This is a guest post from Yvette Pistorio of Cision.

Two shifts have dramatically changed the way media and public relations professionals interact over the past few years: the move away from email in favor of online social channels, and the emergence of versatile, freelance content creators who are as comfortable writing magazine articles as they are blogging for brands.

For PR pros, that means media outreach will soon be more likely to take the form of a Twitter conversation with a freelance writer than an email exchange with a full-time reporter. With these shifts in mind, Cision has created a space for today’s content creator…journalists, bloggers, and PR and marketing professionals.

For those wearing multiple hats, we don’t force you to choose your role.

True Community Takes the Lead

In mid-April, Cision launched Seek or Shout, a new online community for media and PR professionals.

We built it to help journalists, bloggers, public relations, marketing professionals and other professional communicators research and promote their content while connecting with each other in a productive, relevant way. It allows you to connect directly on what is most valuable to you whether it be a story, blog post, video, podcast, etc.

You don’t have to choose a role, you can be both. The site isn’t just a listserv or dashboard, but an interactive community with photos, live comments and direct collaboration. It appeals to social and real-time sensibilities.

Inside Seek or Shout you can…

• Seek products for review, experts to interview, and research materials for an upcoming news article or blog post. Choose to make your requests anonymously, or syndicate them to Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn for maximum response.
• Shout about your latest content, campaign or product. Users who follow you or the tags you place on your Shout will see them in their News Feed.
• Communicate privately with other users about exclusive inquiries and offers.
• Define your interests and find relevant messages from other users in your News Feed.
• Maintain a profile outlining your roles and background.
• Search editorial calendars, like CisionWire and PitchEngine, to spark content ideas.

Seek or Shout the Anti-Spam?

We hope the site helps alleviate the deluge of email pitches for journalists and bloggers. The “anti-spam” if you will.

Receiving pitches through the site provides a more manageable environment to work in allowing you to see pitches easily without other correspondence cluttering your view.

Since you choose the tags you’re interested in, you are deciding what you want to see on your homepage. They can be modified to narrow or broaden your feed. They can represent the industry you cover or just the news you want to read.

“As a freelance reporter covering health, caregiving, antiques, and other topics, I’m inundated each day with pitches from PR professionals who want me to incorporate their client’s product, service, expert, or angle into a story,” says Elizabeth Hanes, freelance writer and a sponsored Ambassador for Seek or Shout.

To help clear out her inbox, she began requesting that PR professionals only pitch her through Seek or Shout.

Gini Dietrich, CEO of Arment Dietrich and author of Spin Sucks, agrees. “I also really love that I can push pitches to come through there instead of to my inbox.”

More Than Just a PR and Blogger Tool

It’s been really great to see how members find new ways to use Seek or Shout and engage in ways we didn’t necessarily anticipate. There’s a diversity of users including book publishers and literary agents seeking experts and other writers.

We’ve also seen more universities and students signing up which is great since they are coming into the field and will be the new content creators. They need a tool like this because the marketplace is evolving, expects versatility from communication jobs, and helps craft a wide content experience to stay competitive.

“We’re fostering a relevant exchange between public relations professionals, journalists, and influencers who need to find sources and information quickly on deadline,” says Jay Krall, business development manager for Cision.

We want Seek or Shout to become a community, a valuable space for everyone to interact, build relationships and collaborate directly on stories, blog posts and any other project members are working on.

“It’s a lot easier to find an expert source to interview on short notice when you leverage the power of a strong community, rather than a few friends or colleagues on an email thread,” adds Krall.

About the author:
Yvette Pistorio is the social media manager for Cision, and a blogger for CisionBlog. She is a lover of cupcakes and HGTV, and enjoys a good laugh. You can find Yvette on Twitter tweeting on behalf of Cision.

Is Seek or Shout the Holy Grail for PR, Bloggers and the Disconnected Media? originally appeared on Danny Brown - under a Creative Commons license.

This is a guest post by Bruce Aristeo.

It was late, and after a long day I stretched out my arms, took a deep breath, and let out a huge sigh. My hands reached out and I began clicking, swiping, and typing as my shoulders curled inward around my chest as if humped over in pain.

My eyes were focusing and scanning the screen, my receptors acting as the light on a copy machine, pin-pointing each pixel and assigning the meaning to each symbol creating structure to what I was seeing.

My TweetDeck was doing its usual fly-by, email accounts were reaching out to their respective servers, Facebook Page was at a standstill while deals were secretly being made in the chat area, and my brain was on stimulus overload from subconsciously keeping track of it all.

No television or iTunes music to breakup the live feed chatter streaming into my mind, only this continued dull hum that my defense mechanism creates to keep me sane.

Breaking The Silence of Social Media

Damn, I forgot to check my Google+ account, I was interested in huddling with a new friend and forgot the time.

Exhausted, my graphic designs began to look as if tie-dye was making a comeback from the sixties, loud and no sharp edges, so it was time to take a short break anyway. I opened my Google+ account and clicked through the various areas looking for something to break the deafening silence of watching social media.

A post… Danny Brown? Wow, I forgot he was in one of my circles. Even visiting Danny’s blog on occasion didn’t break the armor piercing rounds of my focus.

You’d think that reading a great story would stop the world, if only for a moment, but each story only enforced the realization of how much time was passing; the visits became fewer as the weeks slid by. My visit to Danny’s articles were long over due, so I stopped to read this post, a chance to smell the roses –so to speak.

