This is yet another example of how companies should go after new money, using traditional media tools and Social Media as the primary tools. Not every business can afford to do this but you can scale it to fit your budget if you get creative enough. Getting new customers is what it’s all about, I’m willing to venture that Dominos won new customers because they went out and made Dominos fun.

Watch the video at  PizzaHoldouts.com and then think of ways you could generate new money from your existing product or service. While you’re there, be sure to follow them on Twitter & FaceBook, you can even order a Pizza!

It was and is only a matter of time before advertising hits Social Media Networks as a way of life, building a following or a Social Media Community means eyeballs to big business. Twitter, FaceBook, MySpace and so on have built huge communities, within these communities individuals have built large followings. Large followings is taking on new definition every day as more and more people join all these Social Media Networks, the larger the following the higher the return for advertisers.

I decided to experiment with a new service called Ad.ly, you’ll see the banner ad to the right, they are holding a promotion right now to encourage you to try them out. I’m referring you!

The promotion is:

Make Money and Win a Macbook for Referring Friends…

If you want more information just click on the 1st Banner ad to the right and decide for yourself if it’s something for you. They assign an advertiser to your account and then you will be promoting that advertisers products or service. Most Bloggers are always looking for ways to make money online, if they say they aren’t, I would suggest if they suddenly got 1,000 bux a month because of it they wouldn’t turn it down.

Now the jury is still out on this advertising program on Twitter but at some point there will a saturation point because literally thousands will start companies to do the same thing. It’s SPAM at a nother level really, we all will be deluged with millions of Tweets and Updates pushing a product or service. It’s just a matter of time.

As I mentioned, I’m not sure how I feel about it but in order for me to speak intelligently about it I have say I actually tried it. So, stay tuned as I go down this trail, I will continue to write about the experience. Personally, I think you should find out for yourself rather than take someone else’s word for it.

Let me know what you think, is this a good thing, are you ok with these types of programs?

I’ve been thinking about how much time a person or company should spend on Marketing / Promoting their Blog. Is everything you do on your Blog considered Marketing and or Promoting? I mean everyday you do things like branding, PR, adding content and making sure your name (company name / brand) is everywhere. Is there ever a time when marketing what you sell or do is too much marketing? I can’t imagine an executive ever saying we are advertising to much, we have our name out there too much we have saturated the marketplace with our Brand. If you do have someone like that, he or she probably won’t be there very long. I would rather have the problem of too much business and too much awareness than not enough.

Some of the tasks involved in marketing & PR today are changing subtly, because the rules are changing, now that Social Media has become mainstream you can’t just set it and leave it. You have to listen more than you do anything in todays new marketing environment. So, how much time should you spend listening? More than you are probably willing to spend time doing I’ll bet. If you aren’t willing to listen, how will you know what to do? How will you know when to do it?

So I keep asking myself, how much time should I spend doing PR & Marketing my blog? I think you should invest more time listening and then figuring out how you can solve what you just heard that day. So, do you market your blog everyday? How much time do you alot for that task?

Do you promote your blog everyday? I would love your input so please leave a comment below.

I was working on a project today and found myself being distracted, sometimes you have these epiphany’s that give you a perspective you never had before right smack in the middle of working hard. You know what I’m talking about, the subconscious never stops, we day dream, we scheme, we plan and sometimes we get deep. So here it is, I stopped working to write this because it wouldn’t leave me alone!

The 3 P’s of Social Media

1. Presence
2. Placement
3. Participation

Presence

It’s not that complicated, we do these three without giving them a second thought or give them the credit they deserve. We all have presence at some level or another here on the Internet, some are very influential through their presence and become high profile, maybe you. Each organization, group or person has a different strategy to ensure that presence. Some may even be misleading, but I like to believe most are honest and true to their mission and vision. Doing the right thing right, being honest, having integrity, the very things required to be of value and trust worthy. Without those qualities your presence could be damaged without you knowing about it.

I wrote about the three parts of a social media marketer back in June:

• Marketing Knowledge
• They are Entertainer’s
• A dynamic personality.

Those three components add up to people that are, savvy, have trust and brand. Don’t take my word for it, follow them, watch, listen and learn.

