Spark Minute » Tips

Build Attention for Your Brand by Recognizing Others

David Spark — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 16:27:56 +0000

If you want people to pay attention to you, pay attention to them first. It’s how we create personal relationships, and it’s how we should create business and professional relationships as well. Unfortunately not all organizations approach it this way. Many believe they should speak first and announce their “message.” That seems to be the most important part. Always stay “on message” and make sure your audience remembers your “message.”

In today’s give-and-take world of social media, talking about yourself as you enter the room won’t make a good first impression. If you want more respect and recognition, show it to others first.

This is exactly what Spark Media Solutions did with our client Tripwire, whom we’ve worked with at the RSA Conferences. Read our full case study, “How to Become One of the Most Respected Companies in Your Industry.”

Company: Tripwire is an IT security company with a suite of software products for protecting sensitive data and critical IT systems, and detecting vulnerabilities and potential threats.

Situation: The security company was relaunching its blog to serve as a social media hub with new sharing functionality, a new design, and a new title, “The State of Security.”

Challenge: Other organizations that just announce, “We’ve got a new blog,” fall on deaf ears. Users need something to talk about. If Tripwire wanted to bring an audience to their blog they would need an anchor piece of content to act as a hub for conversation. This piece of content had to be done fairly quickly as there wasn’t enough time to do a big crowdsourcing project.

Solution: To complement the new blog, Spark Media Solutions’ recommendation was to create a list of the top 25 people in the security industry to follow via social media.

The Technique

There’s never a guarantee that a piece of content will be successful, but there are methods one can deploy to improve the value and viral nature of a piece of content. For this project, here’s how we gave our list some depth and legs:

Create context as to why these people are valuable – Explain why someone should be following these people. In our research we had found other such lists, but they were just that, “lists.” We found another list that provided context but it was close to five years old. It was definitely time to offer up an updated list.

Provide links to follow the person – Provide Twitter and blog links for each recommended influencer, but also create a Twitter list of all 25 people so with a single click a reader could follow all of our recommendations.

Reach out to the influencers for some content – Since these are the people we’re profiling, we should give them an opportunity to speak as well. We emailed each influencer and simply asked, “What’s your security tip for 2012?” After a lot of back and forth, we were able to get great tips from all 25 influencers on our list. It’s not an easy task, but it was made possible through Tripwire’s preexisting work proactively building relationships.

“We’ve been building genuine relationships with influencers in the community on and off social media for the past two years. We believe in supporting the community and value their contributions to the information security industry,” said Cindy Valladares, social media strategist for Tripwire.

Letting the influencers know they’re on the list – Influencers become influencers by promoting themselves and having others refer to them as influencers. By letting a person know that you’ve written about them, and that you’ve added them to a “top important people list,” chances are extremely high that that influencer is going to tell his/her followers about being honored. That means the top 25 security influencers are probably going to retweet this list to their audience. Meaning ultimately this list will be seen by an audience that cares about security issues.

After a lot of work, we finally produced the piece “Top 25 Influencers in Security You Should Be Following.”

Results

The blog post was hugely successful. Regularly, blog posts on Tripwire’s blog got a handful of shares via Twitter and Facebook. This post got well over 700.

“We were shocked when we saw the amount of web traffic this article drove to our site. December is usually a month with less traffic due to the holiday season, but this article contributed to about 30% of overall web traffic in the first few days it launched. Over the month, the referral traffic that social media contributed grew by 400% compared to previous months,” Valladares said.

While the sharing was phenomenal, what was more phenomenal was the amount of respect and appreciation the community, and the influencers, had for the creation of such a list. Here’s just a sampling of the hundreds of responses:

“Gotta hand it to @TripwireInc , this is an excellent list…” – JT Keating, @JTKeating
“Great list to follow.” – Kylie Heintz, @kmheintz
“Great resource.” – CSID, @CSIdentity
“The security rock star list is up. Are you following these peeps?” – Jennifer Usher, @jmanos
“A big #FF today for @cindyv and @TripwireInc for their efforts in supporting and engaging with the infosec community.” – Brian Honan, @BrianHonan
“A lot of smart security people on this Tripwire list.” – stacksmasher, @stacksmasher
“A pretty good list of #security people you should be following on twitter from @TripwireInc.” – Threatpost, @Threatpost
“Am tweetless at @TripwireInc’s inclusion of me.” – Bob Rudis, @hrbrmstr
“I’m humbled to be on @TripwireInc ‘Top 25 Influencers’ list.” – Brian Honan, @BrianHonan
“Honoured to be on @TripwireInc’s list of Top 25 Influencers in Security You Should Be Following.” – Graham Cluley, @gcluley
“Congrats to Akamai peeps @csoandy,@mckeay & @joshcorman on making Tripwire’s Top 25 Influencers list for Security.” – Karthikeyan D S, @dskishere
“Congrats to @andrewsmhay (#10) and @taosecurity (#1) in Tripwire top 25 security influencers.” – Vivek Rajagopalan, @vivekrj

