Build your own.

If you’re considering following what’s been popular, don’t. That’s what publishers, television stations and movie studios do. So put away your first chapter of George Washington, Zombie Killer, and The Blood-Scarlet Letter: Hester Prynne, Vampire Vixen, and think of something new.

It’s a new year, it’s a clean slate.

Copycat books, series and movies are never as good as the original (even if the original was only popular rather than good), and the follow-the-herd mentality leads to nothing as much as burnout.

You’re better than that.

You’ve probably had an idea kicking around for a while. You’ve probably discussed it with friends. You probably wonder how you can move forward with it.

You start by building a community of people with whom you engage and on whom you test your message. You build a platform.

You start writing. Writing what you actually think and believe and feel rather than what others have thought, believed and felt. If you want to comment on those things – what others have done – then you go to their websites and you do it there. Or you do it in your blog, which exists to engage. You don’t do it as your own original work. You’re not writing a sequel. You’re writing what you believe in – you’re being transparent.

Although many of us like the familiar, which is why we gravitate toward certain genres, such as thrillers, or how-to business books that promise to turn our entrepreneurial world around, nobody likes to read something he or she suspects having read before. (Although, frankly, the same business books seem to  appear at least 52 times a year.)

When you begin to create your work, through blogging or through interactions on social media, your growing audience will offer you not only encouragement but guidance. You’ll know when you’ve strayed from your message. You’ll get a sense when you’re lacking originality.

But first, do this: set pen to paper or get your fingers clicking on a keyboard.

Writing doesn’t just happen: you need to begin shaping your ideas. When they’re on the page, they’re that much more powerful, and you’ve begun to turn your thoughts into something beyond a private rumination. You’re about to engage. You’re about to become a thought leader.

Now start creating.

Ideas come from other ideas. You see connections and you train your mind to weigh in on those connections. One thing leads to another, and an idea grows out of the possibility for expressing a similarity or a difference between what you’ve observed.

For someone who’s just getting into writing – perhaps you’ve started your own blog and the prospect of writing three or four blog posts of about 400 words each is scaring you – you will find that by doing it, the ideas will come. As with many other things in life, showing up is a great part of success. And for a writer, showing up means forging ahead, whether an idea is present or not. Ideas come.

Your audience will help you. As you begin to write, you begin to engage with an audience, and that audience will respond to your writing if you start to converse with them in the digital platform that you’ve been building.

If you’re new to blogging, though, you’re more frightened by what you see as your lack of inspiration. Don’t fret about it. Even inspiration is a result of showing up daily and sitting down to the task. But here are a few tips for eliciting ideas and building upon them:

If you’ve got other ideas for generating ideas, we’d love to hear them!

That being said, let’s start at the beginning. Here’s a few steps to writing a great blog post.

#1 — Pick Your Topic

Keep it small. Keep it simple. Keep to one point. We’re all busy, and a focused blog post will go a long way in building trust with your audience. Taking on a big topic from the outset is like carrying too many groceries at once — you’re likely to drop something. The same is true with a blog: too many topics, too big a subject and you make not make the point you set out to make.

#2 — Know Whom You’re Writing To

This might seem a no-brainer, but most people are confused at first about their target audience. The more clear you are about your target market is (right down to personality types) the easier it is to write to them.

#3 – Write From Your Heart

Over-thinking what you’re trying to say and finding fancy language in which to say it will likely leave you frustrated and ready to throw your computer against the wall. If you tap into your message from your heart and start writing as simply as possible – be yourself — I promise, it will flow much smoother.

#4 – Write, Then Edit

Go ahead and get your ideas out. Write and write, then edit what you’ve written. When you edit you’ll find you can string all the thoughts together in a much more organized manner. No writer writes perfectly the first time out. Editing is a vital part of the process. Write, walk away from it, then go back and edit. (It’ll take you a long way!)

#6 – Add Links

Now that you’ve written a post you’re proud of be sure to add active hyperlinks. Hyperlinks provide your reader with supporting evidence and answer the questions the reader is asking as they are asking them. It will build trust with your audience and they will know they can come to you for the information they need.