A Musical Rose Garden

Huh! Nothing to read, only this posting of a video and a small blip, “Loving this version of ‘Livin’ on a Prayer” from Desmond Child, the guy that co-wrote it with Bon Jovi. Very soulful.”

Okay, I know the song; I grew up in Philly and live in New Jersey. Keep in mind that Social Media was still racing, running, streaming and posting with one eye on the accounts and the other on Danny’s post. I know, …not exactly the full attention I should be giving another human, let alone the artistic expression embedded with a “play” button.

I clicked the play button and the music began, …slowly, …a familiarity to the original yet different. My mind stopped to synchronize my recollection of the original version to this new version. Matching beat, tempo, breaks in the lyrics, but I’m analyzing and still not really free to enjoy the music.

The Shift in Reality

Visually, I broke from the video 30 seconds in, scanning other posts.

Something changed, a shift …not what I was looking at, but how I was looking. I was reading and not scanning posts, each one in fact. The music slowed down all my inputs.

Vision, hearing, movement, and thought were as if warped by Star Trek’s “Q” and the Space Time Continuum. I guess I just dated myself…

I began thinking about the speed at which social media moves, and I correlated it with my studies in child psychology.

It’s interesting that my mind and reactions slowed to the tempo of the music.

Reading the posts became something that happened without intention. It was as if walking through a garden, not intending to smell the roses, but they were there and I happen to think of smelling them.

Stimulation: 10 Second Countdown

Studying child psychology was enjoyable because there were answers to that which gave reason to rhyme.

One such study described how television shows, such as Sesame Street and The Electric Company were delivering a 10 second lesson, meaning the child watching would learn something new every 10 seconds. That philosophy gave rise to the theory that children are being conditioned with over stimulation, thus causing attention spans to decrease.

Being a teacher (K-12), I can attest to how much teachers have to add into lesson plans to maintain student attention.

Listen + Communicate = Intimacy

Now, back to us adults. What are we doing to ourselves by over stimulating our senses with the speed of social media? Are we destroying our ability to sit and listen to another Being by conditioning ourselves with communication void of intimacy?

Our children find text messaging each other while in the same room, sometimes next to each other, is more appropriate than speaking.

Intimacy, the bedrock of communication and the factor dividing us from other animals, is not something transmitted through text, email, Tweets, or Huddles. Intimacy is offered from within each of us, as a means to authentically connect and touch one another with the intention of personal growth.

Some might say that intimacy was part of my social media experience. This is true, but was it Danny’s intention to deliver his personal experience in the link? Only he could answer what his intention was, but my experience came from within. I was only reminded of that place of slowing down, …my personal rose garden.

Giving Thanks and Slowing Down

My engagement with Danny, I couldn’t thank him enough for being in the right place at the right time. Although my message of thanks to Danny was brief, I could not verbalize the shift that occurred within me. Danny’s post reminded me of slowing down, taking a breath, and truly seeing and being in the moment.

Of course you hear “Stop and smell the roses” everyday, but do you ever feel it? I did…

As I part from this experience in social media, and I walk away from the roses, I will always keep that particular garden in mind.

The one I walked through when I was exhausted, and the feeling I experienced when stopping to smell the roses…

This post contains a video. If you can\'t see it displayed properly in your feed, click here to view it directly.

About the author: Bruce Aristeo is an artist, entrepreneur, and a lecturer/teacher of mathematics and psychology. In the spirit of North American Indians, he is a Magician and co-creates the world around him. You can read more from Bruce at AB2BC.Net, or connect with him on Google+ and Facebook.

image: Adventures in Librarianship

A Lesson In Smelling Roses At The Speed Of Social Media originally appeared on Danny Brown - under a Creative Commons license.

This is a guest post by Marjorie Clayman.

A few years back, Yoko Ono released a comprehensive anthology of tapes that John Lennon had left behind. It’s a treasure trove of songs, some that you would know right away and others that he hadn’t yet gotten finished.

One of the latter is a song with the blog title as the chorus. It is, of course, acerbic and hilarious, as one might expect from John Lennon.

This song popped into my head the other day as I was thinking about the world of social media.

I am finding more and more that social media is like the ocean, and it has tides that can carry you out or bring you back in.

These tides can be ways of doing things (or not doing things), ways of thinking about people, ways of presenting yourself, and just about everything else. You meet a person who knows a person who’s connected to a person and they’re all of a like mind, so you float in with them. Then you meet other people and they pull you in a different direction.

Pretty soon, if you’re not careful, you can actually lose your footing and just become a piece of driftwood in this restless sea.

The sad fact of the matter, as you discover as you start treading water here in the online world, is that most people have some sort of agenda, and their ability to influence you towards that agenda is what makes social media extremely powerful.

Maybe a person wants you to think poorly of another person because they are competitive with that person. Maybe someone else wants you to avoid certain things because, really, they’re worried you’d be better than them.

You never really know the full story. You never know when the sea floor will randomly drop, pulling you under.

That’s why you need to follow John Lennon’s advice, online and offline.

It’s easy, very easy, to fall in with a crowd. It’s how we gain acceptance. It’s how we feel part of a group, or to use the oft-used online term, “tribe.” Thinking for yourself or remaining unaffiliated can be really exhausting. There are so many decisions to make on a daily basis. There is so much content to sift through, so many viewpoints to evaluate.

But you have to serve yourself.

