The Invisible Mentor

Posts Tagged ‘Social media’

This week nine cities around the world, including Toronto, are celebrating Social Media Week 2011. From the session Business 3.0 – Strategies and Tactics that can be leveraged to help small companies grow their business and brand here are five tips.

Panellists

Chris O’Neill: Country Director, Google Canada

Jonathan Lister: Country Manager, LinkedIn Canada

Carissa Reininger: Founder & President, Silver Lining

Sean Stanleigh: Editor, Your Business, Globe & Mail

1. What are your objectives? What do social and digital media mean to you? Create a social and digital media strategy then build relationships and share.
2. Play with the platforms such as Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook to understand what they can do.
3. Find out who the influencers are and get them to help you spread your content.
4. Be clear about what you do, who you do it for, figure out the best way to do it then seek the best tool to help you do it more efficiently.
5. If you are selling consulting services and higher priced products you are in the relationship business and you have to take the online relationships you build, and build them further offline. That’s the only way you will make a sale.

How can you use this information? What do you have to add to the conversation? Let’s keep the conversation flowing, please let me know your thoughts in the comments section below. Many readers read this blog from other sites, so why don’t you pop over to The Invisible Mentor and subscribe (top on the right hand side) by email or RSS Feed.

Related articles

• Social Media Week … or Weak? [Matt Hodkinson] (ecademy.com)
• Social Media Week kicks off today, find out how you can get involved (thenextweb.com)
• Social Media Week Seeks Innovation With Multi-City Approach (mediabistro.com)

When I think of Diane Danielson, Brave, Bold and Pioneer come to mind. I always learn from each interview that I conduct, but there were many lessons in this one and I’m sure that you’ll agree. Some important lessons are: make sure that your career suits your personality, separate your emotions from the facts, figure out your passion and what you are good at and be at the forefront. And be flexible because your life doesn’t always turn out the way you expect, but change often brings lovely presents so be open.

Tell me a little bit about yourself.

I am the founder of the Downtown Women’s Club, which is a women’s business network and career website. I’m also Vice President of Business Development for a social media consulting firm called Convengine. I try to combine the two because a lot of what I do at the Downtown Women’s Club is the social media strategy and a lot of our online networking program. I’m also recently remarried, I have four kids and a huge dog and I live outside the Boston area.

What’s a typical day like for you?

They differ from day-to-day but some days I spend the entire day giving several speeches, mostly talking about social media, networking and the different skills you can learn. And other days I’m doing a lot of writing online and doing some strategy consulting for clients. It does vary from day-to-day but it’s a nice mix and I like the idea that there are different days for different things.

How do you motivate yourself and stay motivated?

To make sure that I stay motivated, every day I mix in some fun projects and fun for me is creative writing, so if I’m having a big accounting and bookkeeping day, because I’m a small business, the Downtown Women’s Club is run by a couple of employees and we all do a little of everything but I always make some time for something that’s really motivating like writing, or speaking and the speaking really does motivate me when I go out there and actually get to meet people.

If you had to start over from scratch, knowing what you know now, what would you do differently?

I would be better at delegating things and I would have spent my money more effectively with the Downtown Women’s Club when I was building the company. There was a lot of stuff that I couldn’t control, we built technology that was later cheaper and that’s usually typical with technology, but I also spent some money in areas where I probably could have figured out cheaper alternatives. I did some traditional marketing things that didn’t have as much bang for the buck. I think it’s just something you learn from experience. Anyone who starts a business knows that you are going to make these mistakes along the way and mine weren’t costly but those are stuff that I would definitely do differently.

What’s the most important business (or other) discovery you’ve made in the past year?

I’ve gotten more cognizant that people are afraid of change, and a lot of what I do in social media and forcing women to network and learn technology, is a big change, and they are going through a scary time right now and my important discovery is that their reluctance, it’s not that they are dismissing it, there is this fear of change and I have had to figure out how to help them through it, and I think for me that is a big discovery because I used to walk around thinking why people don’t get this.

What’s one of the biggest advances in your industry over the past five years?

Clearly it’s social media and social networking, it’s just huge – facebook, Twitter. People still discount how big it is but it’s not going away and it’s something that has changed every business model. I don’t think that anyone can name a business model that social media and social networking doesn’t affect in some manner.

What are the three threats to your business, your success, and how are you handling them?

