What if you gave your product away but charged admission for people to work with you? Would the experience your customers get be worth the admission price?

Disney does this. You pay a handsome price to get in the park and then all the rides are free. When I was young, I remember going with my parents to Disney World. My mom never got on a single ride. She took pictures and brought my brother and I towels when we came from the water ride soaking wet.

Did she need to ride the rides to get her money’s worth? She says no. She got the experience.

What do your customers get?

Chances are, your products and services can be found elsewhere. What experiences do your customers get along with the “product”? How does that experience showcase and create the context which encapsulates the entire experience? Your personal brand feeds this as well. Whether you closely tie yourself to each client or you’re the distant guru, that persona shapes how your customers experience you and how they experience what you offer.

My mom never complained about not riding the rides at Disney because she got the experience she wanted and she paid the same as everyone else who rode the rides from sun up to sun down. How about your customers? If you stopped charging to ride the rides and instead charged admission for what you do, would you customers get more or less value from the experience?

Technorati Tags: experience, Marketing, personal branding

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There are more and more reasons to skip meetings and collaborate online instead. Time, gas and traffic are good enough reasons on their own to stay put and meet online. I think the reason people still insist on meeting face-to-face for every little thing is because they don’t know what alternatives are available.

I don’t mean to say you should never meet with other people in person. Face-to-face meetings always have value, but they’re not always the best use of the time. Choose your meetings carefully and for the rest, try hooking up online.

Here are a few online mindmapping tools and collaboration systems I happen to enjoy.

Bubbl.us is a web-based mindmaping tool. They’ve had a 2.0 version in public beta for as long as I can remember. Both the current and beta versions are easy to use for mindmapping and sharing. In case you’re not familiar with mindmapping, here’s a video from techbites on mindmapping with bubbl.us.

Huddle.net has iPhone and Blackberry apps in addition to the web console. I’ve used this to track tasks on a project, share files and manage a project calendar. This service also supports web conferencing with screen sharing, discussion boards and a virtual whiteboard.

Google Docs is one of my favorite tools. You can create text docs, spreadsheets and presentation files which can be viewed and shared online. Give another person change access to the file and they can edit it as well. My Toastmasters group uses Google Docs for the club roster and I’ve used it to submit articles to magazines.

Freebinar is a recent discovery for me. If you’ve done a webinar, or watched one, you probably know they’re pretty handy and of course, they help you reach an audience that can be anywhere in the world. There are some other good tools out there that charge a nominal monthly fee, but I don’t do enough webinars to justify a monthly ding on my card. So far, I can’t tell why I wouldn’t use Freebinar anyway.

That’s a short list, but it works for me.

Do you have any favorite online collaboration tools? Share your discoveries in a comment below.

Technorati Tags: brainstorming, mindmapping, Online Collaboration, project management

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I did this interview a little while ago, but I recently found the transcript which I had promised to post. If you’d rather listen to it, I posted the audio on Google Video before they stopped allowing new content. Here’s the link for that.

John Assaraf of OneCoach.com And The Secret

John: I’ve got as my guest Dave Saunders, who is a social media, marketing and branding expert. He has had 20 years in the industry of the Internet, first working at a computer software startup doing technical support, laying documentation and software. Then he got smarter and he discovered a bigger passion for helping people make use of technology by interacting online with them. Dave has become a celebrated speaker as a radio and television guest and he is the creator of YourSocialBrand.com where he teaches business owners how to stand out, attract business online and increase client retention. We all know, it’s hard enough to grab a client and have them be your client. It’s another thing to keep them. Dave, welcome to OneCoach.

Dave: Oh, thank you so much. It’s great to be here.

John: Well, let me ask you. Let me get right into it. Your started this brand called YourSocialBrand.com which obviously speaks for itself. What motivated you or inspired you to do that?

Dave: Well, you know John, I’ve got a passion for how things fit and connect together. As all this new social media has begun to emerge and develop online, I’ve kind of seen what I view as a completion in the technology that was designed to bring people together in the first place. You know when I first started on the Internet; it was really ALL social media. That was the most active thing that people did on the Internet was connect to each other around the globe. When the WEB came along, there wasn’t the technology to connect people in the same way. So as millions of more people came online and experienced the Internet, they just saw it as another form of mass media and so social media is so much more than that. I wanted to help people see how anybody can find an audience, to find new business and to ultimately serve more people by connecting to them online. Social media is just an incredible vehicle for doing that. So I wanted to create this to help people to see just how easy it is to create more business and do something that creates lasting results.

John: By the way, just so we’re on the same page, just exactly what is social media?