There was plenty of kudos for the list, the expert tips, and congratulations to people who made the list. It was clearly an honor to be on this list as Richard Bejtlich admitted on his blog and said this about Tripwire:

“Tripwire is one of those technologies and companies that everyone should know. It’s almost like the ‘Xerox’ of security because so many people equate the idea of change monitoring with Tripwire.” – Richard Bejtlich, EthicalHackers.info

Next steps

This article was a precursor to Tripwire’s social media strategy for 2012 which includes a major engagement at the RSA Conference to be held in San Francisco at the end of February, 2012. This will be the third year Spark Media Solutions has covered the event, publishing our videos and articles about the event on the Tripwire blog (Check out our coverage from the 2011 RSA Conference).

Now that we’ve identified the top 25 influencers, had conversations with them, and in many cases interviewed them in past events, our next step will be to follow up with an interview at RSA.

The relationships Tripwire and Spark Media Solutions have built with infosec influencers have become critical in our need to reach out to them, converse, and get their opinions.

“Part of our strategy is to allow infosec influencers to freely share their opinions and points of view, regardless of whether they align with Tripwire solutions. We’ve built a relationship of trust, where we hope they benefit from the platform we provide,” Valladares said.

When you have a true relationship with a person, initiating requests, such as interviews, are far easier to make and result in greater acceptance.

Beyond honoring top influencers and interviewing them, we’ll continue to look for more ways to create content that showcases their wisdom.

“The goal is to look for opportunities where both parties succeed, Tripwire and influencers. We want all participants to be seen as key resources that are providing the community with valuable information about security,” Valladares said.

Stock photos of cropped heads courtesy of Shutterstock.

Build Strong Industry Relationships Through Content Marketing

David Spark — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 18:37:09 +0000

Last week I got to appear on Murray Newlands’ show “Future of Engagement.” We talked about how content marketing has become all the rage as of late. It’s been around for a while, but I’m happy that everyone thinks it’s “all the rage” because it makes my company appear a little more hip. Regardless, we talk for about six minutes on content marketing, how it’s necessary to be visible when people are trading information via social media and seeking it via search. That’s why we stand by our credo that “Content is the currency of social media and search.”

Content also becomes a point of contact, an icebreaker, or development step for relationship building.

Watch the short interview, especially to see the absolute worst angle and close up of my giant misshaped head.

My Five Favorite Videos from Interop 2011

David Spark — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 17:20:21 +0000

Were you at Interop last year? Want to relive all the excitement? Probably not, so why don’t you just check out some of the best videos I shot at the event while I was reporting for Dice.

Here are my five favorite videos from Interop 2011

	Google’s Vinton Cerf on the company’s culture of tolerating failure – Watch me make an incredibly stupid mistake interviewing one of the legends of the Internet
	Interop 2011: Tour of the Network Operations Center (NOC) – The coolest thing they do at Interop every year, and I take a tour of the entire thing.
	Funniest trade show booth I’ve ever seen – This was awesome, a mechanical bull on the trade show floor.
	The latest trend in IT is the democratization of IT – My interview with Lenny Heymann, General Manager of the entire conference.
	CIO Boot Camp: Is your IT department a Terminator? Is it Sponge Bob? Or is it Colin Powell? – IT departments get no respect.

Here are 25 more videos from Interop 2011

	CIO Boot Camp: Meet EnviroTech’s entire IT department, Vincent
	Do you need (or want) 169 terabytes of traffic per second?
	Ciphertex’s handy five terabyte carry-it-with-you RAID storage
	Vint Cerf: More applications need to share and reuse spectrum
	Google’s Vint Cerf on flowing in and out of multimedia conversation modes
	Netscout provides deeper insight into voice and video traffic
	Digital analytics for foot traffic
	Vidyo’s video conferencing solution lies somewhere between Polycom and Skype
	Interop 2011 Grand Prize Winner: Performance analytics for your virtual environment
	The best way to prepare for a giant network attack is to create one yourself
	Cisco offers application administrators real-time insight into the network
	Extracting the benefits of fiber when you only have a copper network
	Spiceworks — Free network monitoring and social network
	The best testing environment is the one that simulates real traffic through your network
	NEC’s Programmable Flow Switch automatically configures switches
	Citrix Receiver: One solution for onboarding any mobile device
	Moving everyday files quickly to and from the cloud
	CIO Boot Camp: Decision making under massive uncertainty
	CIO Boot Camp: Letting students pass digital notes in school and church
	CIO Boot Camp: What I really want to do is virtualize
	CIO Boot Camp: What technology do you want to retire?
	CIO Boot Camp: How can my technical infrastructure compete against the agility of a start up?
	CIO Boot Camp: What do IT directors have in common?
	CIO Boot Camp: Jumping the Curve: Switching from old to new technology
	What’s everybody talking about at Interop?

