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Someone says something nice about you? You could… ReTweet and look a a little overly self-promotional, you could Old school “RT @username: @yourtwitterhandle is the bestest speaker EVER! // You’re Right” and at least appear passively bragging about yourself (you wanted to give CONTEXT to your tweet right?).

Or you can STAR it. An email pops into the authors account, and says this person favorited your tweet.

Its like sending a handwritten thank you note.

It doesn’t go on the social stream. But it does communicate value and relationship-

Here is another scenario. Someone who doesn’t follow you says something powerful. Retweet then Favorite it. 8/10 times you just EARNED a follower.

EARNED followers are more responsive, and looking for an excuse to promote someone who has earned a place of influence.

PAID followers are often spammy, and most of the time members of various #-tag teams.

EARNED followers share you content because its natural to share something that connects—

So send a few stars out today and see what kind of fruit comes from a self-less Social Media Investment.

If Homer Simpson was a client of ours, this is how we would explain social media to him:

Twitter –> I am eating a Donut

Facebook –> I like Donuts

Foursquare  –> This is where I eat my Donuts

Instagram –> Here is a vintage photo of my donut

Youtube –> Watch Me eating my donut

Linkedin –> My Skills include donut eating

Pinterest –> Here’s a donut recipe I found

Last.fm –> Now Listening to “Donuts”

Google+ –> hi I am a google employee who eats donuts [+1]

Any Questions?

These are a few cornerstones to the social media strategy StyleVox implements

• Sharebility- Creating content that provokes your audience to apply content to their life easily. People are 4x more likely to share content that “helped, improved, related” to their narrative, and removing all barriers that keep them from sharing your content.
• Visibility- Being strategic about where audiences look for content, how they respond to it, the layers of information they sift  before “research fatigue” sets in.
• Coherence- Is what you’re doing making sense to them? Is it logical? Does it meet their own test of sensibility, does it “ring true” to them?
• Relational/interactive is there a clear 2-way dialogue between idea and receiver that results in “innovation, growth, adoption, or rejection” Does your content, brand presence respond to critics? Seekers? early adopters? or is it a One way stream of self-promotional communication, do you share content written by  your adopting audience (tribe) in addition to your own?

Sometimes we draw a picture that looks like this:

Yes! that is a lot of circles. But if you are not too careful you could end up with content that is VERY visible, and very relational, interactive and personalized but has no value to be shared or be useful to your audience. Online marketing is about creating content, displaying it, and letting is live and breathe among information consuming, overloaded, and discerning people.

When it comes to content, consumers are easily overwhelmed and can pass judgement within seconds of visiting your site, your social media profile, they have already decided as your site loads poorly, looks unorganized, to the information consumer who consumes 1000′s of bits of data a day, it might even be offensive.

We are a culture of snobby consumers, if it’s not on a silver plate in our hands before we thought we wanted it, then it’s not good enough.

So creating highly interactive visible, content that is applicable and makes sense, is what sticks on the palate of the modern info-surfer.

Take SPAM. Its more than just a folder in your inbox, its content fodder, its useless, pointless, vicious, and nauseating to consumers. We label any information that isn’t presented just right as spam.

For example, that twitter account the retweets 400 people you never followed in 4 minutes, too much information hogging up the social media consumer’s plate is a bad idea and an almost guaranteed unfollow.

So TOO Much visibility can be a bad thing, it’s not interactive, and doesn’t really connect to a solid narrative to the account you follow, and the share button seems to have been burned out. Again its a pain in the neck.

NEED More Help Creating Great Content strategy for the web? Contact us. …. 

We are bringing Social Media to the real world. No longer will your professional accounts be managed by some techie in his mom’s basement (wearing bunny slippers). No longer will you ask your administrator to “tweet stuff” while you fly to your next engagement. If you are a professional on the go- flying, speaking, leading, you need someone next to you on the plane, on the ground, in the airport, at the event, managing your social media in real time. Creating golden content people in your audience want to see.

With our unique set-up you too, can have a roadie on an important trip. Not only are they good drivers, tip the bell-boy, and great conversationalist, but they will be your consultant to help you say connected online to the audience that fuels your cause.