Dave: Well, um, ok – in contrast – let’s think about a sales letter that you get in your mailbox through the U.S. mail. One person wrote that letter, they send it out to lots of people and you read it and maybe you take action on it. And for the past many years online, that was really the main way that commerce was conducted and you know there’s lots of Internet marketers out there who are teaching how to do copy writing and basically you go to a sales page, you read the letter and just take action. But until recently there was very little ability to connect to other people and get recommendations about what restaurant to go to or what product to buy or how to best use it. Social media is really the collection of all of these new websites and web technologies that allow us, PEOPLE, to actually connect to each other, to create villages that have no borders. To create tribes that reach to all corners of the globe and that can include things like YouTube or I can create a video that talks to people but now I have the ability to receive videos in response or comments or then be able to connect to people via email. Then take that offline and have a group meeting say in New York City at Grand Central Station – a group of people, you know, who met each other because of this ability to interact online. And so social media is really all of the different, new Internet services that allow people to come together, many to many.

John: I love it. And so obviously, what you are doing is whatever your niche is, your business, your hobbies, whatever the case is – you start to connect with other people around the world in various formats, that have an interest in that business, product, service or hobby.

Dave: You bet. And there are websites that are dedicated to questions where people are coming to different websites to ask questions about specific topics – and so if you know where those websites are and if that’s a particular area of your passion, you can go in there and actually position yourself as an expert or even just a person who is a step further ahead on the bridge of what that other person wants to experience. And by reaching your hand back – hey, you know – your expertise is relative to them and we are all able move forward – we are all able to help each other. And so when you understand that from a business stand point, when you understand that there are literally people in different areas on the internet in some of the thousands of social media websites online, asking questions that are actually solved by what you do for a living – I mean – talk about a gold mine!

John: Wow! It’s taking all of the Internet and actually taking it to another level now.

Dave: It really is.

John: The next level, obviously, of the internet is going to do that even more with the ability to search through video, search through audio, search through a variety of different means.

Dave: Yeah. That’s the amazing thing is that the technology is accelerating to the point where that ability to connect is a great thing because you can kind of think of social media as a virtual cocktail party. Instead of being the wall flower that hangs behind the punch bowl, you can just get out there in the middle of the room, walk up to somebody, look them in the eyes, smile and say “Hi” – “My name is John” and engage that person. But, because of all the search engine technology and because of how all that is increasing in its capabilities, all of those interactions that you have online – they leave a residual effect. And so – 6 months later, say you got onto a social media site and answered someone’s burning question about how to succeed in business – 6 months from now, another person who is looking for exactly the same things can find your question. And because they see the heart and the passion that you poured out in that original answer – they come to you because they want to look at your profile, they want to go to your original website. And so every thing that you do to interact with these people online is leaving a residual effect, it’s in the search engines, and so it just creates this large funnel to lead people into you for your solutions.

John: I love it. I love it. By the way folks, if you think this is not where the internet is going, or it is right now – just think of MySpace, think of Facebook, think of these companies that have been bought for billions of dollars because the visionaries are already seeing where this is going and the technologies are changing so rapidly over the next year to two years. I just recently had a demo of technology this past week that just blew me away – if you want to see something like this go to hollowgenesis.tv. I don’t know if you’ve heard of them or not Dave, it would be worth your while to take a look at hollowgenesis.tv. Dave, let’s talk about personal brand as it relates to social media. What exactly do you mean by “personal brand” and social media in the same context?

Dave: Ok. Well, a personal brand – first off – let’s kind of say what it isn’t. A personal brand is not about what you wear, it’s not about having a catch phrase; it’s not about having to be a celebrity. A personal brand is YOU and the reflection of your personal brand is seen in the relationship that you create with every interaction with another person online. So, one of the ways I like to create an example about this is to say – let’s take a Coke – Ok, a Coca-Cola – a Coke is a Coke is a Coke – right? You open a can of Coke and it’s always the same. You go out on the street and you can find some people who love it, some people who hate it and you can find some people who are in the middle of the road. But the Coke never changed. It was the same thing every time. Well, when you realize that, when you show up online consistently, coming from your own sense of values, from who you are – and you reveal that to other people – what that means is, you are going to be able to attract your ideal client. Because you are able to connect to the people who were intended for you to be serving them. So a personal brand is really about taking your self-awareness, about taking your understanding and about how you want to show up in the world and how you want to serve others. You are using that as kind of your compass, your North Star. Anything that you create online – your videos, an answer to another person’s questions – all of those things are reflective of who you are and who you want to present yourself as. Your true self. And when you do that, you’re doing that consistently, just like a Coke is a Coke is a Coke – you are going to show up consistently online, and 6 months from now, when somebody finds an article from you, or an answer or a video, they are going to see you for who you are, and if that’s another one of the people that are intended to be served by you, they are going to be attracted to you. And so, personal branding, I think – is absolutely critical to anybody’s online activity because if you are not in control of your personal brand – you’re out of control. Everyone has a personal brand whether they think they do or not – so you need to be aware of it and you need to actually use it.