#7 – Add Images to Prove Your Point

Visual hints make it easier for your reader to draw their own mental image and get excited about what they are learning. If you’re telling a personal story, add personal images. If you need stock images, those can be found all over the place both free and paid. Keeping your posts lively with images will keep your readers coming back.

#8 – Ask an Engaging Question at the End

Keep it simple for your audience to interact with you. Always end with a call to action question that puts the conversation back in the hands of the audience.

As you write and find community through blogging I’m sure you’ll find it very rewarding. Following a simple template will help you keep the content flowing and have you on the top of rankings before long. Hope this helps you understand the pieces of a blog post.

Do you have a formula that works for you? Please share.

We’re at that time of year when “best of” articles and lists begin to appear. People whose job it is to look at movies, listen to music, read books and weigh in on such matters give us their opinions of what they consider the most noteworthy in class since the last such list.

You may feel competitive by looking at such lists. Your own tastes might not match the taste of the critics. You may dismiss them since you haven’t heard of any of these works. You may have compiled your own list for your friends (you might be the kind of person people look to for recommendations). Or you might be the kind of person who regards such lists as ridiculous, since rankings based on personal opinion bear only the weight of that opinion and nothing else. (You’ve got a point.)

Then again, you might be afraid to read any “best of” lists, knowing you haven’t had time, and won’t have time, to read these books, see these movies or hear this music. Not to worry – this is what critics do. They get paid to watch, read, listen. Most people read a book or two a year, go to the movies a few times and catch up on music thanks to playlists their friends create for them. You’re not in the business of knowing everything. You know your subject. And you write about it.

But what about your own efforts at writing? And your audience? Surely if you can’t get around to cracking the covers or starting the first electronic line of a book that’s been touted as one of the best of the year, who’s going to read what you’ve written?

Plenty of people. As long as you’ve been building an audience, and introducing your thoughts and your writing to your readers, through your blog, your newsletter your Twitter feeds, your articles, your comments on other articles, you’re being read. You’re building a book online.

You may not be one of those whose works make it onto year-end lists. But so what? How many people actually go through those lists eager to check off every title so that they’re current with received opinion. Do you know anyone like that? Probably not.

Information is everywhere, and we take it in through various methods, often little by little, and often online. In this digital age, online may be the way to go, through the steady flow of a little information at a time to a dedicated (and growing) audience, rather than a flood of it once a year. Who can cope with that?

Better to build slowly. Start with a blog, and keep at it (nothing worse than seeing a current blog post that dates from a year earlier). Then know that while you might not have made it to the top-10 list, you’ve nevertheless had an impact on the people who read you.

One common question is whether businesses should publish full or partial RSS feeds.

In a full feed, RSS readers can read entire articles in their reader without having to click a “Read More” link that takes them to the full article on your blog.

In a partial feed, obviously, only a small part of each article is posted in RSS readers, and readers must finish reading on your blog.

Proponents of partial feeds are concerned that 1) web traffic will be reduced if they publish full feeds, and 2) full feeds make it easier for content thieves to republish their articles.

They also argue that clickbacks to articles on site are instant feedback — you learn which articles resonate more with readers.

Answering the question is a function of whether you want to spread influence or drive web traffic.

Influence Versus Website Traffic

If you want to spread influence, then publish a full RSS feed. Give your best content away, and piles of it. The more the better.

If you want to bring traffic back to your site, go with a partial feed.

But understand this: The influence approach will generate more traffic and market buzz for you in the long-term.

We’re major proponents of full feeds because we understand the power of influence on the web.

Sure, you’ll have a few knuckleheads that will skim your content. Sure, your RSS readers may not come back to your site as often.

But, as the music industry has learned the hard way, trying to control content online is a losing battle anyway. What’s more, you should pray that people start spreading your content.

Sure, you want to be attributed, but most people will give proper attribution. And the people who don’t have lame sites, audiences, and business models, so you don’t need to worry about them.

And so what if RSS readers don’t come to your site? Are you worried about banner ad advertising revenues? Don’t — they’re too paltry to worry about. Unless you’re getting 10,000 hits per month or more, advertising shouldn’t even be on your radar as a viable income stream.

Generate high-quality, relevant content. Get it out into as many venues as possible. Publish the heck out of it.