The 3 P’s are really a platform those three parts leverage, we could go deep six on characteristics and personality profiling but that’s not what this is about.

The dictionary’s definition of Presence:

- the state or fact of being present, as with others or in a place.

In order to be successful in anything you must have presence, you must be present, you have to show up! Showing up is 90% of success in my humble opinion. What you do with that presence sets you apart from everyone, why? There is only one you!

Placement

In order to have presence you have be present somewhere, to be seen or heard, that’s where placement play’s it’s role. It’s part of your strategy in building a presence, in your marketing efforts, and is the playing field to which your brand can have success in the top of mind awareness game.

The definition of Placement:

- the act of placing

- the state of being placed

Where do place your presence? The Internet is the platform that allows all players a level playing field, but not all understand the power of how to leverage the Internet. The Internet is home to a new thing called Social Media, to be frank, Social Media is old news really, it’s always been around under different names and activities. There are literally hundreds of Social Media Networks, you probably know many of them, Twitter, FaceBook, YouTube, Tumblr, FriendFeed and so on. The principles of these networks are primarily the same, how you participate is the critical thing. Give considerable thought to how you present yourself, because it impacts your Social currency and only you can ensure that currency brings value.

Participation

The strategy is done and the presence component has been determined, also where that presence will be maximized, and now you have to heed the call to action…you have to participate. Without this action of participating you have a strategy going no where, it looks good on paper and that’s just where it will stay. Once you have determined placement, you will participate with consistency, persistence and deliver a message that is compelling and powerful.

The definition of Participation:

- the fact of taking part, as in some action or attempt: participation in a celebration

- an act or instance of participating.

Now I know you’re thinking these things are common sense and you are right. We do these things without thinking really, like breathing. The problem isn’t doing them, the problem is not giving these things the respect they deserve, they need their 15 minutes of fame. That’s what I’m doing here, oh sure you could probably explain this better than I but, this is my epiphany

Take inventory of your strategy and make sure you have given the 3 P’s it’s due attention.

If I was in Real Estate Today, the very first thing I would do is identify my PURPOSE, the why I think I should be using Social Media Networks. This would appear obvious but it can be misleading, if you don’t believe Social Media will increase revenue, help build a stronger market share and develop community around your brand, your right, the strategy will be an exercise in futility. If you do, get to work and build a plan.

Get started by doing the following:

• List requirements needed to implement strategy
• Key Result Areas – What are they
• Discern objectives
• Identify Key Success Factors
• List Core Competencies
• Complete a S.W.O.T. Analysis, a plan needs to be well thought out.

Once you’ve completed the above get the following action items flushed out and then make it happen.

• Setup accounts on multiple Social Media Networks and get active, participate, get involved in the communities…then….listen to what is being said, what is happening and where it’s being said. Never stop listening, never stop having a presence in these communities. People come back to things and places that are useful to them. Especially if you can help them.

• Use all SM Networks like Twitter, FriendFeed, YouTube, Viddler, Tumblr, FaceBook, StumbleUpon, Digg, Del.icio.us, Technorati, MySpace, LinkedIn, Seesmic, UStream.tv, and BlogTalkRadio. There are many more.

• Blogging is a must, convert or add a Blog to an existing website, this is where you build community and give customers a place to go and something to do.

• Take advantage of video, do LIVE open house events streamed via UStream.tv or one of the other web broadcasting services. Record those events and archive them, build a library, make them available to anyone to view at their leisure.  These video’s can also be training or teaching prospects on what questions to ask, how to and so on.

• Do a live web radio show, field questions on a live video show that has Twitter embedded so it’s real-time.

• Do video interviews, record testimonials…etc.

• Sponsor or Host a major Social Media Event, these events charge for attendance and should not only cover expenses but should realize a profit. Bring in people who are actually doing or using Social Media at a high level, not just lip service.

• Hire or contract a Community Management Officer or a Social Media Director.

• Get Educated on Social Media, attend major conferences and get around those who are high profile in Social Media, and read books for more insight.

I’m just scratching the surface of your plan, but make sure you actually have a plan before jumping into the Social Media mayhem.