Nobody else is going to gear your towards things that will always 100% be for your own good. You have to achieve yourself, too, because ain’t nobody gonna do for you. You can talk to people, you can befriend people, and you can listen to everybody. But don’t let yourself become that piece of driftwood.

Serve yourself. Ain’t nobody gonna do for you.

Truer words were never spoken.

About the author: Marjorie Clayman works for her family-owned agency, Clayman Advertising, Inc., where she represents the third generation! Margie is the resident blogger at MargieClayman.com, and can be found on Twitter at @MargieClayman. 

Serve Yourself. Ain’t Nobody Gonna Do For You originally appeared on Danny Brown - under a Creative Commons license.

This is a guest post by Marcus Sheridan.

I’m going to sound like the most conceited jerk in the world for a few sentences here….but bear with me.

Over the past few years I’ve probably sold more swimming pools than any single person in the country. My company, which happens to be one of the country’s top fiberglass pool installers, has done quite well during this time period and I’ve been the driving force at the kitchen table, helping hundreds of families choose our services over many competitors in the process. To put it simply, I’m really, really good at the skill called selling…

And I’m also incredibly replaceable.

Inflated Values

That’s right, replaceable. I’m not nearly as valuable as many folks think I am to my company. In fact, I know there are people out there, if put in the right position and given the right tools, that can do just as well if not better than I have over these past few years.

For those of you that don’t know my history, when I’m not passionately writing about all things business, marketing, and personal development on The Sales Lion—I also happen to own a pool company, River Pools and Spas, which was started 10 years ago by me and my two great business partners.

Like any company selling luxury items in a wild economy, these past 10 years have been one peak and valley after another, but for the past few I have known that my time was soon coming to an end. Although I enjoyed talking to families and assisting them in the process of creating memories in their backyard through the pool ownership experience, I knew being a ‘pool guy’ wasn’t my ultimate calling.

As I talked to a few people in the industry about my desires to move on, the comments were almost always the same: “Marcus, you’re really the face of your company, and you’re the guy that sells everything, there’s no way you could just leave.”

And although I’d like to think (as we all would) that my importance and worth to the company is as great as these some of these folks would have me believe, the reality is that they’re simply stuck in a paradigm that most businesses and business owners fall in—that employees, especially the owners, are irreplaceable.

Replace Yourself

Fact is, most business owners are too involved in the day-to-day operations of their companies anyway. As Michael Gerber famously said—They’re too busy working in their business to work on their business.

Such has been the case for me as well. I’ve been so busy selling that it has impeded my ability not only to work ‘on’ the business, but also reach out into the areas of my life that I’m most passionate about and feel called to do.

This is exactly why I’ve replaced myself. I now have commissioned sales persons that have taken my place, and the results thus far have been tremendous. Simply put, they’re better than I was. They’re more driven, more motivated, and take the time to care for each prospect as they should—otherwise, they don’t get paid.

In the past, with so much on my plate, I simply wasn’t able to be the best I could be, and therefore, although the sales numbers may have looked great on the outside, I knew there was room for improvement on the inside.

That’s the thing about being successful in business. We’ve got to be willing to step away. We can’t always have our arms wrapped around every facet of the company. Eventually, if we truly want the ‘freedom’ that entrepreneurship is supposed to bring, we’ve got to lean on others.

So that’s what I’m now doing. My business partners and I essentially ‘oversee’ the company but we’re no longer in backyards digging holes or sitting at kitchen tables trying to make a sale. From now on, I’ll spend about 10 hours a week working on my company’s inbound marketing and the rest of my time will be pursuing the goals of the next phase of my life.

The Fire Returns

And if I may be completely frank, I’ve never been so excited and invigorated as I am right now. My smile is unrelenting. I only wish I had learned to lean on others in the past and not allowed myself to overrate my overall importance to the success of the company.

So that’s the challenge folks. Are you replaceable? Chances are, at least in some areas, the answer is ‘yes’. And if it is, get with it. It’s time you started owning your business instead of it owning you. And as you do this you will once again start to create, imagine, and dream big—instead of being caught up in the minutia of day to day.

Can it be done? Sure it can. Now the only question is….. Will you?

Your Thoughts

Why is it so hard for business owners to replace themselves? Also, are you spending more time working ‘in’ your business or ‘on’ your business? Why?

I’m a guy that loves to converse, so please don’t hesitate to share your thoughts and comments below.

About the author: Marcus Sheridan is the author of The Sales Lion, offering sage advice on business, marketing, blogging, and life success principles. You can also connect with him on Twitter at @TheSalesLion and on Google+.

image: OFU

Stop Kidding Yourself, You’re VERY Replaceable originally appeared on Danny Brown - under a Creative Commons license.

How many times have you stumbled across a blog and felt that something is missing? They have great content. They even have a really cool photo to draw your eye in. The text is large enough to read easily. The blogger kindly responds to your comment, yet you never go back.

Why?

I hate to tell you this – you leave me cold. I read your post with excited eyes, but you don’t make me feel a thing. Challenge me. Make me think. Make me feel something. Even if I get angry, I will come back if you make your point well. If you change my mind about an issue, I will be a fan for life.

Writing with feeling can be a really tall order – do it right and you will have fans for life. Do it wrong and risk confusing your reader at best – or at worst pissing them off. It looks easy to write with feeling, but looks can be deceiving.

How do you blog with feeling?