1. The economy in general. We ask people to join but they are wondering if they should spend the $49 here, or is that four cups of coffee at Starbucks, or whatever it is. People are questioning where to spend their money, but on the flip side people are spending their money more wisely. They may see that investing in their career is a good thing. I’m trying to explain how this has long-term dividends.
2. Our competition is always a threat in some manner, and I try not to see it as a threat because everyone does it a little differently, they have their own style, but that’s always a threat.
3. The other thing is being able to scale appropriately because sometimes we get caught when we do not have enough staff, we need to staff up more yet we do not want to bring on more people until we can be sure that the growth is continuous. It’s a big guessing game, and trying to make the big decisions and being aware of what’s out there and how we try to handle it is being open-minded about what can affect us.

What’s unique about the service that you provide?

At the Downtown Women’s Club we were always at the forefront of social media and social networking. We were the only club that was on email 10 years ago when we were founded so we always had this little edge and we’ve always attracted people who are interested in pushing into new areas. That’s very unique. And on my social media consulting side I’ve partnered with Lena West who is phenomenal and is a social media guru, and what we offer that’s unique, and I think some of it for me for my clients is my marketing background. I’m not coming from a technology standpoint, I am coming to social media from marketing and I understand the technology thoroughly, so that’s a unique mix.

What do you observe most people in your field doing badly that you think you do well?

I think that I’m a little less ego driven than others. I don’t want the Downtown Women’s Club to be Diane Danielson’s club even though I founded it. I try to really empower local directors and try not to have my face be the face. We went through a phase where I was the face because that’s what everyone was doing and I decided that that doesn’t work.  I try to step back out of it. I think that that’s something a little different and it empowers other people to make the Downtown Women’s Club their own. When we start a local chapter the local director is the person who is in charge and makes the decisions.

Describe a major business (or other) challenge you had and how you resolved it.

One of the challenges we had two years ago is that we used to get a lot of website traffic from LinkedIn because we were listed as one of the first LinkedIn Groups and they actually posted a link to Downtown Women’s Club page from their group’s page. So we were always on the front page so if someone went to LinkedIn Groups they would see the Downtown Women’s Club so we had huge traffic, and then two years ago they corrected that, as they should and made it more of a directory so it was always different, and all of a sudden our website traffic went down. I was ready to shut down the shop. I was ready to close the Downtown Women’s Club, I mean, oh my God we’re not getting that website traffic. But what I did, I went and looked at the numbers and tried not to be so upset about it, and sat down and said before we shut down, let’s take a look at what’s going on here. And what I found out was that there was another site that I didn’t know very well, and it was facebook that was sending us a trickle of traffic, we didn’t put any effort there but it was converting into paid members at a higher rate than any other place, so I took that little bright spot and said let’s grow that bright spot and see if we can make it up, and within four months we were back to where we were with the LinkedIn traffic. We found that we got a lot of traffic from LinkedIn but it wasn’t converting to paid members. That was a big challenge.

What lessons did you learn in the process?

1. Before you throw in the towel, separate your emotions and focus on the facts. If 100 people are coming from facebook and 50 are joining as paid members, that’s more important than having 5,000 people of which 50 converted to paid members.
2. Work in small increments and say if things do not improve in three months then we’re done

Tell me about your big break and who gave you.

I don’t know if it was necessarily a big break, there are no overnight successes, but there have been lots of people throughout my career, even when I was in a bad situation as an attorney early on, or in real estate companies, there always seemed to be people who I call my guardian angels. They just showed up out of nowhere and gave me some advice and helped me through a bad position. I can think of a single mom who helped me out when I first became a single mom, I haven’t seen her in 10 years but she came into my life when I needed her and then she moved on. I have had people take me aside and say, “Here’s what you need to do with your career.” I’ve had these wonderful mentors, men and women that for some reason I got their attention without me even noticeably trying. I think by being outspoken people came along and picked me out and said “here.” So there have been many breaks and thanks for people who look to help younger people.

Describe one of your biggest failures. What lessons did you learn, and how did it contribute to a greater success?