John: Now when you say a “personal brand” – you are not only referring to the individual, but a company has a personal brand.

Dave: It does. So, you as an owner can look at some of these Rock Star owners of different companies like Steve Jobs at Apple, and so obviously Steve Jobs has his own brand and Apple does as well – then there’s that kind of hybrid brand of Steve Jobs at the helm of Apple – right? So you need to be aware of those things and be cognoscente of how you want to show up online.

John: Right. I love it. Now there’s a lot of companies that are dabbling at social media, trying to increase their sales and revenues. Who is actually doing that properly?

Dave: I’ll give you a couple of key examples of companies that I think are doing incredible things with social media. Jet Blue, Comcast and Whole Foods. Now, I’m just going to give a little example of a slice of where I think they are showing up in just incredible ways. One of probably the most popular social media sites today is a service called Twitter. It’s a very addictive little service where people are just – it’s almost instant messaging, but people are doing it online, so you’ve got so many marketers that are on there. And for the first example – Jet Blue – they have a Jet Blue account, a presence on Twitter. The way they use it is even though the actual branded presence is Jet Blue – they constantly update the profile that is associated with that account so that you know what actual human being is currently at the keyboard. So, that’s one of the very important things about social media is that you gotta remember – it’s about people – it’s about connections between people. And so Jet Blue, not only do they post updates, like during the last hurricane they were actually posting updates about new flights that they made available to make sure that people could get out of the areas as quickly as possible. But when anybody, in public, through Twitter – because remember basically what is happening on Twitter is happening in front of the entire internet community – when somebody experiences a problem or just has a question or comment about Jet Blue, Jet Blue is actually engaging that person online, in front of everybody. Imagine if customer service telephone numbers actually had a public access number where you could just sit back and listen to – say – Dell tech support or something like that. Jet Blue has effectively taken that on.

Now Comcast, has done the same thing, where people – I have actually seen a couple of bloggers who have collected stories about Comcast and customer experiences online through Twitter – because they are experiencing extraordinary customer service through Twitter and they are experiencing it in front of the whole world to see. And so, not only is it these kind of Nordstrom-like stories of customer service agents going above and beyond the call of duty to make sure the customer is engaged and is satisfied, but they are doing it in public view. I think that’s a pretty exciting thing to be able to see that ability to do that.

John: What I’m hearing is transparency.

Dave: It’s incredible transparency. You know about 10 years ago there was a lot of talk about how the Internet was democratizing all aspects of society. Well, social media is ripping even those covers off – even to the point where nobody can hide. So you either embrace it and just really show off your authenticity or you can stick your head in the sand at your own peril.

John: Absolutely. So, how does somebody go about the beginning, the middle or the end of creating a great social media brand?

Dave: Well, you know, I think there are two sides to it. I think the first is that you need to sit down and kind of decide who you are. In your book, “The Answer”, you’ve got an example of a plumber service and you mind map around it – keywords about how the plumber wants other people to see them – you know, timely, clean, all those little keywords. I think you need to do the same thing. Write your name in the center of the paper and reveal what your values are. Are you kind of the Jim Cramer type where maybe you’re a little bit feisty at times and are a bottom-line kind of guy – or are you just loving and compassionate with every step? You know you are going to be challenged at times online. There are going to be people that test your patience or you see something where you have to call somebody out. You can still do that according to your values. So if you are aware of what your personal brand is, it’s always available as your compass. So I think that’s the first and most critical thing – is to really have a self-awareness of how you want to show up online so that you can make sure that what you are doing is contributing to that.

The next thing you do is show up on some of these social media websites – there’s just some basic ones that you can get on like LinkedIn, is a great example for any professional – everybody should have a free LinkedIn.com account.

John: I agree and then make sure you text me and I’ll join your link. I’m on that as well.

Dave: All right. Well, so you get on that and not only use the summary field to its maximum capacity to explain this is who I am, this is how I help people, this is what I’m looking for. But then also, get into – let’s say for example – the questions/answers area, on LinkedIn.com and answer other people’s questions. Get in there and actually contribute. Become part of the network. Again, this is social media, it’s social networking. It’s like going to a Chamber of Commerce meeting where people are showing up from all over the planet and you’ve got that opportunity to give value. As you do that, you’re seen giving value and that attracts people to you. Right there, I think are the two elements of just getting started in a way that are very reflective of how success with social networking in “the real world” works and you can apply those things in exactly the same way online now.

John: I love that. And another question that I want to lead into is you talked about the book “The Answer” – one of the things we teach our members of One Coach is that they’ve got to know who their ideal client is in order to create real messaging for that ideal client. Is that important for creating a personal brand as well?