My best blog posts have been written with tears in my eyes or my blood boiling. If I want someone to see what I see, I need to tell a story. A good post should tell a story, plain and simple. Tell me why I should care. Tell me why I should feel. Give me a good story and I will be hooked. A good post really is just a story, a very short story. I try to think about what the point of my post will be and write from that perspective.

Great storytellers can make you feel anything they want – they can make you laugh or cry, but most of all they make you relate.

Why are some posts universal? There are themes everyone relates to on one level or another. Everyone has had their heart broken at least once. Everyone feels fear, even if they hate to admit it. Those of us who are parents have had overwhelming feeling of love for our children that we know there is nothing we would not do for them.

That is how I do it. How do you blog with feeling?

About the author: Nancy Davis is a marketer from New Jersey. She’s also a mom who happens to write pretty well about life and people, and she loves to talk. You can read more from Nancy on her blog, or connect with her on Twitter at @NancyD68.

image: rjg329

Bloggers Do It With Feeling originally appeared on Danny Brown - under a Creative Commons license.

This is a guest post by Eugene Farber.

“How do you measure the ROI of your social media efforts?”

It’s a question being discussed ad nauseum of late, and rightfully so. Social media investment is a legitimate issue that businesses have to face, now more than ever. So, being the problem solver that I am, I decided to figure out how to measure the ROI of social media once and for all.

The quick answer is there is no answer!

If you want a long-winded explanation, read on.

Enough “Whys” Already!

For my first stop on the way to figuring out how to complete this elusive calculation I went to all of the usual suspects.

What I discovered actually got on my nerves a little bit. There were no concrete answers. For all of the promises of “how-to” in the titles, all I got was “why.”

Why you need a strategy before entering the realm of social media.

Why you should use social media to begin with.

Why you should measure the ROI of your social media campaigns!

…OK great! But how?

Some Actual Value…

Luckily my next stop resulted in some actual numbers. This was it! I was finally going to figure it out!

To prove that social media provides a great return on investment (if used properly) The Next Web published 10 case studies on the ROI of social media. These are gleaming examples of social media done right. Case studies which every company should take as an example and follow suit.

Social media management firm Syncapse took it one step further. They recently conducted a study and concluded that the average Facebook fan is worth $136.38.

Now I just have to figure out how to get a lot of Facebook fans and I’m ready to retire!

The Caveats

The Syncapse study is utterly useless. To perform the study they used a selection of companies that are not representative of the average small business. Even Syncapse, within the study, states that no two fans are the same. Well no two companies are the same either. There are too many variables to make the $136.38 figure mean anything significant.

Plus, that takes care of the return part. What about the investment?

Sure Facebook is free, but someone has to run the page and the campaigns on there. How many man-hours does it take to keep those campaigns working. How many man-hours does it take for large companies like Starbucks to keep the customer engagement going?!

The “ROI from Facebook Ads” case study mentioned on TNW (originally published on Search Engine Journal) begins to explore the actual investment part of the calculation. But they still fall short.

The dollar cost of Facebook ads still doesn’t tell me what the REAL investment was. Hours of research to figure out how Facebook ads work? Keyword research? Ad design? Maybe even hiring a consultant to do the work for you?!

Strictly measuring ROI in terms of dollars spent on ads doesn’t really give you a true representation.

Attempting an Actual Measurement…

A recent post written by Jay Baer of Convince&Convert is probably the best summary of actual ROI measurement I’ve seen. The post focuses on the ROI of blogging but can be extended to any social media activity (and really any activity in general).

The first step is to identify what activities you (or your company) is performing and what it costs. Consider all costs including salaries, direct expenses and overhead. If you want to get really fancy (and I know you do) you may want to take into account the opportunity cost of time spent on these activities and what you could be accomplishing with those resources.

Once you have an idea of what your costs are you need to figure out what the return on those activities is. To do this you need to figure out what your revenue-producing actions are (what behaviors your customers can exhibit to drive revenue). Is it blog subscriptions? Is it opt-in subscriptions? Are you just focusing on sales?

As you can see the actual calculation is simple, but not easy. There are many variables to consider and the outcome of your ROI test greatly depends on which factors you focus on.

For larger companies the ROI becomes even more of an estimate because overhead allocations are often subjective. This also means that departments have to get together and interact (i.e. marketing and accounting departments). And how often does that go smoothly?

But even if you do get of that straightened out, it may be impossible (or at least very inaccurate) to measure true ROI in a short-term time frame.

Are We Asking the Right Question?

Gary Vaynerchuk has made a hugely successful business through social media engagement. He has made an even bigger business by promoting the idea of social media engagement.

As he points out in his book The Thank You Economy, it is the businesses that don’t begin to engage with their customers on a personal level that will fall to the wayside.

People born today are born in to a world that is connected more than ever before. By the time they are consumers they will expect connecting and interacting with businesses to be easy.

This may sound ludicrous, but Gary V believes it to be true. And who am I to argue with Gary V?

My grandmother never had a computer.

My parents are now using the internet for purchasing, yet they tend to stay away from the social network scene as much as possible.

I am in my mid-20s, on the cusp where the social media outbreak occurred.

My kids will be born into a world where the President of the United States having a town-hall meeting over Twitter would be a thing of the past (the effectiveness and legitimacy of said meeting is a debate for another day).

The evolution is clear. And in a world that is evolving faster than ever before, maybe our questions should be evolving as well.