This doesn’t have to be difficult, it doesn’t have to be hard, but one thing you do, is work if you wish to realize the results you want from your efforts. It will take time, money and above all else, EFFORT! Whether you are a Broker or an agent, it makes no difference, build a plan, work the plan. But hey, you already know that, but do you know the technology and how to implement it? Do you know how to prepare? Are you willing to pay the price?

In this business, success is not measured by fitting in, it’s by standing out. (Mad Men)

I was sharing on Twitter today about a Newsletter I used to write & produce back in 1995 and Rob Cairn’s said he would like to see it. I thought I would reproduce the content and post it here for you to chuckle over.

Back in 1995 I produced a Newsletter called, ” MARKETING TODAY “, it was an informational piece that was distributed electronically, and the local book store was gracious enough to put it on the magazine rack back in the day. So for a walk down memory lane here is a list of things you couldn’t find on the Internet in October 1995. I even had advertisers in this little beauty!

1.) Material on any subject more than a few years old.

2.) Information about small privately held companies.

3.) Information about most companies not USA Headquartered.

4.) Information about Subsidiaries of major companies.

5.) Specialized Dictionaries or handbooks on business subjects.

6.) Directories of companies by industry and location.

7.) Information on business and trade associations.

8.) Information from small commercial databases.

9.) Franchising companies information

10.) Court reports from state and local jurisdictions.

11.) Telephone, fax and TELEX Directories.

12. Business information in languages other than English.

My closing comments on that article were:

I started this section by saying that the information which isn’t on the net now, soon will be. The Internet allows all of the originators of the information to present themselves, the traditional “middle man”  data gathering groups are no longer needed.

Just for fun, I also recommended Seth Godin’s book called, ” E-Marketing”.

Also, the topic of the day was whether or not you should upgrade to Windows 95, OS2 was still very popular back then too.

Of course much of the above if not all is now available and has been for many years, I hope you enjoyed the walk down memory lane.

I’ve met with a number of Real Estate Agents and Broker’s the past few months and I’m not surprised they view Social Media as a waste of time. Don’t get me wrong, I have found a few that get it, they have taken the risk and setup virtual offices and even opened accounts with FaceBook & Twitter. Some use these Social networks well and some just say they use them effectively, my research here in Canada reveals that most aren’t practicing what they preach.

I’ve made recommendations and suggested radical approaches to how an agent prospects and wastes a huge amount of time with tire kickers at open house events. They look at me with those puppy eyes and say I couldn’t do that, I don’t know how, that sounds like too much work. I think it’s harder the way they do things now, but they’re stuck! If you’re an agent or a broker that’s been in the industry longer than 10 years, you may have a tougher time making the paradigm shift. I’m not saying you can’t or don’t have the ability, but I am saying if you don’t, life is going to get very interesting when the new tech savvy up and comers produce at a high level with a very different kind of effort. How will you compete and survive?

Let me give you an example of one thing you could do and have fun doing it. I’ll look at the old school traditional agent first, then the new tech savvy agent.

Old School Agent

The old school agent would sit on the phone rounding up prospects for hours on end, then would set up 4 or 5 walk abouts and even a few open house events two weekends in a row. A lot of time and effort goes into this type of selling, hard work is important but with today’s technology why would you do this? Organizing and worrying about how may or may not show up, worse yet, having to go and pick them to ensure you do have a prospect. Getting flier’s out and setting up sign’s, the list goes on. The advertising costs can be staggering too, time spent networking, convincing people they should come and see this house and so on.

The New Tech Savvy Agent

The new tech savvy agent sits at the desk and decides which homes to work on this week, then prepares how they would sell the dream of the home on video. This agent goes out and buys a Flip MinoHD Camcorder 2nd Generation (Amazon Link) hooks up to the net, logs into their UStream.TV account, walks through the house and broadcasts it LIVE! They walk through the home and share how this home could be plus records the whole event, then puts the recorded video on UStream and his or her Blog and other locations for prospects to view at their leisure. The tech savvy agents then jump on Social Network’s that feed multiple Social networks all at once with this new home to look at via video.

This new agent let’s the prospect qualify themselves and let’s them contact him or her when they’re ready, this agent is thinking about the prospect not themselves.