Interested? We can fill you in on the details– and if you’re worried about the $$ its less than you think. Email Roadie@stylevox.tv to find out more!

Each person in the room was given 4 Seconds to convince us to take an action that would advance the interests of their brand. Half the room lined up while the other half watched.

The first person didn’t say anything until 3am in the morning, after we were all too tired to care.

The second person SCREAMED AT US, and told us he would listen to us if we listened to him first.

The third ate his big mac in front of us and told us about his new shoes.

The fourth was silent but held up a portrait of a starving child in africa.

The fifth person stood up, and said exactly what persons one and two said— ends up they are all from the same company– so that felt a little redundant and I felt mislead.

I was on Twitter.

If Twitter was a conference that happened offline and you were given 4 seconds of screen time to convince the world to take action. What would you say? How would you say it? Would it be about yourself? Would you share a story from NY-Times.com or show a video of an obnoxious kitten rolling on the floor?

Or would you sit there silent? Would you pay someone else to go up for you in your cloths and convince the world they were you?

So many organizations treat their social media accounts like it’s the last thing they think of– they walk out on stage with their back to the audience, in their underwear, surprised to see thousands of people eagerly staring at them.

Don’t get caught with your pants down.

Your Bio. It is the one thing everyone sees first. And the only element of your profile constantly send to others, if they have email notifications. Even the #letsfly Twitter 3.0 moved the Bio from its lost place on the right side of the page to almost the first place you look on the site.

Your bio is more important than how many people you follow, if you follow back, your # of tweets, your auto-responses. It is the first and best impression to  communicate your story. Its a preview of what people can expect your content to be, how its written, whats included and even how you lay it out speaks volumes to your potential audience.

what not to do.

• #!@$$#@%$#%$#^^%&$&%*$%^N or other weird heart-star-glitter symbol vomit. It sends most of us old enough to remember into MySpace tremors.
• Sell Something- please don’t put stuff that should be in an infomercial about your business or your scheme, no one wants  to follow a used-car salesman.
• put #-tags in your bio. If I really wanted to know I will look at your time-line. Its some weird version of SEO for twitter that doesn’t do anything- plus it looks hideous after the 3rd one.

please be

• Authentic- let a little humanity bleed through
• Consistent- your tweets write your bio– if there’s dissonance you look dishonest
• Snarky- Humor is good, personality is better.
• Concise – sentences aren’t necessary, if you can do it in 5 powerful words separated by periods– you just won me.

1. Over Time “in-house” people burrow.

I guess in both of our experience we had people in organizations or clients that had grown totally dependent on the in-house guy doing “everything” no one else on the team could— send an HTML rich email (through MailChimp? Easy!) Edit basic copy on their website (which was all in CSS– who does that?) Edit their social media (like the rest of the world without an ‘in-house’ person)

A part of this we credited to insecurity about their future as a creative in that company. But in-house creatives aren’t the only perpetrator, many of us have worked at companies with legacy employees who have created systems dependent on their position, instead of releasing others to diversify effectiveness.

2. Day to Day designers  beget Same Ol’ Same Ol’ ideas.

We both recognized that brands need to remain consistent for credibility in the eyes of the audience and market. Consistent doesn’t always equal Recycled ideas. As one Hollywood producer once told me, “people who enter the biz with an idea will only last as long as their originality allows them” . Wow my geeky example. George Lucas. Lazor-Swords? No. Lightsabers. Migit Bears? No. Ewoks. Another Space Movie? No. Trans-Narrative Story-telling.

One organization that I spoke with NEVER has paid for a full-time designer(s). They totally could afford it, they definitely had the work, instead they held 50 creatives on retainer at different points in a year. I call it the creative “gun-slinger” model. And it works BEAUTIFULLY.

The last question we asked ourselves was (gulp): If they really were that “creative” why not do it on your own?

• Stability
• Comfort
• Not a business mind
• Not disciplined *ouch
• Not an entrepreneur personality.

BTW we offer great 2 month retainer deals if you want to shake up your creative edge