Dave: Oh – you bet! I can’t imagine how you would really be able to ever effectively attract business if you don’t have some idea of who you want to attract. The reason why I think personal branding is also a critical factor is – I see a lot of people, clients I work with, professional networkers, sales pros, even brick and mortar owners, where sometimes they “show up”. They show up the way they think other people want to see them. It’s not the revelation of their true self, you know what I mean? It’s like a façade. If you’re doing that persistently, Ok, if you’re showing up the way you THINK people want to see you, well, at the very best the results are going to be that you are going to attract clients that are attracted to that façade, not to the true you, not to your inner being. And if you are attracting clients that are not intended for who you truly are, I gotta say that you are not only ripping them off, but you’re ripping yourself off because you were created to serve other people and there’s a connection. There’s a connection between souls. So when you’ve got a good self-awareness about who you are, then you start to say Ok, now who is my real ideal client? Who would be just so excited to know? That I’m getting money from these people because I am helping them and if I bumped into them on the street, I would be overjoyed to run into those people because I know that there is a connection between us. That’s really the most important aspect of having an ideal client is who do you really, really want to serve?

John: That’s great. And you know that really comes from a state of fulfilling your higher moral and social purpose as well. That means you are going to come from a state of loving, caring and kindness.

Dave: You bet. And what better way to hold an intension to really harness that power of “Law of Attraction” by making it something that is authentic and true to who you are.

John: Yep. I totally, totally, totally agree with that. In doing so, with somebody starting to get into the world of social media or they are already into it – is there a step by step or some tips that you give people to start telling his or her story as part of building that personal branding?

Dave: Yeah. You know I think each of us have walked a unique path and that path has, in so many ways, prepared us and built us to the capacity that we are now able to do – here in the moment. I think when you understand that, when you have that piece of your story available, I think there are just so many things you can do with it. For example, say you are in a health-oriented business. You could make some short videos for YouTube to begin to tell the story of “This is why I’m a chiropractor”, “This is why I’m a nutritionist”. These are the things that have happened in my life that puts me in the position I am to help people today. This is what fuels my passion. What’s important about that and what makes that relevant to others – which I think is a key piece to personal branding – is that there’s an element of relevance. There’s a connection in that your story shows other people that you are real! That you are actually there to help people as opposed to – “I just created this account and I am posting a bunch of links to hope to get some search engine traffic” – or whatever. But that you are actually a real person and it helps create an incredible connection to you. So, a lot of the people that I am seeing are getting the most – in some cases – just fanatical results. They are pulling in people who somehow become just their closest and best clients because of that authenticity that they are putting out online. Your story is a vehicle for it and what a great thing to be able to use. I mean, you already live your story and this isn’t about going out there and you know – “Oh, woe is me” – but it’s really just about saying – “Hey, this is who I am”. And it’s not about excuses or things like that. It’s just about saying who I am and this is where I am and it’s because of these things that I am now here in a position to help other people with this. It’s a powerful thing and it just revs up the magnet – you know? Like putting voltage to the electromagnet because you’ve amped up the energy. So now people who would have been drawn in because they were close enough – now they’re going to see you sing from light years away.

John: You know what I’m picking up right now on Dave, is that years ago the Internet was very impersonal and you could send an email to 100 people or 1000 people. But now that people have been inundated with tens of thousands of emails, it is putting “personal” back into the relationship.

Dave: Oh, you bet! You know, let me give you another example. There is a brick and mortar store. A social media site called Yelp.com (Y-E-L-P) and it allows regular folks to write reviews of things in their area. Not just restaurants, but auto shops, … Here in the D.C. area where I live, there are dozens of churches that people have actually put into Yelp and people have written in saying “this is my experience of this church”. They are writing reviews. Well, here’s the great thing you can do. Say you are the owner of a restaurant. You go in and create an account. You say “I am the owner of this restaurant” because there is no hiding in social media – you always want to be authentic about who you are – but then write reviews of your neighbors. Show that you are part of the community. When you do that, you’ve now created a local connection and people will be likely to see that because as you mentioned, there are folks using Facebook email between their friends, because their Gmail account is just inundated with all kinds of letters and spam and kind of where all the general junk goes. So they are going to these social media websites because that’s where they want to connect with people. Facebook is another great example. You know, if you have a chiropractic office, and you have a “fan page” – your fan page could be of your chiropractic center and you could invite every one of your patients to choose to be a fan of your chiropractic center. So now what’s going to happen is when you create content for your fan page, or if you announce that you are going to be closed on Saturday because of a special seminar or something like that, the people that are already going to Facebook because of the activity that they want to see, they are now going to be able to see you – so you will now be able to engage your existing clients to let them know what’s up and do this outside the channels that people are increasingly ignoring because there is just so much static over email.

John: This is just amazing, just amazing – with what’s coming up and how we are going to be able to use this tool called the internet to create communities within communities within communities – incredible! Are there certain elements that someone would have to have in their content like links to videos or audios to make a bigger impact than just a static page?