You’ll develop a reputation as an influencer and it will come back to you exponentially over time.

Recommended Reading:

• “Full Or Partial RSS Feeds — The Great Feed Debate” by Darren Rowse
• “Full Vs. Partial RSS Feeds” on “The Wrong Advices” Blog
• “Why Publish Full RSS Feeds Instead of Partial Summary Feeds” by Amit Agarwal

Stephen Palmer is a marketing consultant and writer with KGaps Consulting. His firm uses their methodology Hub Mentality to help small businesses generate more leads, sales, and referrals while making their marketing budget more efficient.

Stephen is the co-author of as Hub Mentality: Shifting from Business Transactions to Community Interactions as well as the co-author of the New York Times bestseller Killing Sacred Cows: Overcoming the Financial Myths that are Destroying Your Prosperity.

What do you say? “Oh, everything is fine, thanks.”

Your customers are doing the same to you — they’re not telling you what they don’t like about you to your face.

But with the rise of social media, they’re going home and sharing their negative (and positive) experiences with their online connections.

What if you could overhear what your customers were saying about you?

How could that improve your business? What would it highlight that you’re overlooking? How much power would that give you?

Yes, this is possible. It’s called social media monitoring.

Simply put, social media monitoring is using technology tools to identify what people are saying about your company online.

Social Media Monitoring Tools & Resources

Here are a few free and simple ways to do this:

1. Twitter Search

Click here and enter keywords relevant to your business, particularly your company name.

2. Google Alerts

Click here and enter your relevant keywords. Google will email you any time in encounters those keywords online, based on your preferences. (You need a Google account to set this up.)

3. RSS Feeds

Set up a Google Reader (or other RSS reader), then set up RSS feeds from social media sites as generated by searches.

For example, when I search for “KGaps” on Twitter, you’ll notice the RSS icon on the top right. A specific RSS feed is generated for every search.

4. Facebook Page

Set up a Facebook Page for your business, then simply check the wall daily for comments.

Read this introduction to Facebook for business.

5. Free Monitoring Platforms

There are a number of free social media monitoring platforms to take advantage of, such as Addictomatic, Socialmention, and Tweetdeck.

There are also tons of companies who offer social media monitoring services, such as Spiral16, Radian6, and Trackur, but I wouldn’t recommend these for most small businesses; it’s simply unnecessary.

This social media monitoring solutions wiki lists every available tool.

Here are a few more great articles on the subject:

• How to Monitor Your Social Media Presence in 10 Minutes a Day
• 10 Steps for Successful Social Media Monitoring
• The Problem(s) With Social Media Monitoring Technologies

Your Customers are in Charge

Knowing what your customers say about you is vital. It tells you what you’re doing wrong and right and how to improve.

As my business partner and I write in our book, Hub Mentality:

“Not only has power itself changed, but also who controls it has shifted. In the past, it was business that wielded power to achieve its ends. Now, the power lies with customers.

“It is customers who dictate the creation and disposition of information. It is customers who determine not only what things get produced, but also how they get produced (note the rise in social-oriented and environmentally-friendly businesses).

“Customers are firmly planted on the new throne; businesses are their servants. Those that understand and adapt will survive and thrive. Those who don’t will disappear, leaving only a memory.”

Stephen Palmer is a marketing consultant and writer with KGaps Consulting. His firm uses their methodology Hub Mentality to help small businesses generate more leads, sales, and referrals while making their marketing budget more efficient.

Stephen is the co-author of as Hub Mentality: Shifting from Business Transactions to Community Interactions as well as the co-author of the New York Times bestseller Killing Sacred Cows: Overcoming the Financial Myths that are Destroying Your Prosperity.

The challenge is that it takes a bit more expertise to build a website that actually persuades your visitors to take meaningful action for your business.

From Custom To CMS

In the early days of web design, you would determine your needs then have someone custom design the entire site from scratch. The proliferation of Content Management Systems (or CMS), including WordPress, Joomla, and Drupal to name a few, has drastically changed this model. We’re raving fans of WordPress.

With a little research and a lot of persistence, anyone can figure out how to set up and operate a CMS. Thousands of themes, or layouts, are available across the web. This means that all you have to do is choose the right layout then customize the color scheme to match your company branding.