Are We Measuring the Right Metrics?

Maybe the answer to the question is no. Maybe the ROI on social media engagement doesn’t even matter at this point.

Perhaps it isn’t the ROI of social media we should be measuring, but rather the LOLOI – the loss on lack of investment (yeah…I just made that up).

How many potential customers might you be losing if you aren’t engaging in conversation with them? What if your competitors are engaging them? People would rather buy from people they like and can relate to. With social media even the biggest corporations can become more personable.

So at this point the wiser question might not be “what is the cost of implementing a social media strategy?” but rather “what is the cost of not implementing one?”.

A Learning Curve

In truth the investment, and the return, does matter. It doesn’t make sense to pump resources into social media if you can’t afford it. If all of your resources are getting sucked up by social media and not enough are being put into actual business operations then you have a serious problem on your hands.

But it is important to note that social media tools are just that…tools. And the magic isn’t in the tool, but rather how you use it. It doesn’t have to cost an arm and a leg, but it does take some practice.

There are certainly learning curves when it comes to using social media. And each individual and business has its own.

But it may be a good idea to get in now, while it is still early, to perfect the craft before it becomes an absolute necessity.

The Conclusion

There may not be a simple answer to measuring the ROI of social media because there are too many variables. And each individual and company needs to figure out which of those variables they need to focus on.

There is definitely no blanket one-size-fits-all answer. But just because it may not be easy to measure the ROI of social media, doesn’t mean you shouldn’t attempt it.

Go for it. Play around. Test different variables. Finagle some numbers.

And remember…the ROI of social media might not even be the right thing to measure.

About the author: Eugene Farber is an accountant turned internet entrepreneur. He blogs about internet marketing, business and life at Reality Burst. Visit his site today for a free Social Media ROI checklist, and connect with Eugene on Twitter @EugeneFarber.

image: Leads United
image: Debs

How to REALLY Measure the ROI of Social Media originally appeared on Danny Brown - under a Creative Commons license.

This is a guest post by Niall Harbison.

The media landscape is changing right in front of our eyes – we have moved from a world where large organizations controlled the media we consumed to a more democratic time where everybody has a voice. Because of the huge shifts in technology, anybody can start their own media empire with a small amount of money, lots of drive and a creative mind.

Two of the biggest examples are Techcrunch and Mashable which were both started by individuals in their own homes and in less than five years have each become worth close to $50 million. So how would you go about creating your own little media empire and what are the barriers to entry?

Find A Platform

Even the biggest blogs and news sites in the world these days are built on free platforms like WordPress, Blogger or Tumblr. Whereas in the past you needed an expensive printing press and had huge overheads you can start your own site within a couple of minutes absolutely free.

If you are getting a little more serious about things you might need your own domain name, a professional template and some hosting but you can be up and running for less than $500. Three or four years ago you needed more technical knowledge like HTML and CSS but the platforms are so good now that all you really have to focus on is creating great content and growing an audience.

Identify Your Niche

There is lots of competition online with plenty of people churning out content trying to grab an audience so you are going to have to find a niche and really focus on it. You are going to have to find something that you are extremely passionate about and stick to that. The biggest, most acclaimed blogs on the Internet are written by people who have huge passion for their subject.

While it might be tempting to drift off topic and cover a wide range of subjects you will get more traffic and a bigger audience in a shorter period of time if you remain focused and produce excellent content within your niche.

Growing an Audience

If you wanted to build you authority in old media it meant finding a job at a publication that already had an audience and piggybacking off them. If you are starting out on your own you are going to have to grow your own audience from scratch, which seems like a daunting task, but the good news is the tools are there to help you.

The first thing you will have to do is grow huge personal brand. Look at Pete Cashmore at Mashable, Mike Arrington at Techcrunch or Arianna Huffington at the Huffington Post and you can see how important the personal brand of the founders is.

You can do this through tools like Twitter, Google + and by engaging with other bloggers within your niche – this is absolutely vital if you are to succeed. This part is going to take time and you will be writing posts that only have a handful of readers at the start but over time your readers will grow. Don’t expect to get much traction within the first few months and expect to put a years hard slog in to growing your audience at the very least.

There are no short cuts to this part. No magic tricks to get millions of readers. It is all down to pure hard work.

Using Rich Media

Not only do you have a free blogging platform to use but you can also embed all sorts of rich media. With over 200 million blogs in the world you are going to have to make your one stand out from the crowd and using tools like video, audio, photos or visual designs is a great way of doing that.

There are 100s of different ways in which you can use video, for example, and platforms like Youtube are not only free but will also help you get some great exposure. Maybe you could start your own podcast using software like Audioboo or a simple photo blog using the 100s of different options out there.

Build Your Network And Absorb Information

Just like a journalist would build up their contacts and their sources you are going to have to network your ass off. The old way would have seen you shaking hands and swapping business cards in the real world but now you can do it all online and all you need is a laptop and a WIFI connection.

Start talking to the people who are influencers within your niche online. You can watch most press conferences online these days and let people know that they can share information with you that you might publish. Use tools like RSS and Twitter to get the latest news and spend time setting them up properly with as many sources as possible.

You are going to have to become a sponge to absorb as much information as possible but luckily the web is full of it so it’s just about how efficient you can be filtering it all to your own personal needs.

