Monday Morning Marketeer, Brand Building with a Business Blog, 8-24-09

Title: Monday Morning Marketeer, Brand Building with a Business Blog Episode Notes: Using any type of social media for building a brand depends on a lot of elements: establishing credibility on the web and in person, establishing yourself as an authority and matching your social media persona to your web content to enable brand development. If you are using blogging as a part of your web marketing strategy then all of these elements can come together into an online brand that will persist off line also. Fifteen minutes of ideas to get your creative juices flowing to use your business blog to build your brand. EPISODE84 - Start Time (EDT): 08/24/09 09:00 AM EDTDuration (minutes): 30
Listen at: http://tinyurl.com/MondayMorningMarketeer

Third in a series on Business Blogging:
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Show Notes:

If you are using social media to promote your business then you need to find a way to make your brand universal by integrating all of those things into your blog. I like to add all of my other social media elements at the end of the blog so that readers know how to find my shows, how to follow me on Facebook, how to follow me on twitter and join me on LinkedIN. If you have listened before, these are my social media mainstays, Linked in, Twitter, Facebook and Blogging. You can only do so much but it all has to mesh.

1. So even before you start your blog, get all of this together and create a by-line. Use something that tells about you in addition to the name of your business. Mine is: “Monday Morning Marketeer, helping small businesses to jump start their business with gorilla marketing tips that you can do for free or with just your time.”.

2. All of your social media including blogging should have a purpose. The reason you blog is to establish yourself as a thought leader, monitor the marketplace, establish yourself as an expert and shape the marketplace. So the bottom line is that all other elements of social media should direct people to your blog. The end result of course is to turn suspects into prospects and get people to buy.

3. A good suggestion because most social media has limits on number of communication characters, so go to tiny url and create a customized short version of your blog. For this radio show, it’s: http://tinyurl.com/MondayMorningMarketeer Sometimes your name is too long and the idea is to keep it simple so when you do this be creative. I find that people trust vanity customized shortened URL more than one that has letters and symbols.

4. All products and services are not for all people, so you must as in all aspects of marketing determine who your niche customers are and develop a language suitable to communicate to the needs and behavior of your “best customer.” Also, keep in mind that every article you write, every video you record, every image that you post contributes to the whole picture of your business.

5. A brand takes time to build. The reason for that is because you have to establish some power elements that will stick in people’s mind. These elements must result in prospects thinking of you when your field or your niche is mentioned. You can’t expect to be recognized over night.
CNN.com is related to the news; think about what you have on your blog to help create a brand. It’s important to have a strong name for your web domain and then secure that name on as many social networks as you can.

First, I think it’s important to have a strong name for your domain.
Second, go and secure that name on as many social networks as you can. Once you are famous many people will try to take advantage of that and maybe damage your reputation.
Third, arm yourself with patience, passion, commitment and determination.

6. The same characteristic of a successful blog, consistency in posting will also help you establish the credibility of your blog. It doesn’t matter how many articles you post every week. What it matters is to be consistent. People have to rely on you for providing content.

7. I try to post at least once a week to all of my blogs because I also have weekly radio shows attached to all of them but if you have no radio show then I recommend that while you are establishing your brand, you should post at least twice a week. These are not news articles unless they are about you or your event but are articles that you write and publish on your blog. Things like 5 Ways for Entrepreneurs to Survive the Slow Economy or Tips to Running a Successful LinkIn Group. Tips and suggestions, “need to know” articles, “Did your know?” articles, ten mistakes not to make are all great ways to provide good content.

How and when do you create these articles? If you are truly covering the marketplace, you read articles all the week. While you do this I’m sure that ideas for new articles will come, so write the title and few ideas down. Then, at the end of the week, sit down, close the TV, cell phone, Internet connection and start writing. You write 3 articles (or 2) on a row. The idea is to write all the main articles for the week that comes.

8. Where do you get your ideas? When you read articles all week long do you sometimes say to yourself, that’s a great article but I can write a better one? Or you might decide there is something that person left out. It doesn’t always have to be an article if you get writers block. It can be a Power Point Presentation, a video, a podcast. I like to talk and write so I do both podcasts and articles.

9. You don’t always have to be pimping and promoting your own stuff. Between these main articles you can also publish news or articles related to other blogs. This is not necessary but if you have time you can go for it. If it’s something useful to your reader, they will thank you and if you have enough of your own content, you are still the expert.

10. Decide that you are as committed to your blog as you are to your business, follow these simple rules and add more as you learn where you are going with your blog; these are just some suggestions to get you started.

This blog post can be reproduced in its entirety with the following information:

“Monday Morning Marketeer, helping small businesses to jump start their business with gorilla marketing tips that you can do for free or with just your time.”.

© Joanne Quinn-Smith 2009, Monday Morning Marketeer™ 412-628-5048
Listen at: http://tinyurl.com/MondayMorningMarketeerBlog: www.marketingmondaymorning.blogspot.comOr on its unique radio channel at:www.positivelypittsburghlivemgazine.comJoanne Quinn-Smith is the Creative Energy Officer of Dreamweaver Marketing Associates in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and an expert on Web 2.0 Branding.Joanne has also been designated by the 2009 U.S. Small Business Administration as the Small Business Journalist of the Year for her work with information relevant to small business.Follow at: https://twitter.com/monmornmarketerFacebook: http://www.facebook.com/joannequinnsmithThe audio radio talkcast of this show can be heard on Monday Morning Marketeer unique radio channel at http://positivelypittsburghlivemagazine.com, date of show 8-24-09