As you can see the new tech savvy agent takes a different risk, invests their time giving what prospects want and then makes it ridiculously easy for them. The prospect that calls the new tech savvy agent back just qualified themselves, less work than the old school way of handling the same task. This is just one opportunity to start making the shift to Real Estate Selling with Social Media, if you don’t take baby steps now and don’t learn how to do some of these techie things. I have to wonder if Real Estate Brokers won’t become obsolete, Broker / Owners at some point will figure out they can handle inventory in a less complicated way. By the way, people complicate things not flip cams and iPhones.

Are Real Estate Agents Obsolete? Maybe not yet, and maybe not all, but more than you think.

I can’t help myself, I have to promote this book! Gary’s new book hit the shelves today, if you don’t know him, you’re missing on something. This book screams of passion and the message is simple to understand,

” Why NOW is the time to CRUSH IT! Cash in on your Passion “!

Here is a video that sums up why Gary wrote the book, Live Long & Prosper are words that come to mind : )

Lately I have been getting asked (what feels like a million times), the question of how I make money with my blog. Or, can you (I) monetize my blog? Ironically, I attended a local Blogger’s Event this week and two questions were the focus, do you have a blog and do you monetize it? I’ll cover what I do on this Blog.

First a disclaimer….This post is NOT a get rich, a how to make a million in 30 days and it’s not the only way to make money with a blog. I am not claiming or promising you a thing! I am merely going to answer these questions by sharing with you how I generate revenue on this blog.

I’ve been blogging for a few years now, not many years, just a few. I started blogging on the topic of nanotechnology, I even wrote a short eBook on the topic. I also write about I.T. Strategic Planning, some personal thoughts and now I focus primarily on Social Media because that is what most of the readers here want from me. Then every now then, it comes in spurts, I get asked how I make money with my blog. OK, I get asked a lot Keep in mind, I didn’t start blogging for the purposes of monetizing, I had a website long before I had a Blog, it’s easier to manage and it gives me a place to share my knowledge and help people.

I’ll bet the answer to this question is like finding the holy grail, I decided to do a little research and this is what I found out. I did a Google search for the phrase “Make Money With Blogs”, I noticed that there are 202,000,000 references to that phrase. Next I did a search for “How Bloggers Make Money From Blogging”, that showed a result of 136,000,000 references. Then I tried “How To Monetize My Blog” which brought a result of 522,000 references. I even setup a couple Google Alerts and monitored what was being posted for a few days, it’s a mess out there when it comes to this topic. As you can see this is a hot topic and considering the economic times we are in, I’m not surprised people are trying to find ways to make money. I actually hate the fact that we need money to survive but that’s another story.

Let’s move to what I do here on owengreaves.com, if you look around you’ll find I do very little, on the sidebar you will see a couple books I promote, they are affiliate links to Amazon.com. If you go to Amazon you can learn how to do the same thing, they cover the how to very well. I wrote a short eBook that I sell and that’s about it. The real dollars come from consulting on this topic, Social Media and I.T Strategic Planning. The truth be told, I just love to help people figure things out here on the Internet.

There are many ways to generate cash through your blog but you have to decide what your passion is and do people want what you have to sell. There is a process to follow, you don’t find a product first…you find a problem to solve before you start investing in a product.

Recently I Tweeted on Twitter a link to an article by Chris Brogan called, Make Some Money, and people thought I was spamming when I was merely promoting what Chris wrote. Money is a sensitive topic and anything that sniff’s of SPAM is an even touchier topic. Gary Vaynerchuck believes anyone can monetize whatever their passion might be, someone is going to buy what you’re doing, eventually. The trick is finding enough people to buy what you’re selling.

That’s it for now…stay tuned for more : )

Every Sunday afternoon I play soccer with a great bunch of guys, we’ve been getting together at the same field now for over ten years, trying to stay in shape of course. In July of this year I took a tumble at warp speed and broke, no shattered my left shoulder at the clavicle joint. Here it is now late September and I still have not been cleared to play, do you have any idea how frustrating that is? To know you can’t be out there with your buddies, knowing you can help your team mates win. Half the fun is the strategy, who plays what position and who has the touch up front and finish the play by putting in the net. As this is just drop in soccer we get people at various levels of ability, from 17 to 56 years of age and every once and awhile someone comes out that doesn’t have clue what you can and can’t do, they don’t know the rules. So they run around all over the place not knowing what to do and never really ask for help, and when they do, they forget what you said almost as fast as you said it. Given enough time and they come out more often, eventually, they find there way and start to contribute in a meaningful way.