Work Hard, Publish Regularly And Think Big

Once you have all the elements in place above all you have to do is work harder than everybody else to make it to the top. There are no secret shortcuts or fancy tools that will help you achieve your goals overnight. It is going to take you a couple of years to get to the top but if you keep on producing content on a regular basis, create a huge network and stand out from the crowd there is no end to what you can achieve online.

You don’t need much money at all to get started and if you think big and aim for the top there is no reason why you can’t get there. Most of the media companies and blogs selling for $50 million started off in a bedroom just like you could with a laptop, an Internet connection and some big dreams.

Go for it!

About the Author: Niall Harbison is the Co-Founder of Simply Zesty, a social media agency which has grown to 27 employees within 2 years and has a wide range of large international clients. The company blog shares social media tips, news and case studies from around the world. You can find him on Twitter @niallharbison.

image: joeldinda

How to Build a Media Empire From Your Bedroom With Just a Laptop originally appeared on Danny Brown - under a Creative Commons license.

This is a guest post by Howie Goldfarb.

But he also invited me to guest post for which I am flattered and honored. Not sure which I feel more honored and flattered about. Obviously Danny doesn’t care if you like him because he invited me to write this post!

So, this is for you:

Do not follow, read, attend webinars, or conferences by ‘A-Listers’ if you want to learn how to market products, services, or brands. 

There – I said it. Hey A-Lister! I am telling people to ignore you! And I am correct in saying this. You have nothing unique to offer me, or my clients. Because you are an A-Lister, everyone knows your ‘insights’.

How am I going to set myself apart, or my client or brand or product if I am using tips from you? Where is the secret sauce? Everyone is reading you, following your tweets, etc, and thus using your advice for good (or actually often for bad). Your sauce certainly is not secret – it’s just sauce. It’s Ragu vs. what Momma used to make.

First it was about Fans and Followers. Everyone should have a Fan Page. A Community. A Blog. Yet none of these ‘secrets’ have led to Brands or Businesses separating themselves and making a ton of money.

Don’t get me wrong – I am okay with you, ‘ahem’, A-Lister making money for yourself. But you are not the marketing A Team. You are NOT who the CIA sends out to take down Bin Laden. If you want the real A Team, see who comes to this blog, or Spin Sucks, or The Sales Lion and participates.

Don’t you want insight that only a few people have?  The real secret sauce? The goal is to crush your competitor. Not to be like your competitor.

Do you really think A-Listers would share their secret sauce with you if it really worked? Don’t you think an A Lister would make a gazillion dollars if they could seriously show, say, Pepsi how to trounce Coke vs. telling everyone their ‘secret’?

Don’t people pay big bucks and compete like crazy to get into an Ivy League or similar B-Schools, so they can learn the secret sauce? Thousands and thousands of dollars to have that edge, yet you can buy a book by an A Lister for $25 instead and be just as good? Are you nuts?

Think about what will set you apart. Because you want (need) to set yourself, your brand, your product or your client apart.

Because that is what the secret sauce is about. And you’re not going to get that for $25.

image: All Chrome 

About the author: Howie Goldfarb is president and CEO of Sky Pulse Media, an agency focused on helping clients achieve outsized results in measurable bottom-line-impacting ways. He had a 14-year career in direct B2B sales before deciding to lighten up his dreary work life and move into advertising. Follow Howie on Twitter at @skypulsemedia.

Danny Brown Called Me a Dilhole Or How to Find the Secret Sauce originally appeared on Danny Brown - under a Creative Commons license.

This is a guest post by Bill Dorman.

Okay, I was going to jokingly say Michelangelo must have had me in mind when he sculpted this; but then that might imply I’m old and my FedEx package could have been sent via regular mail instead of shipped. Now we wouldn’t want that as a persona, would we?

Throughout your life, somebody somewhere is always looking up to you; and sometimes it can create lofty expectations. Do you want to be there? Is it deserved? What responsibilities come with that?

This post is a reflection of the admirations and criticisms that occur in the social media world.

What are you trying to achieve?

You got into the blogosphere for a reason. Everybody has their own reason but I’m guessing it wasn’t to be a lump and just sit around without exploring or growing, right?

It appears most are hoping to monetize in some way whether directly through their site, or one-off in selling their knowledge or services.

Guess what, to do this you have to expand and grow your network, build your community as they  say. The more you are involved in growing your network, the more visible you become.

I think they like me

Most of the time it is a virtual love-fest in the comment section of blogs. Everybody is gushing how great the article is, how great the author is, how their breath can’t possibly stink, etc. Typically, everyone only sees the ‘good’ you. Can you see how easy it would be for an outsider to assume your community has placed you on this pedestal? Maybe you even start to believe the hype; did you just breathe into your hand to check your breath?

My wife reads my blog from time to time and jokes about how much everyone seems to adore me and all the back and forth thanking that goes on. She said, “Yeah, let them live with you for 30 days and see how great they think you are.”  I’m sure she says it in jest,  but I do see her point.

Don’t get me wrong however, I like the compliments. For some this is the only payment received, so of course they like it; it’s validation. However, it’s only healthy to keep it in perspective and stay as grounded as you can.

Lofty height indeed

As you progress up the ladder, based on whatever measurement of success you are using, you put yourself out there for all the world to see. Your comments, strategy, your whole demeanor is subject to review, criticism and debate.

You do have to develop a thick skin, but do you think it also changes who you are? Does it matter?

Make no mistake, all things are not created equal and there are different rungs on this ladder. This hierarchy is real and to say otherwise would be naive.

