll be at The Mirage, Room Trindad A, starting at 11:30 PST on the 6th.  And if you can’t join us in person on the 6th, you can still view it online live, ask questions, and join the discussion by registering here.

Additionally, if you’ll be at CES, we’ll be having a Tweetup at Nine Fine Irishmen which is at the New York New York hotel.  The Tweetup will start at 5:00 PM PST, and run till about 6:30 PM, at which time we’ll all go over to the Mashable Awards, which will also be at the New York New York hotel.  So we’d love to meet you there, and some of the Citi team will also be there if you want to bend their ears (and vice versa), so please do stop by, and you can sign up for the Tweetup by clicking here.

I will also be at CES on Friday the 7th, so if you’ll be there I would love to connect.  Especially if your company is having success with social media, or if you’d like to discuss how I could help you take your efforts to the next level, I’d love to connect.  Please email me so we can get together!

Next Wednesday I will also be joining the amazing Lisa Petrilli at Marketing Profs free virtual conference, Digital Marketing World!  Lisa and I will be teaching you The 3 Critical Cs of Profitable Business Blogging at 3pm EST.  This course is designed to help you get your business blog off the ground and help you take your efforts to the next level.  The main areas we’ll be covering are:

  • Measuring and gauging the effectiveness of your blogging strategy.
  • How to create more valuable, interesting and engaging content that helps you reach your blogging objectives.
  • Creating and leveraging more dynamic interactions and activity on your blog to reach your blogging goals.

This is a FREE event and you can register here.  We will have  a Q&A chat after the session, and would love to talk to you!

So I wanted to let everyone know about both of these events, and I have updated my Speaking Page to note these appearances.  Again, if you’ll be in Las Vegas next week for CES, I’d love to connect and do try to attend the webcast and Tweetup if you can!

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The promise of social media for business lies in FEWER conversations

Last Wednesday I held my Think Like a Rockstar blogging class for the Content Marketing Crash Course at Marketing Profs.  The course is over, but if you want to view all 17 classes, here’s information on how you can.  I’ve been spending a lot of time on the Rockstar analogy this year, covering why rockstars have fans and companies have customers.  I’ve done so, because there’s an extremely important lesson for companies in the rockstar analogy:

Rockstars and their fans have the same conversation.

Or at the very least, they have more similar conversations than most companies and their customers have.  The disconnect between how the rockstar views its fans and how the fans view its rockstar, is far less pronounced.  Which means the conversations that each group is having about the other, is more similar.  A big reason why is because most rockstars SEEK engagement with their customers.  They not only listen to the conversation that their customers are having, they participate in it.

Contrast this to most companies, who not only lack engagement with their customers, they often FEAR that engagement.  As a result, the company is having an internal conversation about the customer with little to no input from or interaction with the customer.  And likewise, the customer is having an external conversation about that company, without any involvement and interaction with that company.

Participating in a conversation changes that conversation.

Prior to launching its company blog, Graco discovered that 68% of the online conversation that customers were having about and around the Graco brand, was positive.  That’s not bad, but 18 months AFTER launching its company blog, Graco found that the tone of the online conversation its customers were having had shifted to 83% positive.  Additionally, the company found that 99% of the additional online mentions that the company gained in the 18 months AFTER launching the blog, were positive.  The blog gave Graco a vehicle to directly connect with customers and interact with them.  As a result, the online conversation that Graco’s customers were having about the brand, changed.

Interaction breaks down walls.

Likewise, a lack of interaction between the company and the customer strengthens walls and silos conversations.  Then you are left with two groups that each are having a conversation with the other group, without actually knowing that group.  Which means neither group really understands the other, and as a result, doesn’t trust the other group.

But as interaction between the two groups happens, the conversation the customers are having begins to be understood by the company.  And the customers begin to better understand the company’s point of view.  Hugh was talking about this five years ago.  As the company begins to understand the customers’ point of view and incorporate it into THEIR conversation, that conversation that the company is having becomes more familiar to the customers.  Because the company is starting to speak in a language that’s more easily recognizable to them.

Interaction leads to understanding, and understanding leads to trust.

So this interaction is prompting change in both the internal and external conversations.  By better understanding the company, the external conversation the customers are having about the company, changes a bit.  And likewise, as the company begins to interact with its customers and better understand them, that internal conversation it is having about its customers, changes a bit.