I was not a good attorney, but I was in a very tough place, and when my boss left for another firm he left me holding the bag and so I got fired. I thought that my life was over. I actually remember thinking that I was going to step in front of a bus or something because I couldn’t believe that I just got fired. I thought that I was such a good employee and some of it was my fault because I was not the best attorney. I mean I was better than average but it also didn’t fit my personality and I really thought that my life was over. I’d gone to law school and I was in debt for law school. I looked around and felt sorry for myself and I interviewed with other law firms and it dawned on me that I didn’t want to work in another law firm, so I started looking around for jobs that were in marketing and sales and I found one and had a great run. I had fun being VP of marketing in the commercial real estate industry. It was one of those things where I felt it was the most horrible point in my life and I ended up finding a career that was wonderful.

What has been your biggest disappointment in your life – and what are you doing to prevent its reoccurrence?

Not having more children when my son was younger. Of course now I have three step-kids who are wonderful and we have a wonderful house, but I did feel that I missed out on doing the big family thing, because it was just me and my son for eight years.

What’s one of the toughest decisions you’ve had to make and how did it impact your life?

Getting divorced while pregnant and it impacted my life because I embarked on being a single mom for eight years. I remarried when he was eight years. That was a tough decision because to walk away from a marriage that wasn’t working, and clearly neither of us wanted it to work anymore. That was a tough decision and I’m not sure that I had a choice. Even to this day I still refer to myself as a single mom and I think that I’ll always identify with single moms even though I’m remarried and in a wonderful family situation. I’ve developed a strong community with some of the best people that I’ve met.

What are three events that helped to shape your life?

1. Getting fired from being a lawyer. I have many friends who say they were glad that I worked at such a tough law firm because I would not have done all the things I’ve done for women in business had that not happened.
2. Becoming a single mom. It forced me to be a better mom and I suppose had I been married I would have had a nanny and all that other stuff but by making that choice because my son was in a weird situation, I would have to be the all round parent. That changed my view on a lot of things and I discovered that I was a pretty good parent, hopefully my son will agree with me. It also forced me to seek out flexible employment situations and make choices that were different than I otherwise would have made. I always thought that I would have been a big executive and head of a major company. Now I’m running a small business because it allows me to be entirely flexible for my son.
3. Discovering social media. I’m not good working at home alone because I like interacting with people and social media made it less lonely. It kept me going, it provided me with a skill set that was at the cutting edge, I started blogging back in 2003 for the Boston Globe. And now social media affects everything so it means that I was able to join my friend’s consulting business. For me it ensures employment going forward and it ensures me helping people going forward.

What’s an accomplishment that you are proudest of?

The Downtown Women’s Club. The fact that we have 12,000 women involved in it and finding help and value in it, and doing any bit we can do to help women to get ahead. On some days it’s really tough and I wonder why I do this but I’m still really proud that it exists.

What can you learn from Diane’s experiences? Let’s keep the conversation flowing, please let me know your thoughts in the comments section below. Many readers read this blog from other sites, so why don’t you pop over to The Invisible Mentor and subscribe (top on the right side) by email or RSS Feed. I created a Mini Learning Toolkit and you can grab a copy by clicking here.

About Diane Danielson

Diane K. Danielson is the founder and chief social media strategist for the Downtown Women’s Club, a professional network and career website.  She is the author of The Downtown Women’s Club Beginners Guide to Facebook ebook (2009), the co-author of The Savvy Gal’s Guide to Online Networking (or What Would Jane Austen Do?) (2007) and Table Talk: The Savvy Gal’s Alternative to Networking (2003).  Diane blogs for www.womensDISH.com, and Entrepreneur magazine and serves as a workshop leader and social media coach for companies, non-profits and individuals.

She is a former vice president of business development for Spaulding & Slye Colliers, a vice president of marketing for Meredith & Grew, Inc./ONCOR International, and an environmental attorney.   Diane is a graduate of Colgate University and Boston College Law School.

Recently I interviewed Diane Danielson for this blog, and during our conversation she revealed that over a period of 10 years, she grew the membership of  the Downtown Women’s Club, which she founded, to over 10,000 members. This level of membership is significant because many association type organizations are struggling, and bleeding their membership at a rapid rate. I was very interested in how she did it, and it turns out that it was done primarily through LinkedIn and Facebook. She recommended that I read Inbound Marketing: Get Found Using Google, Social Media, and Blogs by Brian Halligan and Dharmesh Shah from Hubspot.

At 215 pages and large print, it’s a very easy book to read, but it’s filled with a lot of solid content so you can easily get overwhelmed. My advice is that you approach Inbound Marketing the same way you’d approach any large project, and that is to bite off small pieces and implement the recommended strategies that way. The concept of Inbound Marketing is about getting found on the internet using search engines like Google, social networks like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, and blogs. It’s about getting your customers to come to you online.