You do seem different

Typically success increases your activity; and this requires more time. Because of this, the way you interact now can look different than it did when you started. This doesn’t necessarily mean you’ve changed per se, but you did change. Some people will resent your success and could be jealous; not everyone will be happy for you to succeed.

Is this the least of your worries?

You can liken it to the corporate world where you have a group of buddies (equals) who hang out together and one of them gets promoted to manager. Suddenly the dynamics of the relationship just changed, and it is different.

It’s still just me

People who want to be successful tend to be competitive. Success can bring recognition and sometimes it might appear you are on a pedestal for all to see. Leaders frequently assume this position.

Whereas success brings more attention, don’t be so quick to build someone up to be something they didn’t ask to be.

Keep that in mind in the way you might challenge someone, until you’ve walked a mile in their shoes. Just because they have had some success shouldn’t make them an open target. It’s all about respect and common decency.

Also remember, once you’ve been placed on a pedestal there is only one way to go. I mean look at that naked dude up there, you don’t think people aren’t laughing at him?
You think you want it, but are you ready for what it entails when you take that ‘step up’?

About the author: Bill Dorman is a blogger who enjoys networking and adding value to his relationships. He is an insurance broker by profession. You can find him any day at Bill Dorman, The Invisible Blogger, where all strays are welcome and you can even subscribe to his content. Follow Bill on Twitter at @bdorman264.

The Social Media Pedestal originally appeared on Danny Brown - under a Creative Commons license.

This is a guest post by Dino Dogan.

Californication is a Showtime series starring David Duchovny, aka Fox Mulder, of the X Files fame. And I’m a huge fan.

One of the major plots revolves around David’s character, Hank Moody, inadvertently copulating with a very mature looking 17 year old daughter of Hank’s former wife’s boyfriend. Wow that sounds complicated. Anyways…

During the act, right at the climax, the young lady takes it upon her self to punch Hank, closed fist, right in his nose.

“So you wont forget me” she answered, when he screamed out a befuddled “What the fuck!?”

No matter. Hank got some much-needed inspiration thanks to his nose-to-fist encounter and managed to finish his sophomoric writing effort. The title of which is… Fucking and Punching. Little on the nose, if you ask me.

Pun…intended?

In Hank’s defense, the publisher and the young lady chose that title, but I’m getting ahead of the story.

You see… Hank Moody is a troubled but talented author who was having a hard time following up on his hugely successful writing debut. You know the type.

While Hank was asleep in post-coital bliss, the young lady managed to get a hold of Hank’s script and decided to steal it. This resulted in a book deal for her along with accolades reserved only for talented new arrivals.

What was Hank to do?

Nothing. What could he do? He was stuck between a gorgeous Lady Devil and the deep blue sea. Between a rock and a hard place. Between a pickle and a jar. Between a… let me stop with the similes, I’m not the writer here, Hank is.

How many times does this happen in business?

How many times does someone have an idea, as well as the execution, only to have someone else come in and punch them in the nose?

A lot!

• First there was Coke, then came Pepsi. And let’s face it. It’s basically the same drink.
• First there was Vark.com, and then 3 years later came Quora. But because Mark Zuckenburg is behind Quora, everyone is jumping on that bandwagon. What a shitty service that Quora is btw.
• First there was Klout, then came PeerIndex, and then came Empire Avenue.
• First there was Friendster, then came myspace, and then came Facebook.

First there was Triberr, then came…?

Triberr was an idea that came to me in a dream-like haze while trying to fall asleep. Once it clicked, I couldn’t bat an eye. I stayed up all night developing the concept in my head. The very next day I got in touch with Dan Cristo.

I met Dan when he commented on one of my posts for Social Media Examiner. Then we did a few podcasts together on SEO and the future of search, Facebook and all manner of other nonsense. Good times.

So I knew Dan and I got along really well. And I knew Dan has a good handle on coding. After all, he developed several very cool sites, like Fluttrs and Ressimo.

So the idea came to me on a Wednesday night, and the following Saturday, Dan and I were sitting at a coffee shop sketching out what Triberr would look like.

Speed Daemon of Implementation

I don’t know how Dan does it. That very night Dan had already put together a rudimentary version of what is today Triberr.

Of course, it was only the wires and the supporting walls -we were still at the early stages- but the lay out was all there and not that different from the way Triberr looks today. About one week later, we were testing the core functionality.

When we saw -for the first time- that my blog posts were going out of Dan’s Twitter account and vice versa, we couldn’t believe we pulled it off.

Two weeks later, we opened doors to pre-beta testers and allowed up to 7 bloggers per tribe.

I have to pause the story here and thank the early adopters. Without them, Triberr wouldn’t be the service it is today.

• Extraordinaire Expatriataire, Mr. John Falchetto. Triberr user ID 12
• The Buff Buffer guy, Mr Leo Widrich. Triberr user ID 13
• PR Hostess with the Mostess, Mrs. Gini Dietrich. Triberr user ID 16
• Downtown Danny Brown, Triberr user ID 17
• Beez Neez who always aims to please, Ingrid Abboud. Triberr user ID 23
• Mr. Wow, Srinivas Rao. Triberr user ID 33
• Mr. Twitter himself, Aaron Lee. Triberr user ID 37

With the core group like that, Triberr has received the kind of credibility and social proof that can’t be bought with money. And so to all early adopters and new arrivals, I thank you.

