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How to “Stalk” Effectively Online

Going from a stranger to a relationship online without coming off like a sociopath

With social media, business professionals that you admire or that you desire to partner with are more accessible than ever.  Business anchor Erin Burnett got her first journalism job after penning what she called a “stalker letter” to Willow Bay at CNN.  Nowadays, you can tweet, follow, “friend” and comment your way into a dialogue with almost anybody. 

Whether you want to call it “stalking”, being a superfan or even a groupie, I consider myself somewhat of an authority on the topic- I had my first “stalker”/superfan when I was 13.   He was a boy named Chris who used to call me up daily and proclaim that he was going to come over to my house with a bucket of Church’s Chicken and sleep in my backyard (totally random, I know, but you don’t get to choose who you are stalked by…).

When it comes to being a superfan, some folks are great at it and some aren’t so endearing.  The reality is that there is a protocol to being the #1 fan if you are really looking to establish more of a relationship.  Here are some of the do’s and don’ts:

Online “Stalking” Do’s (and for those of you who are going to send me hate mail, I use the word “stalking” tongue-in-cheek, not meaning real bodily harm stalking, so get over yourselves).

Be genuine and engaging:  It’s clear when you are being yourself and also clear when you are being a phony, even in 140 characters or a short blog comment.  Authenticity goes a long way.  Being funny doesn’t hurt either, but only if you have a good handle on their sense of humor- not everything translates clearly in writing.

Talk about your mutually favorite topic- them:  Everyone is open to some light flattery (don’t go overboard or you will look like a kiss-ass and a moron). Share what you like or admire about their work as a way to start the conversation. 

Be helpful:  Offering your help and advice for a cause or endeavor that is important to them is a good way to earn some brownie points.

Know when enough is enough:  There is a difference between being a fan and being a pest.  Always leave them wanting more. Also, remember that everyone needs to get some work done too, no matter how interesting you think you may be.

Online “Stalking” Don’ts

Don’t cross the line:  Seeking stimulating conversation is one thing.  If you are looking for something else to be stimulated, look elsewhere.

Don’t be rude, offensive or defensive:  Sometimes superfans get their undies in a bunch if they don’t get the type of response they are hoping for.  Building a relationship takes time, so be patient.  If you act like an idiot, your “stalkee” will never engage with you.  Also, being pushy isn’t a good way to make friends either. 

Don’t lead with “free”: Don’t ask for freebies in your first few interactions.  True superfans have already purchased their “stalkees” products, so nothing raises the “mistrust” red flag faster than saying “I’m your biggest fan! Can you send me free books, T-shirts, CDs, and/or whatever items you have?” Again, building a relationship takes time and if you truly want some type of extras, the “stalkee” will be much more inclined to send you what you want if you have already followed the “Be helpful” tip first. (Thanks to Tracey Sage from the band SAGE4, who also has lots of experience with this topic, for this particular tip)

Don’t be creepy, even as a joke:  The fact of the matter is that trust isn’t implicit; it is earned.  When the other person doesn’t know you from Adam, the creepy radar will be on high.  Don’t make jokes that make you sound like a serial killer or other disturbed individual.  You don’t want to end up on their list of people whose houses the police should check under if they go missing.  (Note to my “stalkers”- I add all “stalkers”-good or bad- to that list…)

Hopefully this will help improve your “stalking” efficiency.  Who knows, someone you look up to may end up being a collaborator or friend down the line. 

This post is dedicated to my personal favorite “stalker”, who definitely understands most of the do’s and don’ts…well done.

Wednesday, September 1st, 2010

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Posted in Business Strategy, Homepage | 7 Comments »

Guest Blog: The Four-Letter Word Killing Small Businesses Today by Sarah Petty

Compete on Value, Never on Price


Four-letter words…good or bad?  There are some that I love and some that are quite dangerous.  Marketing maven Sarah Petty shares her disdain for a certain four-letter word…

 

SP:  There’s a four-letter word killing small businesses in America today: S-A-L-E.

