My Ultimate Digital Gear Guide

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Yes.ShoeFitts Marketing - My Ultimate Digital Gear Guide That is a picture of me. And yes, that is my dog aBoo. We are soaked. Quite soaked. We live in Portland, Oregon. So, of course we must navigate the rain on our morning walks. But, you’ll never find me with an umbrella. By birthright, Oregonians do not carry them. They are a sign of wimps; people afraid of a little bit of water. And, yes. It is blurry. (HA! You try to take a selfie with a wet 110 pound Newfie in the pouring down rain.)

What you won’t find me without is my rain gear: layers of waterproof and water-resistant jackets, pants and shoes. In fact, that is why keeping my morning walk ritual isn’t hard. The right gear makes getting out the door much easier.

The right gear makes all the difference.

Recently, I’ve been offering individual coaching on the world of digital marketing, helping people understand and harness the intersection of the web, marketing and the social world for their business or personal brand. Many times, after our three-hour session, people ask, “OMG! How do you know all of this stuff?” “Where did you learn this?” My answer? “Marketing is my hobby. I love creating. I love experimenting. And frankly, I have a genetic predisposition to tools. I love tools. (Thanks, Dad! This is likely why I have a belt sander and sand blaster in my garage.) Again…

My Ultimate Digital Gear GuideI know the right gear makes all the difference.

If you head out into the digital world with only an umbrella, you may look foolish – you may simply get soaked, or you may be tempted to give up and head right back inside. To help make your digital efforts a bit easier, I’ve created My Ultimate Digital Gear Guide. The guide lists some of my favorite resources for scheduling social, finding sharable content, building websites, creating visuals and quite a bit more. (Get your guide by downloading via the image to the left.)

 

How to Make Digital Marketing Work for You

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Whether you do your own marketing, or you have a team of professionals supporting you, poorly planned or executed social selling efforts could be costing you clients and sales. In 2016, you cannot overlook the opportunity to outsell your peers. You need a workable digital marketing plan that is easy to follow and just takes minutes a day.  In this rebroadcast of the ShoeFitts Digital Institute, you’ll learn ways to:

  • Scale digital marketing to meet your sales efforts
  • Create a sustainable digital marketing plan
  • Discover ways to monitor and measure
  • Avoid antiquated practices that no longer produce results
  • Execute a digital marketing plan with the confidence and tools you need to succeed

How to Love LinkedIn: Five Reasons to Get Passionate About Social Media

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Can you really grow to love social media? From the outside, social media appears to be a struggle. Too many compliance headaches. Too much time. Too few clients online. Too little return.

Many firms have shared with me they don’t know what they don’t know. Therefore they don’t do. This approach leaves many firms sitting on the sidelines, letting the digital world pass them by.

Newsflash! The Internet has disrupted the way we acquire information and interact with the world. It is shaping an entirely new idea of what’s possible in marketing, sales, business and our world of financial services. Responding to the digital demand is no longer an option, it’s a necessity.

Have you lost that loving feeling where social media is concerned? Do not despair. Just in time for Valentine’s Day I offer five reasons why you should stop being a wallflower and start dancing. The social sphere allows you to:

  1. Easily develop a personal brand: An optimized LinkedIn profile is a sure-fire way to solidify your personal and professional brand. The time it takes to optimize your profile will immediately pay dividends in better Google search ranking for your name and your firm’s name. And, don’t forget a professional headshot. Adding a professional photo makes you 14 times more likely to be found on LinkedIn.
  1. Be where your prospects are: LinkedIn reaches 37% of the U.S. population. It is particularly popular among college graduates, those in higher-income households and the employed.
  1. Accelerate connections: When I speak about using LinkedIn for financial advisors, I often say, “LinkedIn is the largest rolodex in the world.” Imagine the ability to tap into the power of nearly 400 million people worldwide? With a bit of ongoing effort to grow your network, you’ll begin to notice the connections within connections.
  1. Scale your top-of-mind efforts: Active profiles – those that share updates and interact – are more likely to be viewed. Think of it as a super simple way to stay top of mind with just the touch of a few strokes on your keyboard. Consider this tip from LinkedIn, “To be seen, you need to move, if you are camouflaged in the crowd, you will stay well hidden.”
  1. Lead the conversation: 74% of prospects chose the company that was first to help them along their buying journey. By consistently contributing helpful content on a particular subject, advisors can begin to lead the conversation rather than follow.

Need help creating an optimized LinkedIn Profile? Or are you ready to take the social world by storm? Stay tuned for news about my social selling bootcamp. Coming later in March!

Three Simple Ways to Tell Your Brand is Stuck in Groundhog Day

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Most companies spend time on their brand when they launch their business. They might focus on their logo and possibly a brochure, leaving the heaving lifting of messaging, value proposition and brand experience to a later date.

Fast-forward ten years. While their business has changed – significantly – many firms still have the same logo, same visual branding, and are still without a value prop or client experience plan. They’re doing the same thing over and over again, with the same messaging, wondering why they’re not getting different results. They’re stuck in a branding version of Groundhog’s Day.

The Groundhog Day movie provides some great lessons that can be applied to branding, and how to create a meaningful brand. After living the same day over and over again – some estimates put it at about 12,395 days – Phil (Bill Murray) learns secrets from the town’s residents, seduces women, steals money, gets drunk, drives recklessly, and gets thrown in jail. And he tries to manipulate Rita (Andie MacDowell) into loving him. After multiple times attempting suicide, only to wake and relive the same day, his experiences change him. He learns French. He learns how to play the piano. He befriends everyone in town. He saves lives and helps people. And eventually he is a changed man and wins the heart of Rita.

While originally panned, Groundhog Day is now considered a self-improvement parable teaching the need to look inside oneself and realize that the only satisfaction in life comes from turning outward and thinking about others rather than concentrating solely on one’s own wants and desires.[1]

Wowza! That is exactly the basis for a brand.

When we work with organizations to develop their brand and brand messaging, we often ask, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” “What is it that you uniquely do to help people around you – your clients and your community?” Answering these questions, along with 50+ more, provides the basis to create a meaningful, differentiated brand.

These questions, this outward facing consideration should be revisited every years. Your business has changed. The world has changed. They way we all buy has changed. As such, your brand must change. Has your brand evolved, or is it stuck?

Here are Three Simple Ways to Tell Your Brand is Stuck in Groundhog’s Day:

  1. You think a logo is a brand. Brands encompass each and every experience people have with you and your organization.
  2. Your collateral and website feature old, out-of-date photos – possibly including the same guy on the front page as your competition. Your retiree images are limited to just people golfing or following passive past-times. (Even worse, most of them look like they’ve been taken from a Cialis commercial.)
  3. You don’t have a value proposition that resonates in today’s marketplace – or no value prop at all. (Read this research by Mass Mutual regarding the need for a value-prop to succeed in today’s marketplace.)

If any of these points apply to you, or if you are ready to take your branding out of Groundhog’s Day, read Create a Magnetic Brand, Build Margin. (Yep. A powerful brand does build margin.)

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[1] Source: Thank’s Wikipedia! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groundhog_Day_(film)