Marketers, watch out!

As of July 1, 2014, there’s a new spam law in town, and violating it could cost your business up to $10 million.

Here’s everything you need to know…

Overview

First and foremost, let’s appreciate the fact that the Canadian government gets digital marketing. They understand that we, the digital public, have the attention span of goldfish. So, the Canadian government made a one-minute video to help marketers understand the new law.

Here’s a brief summary:

Basically, Canada’s Anti-Spam Law (CASL) boils down to a three-prong test:

• Permission: Do you have either explicit or implicit permission to contact the person whom you are e-mailing?
• Identification: Do you identify who you are in the e-mail?
• Unsubscribe: Do you give your recipients the option to unsubscribe from your e-mails?

Now let’s break down these prongs even further.

Prong 1: What is the difference between implicit and explicit permission?

Here are a few examples of explicit consent:

1. Visitors fill out a form on a website.
2. Online shoppers check a box during checkout. (Note: The opt-in box cannot be pre-checked!)
3. Prospects give oral consent to opt into marketing messages.

And here are a few examples of people who have given you implicit consent to contact them:

1. A customer
2. A client
3. A donor to your non-profit
4. A member of your club

With explicit consent, there is no time limit. Marketers can continue to contact individuals until they unsubscribe.

With implicit consent, there is a time limit of two years after the event that starts the relationship (e.g. the date when someone becomes a customer).

For more information on the rules of consent, visit this web page.

Prong 2: How do marketers have to identify themselves?

Marketers must include the following:

1. Their name
2. Their business
3. The name of anyone else on whose behalf they are writing
4. A current mailing address

Marketers must also include one of the following items:

1. A phone number
2. An e-mail address
3. Web address

All contact information must be valid for up to 60 days after sending the message.

For more information, check out this infographic.

Prong 3: Do marketers need to include an unsubscribe option in every e-mail?

Plain and simple: Yes.

And you must honor unsubscribe requests within 10 days.

When will Canada start fining people?

The Canadian government is overly kind. They have given marketers a 36-month grace period to obtain consent. No one will be able to bring a case to the courts until July 2017.

Should I go back and re-read the privacy policies of the marketing platforms I’ve used?

I can’t give you legal advice. I’m not a lawyer. I’ve never played one on TV.

But I can say that, since reading about the law, I’ve dug through the privacy policies of the marketing platforms that Trapit is using.

For instance, we have been conducting webinars on BrightTALK. When BrightTALK users register for and attend our webinars, we have access to their contact information. But does having access to the users’ information mean that we have the right to contact them?

As the head of all things digital at Trapit, I had to determine whether we had permission to contact the Canadian registrants and attendees for our webinars. To find out, I pored over BrightTALK’s privacy policy, looking for lines like this one:

In attending or viewing a Channel, Summit, webinar, video or other content, you consent to our sharing your Profile Information with the Content Owner who may use such information to provide you with marketing messages…

Phew! We’re safe!

For non-lawyers, reading legalese isn’t a fun job, but as marketers, we sometimes have to do it.

Should I be worried about this law?

Let’s face it. Some of us are born worriers. But generally speaking, if you follow the best practices for e-mail, you shouldn’t be worried. Here are a few tips:

Tip 1: Don’t buy third-party lists.

Remember that the contact must have some kind of connection to your business. With third-party lists, neither implicit nor explicit consent is guaranteed.

Tip 2: Do keep track of when your contacts opted into your e-mail list.

This is especially important in cases of implicit consent. Your donors, customers, and volunteers have a time limit of two years, so your marketing department is going to have to determine the best way to manage your implicit relationships.

Here’s an idea: Toward the end of the two-year relationship, run a campaign that would give you explicit consent. Ask them to download an e-book and fill out a form. Ask them to subscribe to your blog. Ask them to explicitly opt-into your e-mail newsletter. Whatever works for your business.

Tip 3: Do keep track of how your contacts opted into your e-mail list.