Small businesses can never compete on price with the low-price focused big box retailers. Yet many small businesses have a knee-jerk reaction when business gets slow and announce a sale to drive traffic into their location. Here’s why having a sale can HURT small businesses more than it can help…

1.    Devaluing Your Brand: Sales devalue your brand in the long term, cheapening your reputation and the value of your products. Once you sell a $100 item for $80, it becomes difficult to convince consumers that at a later date your product is again worth $100. When you are having a sale, you are sacrificing the short-term revenue for long-term profits.

2.    No Loyalty: Sales attract the non-loyal, price sensitive buyer to your business – not the type of customer you want. Shoppers who  are making their decision based on price are going to be fickle and leave you for a better price next time.

3.    Patience is Not Always a Virtue: Sales teach your best clients to wait for a sale and therefore cut into your profit margin. The next time your favorite client considers spending money with you, you don’t want them deciding not to because they know you have a sale coming up down the road. Many businesses at the end of the year show a net profit of less than 20% so when you take that right off the top, it will become more and more difficult to run a profitable business.

In a slow economy, people still have money to spend and due to the added stress in their lives, they want MORE for their money, not less. If you are constantly discounting, you won’t have any budget to do all of the extra things that keep your clients coming back for more. So, instead of discounting, think about how you can add value for your clients and attract non-price sensitive buyers.

1.    Add Value:Use value added incentives to drive traffic into your business. The folks at Clinique makeup do this well. They train us that several times a year, when we come in and invest a certain amount on makeup (usually around $30), we will receive a goody bag of product samples. This not only creates loyalty but it cross promotes their other products through the use of sampling. Think about how you can offer a free gift when your customers invest a certain amount with you!

2.    Be Charitable: Be sure to work with local charities to expose your business to highly qualified prospects. Have an event or sales promotion and invite the charity’s database to come. For example, during one day, when someone purchases a photography session, $50 will be donated to the charity. All of the people who give to the charity will be moved to invest with your business because you are community-minded and you are giving back to the charity they love.

3.    Partner: Partner with other local businesses. This is the best way to create a demand and get people excited about you and your products and services.

It is painful to sit by a phone that doesn’t ring. The key is to focus on using value-added incentives and partnering with charities and other local businesses, you can not only survive in this economy but strengthen your long-term foothold in your market. 

____________________________

There’s never a quick trip to the grocery store for Sarah Petty. She’ll pick up a box of cereal to examine the packaging and dissect the store window displays all while strategizing what works and what doesn’t. For Sarah, marketing really is a joy. She simply can’t get enough.

A highly-acclaimed speaker, author, business owner and coach, Sarah has inspired thousands of small business owners to use beautiful marketing to take their business to the next level at The Joy of Marketing. Her expertise is based on over 20 years helping build the Coca-Cola brand, meeting the marketing goals of a top regional advertising agency’s clients and building her own successful boutique photography studio. This studio was named one of the most profitable in the country within just five years in business. Sarah has mastered the science of marketing and the art of making it simple, actionable, and, yes, fun! Connect with Sarah and her team for marketing tips at www.thejoyofmarketing.com

CR: I want to add that you never want to compete on price in business (unless you are Wal-Mart). Value is great, price is a losing game.  Thanks again to Sarah for contributing this insightful piece.

Wednesday, August 18th, 2010

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Posted in Business Strategy, Homepage | 7 Comments »

Screw Your Brilliant Business Idea

Being first is not always best

I’m getting a little bit sick (and when I say a little bit, I really mean a whole lotta sick) of hearing about people’s brilliant and innovative business ideas.  Not only do business ideas have little value, but guess what folks?  Being the first to do something in a market sucks.  And you know why?  Because you have to educate consumers and that is expensive.

Let’s face it, a lot of consumers aren’t the sharpest crayons in the box.  Educating them about a new product or service takes, effort, time and a boatload of cash.  In fact, sometimes the better strategy is to be a second or third mover in a space- let someone else spend the Benjamins to educate the public. Then, you can figure out how to do it smarter, faster or better.