Most importantly, the walls around both conversations weaken a bit.  The distance between the two groups shortens.  Both conversations become a little bit more familiar to the other group, and as a result, both groups begin to trust the other a little more.  Four years ago I wrote this on The Viral Garden:

As we correctly anticipate the consumers’ wants and needs, and fill them, a trust is developed, which leads to the consumer lowering their defenses and letting us interact with them on a deeper level. This leads to a greater understanding of their needs, which means we can more quickly and effectively meet these needs, and thus the cycle is created.

And that cycle creates an incredibly powerful barrier to entry for other companies.  It also creates fans and advocates for that company.

Trust leads to advocacy.

At this point, the company has interacted with the customer and become so familiar with their conversation that the walls around each conversation are starting to blur.  The voice that the company speaks in becomes more familiar to the customer.  Which makes it easier for the customer to trust the company, because they are speaking in a voice they recognize.

Their own.

And that makes it much easier for customers to advocate on behalf of a company that they believe have their best interests in mind.

Wait, this isn’t about smart social media usage, this is about smart business.

Exactly.  Customer conversations are increasingly shifting online and to mobile devices.  Customers are finding new tools and technologies every day to help them more effectively and efficiently communicate with each other.  And they are getting up to speed on these tools and technologies faster than companies are.  But if companies can follow the lead of their customers and become efficient at using these tools and in the same way their customers are, then they’ll win.  It’s not about becoming a better marketer, it’s about becoming a better communicator.

Here’s to better communication in 2011.

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Join me today at Marketing Profs’ Content Marketing Crash Course!

As many of you know, Marketing Profs has been conducting its Content Marketing Crash Course for the last week or so.  Tomorrow I am finally up, and at 1:30-2:30pm CT, I’ll be teaching my class, Think Like a Rockstar: How to Build Fans and Engagement Around Your Blog.  This is the blogging version of my Think Like a Rockstar presentation that’s my most popular session.  Here’s what we’ll cover:

Engagement and interaction are key to a successful blog. So many companies want more participation on their blogs, but so few truly get it. What lessons can we learn from rock stars about how they convert customers into fans? How to rock stars ignite passion? And more to the point, can you take these lessons and use them to build a community around YOUR business blogging efforts?

In this session you’ll learn:

  • The four reasons why rock stars have fans instead of just customers
  • How you can apply each of these lessons to your existing business blogging efforts in order to increase interaction and engagement with your readers
  • Examples of blogging companies that are adopting these lessons to build fans and community on their own blogs

If you’ve ever seen me speak or train then you know the drill:  I’ll show you what works, explain why it works, then give you real-world examples of blogging companies that are using these same concepts to improve their own blogging efforts.  I’ll also walk you through what Rockstars do to attract fans and show you exactly how to work these same concepts into your blogging efforts to build excitement and engagement.  So as soon as you log-off, you’ll have the advice and instructions you need to start improving your blogging engagement efforts!

Now here is the BEST part.  If you register for this class via this link, and are a basic Marketing Profs member or even if you AREN’T a member of Marketing Profs, you’ll save $200 off the course price.  So you’ll get the entire 17-part course for just $395.00.  That’s a flat bargain to get a full 17 hours of expert content, for less than $400.  But again, to get this discount you have to be a Marketing Profs basic member or if you aren’t a Marketing Profs member, you can also click here to register for the $395 rate.

You can see exactly what courses are provided, and who the instructors are by clicking here.  For tomorrow’s classes, CK will be covering 10 Tips, Tools and To-Do’s to Mobilize Your Marketing at 11:00am CT, then Jay Baer will present on Rapid-Fire Ways to Atomize Your Content at 12:30pm CT, and my Rockstar class will close out the day at 1:30pm CT.

But remember if you want the special discount you need to make sure you register via this link.  That will add the special ROCKSTAR code to your registration.  That gets you a nice discount, and I get a cut from it as well, so it’s a win-win!

And if you do register, THANK YOU!  Hope to see you at the session!

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How does search engine traffic affect your blog?