In the event of a court trial, you’re going to have to show the judges how you obtained someone’s contact information. It’s better to err on the side of caution.

Tip 4: Do send your marketing e-mails via a marketing automation platform.

According to the law, you need to provide an unsubscribe option at the bottom of every e-mail, and services like MailChimp or Hubspot include that information for you.

Tip 5: Do include your contact information in your e-mails.

Not only are you complying with the law, but you are establishing credibility.

For more information on CASL

Please visit http://fightspam.gc.ca/

That’s all, folks…

Until next Monday,

-Mark

P.S.

Here are a few of those webinars that I mentioned:

There’s an ocean of content out there on any topic imaginable. Whenever the right occurrence cracks the levees, a deluge is inevitable, flooding the web with not only factual stories, but also opinion, commentary, and speculation. As a publisher, you’re keenly aware of the full spectrum of voices out there, and while you couldcapture the entire conversation, it’s much more useful to deliver a curated experience to your users. That means deciding how much content to expose your users to, of what type, and from which sources. There’s a world-wide discussion going on, and it’s up to you to deliver only the best of it. That’s the key dilemma every publisher needs to address: identifying what your user’s ideal experience would be, and then figuring out how to make that dream come true.

In a perfect world, your content would be the centerpiece of this experience, with the high-quality content you produce at the core of any conversation. To augment it, there are going to be articles external to your publishing domain — both from networks and independent writers — that have valuable, unique voices that are worth being heard. On the other hand, there are certainly sources and sites, particularly on controversial topics, that are not so trustworthy, and it’s only your expertise that allows you to determine what you’d be proud to deliver to a reader. In addition, there are some places that might be great for information on one topic but not another. If your goal is to deliver as much high-quality content as you can without the pollution from the noise of the internet, you need the right tools for the job.

Here at Trapit, we have a commitment: empowering you to solve this problem for every topic within your sphere and create the collections of content your audience craves. Have an RSS feed or author that you don’t want to miss a single story from? Add it in, and we’ll help you collect every article it publishes. Want a mix of quality articles from around the web? We’ll let you control the frequency and quality of how often it can contribute. Want to add articles one-by-one with a careful, meticulous hand? We’ll help make top-quality recommendations to ease your workload. Have a list of websites, feeds or authors that you want to prevent from ever making it into your collection? We’ll empower you to ban a source at will, and let you choose whether you want to ban it from all of your topics, or merely just one.

We know how highly you value quality, and we understand the importance of curation to a publisher’s integrity. Why settle for anything less than the best tools for the job? Come find out more about Trapit’s Publisher Suite, and never let your audience get swept away by a tidal wave of uncurated content again.

-Ethan

With over 1 billion active users, Facebook is one of the largest social networks. At the same time, it is one of the most personal social networks. Typically, people use Facebook to connect with their family and friends – not their business contacts.

Nevertheless, in some industries like Financial Services or Real Estate, some professionals rely heavily on Facebook to engage their clients. So, we thought we’d put together a series of tips for using Facebook for social selling.

Understand the Difference between Company Pages and Personal Profiles

A Facebook profile is a personal account. When you sign up for Facebook, you get a profile. This is a place where you can add friends and family members, communicate on a personal level, and share photos.

A Facebook page is a business account that represents a company or an organization.

Which Should You Use?

Let’s say that you are a local insurance agent who works for one of the largest insurance companies in the country. Which should you use – a business page or a personal profile? The answer depends on what you hope to accomplish.

You could create a Facebook page for your office and communicate with your customers through the page. One of the perks of having a Facebook page is that you can use Facebook’s paid advertising channels. Plus, you have access to Facebook’s detailed analytics (called “Audience Insights”).

On the other hand, some insurance agents have strong, personal connections with their clients. That’s why they engage their customers through their personal Facebook profiles. Since the Facebook algorithm tends to favor posts from friends rather than business pages, this can be a great way to reach current clients, as well as friends who might become clients one day.