Tips to Energize Brand Advocates

David Spark — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 17:20:51 +0000

Earlier this year I produced and reported at an event for Zuberance, a tool that helps companies energize their brand advocates. Tons of marketers and social media goons were there, and offered up some fantastic advice. Here are all the videos and their advice.

	How Do You Energize Brand Advocates?
	Build a relationship with an Advocate like you would with a friend
	How do you convert a passive fan of your brand into an Advocate?
	Advocates love brands and brands love Advocates
	Give Brand Advocates special access
	How JetBlue built long lasting relationships on their 10th birthday
	The ongoing confusion between Advocates and influencers
	Microsoft knows that their customers sell their product better than they do

Creative Commons photo attribution to ThinkPanama.

My Five Favorite Videos from the 2011 Game Developers Conference

David Spark — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 17:20:36 +0000

I was looking back at my collection of videos and realized I had a ton of videos that I had yet to share. So going back to the way back machine, about eight months ago, I pulled out all my videos that I shot for Dice at the 2011 Game Developers Conference. Here they are:

My five favorite videos from Game Developers Conference 2011

	What game inspired you to be a game developer? – Love their responses. Every developer was inspired by a different game.
	World of Warcraft Game Director on how to upgrade an insanely popular franchise – His session was PACKED, and I caught him for a quick interview about revamping the most popular MMORPG.
	Three tips from @MistressMousey for getting a job in gaming – Gamer or not, these are good tips.
	One game developer’s plan to advance his career – This guy was completely open about wanting to leave his job.
	What’s more valuable at GDC: Roaming the floor or the parties afterwards? – Game developers trying to figure out how they should best network the conference.

And here are 21 more videos from the 2011 Game Developers Conference

	What are you bad at?
	The advantages of developing casino games
	The psychological benefits of videogames. They’re not just for fun anymore
	Building a talent pipeline with your local university
	The hardest part of game development
	Top three challenges for technical artists
	Could Zynga’s CityVille be the most perfect social game?
	Sony Computer Entertainment is hiring, hiring, hiring
	Why do you want to develop games for RockYou? They’ve got great food!
	Independent developers and GDC are the hotbeds for great gaming talent
	Soldiers play videogames to reduce nightmares that result from traumatic combat
	Surprise, you need experience and passion to work for Microsoft
	Networking at the San Francisco Game Developer’s Workshop
	Are schools helping gaming students prepare for the real world of game development?
	THQ is looking for senior talent across the board
	Ex-TV producer looking for developers to launch a new social gaming network
	Key to getting a job in game development is networking and a clear portfolio
	Want to get a job in game development? Do a team project
	Demand is high for developers, but breaking into the gaming market is still difficult
	Best skill you can learn in game development is team building

How to Fail at Content Marketing

David Spark — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 17:35:29 +0000

Screwing up at content marketing is one of the easiest things you’ll ever do. In fact, I see far more content marketing failures than I see organizations doing it well. It’s an honest mistake an organization makes. For most, content marketing is new territory and rarely are we good at something the very first time we do it.

I have witnessed and unfortunately been part of many of the following mistakes. If you’re just starting out with content marketing, you are almost definitely making some of these mistakes. Almost all of my clients have at one time dealt with these issues and in some cases may still be dealing with them.

Hire an ad agency or PR firm

As the communications landscape changes, traditional ad agencies and PR firms have been offering more services to satisfy their clients’ needs, such as content marketing. Seems natural, right? Communications firms know how to write and produce video for marketing purposes, it should be a natural shift to do the same editorially. It’s not.

Unless an ad agency or PR firm already has a staff of former journalists and TV producers, it’s not a natural shift just like it wouldn’t be a natural shift for a journalist to start writing marketing copy.

Yes, ad agencies and PR firms without a seasoned editorial staff can physically create media, but it’s like hiring a general practitioner when you need a specialist. A GP can only sort of help you.

I’m sure I’ll get a lot of heat for this comment as many ad agencies and PR firms are basing a lot of their new business on content marketing. I’m all for that, just as long as they have an experienced staff to do it. That requires hiring people who have worked in traditional journalistic media, not just giving new responsibilities to staffers who don’t have the experience or training. Traditional media is very different from creating ad copy.

Treat content marketing like marketing

This is one of the net results of hiring an ad agency or PR firm to do content marketing. Because their head is so steeped in creating marketing and delivering for the client, it’s very hard to break away from it. Heck “marketing” is in the title of “content marketing” so why not treat it like marketing?

People are forced to watch ads, but they self-select content. If it appears that your content is really marketing in disguise, consumers will sniff it out and avoid it. There are exceptions to this rule such as truly entertaining Superbowl commercials that people like to watch on YouTube.

The core problem is in the name “content marketing.” It sounds insidious. We’re giving you content, but we have an ulterior motive and that’s to market to you. I have used the phrase content marketing to categorize my business, Spark Media Solutions, solely because it’s understood and people use those words when they’re conducting Google searches on the subject. I used to use the synonymous term “custom publishing” but unfortunately it’s become rather dated and only people in the industry know what it means. What I now use, which I think is a more apt title that speaks to the viewpoint and the skills needed is “brand journalism.”