Take Google for example.  Search engines have been around for 15+ years, if you can believe it.  Names like Open Text, Magellan, Infoseek and Snap came about before Google and are all now dead.  There are a whole host of others that “re-invented themselves” that trail Google by light-years.  Google capitalized on the fact that these first-movers educated the market.  They took note of what these companies were doing well, what they weren’t doing well and then created a superior offering.  And that’s why Google dominates web search, even though they didn’t create the idea of search or were anywhere near the first to market.

So, don’t worry so much about having a unique business idea- spend your brainpower on finding a unique (or at least better) way to execute the business.

Thursday, August 12th, 2010

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Posted in Business Strategy, Homepage | 28 Comments »

Do You Want to Borrow My Balls?

Seriously, go ahead…I will loan them to you

I was having lunch with my buddy Jason Seiden the other day and he mentioned how many people relate to me because, ultimately, they wanted my “balls”.  Now, normally that might seem strange to say about someone who biologically does not have any male genitalia, but it wasn’t. Loads of men and women have told me that I say the things they wish that they could say.

So, I figured that if you wish that you had your own pair but don’t, that I would let you borrow my brass cojones.  You now have the permission to be bold, provocative and even slightly outrageous if that feels authentic to you.  Tell people what you think.  Say what’s on your mind.  Stand up for yourself and what you believe it.  Own it, knowing that you now have a pair of major balls in your possession to lean on (they are brass- lean away).

The only catch is that you can only borrow them temporarily.  Then you need to get your own pair. 

Here you go:

 

Thursday, July 29th, 2010

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Posted in Business Strategy, Homepage, Random Musings | 13 Comments »

Putting the Prized Horse Out to Pasture

A horse is a horse, of course, of course- unless it won’t take a damn drink

You have undoubtedly heard the old saying, “You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink”.  In business, this can be a very maddening situation.  You may have a horse in the form of a client, customer or collaborator, or possibly even an employee, who has the potential to be as good as a Thoroughbred.  But sometimes that horse won’t take a drink.

This can be beyond frustrating for you- it has been for me.  I have made people gobs of money over my career, which makes me generally pretty popular around the business folks.  But every once in a while there is a horse with Thoroughbred potential, and when I take that horse over to the edge of the pond, said horse just stubbornly looks at its reflection in the water.  

Now, horses aren’t the smartest animals around, but I don’t chalk this up to stupidity.  It usually comes from a deeper place.  It could be that the horse is intimidated.  It could be that the horse has a big ego (assuming horses have egos, which in this thinly veiled piece, they do).  It could be that the horse is afraid- afraid of breaking outside of its comfort zone, afraid that the favor is going to be lorded over it in the future or even worse, afraid of being as successful as it can be. 

This horse could be a client that won’t take your business advice to improve their situation, a collaborator that engages you and then backs away from your project or an employee that can’t take the constructive criticism needed to get him to the next level.  And yes, this can happen even when the horse has asked you help it find some water in the first place.

If you are a horse and someone leads you to that water, take the damn drink.  Unless you have a really good inkling that the helper is going to hold the favor against you, realize that most people that offer help are doing it because they genuinely want to help you (and that helping you can also help them too- a win-win for everyone).  Don’t forgo your potential because of your own insecurities.  And don’t expect someone to chase you when you ask for help.

If you are the one doing the leading and the horse won’t take the drink, then you have to put the horse out to pasture. It is painful to see a prized horse rendered useless (kind of like how Jack Woltz felt when the severed head of his racehorse ended up in his bed in The Godfather) but life is too short to deal with a stubborn horse (or a stubborn ass, for that matter).

Will you be able to put your stubborn horse out to pasture?

Monday, July 12th, 2010

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Posted in Business Strategy, Homepage | 8 Comments »

Inspired and Inspiring- What’s Your Success Intention?