Joe Pulizzi is an interesting example. He is the founder of Content Marketing Institute, and he uses both a personal profile and a business page. He uses his profile to communicate with members of the marketing community.

At the same time, the Content Marketing Institute also has its own business page.

Segment Your Friends via Facebook Lists

If you decide to use your personal Facebook profile as a way of communicating with your customers, consider using Facebook lists to organize your friends into groups.

You might have one list for friends, another list for family members, and yet another for your clients. That way, you can choose the right audience for your Facebook posts. Photos of your children can be shared with friends and family members. Meanwhile, your professional posts can be seen by customers – with a smattering of personal photos so that you appear human in the eyes of your clients.

Think about Mindset When Planning a Content Strategy

When people use Facebook, remember that they have a casual mindset. They are looking for moments of nostalgia, diversion, and distractions. They’re looking for content that complements their lifestyle and interests. They aren’t necessarily looking for a long dissertation on their profession, nor are they looking for explicit sales pitches.

Here’s what parentsare looking for, according to Facebook’s research:

How Do You Apply This Mindset to Your Content Strategy?

Let’s say that you’re a real estate agent. What would your content strategy look like on Facebook?

For many people, thinking about real estate is a welcomed distraction from other tasks. So, as a real estate agent, you might post some tips and tricks for buying a house. For example, here’s a post shared on a profile page of a realtor:

And here’s another example from a Facebook business page:

Those examples of Facebook posts are more straightforward, in that they are closely tied to the real estate industry. But don’t be afraid to think outside the box, as well. That could mean positioning yourself as an expert on your local news and cultural events. For example, here’s an update from a real estate agent on a bridge closure in her community.

Share Visual Content

When sharing content to Facebook, include photos, videos, and infographics. Those types of content tend to resonate well with Facebook users.

Look at the examples from the previous section. Each Facebook update includes an eye-catching image. That’s important for getting someone’s attention.

Establish a Cadence

Be warned: If you flood your followers’ feeds with posts, they may unfollow. No one likes to be bombarded on Facebook. So, best practices say that you should post between one and two times per day.

Don’t Be Afraid to Look for Prospects on Facebook

Twitter and LinkedIn seem like the most obvious places to look for prospects. But Facebook can be a treasure trove, as well. This infographic from Salesforce explains how to use Facebook’s search commands for prospecting.

Remember that Facebook is a personal network. While you might find the names of potential customers on Facebook, you may not to use another channel for your initial outreach (e.g. email or LinkedIn) because contacting a stranger on Facebook can be creepy.

Want to Learn More?

After reading this post, you should have an idea of whether social selling on Facebook is right for you. And if it is right for you, you have some ideas for using the network properly.

If you’d like to learn more about social selling, check out our cheat sheet for social sellers. You’re sure to find some tips for LinkedIn and Twitter.

I know that all good things must come to an end and I’ve had an incredible ride. I just want to end it on the right note. — Alonzo Mourning on his retirement

Today we’re shutting down Trapit’s free personalized content discovery apps. It’s been an incredible ride for us too, Alonzo. When Hank and I launched our free web app nearly three years ago, we really didn’t know what to expect. And that was the point. Sure, we had a bucket full of patents from SRI, and we’d spent over a year taking code and concepts intended for very targeted US Government Intelligent work and trying to turn it into a much more general –infinitely more scalable – tool. A tool that could “trap” any topic and, from an individual user’s feedback, produce a stream of personalized, relevant content for each user. This was at a time when crowd sourcing was red hot and “collaborative filtering” – the technique of delivering content to you based on popular stories that others “like you” have selected – was ubiquitous. But we challenged this belief – our mantra: “You are not the crowd.” We are all individuals with our own beliefs, tastes, and principles. A popular story is not necessarily relevant to you. So that was our theory – but we really didn’t know if we could pull it off. The challenges were daunting. Daunting from a technology standpoint: could our algorithms – just strings of binary code – really get to know each user as an individual, and deliver to them content on any topic that was relevant to them? As an example, we had about 100,000 people interested in “big data.” So 100,000 people got 100,000 different streams of information on this topic. Sure, there was overlap, but the SGI engineer interested in Hadoop, was seeing a very different “trap” than the Rackspace engineer who wanted to stay current on the latest developments in cloud infrastructure. Combine this with our insistence that Trapit would function in real time, and that new, original content would be delivered to our users within minutes of the publication time. So scale was a huge concern for us. Consider 1M users, each with an average of ten traps. Could we really deliver 10M personalized streams of information – in real time? And could we really trap any topic – from the very specific, like “Alonzo Mourning” – to vague concepts, like “digital culture,” “future TV,” or “relationship advice?” And could we truly boil down the web to a large – but finite – base of sources that produced original, high-quality content?