Try content on a limited basis, and give up quickly

I have sadly seen too many examples that I will not show in order to protect the guilty. As I mentioned in a previous article, “Top 10 Things You Didn’t Consider When Developing a Social Media Strategy,” you have to calculate time into your strategy. Rarely do companies have that kind of patience with any communications. It’s understandable that if you spend money you’ll want to see some results for your efforts. The problem is measuring a content marketing campaign is unlike measuring a marketing campaign. Content’s value is cumulative. Initially, you won’t see the results like you would from a pure marketing effort, but over time results will increase, sometimes dramatically.

No magazine built a brand with its first issue. It takes many issues, trial and error, to build an editorial voice, a brand, and a following.

Don’t get involved in social media

Traditional marketing doesn’t require involvement with your audience. It’s something that can be outsourced and you don’t have to get your hands dirty. Not the case with social a social engagement which should be part of any content marketing effort. Unlike most services, this isn’t one that someone can “just do for you.” You need to take a level of responsibility yourself, and that requires building a social presence and that takes time.

Have a narrow view of production

A good number of my initial engagements begin with “We want to make a video” and immediately the first question is “How much does that cost?” Which is the equivalent of asking, “How long is a piece of string?”

In all cases, someone who wants to “make a video” has a bigger problem to solve, and that gets into discussions of strategy and whether this video will be the solution to that strategy. But a greater concern of mine is that if you focus all your efforts on just one video it can get very costly to just create a single item and that means you’re putting a pretty heavy gamble on one single piece of content. Conversely, I’m a big fan of one effort, multiple units of content. For example, instead of going to a conference and producing one video of the event, why not produce multiple videos, articles, photos, a podcast, and maybe also a summary of the event? All of that is going to yield much greater output, make you more visible, and your per unit (video, article, photos, podcasts) costs will be a fraction of that original video you wanted to create.

For more, read “Be the Voice^SM” – Build Your Business by Becoming your Industry’s Thought Leader.

Have extremely high expectations about traffic

This coincides with giving up quickly. I’ve had huge clients for which the employees eat, sleep, and drink the company Kool-Aid. If you’re so steeped in it you lose perspective and think the rest of the world has been itching to hear more about you and once your story gets out there they’re going to be busting down your doors.

It’s not going to happen. Unless you already have a brand with an extreme loyal following, no one cares about you. Everyone cares about themselves.

Believe there’s a direct correlation between site traffic and inbound sales calls

It rarely works that way. Have you ever purchased something solely after reading an article or seeing a video a single time? Probably not, so don’t believe there are some other people out there that do. Direct sales shouldn’t be content marketing’s purpose. That’s the purpose of marketing. Content marketing helps you build greater brand affinity. It plays into many other critical factors, such as:

Increasing brand value
Increasing audience trust
Humanizing your business
Connecting with industry influencers
Creating assets to be traded via social media
Creating assets that are visible in search
Increasing the value of your services

The asset itself and the process of creating it is what creates value.

Conclusion: Pay attention to your audience first

Self-centeredness with content production only works for a select few that have already established a powerful brand. For organizations that are just starting out you must always play to your audience. It’s a great rule of thumb. Before you create any piece of content ask yourself, “Why would anyone care about this?” If there isn’t a compelling reason, then move on to another content effort. Remember, unlike traditional marketing, content marketing is user selected. Make something the user wants to select.

Fail, traffic, and cameraman photos courtesy of Shutterstock.

CASE STUDY: Build Your Brand Through the Wisdom of the Crowd

David Spark — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 22:47:59 +0000

This is a story of how Spark Media Solutions helped its client, Dice, build brand awareness and industry respect by proactively gathering and publishing the knowledge of its industry peers.

Company: Dice is a recruiting site for tech. Recruiters and employers are Dice’s customers as they pay for tech job listings and to gain access to Dice’s specialized niche tech database to find the best talent.

Situation: Dice had recently relaunched its resources blog (resources.dice.com) and was sponsoring a conference held at Facebook called the ERE Recruiting Innovation Summit (#RIS11).

Challenge: Dice wanted to showcase its social recruiting expertise plus gain recognition and further traction from recruiters, HR bloggers, and influencers, whether they were at the event, viewing the event’s live stream, or just watching the social media channels.

Solution: Ramp up excitement before, during, and after the event by producing valuable media for and about the recruiting community. The value comes via the content itself, but also through soliciting members of the community and promoting their ideas and knowledge. To simplify our efforts and make it clear what we were doing, we focused the majority of our content on a single theme. We asked everyone, “What’s your most innovative recruiting tip for 2012?”

The innovative element was critical because it tied into the theme of the conference, Recruiting Innovation Summit. Plus, we knew if our content was going to have any value we needed to entice participants to offer up new ideas, not the same ones recruiters have heard over and over again.

