CarusoBlog

Linkedin's best-kept secret

Every social media platform has a secret weapon. 

The best feature on Facebook is the Notes page where you can promote your company in messages much longer than 140 characters.

Twitter has some amazing apps such as Tweetdeck that put the micro-blogger on steroids.

Even the relatively staid Linkedin has a piece of heavy artillery.  It's called "Recommendations." 

In the old days (the 80s, LOL) business people used to request a "letter of recommendation" from satisfied customers.  Now I ask people to post compliments on my Linkedin page.

These types of testimonials are what Robert Cialdini, author of Influence, refers to as "social proof."  Such recommendations, for example make me feel good, but they also make my prospects feel good.  Nothing brings in business like third-party testimonials. 

A client of mine recently posted this kind compliment on my Linkedin page for all to see:

"I had the opportunity to hear Michael speak at a Rotary function several years ago and was so impressed that I invited him to speak at an upcoming Zone meeting for seven Rotary Clubs in Southern Wisconsin.  He had 120 people totally involved while speaking and his ideas for improvement are something we actively use today. I highly recommend Michael Angelo Caruso."     

  -John Stensland, VP, Martin Business Group, Geneva, Wisconsin, via Linkedin

 

Thanks, John! 

If I had written this message about myself, people would think of it as advertising.  But when John posts this message, it's the truth.  That's the beauty of third-party testimonials, such as recommendations on Linkedin.

I'll be interviewing Linkedin expert Dean Delisle on Tuesday, December 1 at 4 PM ET.  He's the President of a company called Forward Progress and a real guru on Linkedin.   

Register at http://budurl.com/UseLinkedin4Biz.

Marketing made easy; Use social media and blogs to forward testimonials

It's easier than ever to market your company.  Using a blog, Facebook or Linkedin as a delivery system, simply forward testimonials to people on your list(s).  For example, I recently received this message from a client named Chad Drexler.  He cc'd me when he sent the same message to about a dozen of his closest friends and associates.

Hello all,

Hope everyone is doing well!  Just wanted to drop you all a quick note.  I have been fortunate enough to develop a relationship over the past few weeks with Michael Angelo Caruso, nationally known sales/inspirational speaker. 

I ordered some of his sales training material, and decided to pick up the phone one day to make contact with him. To my astonishment, he actually picked up the phone and took valuable time out of his day to listen to me and guide me in the right direction. 

Since our first contact, we have been in touch several times and I really love his stuff.  Take a look at what he has to offer and check out the following websites:

http://www.edisonhouse.com http://carusoblog.typepad.com

In my humble opinion this guy is right on the money.  You may even be able to call him as well and bounce some ideas off him.

Regards,
Chad Drexler, The Baseball Head Doc, MInneapolis, Minnesota

The above is a pretty good testimonial, don't you think?  When Chad originally sent this out, only about a dozen people saw it.  Chad gave me permission to send it out, too, so I posted it on my blog at www.CarusoBlog.Typepad.com and posted the link to my blog on Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin.  When I did this, about 40,000 people saw it. 

Be your own public relations firm.  Use a blog and social media to share the nice things people say about you and your company. 

Use popular blogs to drive traffic to your site

Most likely, there are tons of blogs receiving more traffic than your primary Web site.  You can siphon some traffic from these sites with some etiquette and a simple technique. 

Most bloggers don't mind you promoting yourself a bit, as long as you provide value to his or her readership.  I certainly don't mind when readers leave this type of post on my blog. 

Use a 95/5 rule of providing only 5% self-promotion and the rest some comination of value-added content and compliments.  Here are the five steps to using other blog sites to drive traffic to yours.

1.  Read a recent blog post on a popular site.

2.  Compliment the blog host on his site and message. 

3.  Use an incidental credential to introduce your comment, such as "in my experience as a speaker" or "when I published my book on the subject" or "in my 15 years of experience." 

4)  Offer a value-added comment that will help readers. 

5)  Finally, give your contact information.  Note:  Some blogs automatically reject comments that contain full URLs.   

If you are too blatant about promoting yourself, it won't matter how valuble your comment is.  The comment will be disallowed. 

Play by the rules, be nice and you can use other peoples' blogs to drive traffic to your site.

What will your book be about? Whatever the topic, it'll be pure profit if . . .

Ever think about writing a book?

An e-book or electronic book, has one of the highest profit margin products in the history of marketing because the author doesn't have any fixed costs.  When you write and sell an e-book, there are:

-  No production costs

-  No inventory costs

-  No printing costs

-  No delivery costs

-  No returns

-  No cost of goods sold

-  No design costs

-  No advertising costs

-  Almost no barriers to entry

In fact, since the author is essentially selling electrons, whatever price he or she charges for the e-book is almost pure profit.  Yes, the author's time is worth something and there may be a few dollars spent on Internet marketing tools, but for the most part, those expenses are minimal.

Of course, a free market economy and the price of competitive products may dictate some parameters, but information products are generally free of traditional publishing costs and even most marketing expenses.

This is true for many digital information products, including e-books, teleseminars, home study courses, podcasting and anything else you choose to "self-publish."  Here's an example of such a product, an e-book on how to create information products:

http://tinyurl.com/CreateSellInfoProducts

While it is true that the average published book only sell a couple thousand copies.  A $10 e-book that sells 100 copies nets the author a cool grand--pure profit, less the time it takes to write it.

What will your book be about?

Social media is about to make your life easier

Everywhere you turn, you hear about these Social Networking and social media websites: Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn, Digg, and Delicious. 

Everyone's talking about them.  Newspapers are writing about them.  It sometimes appears as though social media Web sites are taking over.

Facebook now has over 200 million members.  YouTube visitors are viewing 13 billion videos a month.  LinkedIn has over 15 million business people networking.  And Twitter is growing at a phenomenal rate of over 40% a month.