The point is, these were questions that could not be answered in theory – we needed real people, and lots of them, to try it. And our initial results were, quite frankly, pretty awful. Technology and techniques that looked good in sterile lab conditions were markedly different when exposed to the vagaries of the raucous, wild web. Minimizing duplication, disambiguation, outsmarting SEO, finding the right image in seas of clutter – all these and hundreds more were problems that we encountered as we made incremental improvements to our app as we gradually increased our user base from tens to millions.

But vetting the technology was not the only reason for launching a broad-based consumer app. Hank and I believed from the start that the real value of Trapit would be unlocked by business. Though we had no way of knowing which businesses would benefit most – finance, sales, marketing; publishers, developers, educators – and hundreds more. So we needed to see how Trapit was being used, identifying the usage patterns in order to build our business plan around real market intelligence.

And we did. Last year, in April 2013, we launched our first business application – the Trapit Publisher Suite. In September, we followed up with Trapit’s Content Curation Center (CCC), a comprehensive personalized content discovery, curation, analysis, and delivery application that helps marketers solve the thorny problems of content marketing. Along the way, we offered our API’s to selected customers, allowing great companies like Zeebox to embed Trapit’s unparalleled content curation and recommendation technology into their own apps.

Which brings us to this bittersweet day. We’re a small team. Now that we know Trapit works beyond our initial expectations, it is time to end this incredibly important part of our history and concentrate fully on the market that we’d always hoped would materialize: business users. In making the transition from the free app to our current platform, significant changes were required. Many of the features and capabilities absolutely required for business use – capabilities that put the power of Trapit’s technology into the user’s hands, like advanced filtering, image and headline control, selection and automation of the content delivery, and many, many more – were well beyond the scope and practicality of a free consumer app. But as long as our free app remained in the market, our prospective business customers would be confused. “Why am I paying if I can get it for free?” Or, “I’m using Trapit now, but it doesn’t have the features and functions I need.”

Not surprisingly, I’ve been an avid Trapit user myself. I’ll miss keeping tabs on a wide list of my interests, both personal – like my bacon trap – and topics relevant to Trapit’s business – like my content marketing trap. Like so many of you, I’ll miss my daily email digest and the dynamic updates insuring that the topics important to me would always be current. But on a positive side, many of the users of our free app are getting their companies to embrace Trapit as the ultimate platform for content curation, allowing them to continue use our powerful CCC.

Trust that we understand your disappointment at the loss, and that we sincerely appreciate your loyalty, support, and the kind words we’ve heard from so many of you over this fascinating journey. We could not have done it without you, and we could not be more grateful.

-Gary, Trapit CEO and Co-founder

“Social selling can transform the way companies engage with prospects and customers,” writes Forrester analyst Peter O’Neill. That’s because social selling helps businesses engage potential customers earlier in their buying journey and makes it more likely that sales reps will attain quota.

Yet many sales leaders have not embraced social networks like Twitter and LinkedIn. Sure, many have encouraged their teams to leverage social selling. However, they themselves have not invested time and energy into social selling. That’s because they view social networking as a luxury that they simply do not have time for.