Ultimately we decided to create four media assets:

Giant tip article: Crowdsource and write a huge list of innovative tips for recruiters. Aim to publish at least 30 tips because that seemed to be a critical number for search and for social media recognition.
Speech bubble photos: Take photos of people holding up speech bubble white boards and chalk boards with their innovative recruiting tip and their Twitter handle. The recruiting community is heavily involved in Twitter so this was a good avenue to utilize.
Compilation video: Produce a video of many people answering the question, “What’s your innovative recruiting tip for 2012?”
Industry luminary interviews: Conduct one-on-one interviews with industry influencers about innovative recruiting and other relevant industry issues.

We were able to achieve all four goals:

We published a monstrous tip article, 30 Innovative Recruiting Tips for 2012 to Dice’s Employer Resource Center (resources.dice.com)
We shot, produced, published, and tweeted out 100 photos of attendees holding up their innovative recruiting tip for 2012. As these photos were being produced they were displayed on a screen for everyone in the conference to see.
We conducted and published one-on-one interviews with 6 recruiting industry luminaries.
We shot and produced a 3-minute video of people offering up their innovative recruiting tips for 2012.

Results

For a conference that had only 200 attendees our recognition extended well beyond the people in the room. Along with Dice’s premier sponsorship at the event, including a live stream and tweet-up sponsorship, the reach of all our content was in the tens of thousands of views.

The photos received over 33,000 views and the article received hundreds of shares via social networks.

More important than the numbers was the community’s commentary on what we were doing. Here is just a sample of what people said about our monstrous tip article and compilation video:

“A must read!!” – SHRM Long Island, @SHRMLI
“LOVE this list.” – Riviera Advisors, @RiveraAdvisors
“Great Article!!” – Tricia Folliero, @Folliero
“Really great list of recruiting tips – definitely worth a read for hiring managers/recruiters.” – Kate Matsudaira, @katemats
“Good find!” – Hiring Solutions LLC, @HSLLC
“Some old, some new, all good.” – Amy Rubin, @RubinTime
“Great read for any recruiter.” – Sam Rahbar on Facebook
“Insightful info to share with job seekers also.” – Arnita Tucker-McFarland on Facebook
“Great video of #recruiting #tips from #ris11.” – People Science RPO, @People_Science

We were most visible with all the speech bubble photos we were taking.

Those photos turned out to be our most retweetable content:

“Love what @EmployersonDice is doing w/the photos & the tweets at #RIS11. Great way to soak up insights.” – Blair Hite, @BlairAtVolt
“Have you seen the tips and pictures on @EmployersOnDice? love the effect.” – Bill Boorman, @BillBoorman
“@EmployersonDice I’m loving the photos on Flickr!” – Danielle Z. Moseley, @Dzittel
“Wow! Tons of great tips from great recruiters!” – Jennifer McClure, @JenniferMcClure
“Loved the content, Joy (photographer), and the photo format was perfecto!” – Lisa Thorell, @LisaT2
“Brilliant concept brilliantly executed” – HRExaminer Staff, @HRExaminer
“Genius way of showing them!” – Mark Sullivan, @sullivanmarkd

To extend the length of our coverage we chose to publish the six one-on-one expert interviews weeks after the conference.

What we learned

Whenever Spark Media Solutions takes on a new media production effort we make a note of what works and what doesn’t work. We wanted to share some of that knowledge with you. Here are some of our takeaways from the project and the event.

Recruiters are outgoing people that are happy to participate in a fun project like our whiteboard speech bubbles.
The whiteboard project had valuable content and built in virality. The content of each photo was a tip that was tweeted out with a person’s handle who inevitably retweeted the photo to their followers.
The question, “What’s your most innovative recruiting tip for 2012?” requires a lot more thought and contemplation than can be captured in a quick sound bite on camera or on a whiteboard with limited space. While answers were good and valuable for the video and speech bubbles, they weren’t comprehensive enough for the bigger article. The answers we had crowdsourced before the event were more thorough because there was a lot of back and forth, follow up questions, and people had more time to compose their thoughts.
If time permits, it may be better to publish the article before the event so we would have had some relevant content to point back to from all the photos we tweeted out. This was not the case here given our quick turnaround. Each published photo on Flickr allows you to add some links. While we pointed back to the main blog, it would have been nice to point back to an event-relevant article.
To pull off this project you must have the right balance of aggressiveness and charm in person and online. This is critical for success. It’s a subtle balance that has to be played correctly to get the content you want.
People really enjoyed seeing other conference goers at the event on the screen. It increased participation in the project and reduced our need to explain what we wanted them to do. They got it immediately.
Proofread people’s boards before you photograph them for two reasons. First, we needed to be able to read recruiter’s tip and their Twitter handle because we retyped everything again in Flickr and Twitter. Second reason is to catch handwritten typos. There were many cases where people had spelling mistakes on their whiteboards. We caught all but one and were lucky enough to fix that error in Photoshop.
The mere fact that we were so visible capturing content in photos and video made Dice a beacon of influence at the conference.
A good time to get people to participate is during the pre- and after-party.