Dave: Um, again I think it comes down to the concept of engagement. Videos are awesome. So for example, on YouTube, you could create videos with $150.00 camera called the Flip Video Camera. It is the most ridiculously simple to use digital camera that I have ever seen in my life.

John: A couple of my friends just got it and were filming with it – and within minutes, the event was on the Web!

Dave: There you go! So you can do that with your practice or with your business or with your passion. Let me give you a little formula: You take the camera and you have a friend point it at you and let’s say you first go through 10 frequently asked questions that your clients ask you. Have the person ask you a question after they hit the little record button, and you answer the question – not as a sales pitch – just answer the question like you were sitting in a coffee shop just talking to your friend because that’s who you ARE talking to. Click off 10 of those videos and upload them to YouTube. You now have 10 videos positioning you as somebody who is an expert on those particular questions. Now, understanding that many people that may be looking for what you have to offer don’t understand all your lingo and terminology or your product name or those types of things. They don’t understand that detail yet. Do another 10 videos that are based on what kinds of questions are people out there asking that if they knew about me, they would want what I have. So these are kind of what I call “bridge questions”. So you click off 10 of those right off your video camera, upload them to YouTube and you know John – say in less than 2 hours, you could have 20 videos online that are pulling people in. That’s not only useful for your existing clients, to give them more information, to get a greater connection to them, but that’s also content that you can use to attract new clients, to attract new customers. So video is a huge thing. But also, don’t discount the concept of getting into some of these discussion areas – Yahoo.com/answers or LinkedIn.com and their little question and answer section, which actually is not little at all – it’s actually very big.

John: Huge – yeah, huge.

Dave: Look for questions in your field and just answer the questions. That engagement, that connection – it speaks volumes. Because it is so much more powerful than say – an article. I mean article marketing is still very widely used on the Internet. But when you are actually answering another person’s question in public, it creates an entirely different context in terms of the connection and presence that you create online.

John: I love that. And what if somebody doesn’t want to videotape themselves because they are self-conscious?

Dave: Heh – you know, if you’ve got the face made for radio – that sort of thing. Heh Heh.

John: Heh – or even if you’re language skills aren’t great.

Dave: Oh – you bet! Well, it’s not actually necessary to – well #1, you don’t need to do all the multimedia stuff. You don’t need video. You don’t need audio podcasts. They are not mandatory, they are not must-haves. You can, instead, focus your attention on finding forums, finding discussion groups where people are talking about your passions and just engage people right there. So much of the Internet is all still based on text – on people writing short little letters back and forth. So you know it’s real easy to see all of these different types of Internet marketing techniques and traffic generating techniques and all of these crazy things online to try to build your business. Just pick what is coming from your skill set. Pick what’s gonna come from your strengths and focus on it. And so the real – I think exciting – thing that comes from social media is the fact that no matter what your strength or skill set happens to be, there is a way to apply yourself through social media. Don’t pine for the things that maybe you don’t feel comfortable with. Instead, just really put your heart into the things where you can.

John: And get started! Don’t sit on the sidelines because you’ll be left on the shores. Now because social media is so responsive – what do you do when somebody leaves a negative comment about your product, your service or you?

Dave: You know I think this is probably one of the most critical areas when it comes to putting your personal brand to use because this is how you get to show up and show how you handle adversity. So first off I’d say, you look at what those comments are and first decide whether it’s worth a response or not. I’ve recently had some people say just some flat out nasty things about me on a particular blog and after looking it over, I just decided to ignore it. It wasn’t the kind of opportunity for me to respond. But in other cases – I think you should engage the person directly. Let’s say somebody has said something about your restaurant. Well, I think you should actually step up and say – “I am the owner of this restaurant and I’m very sorry you had this occur and I would like to fix it.” Or, sometimes it may actually be just a disconnect in a person’s expectation. Maybe, a person was expecting something from your business that you have consciously decided – “hey, this isn’t what we do.” Well, I still think it’s very valuable to engage that person and again because it’s social media – you are typically doing this in full public view – and just say, “I am really sorry that you did not find the types of services you were looking for. This is what we do, and if you are ever looking for these things, we are here to bend over backwards for you.” And gosh – if you actually know a way to recommend to that person what they really are looking for – you know, think of Miracle on 34^th street! Give somebody a referral to what they really want and that can bring so much back to you. You know, when we give, we are completely open as a conduit to receive. So I think that is something that is really important to keep in mind is to just engage people directly. The thing that you should never ever do – and I’ve actually worked with a couple people that I’ve given this counsel to and they didn’t do it and it REALLY backfired on them – is DO NOT go and create a fake account and try to response to the person’s complaint as another customer or colleague or something like that because there are people online with some pretty significant internet skills and when the see “posers” (there is often times technology that they can surmise whether you are one or not), they will call you out and that can have damaging effects that are just orders of magnitude more significant than a negative comment from somebody online.