But here’s the startling truth: A VP of Sales who ignores social networks won’t be a VP of Sales for much longer. Adapting to social – and the digital age more broadly – will be a defining factor in how enterprise sales teams increase their productivity and communicate with their customers.

Let’s take a look at two research-backed reasons why sales leaders need to embrace the social age.

Aligning Social Selling with Company-Wide Digital Strategies

Today, high-performing sales leaders don’t silo their go-to-market strategies from other departments. Instead, they align their department’s activities with the company’s overall strategy. And the very best sales leaders actively participate in setting the direction of a company’s overarching vision and goals.

You might be scratching your head, wondering how this pertains to social selling. So, let’s cut to the chase: digital transformation is a major concern for CEOs, which means that digital transformation needs to be a major concern of yours, as well.

PwC surveyed over 1,400 CEOs across the United States, and they found that CEOs are striving to foster digital change across departments. These forward-thinking CEOs recognize that business is changing. Customers are becoming more digitally savvy, and to grow revenue, companies need to stay in lockstep with their buyers.

How will CEOs execute on that vision? Half of CEOs surveyed by PwC view social media as an integral part of the digital transformation.

That is good news for a VP of Sales. To keep her seat at the executive table, a smart VP of Sales will map her sales strategy to the company’s larger vision. In 2016, that means wholeheartedly embracing digital transformation and showing how social sales will play an essential part in the company’s vision for a digital future.

Leading from the Top

In the section above, we looked at the upstream reason for embracing social selling. As you can imagine, there’s also a downstream reason for sales leaders to engage on social networks. Embracing Twitter and LinkedIn for sales is about leading your team by example.

Too many sales organizations have been unable to successfully execute a social selling strategy, and that’s partly because the sales leaders have not modeled the right behavior and attitudes for their reps. In order for social selling initiatives to be successful, the VP of Sales must believe in the impact of social sales on revenue, and he must model the right behavior for his team.

Studies have shown that a leader’s behavior is contagious, and it can have a trickle-down effect within an organization. In fact, technical skills and strategy skills are among the most contagious behaviors that leaders can pass down to their direct reports. Though many people continue to believe that senior leaders don’t need technical acumen, research shows that leaders with poor technical acumen are also the least effective leaders.

That research has important ramifications for your sales team and their social selling effectiveness. The social savviness of a sales executive is contagious. How a VP of Sales engages with his social networks will manifest itself in how a mid-level sales leader engages with his social network. And how a mid-level sales leader engages with his social network will impact how a sales rep will engage with his social network.

Let that sink in. Take a moment to reflect on your social presence. All your bad habits on social are as contagious as conjunctivitis.

For example, if you don’t have a social profile, chances are good that your direct reports will follow your lead. Or perhaps you never share thought leadership content with your network, and you’re struggling to get your sales reps to maintain their professional brands on Twitter and LinkedIn. Once again, your sales reps are following your lead.

Sales leaders can greatly influence the effectiveness of their social selling programs. But to do so, they need to change their unfortunate habits, replacing them with best practices.

When that happens, sales reps will take social selling seriously. Moreover, by using social, they will better understand its inner workings and see its impact first hand. In turn, sales leaders will be better at delegating responsibilities to their direct reports and shaping the vision of the social selling program.

Hiring a VP of Sales?

Companies are still determining the best way to adapt to the digitally savvy modern buyer. As a result, almost everyone is in catch-up mode. On the one hand, it’s comforting to know that you’re not alone, especially if you’re feeling behind the curve. On the other hand, it should incite you to action. To capitalize on this moment of transition, companies need to get a head start on their competition by setting a clear go-to-market strategy that incorporates social.

At the helm of this change needs to be a strong sales leader. Not only must the sales leader be able to relate the social sales strategy to the company’s overarching vision and strategy; that sales leader must also have a strong social presence that is worthy of imitation by mid-level managers and sales reps alike.