John Sumser, HRExaminer

While the community recognition Dice received was fantastic, the best acknowledgement came from noted industry pundit John Sumser of HRExaminer who in his article “Branding 2012” said, “Dice.com showed up in Palo Alto and changed the dynamics of conference marketing.”

“Dice used the Recruiting Innovation Summit to announce its material entry in the social media sweepstakes. By building a treasure trove of links, content and connections, they raised their profile in ways that most marketers can only dream of,” said Sumser.

The reason marketers dream of this kind of recognition is because they’re still doing “marketing.” Our approach is to create editorial media that puts businesses in the center or lead of key industry conversations. Content, not marketing copy, is the currency of social media and search. We produce a lot of media at conferences and trade shows simply because it’s one of the best methods to gather and produce a lot of content very quickly. While handing out water bottles and swag may be valuable for name recognition, we find that at a conference or trade show creating content is a far more valuable technique for building industry visibility and deep relations.

Tricks to Getting Great Yelp Reviews

David Spark — Mon, 02 Jan 2012 22:47:49 +0000

This blog post is a report being submitted for Intertainment Media, makers of desktop communications and content app, KNCTR, and real-time chat translation tool, Ortsbo. It was originally published on Intertainment Media’s blog.

If you’re a small business owner, or talk to a small business owner, especially a retail business owner, you probably know about their love-hate relationship with Yelp.

Yelp has become a phenomenal resource for consumers looking for great vetted recommendations. The operative word there is “vetted” as that’s been a source of consternation between Yelp and the vendors who are reviewed on the site. Yelp has a very secretive algorithm for how they vet the authenticity of a review. They realize they have to keep that algorithm secret because if they made the information public, it would be easy to circumvent.

While asking your audience to retweet something, or comment on a blog post is acceptable social media behavior, Yelp actively discourages vendors from soliciting reviews on its site. Seems odd that they would discourage that since user reviews are their core assets that drive value for the product. But if the review isn’t authentic, then it actually detracts from the value of the service. That’s why Yelp is so vehement about it.

Talk to vendors and they’ll tell you many authentic and legitimate reviews have been removed, and it understandably aggravates them greatly, especially when Yelp leaves up negative reviews.

Regardless of where you stand on the debate there are techniques to getting more Yelp reviews without being overtly solicitous. The suggestions all revolve around keeping Yelp top of mind with the customer. Here’s how:

Ask customers to visit your Yelp page

“There is an important distinction between ‘Hey, write a review about me on Yelp,’ [BAD] and ‘Hey, check us out on Yelp!’ [GOOD],” said Luther Lowe, Director of Outreach and Public Policy at Yelp. “It’s the difference between actively pursuing testimonials and simply creating awareness of your business through social media outlets.”

Brand your business and website with Yelp

Lowe also recommends you adorn your front door, coasters, napkins, website, email signature, and cash register with “Find us on Yelp” stickers. You can freely use these Flickr images or use this widget to create a badge with embedded reviews for your website.

Passive request for reviews

Tyler Willis, VP of Business Development at Unified suggests a more informational way of asking for a reviews rather than outright request. Print on the receipt and/or say in person, “If you enjoyed your time tonight, we love getting reviews on Yelp.” Just say that, and nothing else. It’s purely informational even though it’s a passive way of saying, “We want a review.”

Lead them to Yelp

If you want people to leave a review, make it easy for them to do so. That means configuring your website’s UI so that the Yelp button is big and prominent and it’s clear that’s a place for them to go. Willis also suggests forwarding a web address, such as myrestaurant.com/yelp, to your Yelp URL.

Create a Yelp Deal

One way to draw customers into Yelp is with an “only on Yelp” coupon. That’s possible with Yelp Deals. Let your customers know that you always post your first coupons and deals on Yelp.

Talk about Yelp

Mat Siltala suggests you ask customers if they found out about you through Yelp. No matter what they say that opens the door for a conversation about Yelp. Use it to talk about how many of your customers come from Yelp (whether it’s true or not) and tell a story about how Yelp has been helpful to you with some other non-related business. When you tell your story make it clear that it was the positive reviews on Yelp that influenced your decision to go to that establishment.

You can be so bold as to say, “Yelp is my favorite way to attract new clients and reviews are what put us on the map,” said Siltala. “Expressing how powerful an impact positive reviews are to your business is really stating the obvious! Its a direct yet subtle way to influence a positive response.”

Yelp customers get the best service

I like Siltala’s suggestion of dropping the line, “Because you found us through Yelp, we’re going to deliver you the best service.” Of course you try to deliver the best service to all customers, but that phrase really connects the service you’re delivering with Yelp.