Big Fat Copy Cat

It’s only a matter of time before someone comes along and rips off the idea of Triberr.

Now don’t get me wrong; I’m not saying that the idea of tribes is original. Tribes have existed from the dawn of our species.

And I’m not saying that the idea of retweet clubs is all that original either.

But! The idea that a band of bloggers would trust one another to automagically post to each other’s Twitter stream is entirely new and unique to Triberr. And not as a one-time deal, but as the basis for something long-term, meaningful and mutually beneficial for everyone involved (including followers.)

• So, who will step in and be the next one to deploy a copycat service?
• Will they be successful?
• What would they have to do in order to be the real competition to Triberr?

How is Triberr protecting itself against the big fat pussy?

SONY created the first portable music delivery system. They called it the Walkman. They did it without spending money on market research, product testing or Return on Investment analysis.

The day before the launch of Walkman, there was no market for portable music players. The day after, the entire world couldn’t live without a Walkman.

Sure, nowadays, we use our iPods, but SONY was first to the market. First to the market, yet replaced.

Will the same thing happen to Triberr?

I hope not. And here is how we’re making sure it doesn’t happen:

One:

From the very first piece of code, every single feature has had to answer one question. How will this help a blogger? If the answer is not convincing, it doesn’t get implemented.

This alone creates an obstacle for someone else to enter the market because in order to effectively compete, they would have to focus on that as well, rather than on “how do we make money with this?”

My personal commitment and promise is that Triberr will ALWAYS put the needs of bloggers above all.

Two:

We are first to the market. The copycat will have to live with that knowledge and stigma attached with the knowing that you ain’t nothing but a sloppy second.

This is an important distinction for people in the know. But it’s a vast world out there and I don’t know that too many would be able to tell –or care to tell- the difference.

It’s a small obstacle to entry I’ll grant you, but an obstacle nonetheless.

Three:

When you are invited to Triberr, you’re not signing up for a soulless, faceless web app. You are getting a direct access line to the founders and coders of the platform.

So the previous obstacle wasn’t a mountain to overcome, but coupled with this one, I think it creates a strong wind of resistance. Why?

Copycats know they are copycats. They would have to put their face in front of their product to compete effectively. I say this under the assumption that most people want to deal with people. And most money-driven, soul sucking, rip-offs, aren’t looking to put their credibility and reputation on the line under the circumstances.

Four:

We are sooo fast. Dan is a speed daemon when it comes to answering the development needs of Triberr community. And they request new features on daily basis.

For example. Danny Brown had decided to implement “many small tribes” strategy and expressed his desire to leave the very first (and very large) tribe he himself created. So what does Dan do?

That SAME day, Dan had built a feature that allows Chiefs to transfer the control of their tribe onto another member of the tribe. How fucking cool is that?

So any competition would have to be extremely responsive, approachable and would have to deliver in a big way. And lemme tell you folks…there are easier ways to make money.

Five:

Dan is the guts, I am the brain. Dan and I feel that it is our unique backgrounds that enabled us to create Triberr. He is an amazingly fast and resourceful developer, and I have the deep insight into what bloggers need because I am a blogger. Sure, there is overlap, but we make for a pretty perfect Venn Diagram.

Six:

We have a secret Ace up our sleeve. Well…I’m not gonna tell you what it is, but we got one. Good luck, copy pussies.

Triberr Community

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. Companies pay good money for the type of feedback that we get. I LOVE The Triberr community.

The initial coverage of Triberr was nothing short of amazing. We had received so much press and so fast, its makes us grateful and humbled by the attention.

Here is a short list of early supporters:

• A Leap Of Faith That Brought A Metric-Ton Of Traffic
• Triberr – A New Way to Participate in a Tribe
• Triberr: How I Increased My Reach To Over 300,000 (And Growing)
• Triberr, The Gift That Keeps on Giving
• Triberr: A Clever Traffic Secret You Really Want to Know
• 5 Reasons Why You Should Suck Up To Me To Get A Triberr Invite

But that doesn’t mean all the press we got was good.

• Why my relationship with Triberr is coming to an end…
• A Rollercoaster Ride of Automated Tweets and Cross-Promotion
• Social Media Automation, Respect, Credibility And Robots

We loved getting the bad press almost as much as good. As a direct result of the issues raised in these articles, we’ve implemented a Manual Mode, Explicit Content setting, ability to remove tweets from the Cue, etc.

The Moody Side of Business

Hank eventually ended up in court winning the rights to his book. He also ended up in court for statutory rape.

The same fate happened to Vinklevoss brothers as they settled their lawsuit against Mark Zuckerberg for a lofty sum of $65 million in 2008, only to feel like they got raped (statutorily?) when the judge refused to re-open the case of Vinklevoss Vs. Facebook.

Will similar fate befall Triberr? Will the Lady Devil come along and steal our idea? Will we get Vinklevossed?

• Has something similar ever happened to you?
• What did you learn from it?
• How are you making sure it doesn’t happen again?

About the Author: Dino Dogan is the founder of Triberr. Lousy Mixed Martial Artist and a recovering Network Engineer. Pretty good singer/songwriter, trainer of dogs, and a blogger of biz. Fun at parties and a global force for badassery. Follow on Twitter at @dino_dogan.

image: Glamhag

F***ing and Punching: The Moody Side of Business originally appeared on Danny Brown - under a Creative Commons license.