Without those two components, your social and digital sales initiatives are likely to fail. So, if you’re in the market for a new VP of Sales, take the time to understand the candidates’ views on the buyer in the digital age. Ask the candidates’ how they would incorporate social selling into a go-to-market strategy. Furthermore, check to see if the job candidates would lead the team by example. Look at the candidates’ social presence. Review the candidates’ tweets and “recent activity” on LinkedIn.

Doing so is worth the extra effort. In the digital age, hiring the right VP of Sales is one of the biggest decisions you can make.

Want to Learn More about Social Selling?

Flip through the Executive’s Guide to Social Selling Success.

Your company has just started a social selling program, and you’re excited about it. If social selling can help you make your sales quota, why not do it?

But there’s one problem. Your boss is encouraging everyone to be active on Twitter and LinkedIn. LinkedIn is a done deal. You use it all the time. You’ve heard of Twitter. You know that your coworkers use it all the time. But you don’t know where to start with this network.

Not a problem. Let’s walk you through the basics of creating a Twitter presence for a salesperson.

Choose a Professional Twitter Username

Remember that you are creating this Twitter account to attract buyers. Names like “CoffeeLuvr79” aren’t going to cut it. It’s usually best to use some variation of your name. Granted, if your name is John Smith, you will have to be more creative.

Choose a Professional Profile Picture

You need a profile picture on social media. No exceptions.

If you don’t choose an image, people will see an egghead. And who wants to do business with that image?

When selecting a photo, choose one that is professional. If your company provides head shots, use your head shot. If you don’t have access to a head shot, choose a photo that looks like it belongs on your company’s website.

Pro Tip: Use a smiley photo. Individuals with smiling photos are thought to be more competent, likable, and influential.

Here are the required dimensions:

• A square image – Optimal size: 400×400 pixels
• Maximum file size: 100kb
• Image format: JPG, PNG, or GIF.

To upload an image, navigate to your profile.

Click on “Edit Profile” on the right-hand side of the screen.

Then, click on your profile picture and upload it.

Write a Bio for Your Industry

Twitter gives us 160 characters for our biographies. In a small amount of space, we have to explain to the world who we are, and for social sellers, you have to exude confidence and trust. That’s not an easy task.

As you begin crafting your bio, think about your audience.

Let’s say that you work for a software company, and you plan to communicate with potential buyers on Twitter. Should you dedicate your entire Twitter profile to your love of the TV show Scandal? Probably not.

Instead, craft a bio that shows you can help your followers. Here’s a simple formula that you can use:

Remember that people buy from people. To be effective on Twitter, you need to be a human being – not some robot that spits out tweets. By listing things you love, you humanize yourself. Plus, your interests might be a great conversation starter.

In addition to sharing your love for coffee and golf with the world, you need to show some depth. As a salesperson on Twitter, you should aim to be a reliable source of information. The “I tweet about” phrase accomplishes that goal.

That phrase is your pact with your followers. When they follow you, they know that they can count on you for information on these topics. The “I tweet about” topics are your areas of expertise. They might be related to the product you’re selling, or they might be related to your sales vertical. Whatever the case may be, people know that they can count on you for information on those topics.

By the way, you do not have to rigidly follow the format above. Feel free to mix it up. Jill Rowley, for instance, has done just that in her Twitter profile:

Follow People

As Jill Rowley’s profile states, “Always Be Connecting.” The beauty of Twitter is that you do not need permission to connect. You can follow anyone who has a public profile.

To follow someone, you first need to locate the person on Twitter. Let’s say that we want to follow Twitter’s current CEO, Dick Costolo. First, I would type his name into the search bar in the upper right-hand corner:

Then, I select the Dick Costolo whom I want to follow by clicking on his name from the dropdown menu. (For me, it’s @dickc.) On his timeline, I select “Follow” in the upper right-hand corner.