For example, you can get free WordPress themes here, or premium themes from StudioPress, iThemes, or WooThemes, among hundreds of other sources. To find themes for specific Content Management Systems, simply do a Google search (i.e. “wordpress” + “themes”, “joomla” + “templates”).

If you find a theme that meets your needs as it is, then all you’ll have to pay for is hosting (assuming you build the site yourself). If you want a custom design but aren’t tech-savvy, you can hire a graphic designer.

Architecture

After you’ve chosen and set up your CMS and theme, the next step is to architect your site. As I detail in this blog article, there are four components of a website: 1) technical programming, 2) graphic design, 3) copywriting, and 4) architecture.

The technical programming is taken care of with your CMS, and you can find designers who work specifically with the CMS of your choice. This leaves text and architecture.

This is where knowledge of personas plays a critical role. You need pages and text to answer the questions asked by each. Specifically, you should have at least the following:

• An “About Us” page describing credentials and competitive advantages for Competitives.
• A “Get Started” page, or something similar, for Spontaneous types. Free downloads also appeal to this persona.
• Pages that detail your products, services, processes, methodologies, and applicable research for Methodicals.
• A “Testimonials” or “Case Studies” page for Humanists. Also include bios of relevant owners, managers, and employees for this persona.

Write your text to answer the questions asked by the personas. Use hyperlinks on relevant words and phrases to direct people to your pages. Make the navigation simple and intuitive. Test it on a number of your friends to find where they experience difficulty or their questions don’t get answered.

Build Your Database

Capturing data from your website visitors is one of your biggest priorities. People may not buy on an initial visit, but if you can gain their trust enough to get at least their name and email address, you can continue serving them and making your case over time.

The trick here is to have a free download, such as an e-book, audio file, or a free trial of something. Your download must be relevant to visitors and valuable enough to draw attention.

You’ll need database management software, such as AWeber, to create web forms and build and manage your database.

Drive Traffic

With your website built, the next step is to drive traffic. Website traffic comes primarily from organic searches, direct referrals, links, and social networking and bookmarking.

To optimize your search engine ranking, there are a number of technical programming elements to take care of. This is one reason why I love WordPress so much — it automatically takes care of all those details for you.

It’s also imperative that you have a blog and post articles frequently. The more you post the more relevant content search engines will find. Furthermore, it increases your chance of people across the web linking back to your site, which search engines love. Read my free e-book, The Beginning Blogger’s Bible, for more information on the benefits of blogging.

Currently, the three most popular social networking sites are Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Set up profiles on each, make friends, then wisely refer people to your website. Social bookmarking sites include Digg, Reddit, StumbleUpon, and others. These allow people to share content. The better your blog content, the better your chances of people linking to you from these sites.

Optimize Over Time

Your website will never be finished. Embrace that fact. As I explain in this article, the key is to always be testing to optimize your site over time.

To test you need to set up analytics. Google offers this free version, which works great for most websites. Set up an account, then input your website address. You will then be given code to insert into the back end of your website, either in the footer or header.

This will track everything from page views to time spent on your site, and hundreds of other variables. Adjust your site and watch what happens to your statistics, then further adjust accordingly.

Review

• You don’t need a custom site; these are expensive and unnecessary. Choose a CMS. WordPress rocks. Choose a good layout that works as it is, or have a graphic designer customize the design.
• Set up your navigation and write your text to cater to the four main personas.
• Use a free download and database management software to build a database.
• Blog, blog, blog. This will drive traffic, generate links, and create trust and credibility, among other benefits.
• Drive traffic through social media.
• Optimize your website over time by using analytics.

Stephen Palmer is a marketing consultant and writer with KGaps Consulting. His firm uses their methodology Hub Mentality to help small businesses generate more leads, sales, and referrals while making their marketing budget more efficient.

Stephen is the co-author of as Hub Mentality: Shifting from Business Transactions to Community Interactions as well as the co-author of the New York Times bestseller Killing Sacred Cows: Overcoming the Financial Myths that are Destroying Your Prosperity.

Something’s wrong though.