If you are interested in getting found on the Internet, and looking for strategies and tactics, this book is for you because it’s very hands-on with non-technical how-tos. The book is divided into four parts: Inbound Marketing, Get Found by Prospects, Converting Customers, and Make Better Decisions. At the end of the book you’ll have concrete steps to follow.

The authors stress that you find people who are potential clients and start by building relationships with them by serving them. So what would this look like? In the context of StumbleUpon and Digg, friend these potential clients and comment/vote on their articles. I really appreciated this tip because it would never occur to me to look at articles within my area and comment on them. This is something that I do for blogs that I subscribe to.

For Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, start a conversation with potential clients, answer their questions, and post content that you think they would find helpful. Consistently doing this, your potential clients will return the favor. For Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, there are search functions that you can use to zero in on your potential clients. It’s also important to spend some time thinking about the kind of information that would be useful to people in your marketplace.

While reading this book, I felt as if Halligan and Shah were holding my hand, and I appreciated it because I didn’t feel like I was being spoon fed. For instance, while reading the chapter “Get Found Using Social Media,” I was busy taking notes and prioritizing the steps to take, only to discover that at the end of the chapter there is a To-Do List with a summary of the essential steps to take to increase your findability. Examples of some of the steps include:

• If you’ve somehow managed to resist signing up for Facebook, despite requests from your friends and family, go ahead and do it
• Make sure your LinkedIn profile is 100 percent complete. Link your profile to your business website and blog
• Use the group search feature [in LinkedIn] to find the biggest groups in your industry. Join these groups and start participating  in discussions
• Use tools like Twitter Search and the search feature on Twitter Grader (http://twitter.grader.com) to find influential users in your industry. Begin forging connections early
• On Twitter complete your online profile including a brief bio, your location and a link to your website
• When you see an article that you like and that’s relevant to your business, befirend the person that submitted it. If the article is very relevant, review some of the other users that have dugg the article and befriend them too
• When you come across interesting web sites or articles, submit them to StumbleUpon (don’t submit your own yet). Do this by clicking the “Thumbs Up” button in the toolbar when on the page
• Begin befriending those that are submitting sites that you find highly relevant. Start building your friend list

Five + 1 Great Ideas

1. Rewrite the unwritten rules in your industry and don’t be a conformer
2. Create remarkable content
3. Think about the Sacred Cow Rules in your industry and how can you change them – think disruption
4. Pay attention to your customers but do not follow them
5. Think across the traditional boundaries of your marketplace to alternatives or be the world’s best at what you do within your existing market rules
6. Follow the 80/20 Rule – spend 80% of your time getting more visitors and 20% of your time getting higher conversion rates

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is important to many of us and the authors explain that, “It’s about creating content that users would want to find and helping Google deliver great search results. The best way to rank well in Google search results is to create content that is rank-worthy.” (For many of my blog posts I use Scribe, an SEO software you can get from Brian Clark at Copyblogger.com. The software has a list of criteria, which it uses to judge the level of optimization in your article and it makes recommendation for improvements).

Other information that I found useful are:

• 7 Tools to Keep Tabs on Competitors
• Making Your Articles infectious
• Tracking Your Progress
• Compelling Calls to Action
• Tips From the Trenches for Headings

I recommend Inbound Marketing: Get Found Using Google, Social Media and Blogs because it’s the kind of book that you will refer to time and time again. As Halligan and Shah says, you have to be consistent and devote the time to implement the strategies and tactics. Whenever you get the opportunity, visit Hubspot and sign up to receive their blog.

Let’s keep the conversation flowing, please let me know your thoughts in the comments section below. Many readers read this blog from other sites, so why don’t you pop over to The Invisible Mentor and subscribe (top on the left side) by email or RSS Feed. I created a Mini Learning Toolkit and you can grab a copy by clicking here.

All book links are Amazon Affiliate Links.

Today and tomorrow we present Paul Copcutt’s interview. Are you noticing any similarities in the interviews that you read here? If you were asked what are three threats to your business, how would you answer? What are three events that shaped your life? For Paul, it was (1) The death of his mother and sister when he was seven years old, (2) Taking a job at a biotech firm as a National Sales Manager without any medical experience and (3) Marrying his wife. If you were to respond to the questions, would any of  your answers be similar Paul’s?