I am definitely not an SEO expert, but after a couple of years of studying up on how search engines work, I think I have at least a 101-level understanding of the topic.  Still, as with most other things, I can learn something better if I can figure out for myself why it works.

Earlier this year I started paying closer attention to the percentage of this site’s traffic that came from search engines.  I noticed that at the first of the year, less than 10% of the traffic came from search engines.  This seemed really low to me, and the most common answer I was given for increasing search traffic was to post consistently to the blog.  The idea was that over time, search traffic should rise as more content from the site was indexed.

And here’s the graph for the weekly search traffic here:

In February, search accounted for just 6.53% of the traffic here, but through last week, search was responsible for 34% of the traffic here for this month.  And the nice steady growth in search traffic you see in the above graph backs that up.

But I noticed something pretty interesting when I was reading my site’s stats.  For the year, 73.84% of the people that visited this site were here for the first time.  Yet when I look at just the search traffic for the year it was even higher, the percentage was 78.25%.  So that means that almost 80% of the search traffic here were people visiting this site for the first time.

I think this is pretty significant because many of us that blog want to avoid covering topics we have already previously discussed.  But at least for this site, roughly 75% of the people that see every post, are seeing this site as a whole for the 1st time.

This leads to some interesting questions, such as…

1 – Should we as bloggers be attempting to more narrowly focus our content?  For example, instead of covering 5 complimentary topics, focusing on just 1 or 2 areas, and creating content that often covers the same ground?

2 – Or should we instead be looking for ways to get more visits from return visitors?

3 – What IS the ideal percentage of new visitors?  Very little in social media is ‘one size fits all’, so how can bloggers decide what that percentage should look like, based on what they want to accomplish with their blogging?

Would be interested to hear what y’all think, and also how my stats compare with what you are seeing on your blog.  I used Google Analytics to find mine, and I don’t think there is a ‘right’ answer here.  If your percentages are higher, that could be good, and if they are lower, that could be good as well.

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Get over it, your blog IS a selling tool

No matter what reason you have for blogging, your blog IS a selling tool.  You are creating content that’s a selling tool for….something.  The key is to make sure you are selling what your customers want to buy.

Most companies create blog content that directly promotes its products, because that’s what it wants to sell.  But for the most part, the content we WANT to see is content that shows us how the product will fit into our lives, or solve a problem for us.

Case in point, earlier this year I started doing research looking for a new carryon.  The one I had provided very basic functionality, and was starting to break down.  Additionally, if I attended an event for more than 2 days, it was tough to pack everything I’d need in it, especially considering any materials/books/swag I might pick up during the trip that I’d like to bring back home.

So while I was technically looking for a new carryon, what I really wanted was a product that would make the travel experience easier for me.  Then I found this post from Chris where he reviewed the Eagle Creek Tarmac 22 carryon.  I bought it recently and I. Am. In. Love.  The bag does exactly what I need it to do, it perfectly organizes all the clothes I’d need for any trip, and as a result, now makes it possible to pack clothing for at least 2-3 additional days over my previous carryon.  For a recent business trip to Atlanta I packed a full wardrobe for 3 days plus a sports coat and jacket, and had room for at least 2 more days worth of clothing.  And that’s without using the extender, which gives you 15% more room.

But notice that this content was created by an Eagle Creek customer (Chris), and the FOCUS of the content was on how the bag helped him as a busy traveler.  That was a big selling point for me, because Chris does more traveling than I do, so I knew if it worked for him, that it would probably work for me.  Chris wasn’t trying to sell the product literally, he was trying to sell us on why the product worked for him.  And as such, he was sharing his experiences with us, in the hope that it might help us as well if we are considering a new carryon.

And it’s interesting that apparently Eagle Creek does NOT have a blog.  So I had to get ‘sold’ on the Eagle Creek Tarmac 22 by Chris, not the company.  Which approach do you think would do a better job of selling this product:

1 – Explaining the product itself, how it’s constructed, the materials used, and any guarantees it has.

2 – Explaining how this product will help a busy traveler better stay organized and save time and effort.

I lean toward #2, but there is some importance in #1.  I think the problem is, most companies understand their product better than they do how their customers will USE their product.

IMO if you want to use your blog as an effective selling tool, sell me how the WHY and HOW I use your product, and create content around that.  Look at the above picture, do I want you to sell me on why I should buy your basketball, or do I want you to sell you on how you can make me a better basketball player?