You are probably wondering where I’m going with this, the question is, are you one of those soccer players running around trying to accomplish something meaningful in the game? Are you playing with the Internet and Social Media the same way? You’ve setup your Blog and you’re telling everyone to come to your site but you haven’t taken the time to learn how or what to do with all those visitors. There are a great many people out there you would consider successful, but there is a far greater number that haven’t realized their 15 minutes of fame yet. You have two ways to approach the Internet & Social Media, you can learn from those who have gone ahead of you or you can try to figure it out yourself.

I can tell you from personal experience, learning from those who have gone before you and succeeded is much easier, that is the choice I would make if you’re just getting started. In fact, if you’ve been Blogging for awhile you should study the leaders anyway, learn the guidelines and then figure out how to make them work for you. Pay attention to what they do, but don’t try to act like they do…why? In Social Media circles you will hear the mantra, be real, be yourself and be honest. So trying to act like someone else won’t let the uniquely designed you to come out, and you will be known as someone who is not authentic and phony.

Everyone loves guy’s like Gary Vaynerchuck, Chris Brogan and Scott Stratten but you will never be able to duplicate how they deliver the message and do what they do. You can however, learn what they do and then learn to make it yours, learn to make it unique by being who you were meant to be. Gary wrote a book soon to be released in October called, ” CRUSH IT ” and Chris’s book which is already out and amply titled, ” TRUST AGENTS “, tell you what I just shared, be sure to order a copy and learn from them first hand.

As you can see, help is closer than you think. No matter what your niche or area of expertise happens to be, study what Gary & Chris do but also pay attention to others like Amber Naslund, David Armano, Mack Collier, Olivier Blanchard, Trey Pennington and Kris Colvin. Spend some time in the Silicon Valley circle to by watching Robert Scoble and Louis Gray. Most of the above have sites with video’s you can view so you get an idea of who they are, and what they are doing with Social Media Networks. As you can see there many to follow and learn from, but they all cover their interests and passions in their own unique way. Also keep in mind some of these people are paid to do what they do in Social Media Networks, but that’s what makes them great case studies.

- Amber Naslund works for Radian6, they provide tools for real-time social media monitoring and analysis designed primarily for PR and Ad agencies.

- David Armano, is the Senior Partner at Dachis Group, was created to unlock the value of social technologies for large corporate enterprises through its Social Business Design global advisory practice, and technology implementation program. David talks about the 5 B’s:

1.) Be Ubiquitous

2.) Be Social

3.) Be Interesting

4.) Be Remarkable

5.) Be Yourself

- Mack Collier, Helping companies understand the  ” Social ” part of Social Media.

- Olivier Blanchard, trains company executives and project teams in all matters of social media management and measurement, then help them build and integrate effective programs into every facet of their business, from Public Relations, business development and market research to Human Resources and Customer Support. Oh and Olivier is working on a book that will educate you on the proper way to realize and calculate the true ROI (Return On Investment) in Social Media.

- Trey Pennington, Interviews leaders in Business & Social Media on BlogTalkRadio and uses almost every Social Media Network out there.

- Kris Colvin, is the designer of Twitterface.com and a Social Media Maven with passion and desire, Twitterface is a great tool so be sure to use it.

Whether you already have a business or a Blog, you will never stick with it and see it through unless you’re passionate about it. Gary Vaynerchuck’s war cry is to do your passion and you’ll give yourself the best chance to win. Remember, the Internet is the Platform, Social Media is the Tool you can master on the Internet. Do your homework, study how to use the tools and pay attention to your passion. In another article I wrote, called ” Your Passion Is In Front of You, You’re Just Not Paying Attention” its so simple it’s almost embarrassing, I triple dog dare you to read it.

Each person who is a success online can only teach you how they did it, not how someone else did it. Now pay attention to what I just said, they may have duplicate someone else’s system but they made that system there’s through their personality and how they think. They couldn’t ever act or be like the person they learned from, so study by taking notes, watching videos and then find your passion. The final step is to make it your own, only you can be you and only you can do it. So who are you and what are you doing?