John: That’s interesting you say that. One of the guys here in my office that works on our social media strategy was a little too aggressive on Facebook where it had – I don’t know, 10, 12, 15,000 people that were friends – and they shut us out. It just got revised again. He was being a little too aggressive promoting some of our books that had just come out. He’s laughing a little bit, but yeah, you’ve got to be very, very careful. Take me out of here or however far you can see. What do you see as the BIG PICTURE of where we are going with the Internet and social media?

Dave: Well, again when I first got on the Internet, it was all social, it was all people getting connected. So, one thing I see as being a HUGE potential – I think we just saw a reflection of with the recent elections – we saw people being engaged and engaging others in the political process online.

John: 3 million people I hear.

Dave: Yeah. What unbelievable power. I mean it’s almost like the days of Camelot when JFK was the pretty boy of new media back then and new media was television! Now, we’ve got this ability to engage people in so many different ways and I think we are seeing the dam break in some countries. There are news items in China, in Iran where people have so much access to the information – they can see both sides of the story – that they’re demanding change, they are demanding their own access, they are demanding transparency in ways that have just never occurred before. You know – you can’t put the genie back in the bottle and social media is just blowing the lid off of such an awareness as to how the world is connecting. So #1, I really see this as a major movement. Again, I believe this is where the origins of the Internet are, as far as my perspective goes. And so I see this as closing the loop. Social media is bringing back – what I always felt was – amazingly powerful aspects of the internet to begin with, but what that then opens the doors for is the need for people, for thought leaders to come out and create context. You know, information, data – they are great things – but we also then need thought leaders to help us make sense of it all – to help bring context, to bring continuity and to help us bring meaning. So there are so many different niches – if you want to call them that – online, that I think there are just infinite opportunities for people to engage entire groups or tribes or villages or whatever you want to call them, to just create all kinds of service movements. I think we are going to see an incredible transformation in how charitable and philanthropic processes work online because we will actually be able to engage people. It’s not just going to be about raising money so that some organization can go do whatever their brochure says – but instead, actually connecting to people directly and saying “this needs to happen”, “how do we move forward on this and how do we actually see a community spontaneously bind together to do something?” I think if you look far enough back at the origins of non-profits in the United States, that IS kind of how they got started. They had a common vision, they said that this ought to be done and they formed an organization to get it done. Now you have so many of these non-profits, they are like monolithic organizations that don’t like to “rock the boat” because it can screw up their annual donations from major providers. Well, the Internet now creates that bottom up capacity. Grass roots is going to become the norm. People who are kind of the “heretics” are going to become the heroes because the thought leaders – the people who are willing to stand up and say “This is how I see things”, “This is my vision” – they are going to be able to find an audience and they are going to be able to make change! I think that’s a REALLY exciting thing that goes so far beyond the mere technology of social media, but it’s definitely social media that’s going to make that possible because it’s opening the doors SO wide.

John: Wow! Absolutely love it! Friends, you’ve been listening to an interview with Dave Saunders and he’s got a gift for you, which I greatly appreciate. Why don’t you tell us about the gift – it’s all about “How to Harness the Power of Social Media” through the four input methods of exposure to the Internet and social media. I think you called it the “Social Media Funnel” – is that right?

Dave: You bet! As I’ve been teaching the context of how to really harness the power of social media, one thing that I realized is that most entrepreneurs and sales people do have a common understanding in this concept of the sales funnel. So, what I created was really a social media in terms of how you fill that funnel. So I’m not here to replace anybody’s existing sales funnel model. However you have learned it – that’s fine. What I want to show you is how social media – how different aspects of how you use social media – fill that funnel. So, I created an online video that is free for folks to watch and all they have to do is visit www.yoursocialbrand.com/funnel and then right there you can just click a link to claim your own viewing of the video. It really kind of just takes you through the process of showing you how the different ways we have discussed here of using social media all work together to just fill that funnel and just pull in people, as well as engage your existing business.

John: Awesome. So it’s www.yoursocialbrand.com/funnel and you’ll see a great squeeze page there that works well – you’ve all heard about that in the past. So Dave – are there any last parting thoughts you’ve got for the members of OneCoach?

Dave: You know – again – it’s just get out there and take action. I know different people have different levels of technical comfort and I’ve just got to say that I personally know 90 year old women that have their own social media sites, that have found an audience online, that have found their own particular passion. So, when it comes to just using existing social media sites to get out there and connect to people – it is easy. You can’t break the Internet by doing it. Just take action immediately – get out there. But remember, it’s not about posting links, it’s not about being a big billboard – you’ll have opportunities to do that later – but it’s about adding value. It’s about giving. It’s something that doesn’t take a lot of time to do. Activities on social media should be very time efficient. It’s something I teach in YourSocialBrand.com as well. But It’s something that you should be able to easily fit in your schedule and not only do you have the potential for getting very quick results – but all the activities that you engage in on social media have LASTING results because as we mentioned – you are leaving all of this virtual real estate in the search engines.