Now, I will see Dick’s updates in my Twitter feed. When he says something, I will know.

Engage with People

Connecting with people is not just about reading what they say. You must also engage with them. You have to strike up conversations with them. You have to add value to their lives.

Replying to people’s tweets is the easiest way to do that. Just click on the “Reply” button and type a short message.

Quick Tip: Remember that content is the currency of social media. We build relationships and create our identities by sharing articles, blog posts, infographics, and videos. Use content to educate and entertain your fellow Twitter users.

For more tips on breaking the ice with prospects, download these templates.

Know How @ Tweets Work

When I hit the “Reply” icon in Twitter, my message automatically begins with @TwitterUsername. If I want to have a private-ish conversation with someone, you want to begin your tweet with @TwitterUsername. Here’s an example:

I said “private-ish” because it’s not entirely private.

Most people won’t see this tweet that I’m composing to Henry Nothhaft, Jr., one of the Co-Founders of Trapit. Only people who follow both me and Henry would find this tweet in their main timeline.

If you want everyone to see your tweets, don’t start your tweet with the @ symbol.

In other words, I can make my tweet visible to all my followers – while still engaging with Henry. I simply have to put Henry’s Twitter handle later in the post:

Henry and all my followers will see this post in their timeline.

Understand Twitter Lingo

Since Twitter users have only 140 characters to leverage, they frequently resort to acronyms. Here are a few common acronyms that you will see:

RT: Retweet – Used when you repost someone else’s tweet.

MT: Modified Tweet – Used if you are retweeting something, but you want to modify the text in a small way. In the following example, you can see that Niki wanted to add some commentary, so she modified Bill’s original tweet to shorten it:

Here’s the original tweet, which Niki changed slightly:

ICYMI: In Case You Missed It – Used if you want to repost content again. Due to the rapid pace of the Twitter timeline, it’s likely that many people won’t see your tweet the first time. Use “ICYMI” to tweet the content again.

TBT: Throwback Thursday – Used for showing old photos and posts on Thursdays.

HT: Heard Through or Hat Tip – Used to give credit to person who tipped you off to something.

Compose Tweets between 120 and 130 Characters

Data scientist Dan Zarella has found the sweet spot on Twitter. If you want people to engage with your tweets, make sure that your posts are between 120 and 130 characters.

Besides being optimal from a statistical perspective, this general guidelines is practical, as well. If you want people to retweet your content, you need to give them some space to do so.

Let’s say that your followers want to reshare the last article that you posted. Your original post was 140 characters, the maximum number of characters allotted for Tweets. The article was so good that people want to reshare it.

To add “RT @username:” at the beginning of the tweet, the user has to shorten or modify your tweet in some way. This makes their life more difficult, and people like things to be simple, especially if they are trying to type on their mobile phones.

Use Private Twitter Lists to Monitor Your Prospects

Once you begin to follow people on Twitter, you can quickly become overwhelmed. How do you decide what to read? How do you keep track of everything people are saying?

Consider creating lists. Lists are a way of grouping users together so that you can see the group’s posts at one time.

You might create a list for the influential people in your industry. You might create a list for prospects. You might create another list for your customers. Then, you can read all the influencers’ tweets at one time, all your prospects’ tweets at another time, and all your customers’ tweets at another time.

Be careful as you create your lists. Twitter users will receive a notification when you add them to a public list. If you don’t want Twitter users to know that you’re prospecting them, don’t add them to a public list called “My Prospects.” Create a private one.

To create a private list, click on your profile icon in the top right, and pull down to “Lists.”

Then select “Create New List.”

And make sure you select “Private.”

To add people to your list, find the person on Twitter. Click on the gear icon next to the person’s name. Pull down to “Add or Remove from Lists…”

A pop-up will appear, and you can check the lists to which you would like to add your prospect.

To access and monitor your lists, navigate to your lists page from the profile icon in the top right. Pull down to “Lists.”