Tell me a little bit about yourself. Tell me a little bit about your company and where the idea for your business came from?

Paul Copcutt, a transported Brit, I came to Canada in 1996 with the biotech company I was working with to follow a Canadian and convince her to marry me. I started my company Square Peg in 2004 as a recruitment company but always with the intention of doing something more involving personal branding because what I had been doing in a corporate career was personal branding there was just not the name for it.  Now that is all I do, personal branding for individuals, inside corporations and speaking on the topic.

What’s a typical day like for you?

I run a home based business, so once the family is getting on with their day is when mine starts professionally. This will involve talking to clients on the phone, using the technology of the internet to connect and stay in touch. If I am out meeting clients or speaking, a day can start early and be a long one depending on location, travel etc.

How do you motivate yourself and stay motivated?

My main motivation is that everyone should have the opportunity to understand personal branding and see if it applies to them. My purpose is to spread that message to as many people as possible. Also I love to connect with others. My colleagues and connections become my virtual watercooler. I am in two mastermind groups and we help and hold each other accountable.

If you had to start over from scratch, knowing what you know now, what would you do differently?

The journey I have had to this point makes me who I am, I don’t know that doing it differently would have resulted in the same outcomes, so I hesitate in saying what I would do differently.

What’s the most important business (or other) discovery you’ve made in the past year?

That my biggest strength is spreading the message to many versus converting people one at a time and modestly I am actually very good at it.

What’s one of the biggest advances in your industry over the past five years?

The speed of the internet and the developing technologies that stem from that. Now people see the need to manage their personal brands because of the impact of social media and online brands.

What are the three threats to your business, your success, and how are you handling them?

1. Remaining focused – belief that what I am doing now is right and resisting the temptation to look at another direction just because things may not be happening fast enough. 2. Too much noise, not enough substance – there are a lot of people now talking about personal branding but to be honest that is all it is. There are very few people who are actually doing something everyday in terms of helping people define and develop their personal brands. 3. Bright shiny objects – trying too many new things can be a distraction. I am a catalyst and starter, but not a finisher, so new ideas and so on are a big attraction but also distraction.

What’s unique about the service that you provide?

I inspire people to take action with regards to their personal brands by sharing personal information and examples and practical solutions. There does not have to be smoke and mirrors to make this happen.

What do you observe most people in your field doing badly that you think you do well?

I do not think that most people in my field who are actually working with people on their personal brands are doing it badly. It is more those that talk about personal brands as the solution to online branding but fail to get the foundation offline established first.

Describe a major business (or other) challenge you had and how you resolved it.

Charging by the hour you reach a limit – either in number of hours you can work or fees you can charge – or both. I stopped charging by the hour or month for my services and went to a project based model.  Researched value based fees models and created proposals and marketing materials around talking about value and outcomes versus hours worked.  I now have only one client who pays by the hour and that is an arrangement through a partner and not my contract.

What lessons did you learn in the process?

People are receptive to a project based fee model for consulting and coaching. It makes you focus more on the outcomes and creates a much better relationship with clients because you both have interest in getting results versus just delivering a program.  Clients call on me when they need to not when they need to pay for it.

Tell me about your big break and who gave you.

My first ever client for my own business. I had made the decision to leave my previous employer and had no actual business to take with me. That first client gave me the opportunity to prove myself and became a significant client for my first 2-3 years of business.

Describe one of your biggest failures. What lessons did you learn, and how did it contribute to a greater success?

First ever job that required me to sell a service instead of a product. At the time I was not ready, I could not relate to selling an intangible and within 3 months I had left the company. The next time I went to sell a service a few years later I knew what was expected and needed and although it still took me some time to get good at, it eventually set me up for what I do now.

What has been your biggest disappointment in your life and what are you doing to prevent its reoccurrence?

To varying degrees I still get disappointments – the contracts or pieces of work you expect to get but don’t. I try to learn from every experience and even ask the question “Is there something I could have done differently?” and take that to the next experience.

What’s one of the toughest decisions you’ve had to make and how did it impact your life?

Moving to Canada with all my family still in the UK. I knew deep down it was the right move, and Canada has offered me so many opportunities as well as a wonderfully supportive wife and two great children. Not sure if I ever would have started my own business back in the UK.