Recently, Liz Strauss, Ghennipher Weeks and I had the distinct pleasure to presenting to fantastic women and men at the EVO conference in Park City, Utah. In addition to confirming just how badly realistic business advice that doesn’t patronize small business owners is needed (particularly for women- none of this “oh, your little business is cute” b.s.), we had a really productive session.

We challenged the participants to really own what they wanted to do by changing their dreams to goals through intentions and planning. This inspired the room and inspired us as presenters as well.

Here are a collection of blog posts from some of these participants on what they took away from the conference:

Sarah Kimmel- Setting Goals, Valuing Your Time
Twitter: @Tech4Moms

Danielle Smith- Evolution of “Dreamer to Do-er”
Twitter: @DanielleSmithTV

The Hale Mom-“ Stopping “Super Mommy Syndrome”
Twitter: @TheHaleMom

Lorraine Sanabria Robertson- Owning “I Can”
Twitter: @AskWifey

Kelly Whalen- Being Irresistible by Being Authentic
Twitter: @Centsiblelife

What’s your intention for success? Please share in the comments!

Thursday, July 8th, 2010

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Posted in Business Strategy, Homepage | 4 Comments »

The Four-Letter Word You Should Embrace

Not being afraid of the “H” word

Four-letter words often get a bad rap.  And having bit of alpha-male energy myself (being my father’s only son, as he so affectionately refers to me) one of those four-letter words that has made me very uncomfortable in the past is “Help” (not the direction that you thought I was going, huh?).

Progress doesn’t happen solely on the back of one person, so why are so many of us afraid of asking for help?  Is it that we feel that asking for or receiving help is a sign of weakness?  Or perhaps we don’t want to feel obligated to someone else.  Whatever the root, for those of us accustomed to giving help, asking for some is often very uncomfortable.

I have been so fortunate to be able to embrace this four-letter word over the past nine months and in turn, receive input from a variety of very smart and interesting people.  What I have learned is that receiving help doesn’t make you weaker, it can actually make you better (of course, if you don’t abuse asking for it).  I have been able to learn quickly and efficiently.  I have been able to get to know people on a different level.  I have been able to forge new relationships.  And I have been able to advance my personal and professional goals. 

The weakness in asking for help isn’t the word, it is the feelings that we associate with it, rightly or wrongly.  My weakness was not asking for help- I was actually weaker when I was unable to go outside of my comfort zone and be vulnerable.

For those of you who have given me help when I asked (and in some cases, when I didn’t ask), thank you- you have made me a better person.  I hope that this will encourage others to ask for help, even when it is way outside of your own comfort zone.

And for everyone else, perhaps you will at least see the good side of four-letter words!

Monday, June 21st, 2010

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Posted in Business Strategy, Homepage | 14 Comments »

Stop Being A Business Slut

Nobody wants to buy the cow when you give away the milk for free 

Do you have slutty tendencies?  I think many of us have been there at one point in our business (or perhaps even personal) lives.  Being a business slut is giving your time, money, effort, services, etc. away- over and over again- for free or at a significant amount less that it’s worth because you don’t value yourself and what you bring to the table.

How many times have you discounted what you do and offered to provide something that you should be paid for totally for free? 

Now, I am not talking about helping out a friend, colleague or even stranger from time to time (in a business sense, of course- get your mind out of the gutter!).  I advocate being generous, but there is a difference between generosity and slut-hood.  I am talking about not knowing where to draw the line.  I am talking about giving away a free scoop of ice cream (or a frickin’ hot fudge sundae) even after the free pink spoonful worth.  I am talking about discounting your services because of a lack of confidence and purpose.  Those are the hallmarks of a true business slut.

Sluts make life hard on everyone because they set a dangerous precedent. 

If these words don’t inspire you, watch the following video “Pay the Writer” by Harlan Ellison (which I was alerted to via Twitter by Jason Seiden via @frankroche of ifractal) who will hopefully reinforce why those who are willing to give “it” away create a tougher playing field for the rest of us.


Will you stop being a slut?