Your blog IS a selling tool.  The key is to create content that promotes the product by being customer-centric, not product-centric.

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Setting the record straight on online reviews: An interview with Bazaarvoice’s Ian Greenleigh

A few months ago Ian Greenleigh gave me some great stats and case studies from some of Bazaarvoice‘s clients on how they were benefiting from online ratings and reviews.  I published those findings in a post that proved to be one of the most popular here so far this year.  So I wanted to bring Ian back to let him talk more about the power of online ratings, reviews and comments:

Mack:  Tell us what you do and why you are awesome.

Ian: I manage social media for Bazaarvoice. This includes oversight and content creation for all of your “usual suspect” channels, but I focus most on making sure we have a leading corporate blog that adds value and contributes to our thought leadership. Personally, I’m most active on Twitter (be3d).

Bazaarvoice: We help our clients build revenue by building customer conversations into their businesses. This takes the form of hosted & moderated solutions like Ratings & Reviews, Ask & Answer and Stories.

Mack: What’s the biggest misconception you think most companies have about online reviews?

Ian: Many companies don’t understand that negative reviews are normally a net benefit if they’re open to them. Here are a couple of ways they help:

  • They help the company appear more authentic and credible
  • Negative reviews are better than no reviews at all—products/services with more reviews (even if they’re negative) get more clicks than products with fewer or no reviews
  • Negative reviews often alert companies to product flaws that can then be addressed to lead to increased sales in the next product release
  • Negative reviews provide a more realistic view of the product to customers. They return this product less often, because they know what they’re getting and aren’t surprised by shortcomings.
  • Companies might think that if they don’t invite reviews, they simply won’t have to deal with them. Instead, they end up having to address these reviews outside of their “home turf”, in the social web where they have far less control and influence. Letting the conversations take place on company websites makes more sense because conversations are more easily tracked, complaints are easier to address and results are far more instantaneous.

Mack: Do you have any stats on how Bazaarvoice’s clients have seen an increase or decrease in sales after adding Ratings and Reviews to their site?

Ian:  Sure, from our stats page:

  • Products with syndicated reviews convert 26% higher. (Bazaarvoice Case Study, 2009)
  • MarketingExperiments tested product conversion with and without product ratings by customers. Conversion nearly doubled, going from .44% to 1.04% after the same product displayed its five-star rating. (MarketingExperiments Journal, July 2007)
  • Giving shoppers the ability to sort products within a category by customer rating led to a sales increase of 41% per unique visitor. (PETCO, June 2007)
  • 11% of retailers reported a 20% or more overall increase in conversions as a result of adding reviews to their sites, 21% reported an 11% to 20% increase and 5% reported a 1% to 10% increase. (eTailing Group, June 2008)

Mack:  If a company encounters a ‘negative’ blog post or comment from a customer, how should they handle it?

Ian: As long as the content is not ad-hominem of offensive, concerns should be addressed head on. When this doesn’t happen, you see things like the famous United Breaks Guitars video. Keep in mind that others are watching to see what is done about the complaint, so a public response is usually warranted. One of the best ways to take the conversation in a better direction is to leave a follow up comment saying that someone is going to call, email, etc., and then take the conversation offline toward resolution. This at least tells all the people watching the post that you’re taking action.

Mack: When a company encounters a comment they want to address online, should they have a ‘chain of command’ in place so certain employees handle certain comments based on topic/tone/etc, or should the employee that finds the comment always be the one to respond?

Ian: Responses should be assigned out to employees by role/expertise, but locating and cataloguing negative comments should be a centralized task. Employees that happen upon them should know who to ping in order to resolve the complaint. Alternatively, companies can adopt a “respond if it’s in your wheelhouse” policy, telling employees to pass along anything they don’t feel comfortable responding to (or don’t have the knowledge for). Either way, centralized records should be kept and incident data trended over time.

Great information once again from Ian, and really helpful advice on handling negative blog comments and the power of online reviews and rankings.  As Ian shows above, clients that use ratings actually benefit, as do companies that handle negative comments correctly.  Thanks again Ian, and please follow Mr. Greenleigh on Twitter at @be3d.