Depsite these staggering statistics, The big question on many people's mind is a simple one: Are these websites useful business tools or a massive waste of time?

Well, not only is social media useful, it's about to make your life a whole lot easier and more fun--if you let it.

I've done a lot of research and experimentation on the three most popular social media platforms and have some great info for you such as:

1. The top 3 mistakes that people are making using Social Media.

2. How you can position yourself as an expert in any niche fast without spending a dime.

3. The top 4 ways people are generating leads through social networking.

5. How we know that Facebook is becoming the new White (and now Yellow) Pages.  

6. How to use social media to generate income.

These tools are not only changing business, they are shaping our lives.  I'm helping people like you figure it out now so you can benefit from these fantastic changes.

Join me Monday, August 24 for a fun, productive teleseminar on how social media can make your life easier in so many ways. 

If you can't attend the live teleseminar, pick up the audio CD and listen anytime you'd like. 

Register   for the teleseminar, held Monday, August 24 from 4:00 PM to 5:00 PM ET and benefit from live Q&A; invite your boss to attend; send an associate this invitation                       

 or

 

Order      the 60-minute audio CD on the subject; listen whenever you'd like, as many times as you'd like; share with others

Whatever you do, get with the program.  Social media is here to stay.

Free marketing advice from the world's greatest athlete

It's always fun trying to rank athletic prowess.  This exercise is best conducted on a barstool over a couple Heinekens and usually ends up as a fun, albeit circular discussion.  But there is an important lesson here for marketing your business.  

Stay with me on this.  

Should we consider individual statistics or his/her contribution to the team?  Dan Marino is surely one of the finest quarterbacks to ever play the game, but he never led the Miami Dolphins to a Super Bowl title. 

Of course, tennis players who specialize in singles don't usually play for a team.  Should we count them?

Who's the greatest tennis player of all time?  Roger Federer for winning his 15th Grand Slam title?  What about Bjorn Borg, who won 11 majors before retiring at only 26 years of age?

Who's the greatest, A-Rod or Jeet?  Alex Rodriquez has far better career stats than Derek Jeter, yet Jeter has four World Series rings. 

How should we judge greatness when the game changes over the years?  Is Phil Jackson a better coach than red Auerbach?  Jackson has ten championships to Auerbach's nine even though Auerbach coached when there were fewer teams in playoff rounds.

What about comparing across sports lines-- who is greater, Federer or Tiger Woods?

Fun stuff, eh?  Now here's the valuable marketing lesson:  The answer to the question, "Who is the greatest . .  ." is  . . . Mohammed Ali.  Ali was the greatest partly because he said he was.  

If your company has game, it's a good idea to promote it as the greatest.  

Find one thing that really sets your company apart from the competition and start telling everyone how great your work team is.  And as in sports, it helps if you're able to deliver.

Internet marketer Garrett Pierson is one to watch

What a pleasure being interviewed by SEO guru Garrett Pierson for his new book: http://www.whatsuccesstakes.com/

This guy knows his stuff!

Goodbye, Casey Kasem; Hello information marketing

Last weekend, Casey Kasem, retired as the longtime announcer of the American Top 40 (AT40) radio show.   AT40 ran for an amazing 39 years.  It was on the air during disco, new wave, metal, arena rock, grunge, rap and hip hop, but apparently American Top 40 couldn't make it to year 40.

The countdown show isn't over, however, because the clever Mr. Kasem, who attended college here in Detroit at Wayne State University, has the show in syndication.  Who'd a thunk that anyone would ever want to listen to an old music countdown? 

Mr. Kasem and whoever else is profiting from AT40 syndication are essentially engaged in information marketing.  Specifically, he is collecting a residual from the repurposing of information that was originally marketed many years ago.  

Everyone has the ability to do this.  You can publish digital products such as e-books and teleseminar recordings for almost no money.  More info here.

Casey's work was a model of perfection, but the man was human.  Listen to an oddly funny outtake at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qmuqdGvCxtA&feature=related

Video is the new way to market your biz

E-newsletters have quietly become the most effective, low-cost marketing tool for establishing top-of-mind awareness with customers and prospects.  Of course, you can use hyperlinks (clickable links) to drive traffic to your Web site and process orders online and in my telecourse, I teach people to embed video into their e-newsletters.

Video rocks and if you're not using it to promote your products and services, you're missing out.  The equipment is very inexpensive, especially the camera and the editing process I recommend.  The technology is easier than ever to comprehend; I can teach anyone to do this.

Why video?  Nothing sells better than video, but the number of people who see the video on your Web site is limited to how much traffic you get.  When you use video in your e-newsletter, everyone in your data base has an easy opportunity to click, so viewership goes way up.

Imagine these easy applications and how effective they'll be in making your cash register ring.  What would probably happen to your sales if you posted a video clips of:

-  A satisfied customers singing your praises

-  A message from your President or top salesperson

-  Product demos

-  A tour of your facility

There is no end to the possibilities of using video to promote your business.  My YouTube channel is a mix of helpful communication tips and soft promotions.  One of the vids has over 4,500 views and counting!

Soccer mom Paula Parisot blogs for profit; you can, too!

For immediate release . . .

Paula Parisot makes money blogging. She started with practically no technical skills and learned just enough to start cashing checks.

Paula will talk about how to get started blogging and how to avoid time-wasting pitfalls during our upcoming interview. She also puts a killer twist on blogging that most people never think to do.

This one-hour program begins at 4 PM ET on Monday, July 20. Registration is only $39 and includes a free, 30-page e-book on time management called, How to Save One Hour a Day.

Sign up at http://tinyurl.com/BlogForProfit.  This interview is part of my monthly interview series.  Michael Angelo Caruso