Tuesday, June 15th, 2010

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Posted in Business Strategy, Homepage | 7 Comments »

Unsolicited Business Advice: Why I Hate Whole Foods

And what your business can learn from their mistakes

Last year I did a guest post for Rich Gallagher’s Point of Communication blog on why I love Trader Joe’s and alluded to what they do better than the competition, but now I want to talk about what the competition is doing wrong- specifically Whole Foods.

We take food pretty seriously in my family and since I don’t cook, having our favorite brands of packaged food, as well as pre-prepared meals for my husband to heat up in the microwave, is fairly important to us.

I am in what can be best described as a bad relationship with Whole Foods.  While I have cut way back on the amount of time I spend there, I just haven’t been able to fully quit them.  I shop at Whole Foods about once a month, solely to get those brands I can’t find anywhere else.   They do a really good job at stocking new and interesting “healthy” food brands.  That is where my compliments end.

To say that Whole Foods is sort of expensive is like saying that fire is sort of hot.  A box of Annie’s Bunny Fruit Snacks that I can buy at Target for just over three bucks cost $4.69 at my local Whole Foods (they are pretty tasty, by the way, if you like food made for eight year olds).  For that pricing premium, you would figure the customer service would be outstanding, right?  It isn’t- it actually sucks.

I have been to probably a dozen stores in four states and the floor employees have been generally useless, clueless and sometimes downright rude.  They act as if they are doing you a favor by letting you shop in their store (not quite the premium experience).  Today’s shopping trip including me doing what looked like some weird interpretive dance to reach around an employee blocking off the entire refrigerated fruit section to pick up part of a watermelon, not being able to get through two other aisles because of employees blocking them off and an employee with a large moppy-broom thing (I’m sure that’s not the actual name of the tool, but I am not very domestically inclined) that tried to cut me off as I was headed across the back aisle when he wanted to go across my path towards the front of the store.  There is no “Excuse me” or “After you, miss” or actually any acknowledgement that you even exist as a customer if a Whole Food employee is trying to restock, mop or do some other task.  It is somewhat like an obstacle course of employees, which could be fun in a setting other than a grocery store.

If you need help (like I did when trying to locate a product they had moved for the fourth time this year), you better hope you have some free time on your hands.  And the potentially cool aspect of having samples of different products to try (like cheese or cookies) isn’t that great when all that is out there are crumbs.   

While the checkout girl was fairly cheery, the entire experience every single time is just god awful.  It’s my own fault for going back, so my quest now is to find someplace else to buy my Wallaby Down Under yogurt and end my bad relationship.

So, what can your business learn from my abysmal Whole Foods experience?  Make your customers feel special.  It is easy- Trader Joe’s does it (and they have great value prices) just by having helpful, friendly, knowledgeable employees.  I could be a raving fan and lord knows that I am a customer that spends ridiculous sums on the things I really like (just ask the staff at the BCBG store), so make sure you are treating your customers in a way that makes your entire value proposition enjoyable.  Otherwise, you may just find that your customers ending your relationship.

Monday, June 14th, 2010

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Posted in Business Strategy, Customer Service, Homepage | 10 Comments »

Taking Business Advice From Someone Who’s Just Lost Their Virginity

Doing something once doesn’t make you an expert 

There are a lot of “experts” running around out there that know just enough to be dangerous.  One area that really scares me is the number of entrepreneurs who have sold a company that they built and are now spouting off M&A and business sale advice.  I mean, you don’t lose your virginity one day and then go author the sequel to the Kama Sutra, right?

M&A and selling a business is as much an art as a science.  Not to say that you can’t learn something from another person’s singular experience, but every business situation is different.  Maximizing value in a sale depends on the industry, the type of buyer (financial or strategic), the business’ market position, margins, customer concentration, sales mix, historical financial trends, growth projections and a whole host of other factors.  Trying to take one special situation and applying it to your business may give you a helpful tip or two, but shouldn’t be the be-all, end-all of advice for you.

The takeaway- don’t take business tips (or sex tips) from someone who has only done it once.

Wednesday, June 9th, 2010

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Posted in Business Strategy, Homepage | 2 Comments »

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