What are three events that helped to shape your life?

1. Loss of my mother and sister when I was 7 years old.
2. Taking a job as a National Sales Manager for a biotech company without any medical qualifications.
3. Marrying my wife.

What’s an accomplishment that you are proudest of?

My two children.

How did mentors influence your life?

There are probably three people, apart from my father, who have influenced my life.  My first ever boss when I had a part time retail sales position. He said, “You are never bigger than the customer and the customer is never bigger than you.”

The owner of the first recruitment company I worked for who let me learn from my own mistakes and was okay with my learning the lessons even if it meant we lost the business.

And my boss when I first became a manager, who always challenged me to have at least two options to any decision.

What’s one core message you received from your mentors?

See above

Which resources (books, movies, training etc.) did your mentors recommend to you?

The most influential training I received was the Wilson Learning Social Style program over 20 years ago and is still something I use now.  I am constantly looking for new resources, books and probably seek out opinions from many places to find these, but I have never found anything to replace that program.

As an Invisible Mentor, what is one piece of advice that you would give to readers?

Be yourself, be truthful. Stick to your values and beliefs and it’s okay to say no sometimes.

What nuggets of wisdom have you gleaned from Paul’s interview? How might you apply his responses to your situation.

Keep the conversation flowing. Many readers read this blog from other sites, so why don’t you pop over to The Invisible Mentor and subscribe (top on the left side) by email or RSS Feed. I created a Mini Learning Toolkit and you can grab a copy by clicking here.

For your research and writing needs, consider my firm Ambeck Enterprise for white papers, articles, fact sheets, anniversary booklets, you name it. Since I am the best kept secret you may not know this, but I have over 15 years research and writing experience. I KNOW content. And if you cannot figure out which books to read for professional development, I am your WOMAN, I can assist you with that too.

How tuned in are you to what’s going on around you? I have pulled the interview responses from several interviews to give a different perspective because the interviews are rich in content so you may miss key information. I usually allow interviewees to interpret questions which has resulted in a minefield of very rich content. Take a look at the diversity of responses to each question. Which answer would be closest to yours?

What’s the most important business (or other) discovery you’ve made in the past year?

Steve Spalding

My most important business discovery has been that working more does not mean working better. In the last few months I’ve realized that you need to take some time out for yourself and do things completely different than what you spend 50-60 hours a week doing or you’ll start to stagnate.

Go for a hike, learn about Jazz, take a trip to New Zealand, do something entirely different and see how it ties back into your day job. You might not think that your career has anything at all to do with the plot of Pulp Fiction, but the lesson that most entrepreneurs really need to learn is to take lessons from everything they do.

It’s a badge of honor among entrepreneurs to brag about how many hours you work on your business, that’s great and I do it all the time myself but the truth is that success is much more a function of efficient time use rather than raw volume.

Shannon Van Roekel

I have been startled to recognize that God is not at all intimidated by business. That world belongs to Him, too. I am trying to learn to strive less and to depend on His nudges and promptings more. He is the best agent/manager anyone could ever have.

Deborah Koehler

I am good at whatever I set my mind to do.

Dennie Theodore

The best skill to have is the ability to adapt.

Don Martelli

The most important discovery I’ve made is pretty simple — social media is great, but it doesn’t replace the human aspect that’s needed to close business deals. Yes, clients like the fact that we are on the cutting edge of social media, but if we don’t vibe well with the client, we won’t win the business. Relationships and personal, face-to-face interaction is key to bringing in new business and keeping current clients happy.

What’s one of the biggest advances in your industry over the past five years?

Steve Spalding

In the realm of Social Media (where I work most often), the biggest advances are coming as large companies start to care less about the number of people coming to their sites and start to care more about the quality of those people.

Almost every client meeting I have starts with the person wanting to get millions and millions of hits, as if traffic alone was somehow going to drive their business forward. I have to tell them that if that is all they want, that’s not too hard but no matter how many million people show up to see whatever stunt we devise to attract them, none of it matters at all unless those people eventually turn into customers.

I think companies are getting a more sophisticated understanding of how to read their own analytics and this understanding is translating into making discussions about “quality over quantity” a lot easier.

Shannon Van Roekel

I write contemporary Christian fiction; the biggest advance in that field over the past five years has probably been the growing interest in reading about real life issues, including international crises.