John: Awesome. I love it. Alright friends – you’ve got the wisdom of Dave Saunders – for the 30,000 ft. view of a whole bunch of tips, go to: www.yoursocialbrand.com/funnel. Dave, thank you so much – if there is anything I can do to help you, you’ve got an alibi!

Dave: Oh – Thank you John.

John: Everybody – remember, It’s your choice to create a great day and do something nice for somebody this week that is unexpected! Bye bye now – thanks Dave.

Dave: Thank you.

Technorati Tags: Social Media

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If I had a dollar for every time I’ve heard someone say something along the lines of, “I don’t like Twitter because you can’t have a conversation and connect with people in only 140 characters,” I’d be swimming in singles.

How do these people communicate in “real life”?

Conversations are a back and forth exchange of words and ideas. Connections result from those conversations. Sure, if you expect the conversation to end when you hit send, don’t expect a lot out of Twitter.

The beauty and fun of  Twitter is that you can’t spew a giant manifesto at another person. The 140 character limit is forcing you to take a breath and listen. Just like in real life, some people talk back and some don’t. Why is their issue—not yours—but that’s the subject of another post.

As one of the 4 E’s of social media—Engage—Twitter is actually the ideal venue for connections and conversations. Sure, it’s not the ONLY venue but if you’re not getting it here, you’re probably not getting results in other areas either.

There are a lot of walking billboard on Twitter. People who do nothing but tweet quotes—sometimes self-generated—or announce the latest thing for sale.

No engagement there.

There are also the Twitter snobs who ignore everything around them and only “talk” with 2-3 people.

No engagement there.

One of the big points that applies to all Social Media is the ability for people to connect. No more static web pages and technologically confused members of Congress and the courts who think the Internet is just another form of TV or print distribution.

Twitter is both fun and useful. Use it to find people who are talking about your passions. Listen and engage. Some people will give you the digital equivalent of a polite nod and stare. Move on. The better connections are waiting. It just takes more than one tweet to find and make them.

Feel free to say hi on Twitter: I say hi back. @davesaunders

Technorati Tags: Social Media, twitter

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When my friend Jill Foster asked me to be a speaking coach for some of the speakers at TEDxPotomac, there wasn’t a moment of hesitation on my part.

“I’m in.”

I had no idea who I would be coach, but I did know two things:

1. I’m a big fan of TED.
2. I love to help people learn how to—or discover how to—express themselves better so they can influence more people with their ideas.

The title of this post is from Stephen Covey’s The 8th Habit. If you haven’t read this monstrous tome, that’s it in a nutshell: Find your voice and inspire others to find theirs… It really is a great addition to the other 7 habits of highly effective people he covers in his best selling book by the same name.

Not that I’d call myself highly effective.

Moderately effective?

Mildly effective?

Hey, at least I read the book. That counts for something, right?

My experience with TEDxPotomac was a great one and I really enjoyed working with Craig Newmark and Alexandra Cousteau. I hope I helped them connect to the audience more effectively.

Working with Toastmasters International, I’ve helped a lot of people practice and develop their communications skills. It’s a lot of fun and I find it fascinating too. I find how a person speaks to be sort of like a 2-way Rorschach Ink Blot Test conveyed through words. There are many factors that impact how a person communicates. Self-awareness and a little practice can turn these factors into powerful tools or oration.

• Cadence
• Word use
• Voice control
• Repeating themes

These are just a few examples which I talk about more in other posts. They’re fascinating things to me and if you ever end up in a Toastmasters meeting with me, or hire me as a speaking coach, you now have some idea of the things I look for.

They’re elements of a one person symphony.

The motto of TED is “Ideas worth spreading,” and it’s what I love. I don’t have to agree with an individual’s message, but I respect and support their right to be heard.

Maybe you’re not scheduled for a TED talk any time soon.

I’m not either.

That doesn’t mean you don’t have a voice though.

Find your voice and inspire others to find theirs…

Technorati Tags: TED, TEDxPotomac

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I’m working on building out a series on SEO and search engine marketing. It’s intended for business owners, entrepreneurs and bloggers who are looking to search as a way to get found…and hopefully to increase sales too.

As this class is for you, I’d like to ask you a question.

What do you want to know about using the search engines to help your web pages get found by the right people?

Please leave a comment below and let me know!

Technorati Tags: Search Engine Optimization, SEO, wordshop

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First, a party to kick of the Screen on the Green season here in Washington, DC.

Next, a sweet lineup of films

July 12 – Goldfinger

July 19 – The Goodbye Girl

July 26 – 12 Angry Men

August 2 – Bonnie and Clyde

Each film starts playing at dusk on a projection screen located on the National Mall between 4th and 7th St, NW.