Yelp goodbye

Siltala goes on to suggest that when a customer who found you through Yelp leaves your establishment, say, “Thanks for choosing our business AND using Yelp”

Don’t overdo it

Lastly, Siltala advises to do all these suggestions in moderation. There is a point where it goes overboard. Don’t be that guy that overwhelms your customers with your Yelpness.

Creative Commons photo attribution to Yelp.com, roboppy.

My Strategy to Go Paperless in 2012

David Spark — Wed, 28 Dec 2011 18:16:21 +0000

I’ve begun the purge. I’ve scanned and thrown out so much paper that being paperless in 2012 is becoming a reality.

When I mean paperless, it doesn’t mean zero paper. Some paper you have to hold onto, but I’m really trying to get rid of as much paper as possible, plus for the future, collect as little as I can. That includes everything that’s in my filing cabinet, but it also includes books as well. All this paper is simply taking up too much unnecessary space, is poorly searchable, and it’s also not secure in its non-digital form.

Number one rule for a paperless strategy

Success for any life changing endeavor is simplicity. If you don’t create a simple enough strategy, you won’t actually do it nor will you keep up doing it. I learned this when I started my video a day of my son (still going strong), and I realize it also for any exercise regimen. Don’t let your excitement of what you want to achieve go beyond what you’re truly capable of doing.

Here’s my process so far:

Step 1: Throw out unnecessary papers

We all collect garbage papers and we don’t throw them away. Time to chuck them. Remember to recycle.

Step 2: Some documents you have to keep

You’ll have to keep a variety of documents still in their paper form, such as notarized documents, the title to your car, and birth certificates. But it’s good to scan those in as well in so that you have a digital record.

Step 3: Create a digital filing cabinet

Now that you’re going to become paperless, you’re going to need to store digital copies of your files on your computer. Look at your filing cabinet and begin creating a digital folder structure that mimics what you have in your filing cabinet, if not more so. For example, create a folder entitled “Receipts 2012″ and then under that create subfolders for each month, but give them two digit numbering to simplify sorting (e.g., 01-12, 02-12, 03-12).

Step 4: Scan your documents

To pull this off you’ll have to have a scanner that’s got a sheet feeder. To do this without a sheet feeder will take you forever.

There are tons of different documents you can scan and then throw away. Receipts, health documents, and other sensitive information are the obvious first items to scan, but I would also look at mementos, such as cards, letters, and things you’ve written in the past. Is the actual card really important, or would you be OK if you just scanned the card to keep the sentiment and threw the card away?

Depending on how you like to keep the settings on your scanner, you’ll probably have to optimize and compress your documents as well. This will reduce your file sizes dramatically. Adobe Acrobat is the standard, but you also might want to try Power PDF Compressor.

Step 5: Turn off paper billing

Almost every recurring bill has the option to turn off paper billing and to just receive an email alert when your bill is ready. Go through all your billing accounts and turn off paper billing.

Step 6: Capture receipts going forward

There are tons of solutions for financial tracking, but you’re probably already using an application such as Quicken. No need to change what you’re doing. Still, you’ll want to capture all receipts going forward from here. Quicken has a method to attach a receipt image to a line entry, but it’s such a pain in the butt to use it’s not worth it. That feature will be valuable once Quicken releases a mobile app that lets you capture images of receipts.

You’ll want to capture receipts in a variety of different ways:

Online purchases – You’ll get a receipt via email. Save as a PDF.
Recurring bills – You’ll be able to download a PDF copy of your credit card bills, phone bill, cable bill, and more.
Retail stores – Whether you’re at a restaurant or other retail establishment, your best bet is to use Evernote to capture your receipts via your mobile phone. If you have to fill out formal expense reports, you can use Expensify in conjunction as well.
Paper bills in the mail – Use your scanner.

Step 7: Throw away all your manuals

Almost every single manual is available online in a PDF. Stack up all your manuals and search for each one online as a PDF. Once you find it and download it, chuck it into the recycling bin. For the manuals you rely on a lot, you can save it to your iPad or mobile device for easier access.

Step 8: Sign contracts digitally

Many of your important papers are signed contracts and one of the most difficult things about contracts is actually getting them signed. Making someone print out a document, physically sign it, find your fax number, and then fax it to you, is a long laborious and unnecessary process. It’s often the reason documents take so long to get signed.

Switch to digital signatures. I use a service called EchoSign that I use and have noticed a much quicker turnaround for signed contracts. I still give people the option to print the document, sign, and then fax. While I do want to stay paperless, I want to get the contract signed first. Another possible option is DocuSign.

Step 9: Receive faxes via online service

I have a fax machine, but I don’t use it to receive faxes. Instead, I signed up for eFax and got a free inbound fax number that I give out to people who want to send contracts. Anytime I receive a fax, it comes directly into my email, and if it’s something I want to save, I just save it as a PDF.