Deborah Koehler

Of course the movement of natural and organic products.  Nepal is ideally suited to deliver wonderful products that are non-chemical, utilize wise water usage and zero carbon footprint – all the new buzzwords. My business works to support new business opportunities in these areas.

Dennie Theodore

Women seen as necessary in leadership positions to move projects and business forward.

Don Martelli

That’s simple — social media. It has greatly impacted the way we think about our business and our client’s business. Every program we develop is run through a digital prism. The lines of advertising, marketing, journalism and PR are blurred because of social media.

What are the three threats to your business, your success, and how are you handling them?

Steve Spalding

Unfortunately, when you are in an information or knowledge based business like mine you only really have one threat — obsolescence.

Every day you wake up and your industry has moved forward a step, if you aren’t keeping up then it won’t be long until you have nothing to offer your clients that they can’t just read on the Internet.

I think the hardest thing about working in this field is the fact that not a day goes by where you can be complacent. If you are not constantly improving then you’re dying, and that death will come suddenly and without warning if you aren’t paying attention.

How do I handle that?

Well, mostly, I use the Internet a lot. I also try to avoid the trend lines. I am more apt to observe early adopters rather than be one myself, if you spend your time too deeply tied to the hot new trends you start to lose the forest for the trees and when you make your living off of the trees, that can be a serious problem.

Shannon Van Roekel

Three threats to my business and success would be

1. Not placing God first.
2. Lack of discipline
3. Getting distracted (can you spell f-a-c-e-b-o-o-k?)

I handle these threats, more or less, depending on the day, by starting it with God, keeping a day planner and working through the tasks I set for myself one at a time. Keep on doing the next thing.

Deborah Koehler

Local corruption, unskilled staff, and lack of testing facilities.

1. Local corruption: I face it without a Nepali present.  Usually corrupted officials are unwilling to ask for bribes directly to foreigners.
2. Unskilled staff: I teach in a college, train my own business staff, and offer suggestions where I can.
3. Testing facilities: I find existing documents and then talk to different labs and see if they can create a similar testing program or request that the testing be done in the clients home country.

Dennie Theodore

The usual… Similar Circles is run out of my kitchen with no funding, no time and is too GTA-centric. I’m handling them by asking my community to pitch in and they’ve been giving with both hands.

Don Martelli

There really isn’t three threats. It’s just one — social media. However, it’s also an opportunity. Social media has all but leveled the playing field for agencies. We are all “experts.” We are all going after the same budgets. It’s created a very intense and competitive environment, even more so than it was before. So the key is to stay on top of the trends and develop programs that are so forward thinking that the work you do speaks for itself. Clients hire on experience.

What’s unique about the service that you provide?

Steve Spalding

I think the most unique thing we provide is that we try to avoid stunts. A lot of Social Media tactics can devolve into pet projects that look great in a case study but don’t provide real client value.

At our core, we are educators, I want our clients to leave us, not only able to use the infrastructure we’ve built up for them effectively, but to also use some of the intuition that’s necessary to grow.

Shannon Van Roekel

I like to weave a story around a real issue, not normally in our radar, that will hopefully, not only inform and entertain, but also lead readers to compassion and empathy. Information dumps have caused us to shut down to the need, because we are intimidated by the enormity of the situation—especially in the third world arena. I believe touching hearts through the power of these stories can pull one out of that inertia into a state of true identification and hope.

Deborah Koehler

Traveling to and living in Nepal for 25 years, as well as working outside of my own culture has made be astute to cultural dynamics and my communications skills help me to facilitate new transactions.  I am accepted on both sides of the transactions.

Dennie Theodore

I’m not trying to offer a 10-step “how to” process, but rather open discussion on “why to”. By creating an emotional/mental comfort zone, folks feel better about mentoring and networking.

Don Martelli

Our unique perspective on this business stems from the mashup of the PR world before the web and since eruption of the web 2.0. We have experience that runs the gamut and fusing that experience with the knowledge of the digital space, truly gives our clients a 360 view of their brand and how we can help them move the needle.

What are your thoughts? How would you answer the four questions? Which interviewee do you identify with? Let’s keep the conversation flowing, please comment. Many readers read this blog from other sites, so why don’t you pop over to The Invisible Mentor and subscribe (top on the left side) by email or RSS Feed. I created a Mini Learning Toolkit and you can grab a copy by clicking here.

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