If you’re from outside of DC, we call the big landing strip of open grass—between the Washington Monument and Congress—“The Mall.”

It’s probably some Free Mason thing.

For a bit more info on the Screen on the Green project, check out program director Jesse Rauch in this News Channel 8 appearance.

Here’s some additional history on Screen on the Green.

This is great entertainment, and it’s free. Sure it’s hot outside, but it’s hot everywhere around here. Suck it up and have some fun.

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It’s officially HOT in Washington, DC. Has it been a full week of 100+ temps? If not, it’s still pretty darn hot. Of course, the best way to beat the heat is to meet other sweaty people and share cool drinks.

To that end, the next DC Tweetup (#DCTweetup 14) is at Urbana DC.

From the EventBrite listing:

Enjoy a hot mid-summer evening with us while drinking wine and sangria at Urbana Wine Bar & Restaurant. Meet some fun people, make business contacts and relax after a long day at work. Instead of asking people what they do, ask them what they love! They’ll answer – #DCTweetup!

WHERE: Urbana Wine Bar & Restaurant
WHEN: Tuesday, July 20th, 5-8pm
ADDRESS: 2121 P St NW, Washington, DC. 20037
METRO: 2 blocks from North Exit of Dupont Circle (Red Line)
WHAT: wine & sangria happy hour!
WHY: meet some great people, eat & drink great stuff & enjoy an evening out
COST: Did we say FREE?! SPECIALS: Urbana’s happy hour menu includes $5 sangria, $5 small plate appetizers & $8 pizzas.

Be there or be some sort of square-like square. Not literally a square, but like one.

No idea what that means.

See you there.

Technorati Tags: DCTweetup, Social Media, Social networking

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A year ago, I lost my dog in a tragic accident. As the neighbors helped out by literally picking up the pieces, I wrote this post.

My July 4th last year was spent at the farm as my friend Lili literally put the pieces back together so I could bury Punkie under a willow tree. Not exactly good times, but she actually has a permit for “real” fireworks so we had a good time blowing things up that evening too.

Life moves on.

The past couple of months have had some amazing highs and some fairly low, lows. Through it all though, I’m happy to say that I always seem to be surrounded by friends. Some are consistently there. Some are transient. Some appear from nowhere and seem to be exactly the kind of influence I need at the time.

Amazing stuff.

While July 4th is a day to celebrate independence, freedom and autonomy wouldn’t be all that interesting if we lived in individual caves and never interacted. It’s a time for friends and friendship.

Have a great one.

Live a story worth telling.

Say hi and leave a comment below.

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When I first read Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us [AF] from Daniel Pink, I was blown away. I hadn’t heard very much about the content so I didn’t know what to expect. I just thought it was a book on motivation. I’ve worked with managers who love to create “incentive bonuses” and have had employees who even—get this—asked for bonuses when completing their assigned work on time. I’ve also worked with personal development workshops that suggest you create personal incentives as a reward for achieving a goal. If that goal is to get to 100 pushups in a single shot, that sort of incentive system seems to work fine, but I’ve always had this uneasy feeling about doing such things when creativity and problem solving is on the line.

Imagine how blown away I was to find out that a Nobel Prize in Economics was awarded in 2002 to psychologist Daniel Kahneman. His research, along with studies backed by MIT, the University of Chicago, Carnegie Mellon and the Federal Reserve, along with other studies from psychologists, sociologists and economists show that larger rewards led to poorer performance in tasks that called for anything beyond rudimentary cognitive skill.

It’s easy to miss some of the important details here. This does not say that compensation isn’t important. A person should be compensated in such a way that they are not “worried” about money and therefore can relax into the creative and problem solving tasks. In doing freelance writing, I find that getting a sufficient retainer to start seems to increase my productivity whereas having the compensation “held hostage” actually seems to lead to my mind wandering to other ways to generate cash flow.

Which is to say if you don’t pay people enough, they won’t be motivated. After that point has been reached, “bonuses” do not enhance performance in creative and problem solving jobs.

For some more info, watch this video from RSA Animate. The content from Daniel Pink would be great on its own, but is really enhanced with this creative video accompaniment.

This video from TED is also worth watching.

“This is one of the most robust findings in social science, and it’s also one of the most ignored.” –Daniel Pink

Here are some additional links to studies cited by Daniel Pink in his talks and his book.

• The Effects of Financial Incentives in Experiments: A Review and Capital-Labor-Production
• Karl Duncker’s “Candle Problem” and functional fixedness
• Economist Dan Ariely who did the MIT study

What do you think? Is this a surprise to you? Don’t believe it? Any personal experiences? Leave a comment below.

Technorati Tags: Daniel Pink, Drive, economics, motivation

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