Step 10: Dispose of your sensitive documents

You’ll have plenty of nonsensitive documents. You can definitely throw those in recycling. But for the sensitive documents, you’ll want them destroyed before they’re recycled. A paper shredder is good for small jobs. But if you’re doing a massive purge a simple paper shredder can’t handle that volume. Luckily, you can go to your local FedExKinko’s and throw all your sensitive documents into a giant locked box which will be taken offsite and be destroyed. No charge.

Step 11: Secure your documents

Since you’re putting all the documents in digital form, you’ll want to secure the documents through either password protection on your computer, and/or full encryption.

Step 12: Always have an export option

Don’t ever rely on any new solution for managing all your receipts. Applications come and go, but you’ll need many of your digital documents for longer than the lifespan of your application. For that reason, no matter what solution you choose, make sure it has an export option.

For example, as much as I like Evernote, I take all my receipts out of the program eventually. Evernote’s desktop application has an option to export your notes to an HTML document. For my receipts, I just export the Evernote receipts to the digital file folders I created on my hard drive.

Step 13: Backup locally and online

Get yourself a local backup system that mirrors every item you save on your computer. A 3 Terabyte external storage drive can be had for only $150 these days. That will surely backup all of your data. In addition, an online backup system will protect you from any unforeseen tragedy. There are a bunch of solutions out there, but I’d recommend Crashplan for its versatility in managing your backup and its low cost (about $5-$10/month depending on the package).

Step 14: Become a digital reader

Don’t ever purchase a new book in paper again. Get yourself an eReader or tablet device. Every new book is made available digitally. So if you’re going to buy a new book, make sure it’s a digital book. For anything that’s in paper, go to the library or borrow a friend’s book and then return it. That way you won’t be stuck with so much paper.

I’ve taken almost all these steps so far myself and should complete and continue the process by early 2012. Do you have any suggestions you can share with me and fellow readers?

All scanning and paper images from Shutterstock. And manuals image from N55.dk.

Our 10 Favorite Videos of 2011

David Spark — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 17:17:34 +0000

The year is wrapping up and while I posted Our 10 Funniest Videos of 2011, I also wanted to post our favorite non-funny yet really interesting, videos. Here they are.

1. A tour of an IndyCar steering wheel

This year Spark Media Solutions began covering IndyCar Racing. While we loved interviewing all the drivers, the geek in me wanted to learn more about the technology. Here’s a very simple explanation of all the buttons and readouts on an IndyCar steering wheel as explained by an engineer on Simona de Silvestro’s racing team.

2. The Best of the SocialDevCamp Hackathon

By putting a severe time limit on an open-ended project it forces the participant to rise to their fullest potential or completely give up and fail. That is the architecture of a hackathon and it always makes a great story. For 36 hours at SocialDevCamp in Chicago I followed all the participants as they struggled to come up with an idea, work with their team, parse out responsibilities, execute, and present their project without failing. Oh yes, and do all that with little sleep and very little bathing. This nine-minute video tells the whole story.

3. What’s the best advice anyone ever gave you about development?

At the same conference with the SocialDevCamp hackathon, I asked the throngs of developers about tips they learned that inspired them to become developers. Some really great tips here, even if you’re not a developer.

4. What do you wish you knew about web development two years ago that you know today?

At the Future of Web Apps conference in Las Vegas I got the developers to admit to past development failures that make a lot more sense today. Had they only known, development would have been a lot easier.

5. My interviews with Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley of KISS

Here are my interviews with Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley after they broke the record for the most global online conversation using Ortsbo, a real-time chat translation tool. Both incredibly nice guys, and I learned that Gene Simmons has never uttered the phrase, “No comment.” He’s literally got an opinion on everything.

6. How do you energize word of mouth?

Word of mouth is arguably the best form of advertising. At an event Spark Media Solutions produced for Zuberance, the brand advocacy champions, I asked attendees what techniques they use to get people to talk about their product.

7. What game inspired you to be a game developer?

Game developers were gamers before they became game developers. For most, it took the inspiration of a certain game to become a game developer. At the Game Developer Conference in San Francisco I asked attendees, “What game inspired you to be a game developer?”

8. Andy Ihnatko’s take on Apple’s iPad 2 launch

Andy Ihnatko is a well known tech journalist and author, specifically about Macs and Apple. The two of us went to junior high together. While we knew each other when we were 13, we didn’t reconnect until both of us entered the world of tech journalism. Now, once a year, at MacWorld, Andy and I reconnect at the conference and I often get him on camera to talk about whatever the hot issue is in the world of Macs. This year, it was the introduction of the iPad2.

9. RSA Conference 2011: End of show report

The RSA Conference is the biggest conference every year about IT security. Everyone and everything in the industry is discussed at this event. Here’s my 5-minute summary of the event.

10. How to make your product go viral

A little known conference in the tech world is ICIS. It’s held every year in December, a poor time for conferences, but a great time for educators who are on winter break. This conference is for people who research and teach technology to young people entering the IT workforce. One of the people I spoke to was a doctoral student at NYU who had done some interesting research on online contagion.

Stock photo courtesy of Shutterstock.