There is something nagging at you in the back of your business owner mind.  You are a little worried that social media is a waste of your time.  You question whether or not you are building real connections through your social media efforts.

Relax.  A lot of business owners, including myself, have been there.

What did I do about it?

I decided to take some control of what I was doing to ensure that social media is valuable use of my time and produces results for my business. I am not a social media expert like Lindsay Wilson, but I am a real business owner who has the same desires and fears as every other business owner.

Here’s a few tips on how I took control of my social media usage and started building real connections:

Commenting on other blogs:  I still comment on blogs as much as I can, but when I was starting out, I did it religiously.  The great thing about doing this is it allowed me to build real connections with people who were already doing what I wanted to be doing.  These connections that I made helped me grow and they can do the same for you.

Be Intentional:  The one mistake that I made initially with social media was just randomly going out and participating without any real plan.  This is especially the case with a service like Twitter.  Twitter has so many users posting tons of updates throughout the day.  How do you make it useful?  One thing that I did with Twitter to make it more personal is to start contacting people directly that followed me on Twitter.  I didn’t connect with everyone, but I would pick 2 relationships each week and reach out to them.  This allowed me to build real relationships through Twitter.

Use offline to build online:  There are awesome groups that form offline to build communities online.  Meetup is one such service that I have been a part of.  Twitter users are familiar with Tweetups as well which is a way for Twitter users to meet offline.  Don’t be content to build virtual relationships only.  Get out and build real physical connections with people that you meet on social media platforms.

Measure results: How are you measuring you social media return on investment (ROI)?  I know that sounds a little cold, but if you want to feel like you are having real results, then you need to have a way to check on how you are doing so that you are not wasting your time.  Make sure you keep track of the real relationships that you are building through social media and what that ultimately means for your bottom line.

Those are just a few of the tips that have really helped me and my businesses use social media more effectively and build real connections where there is value exchanged and win/win partnerships created.  Are you building the kind of connections you want to make through social media?  Try some of the above tips and start connecting at a deeper level.

What are some other great tips out there about building real connections with social media?

What your audience wants to know when they visit your ‘About Us’ page is who you are.

It’s simple, who are you, why are you writing or blogging about this topic, why are you an expert in this field, and what jazzes you up.  Check out our speed process for writing an About Us page.  Oh yeah, and it’s always good to put a little bit of your personal quirkiness in, too.  Letting your readers know about you personally allows them to connect with you.  If they connect with you, they are far more eager to see you as the trusted authority on your chosen topic.

I’ve spend some time writing out the process to speed write your ‘About Us’ page.  If you want to complete the task in 45 minutes or so you can check it out here.  (link to the speed writing process page) Make sure that you allow your brilliance and skills to shine on this page.  Don’t be afraid to talk (keeping it real, of course) about your accomplishments and track record that makes you an expert in your field.

Now that I’ve shared the secret sauce to excellent About Us pages, all you have to do is go and write.  When you’ve completed your About Us page on your blog and you’re ready to share with all of us, please leave a comment and link to your newly polished page.

At the time William Hung was a household name, his naive confidence was not an act.  People couldn’t get enough of this video.    It was a shot across the bow.  It was an alpha voice for today’s civic cycle.  In a polished and plastic world, he stood out like space heater in a frozen tundra.

Skip forward to January 2011, 7 years later.  Authenticity is more nuclear than ever.

Meet Ted Williams…

Ted is the likely opposite of William Hung, a homeless, former drug addict with tons of real talent.  He didn’t have a high-rated reality TV show to get exposure.  All he had going for him was his voice, and a cardboard sign etched with an authentic message.

Someone took notice, interviewed him, and put it online.  Now millions have seen the video and a community on Reddit decided to organize and help him get a job and a home.  Looks like he is going to do well.  The latest is that the Cleveland Cavaliers offered him a job and a home.

Go Ted!

That is the power of having an authentic message to share.  You can put it on a blog , on the radio, on Facebook, on a billboard, on YouTube, on the nightly news, in a full page spread in the USA Today, or even on cardboard sign. It doesn’t really matter.

Just put it out there, get someone to see it.  Sooner or later, it will kindle a fire.

Do you have something authentic to put on a cardboard sign?

What are you waiting for?