Then click on your list of potential customers, and you’ll see all their updates. Feel free to respond to a Tweet or two.

But don’t respond to all of them! That will make you look like a creepy stalker! For more directions on interacting with prospects, check out Social Selling 101.

Schedule Your Tweets

Believe it or not, the weekends are a great time to share content on social media. Busy employees finally have a break from meetings, and they can catch up on their Twitter feed.

But perhaps you don’t want to spend your weekends updating Twitter. So, take time on Friday to schedule a few posts over the weekend.

Then again, maybe you don’t want to be active on weekends. Maybe you firmly believe in the five-day work week. No problem. You still should schedule posts.

When it comes to social media, consistency is key. And stopping every hour to write a post is a nuisance. Be active all day by scheduling posts to share. A good social selling tool like Trapit can help you with that.

Whatever you do, don’t…

…spam your followers with hard pitches.

Twitter is not another avenue for pushing your elevator pitch on people. Twitter is about building relationships.

Brands on social media have the 4-1-1 rule. At Trapit, we always aim to post four pieces of content written by others for every one soft promotion (e.g. a link to an e-book download) and for every one hard promotion (e.g. a demo request).

This rule prevents us from exhausting our prospects with pitches and promotions. Instead, it allows us to build trust and educate our audience – without seeming too pushy.

Think of sharing content on social media like going to a dinner party. You don’t want to be the loathsome guest who can speak only about one topic: himself. Yawn.

So, make sure you balance both your company’s branded content, your hard promotions, and other people’s content. A good social selling platform like Trapit will help you do this.

Over to you…

We’ve looked at some general best practices, as well as a few pointers. I hope that they help you as you begin using Twitter to connect with your buyers. Best of luck!

Leave a question in the comments section below if I can help you with your social selling on Twitter.

-Mark

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There are so many things that a sales rep can do on social media. It can be daunting.

But believe it or not, social selling doesn’t have to be overwhelming. There are several quick and easy wins for sales reps. That’s why we put together this list of ways to improve your social selling in under an hour.

Let’s jump in!

1. Tweak Your Twitter Bio

Twitter gives us 160 characters for our biographies. That doesn’t give us much space to capture someone’s attention and gain someone’s trust. So, you have to be a little creative. Here’s a formula you can use:

By listing the things you love, you humanize yourself for your followers, and by listing what you tweet about, you establish your expertise. Moreover, you create a pact with your followers. If they follow you, they will get info on the topics mentioned in your bio.

2. Optimize Your LinkedIn Summary

After your photo and headline on LinkedIn, your summary (i.e. your bio) is the most commonly viewed portion of your profile. If you’re in sales, your LinkedIn profile shouldn’t read like a resume for a hiring manager. Rather, tell your story to a potential customer.

Not sure of the difference? Here’s a simple template you can use:

Here’s an example:

Don’t like this template? HubSpot has created three additional templates you can check out.

3. Check Who’s Following You on Twitter

If you’re using Twitter well, you should attract new followers, many of which can be useful to you. They me be leads, who may want to purchase your product, or they may be industry influencers, who can promote your company to their contacts.

Whatever the case may be, it’s important to actively monitor who’s following you because you never know where your next business opportunity might come from.

Bonus Tip: Follow some of your followers, but don’t feel like you have to follow everyone who follows you. Be judicious. For example, you may want to follow the people who fit your buyer persona.

4. Check “Who’s Viewed My Profile” on LinkedIn

On LinkedIn, you can see who has visited your profile. Admittedly, it’s much easier if you have a paid version of LinkedIn. But if you don’t, you still can gain access to this feature if you select the right viewing settings.

To change your viewing settings so that you can see who’s viewing your profile, go to Privacy & Settings → Manage

→ Click the Privacy Tab → Profile Viewing Options → Choose “Your Name and Headline.”

You can use the “Who’s Viewed My LinkedIn Profile” section to look for potential leads. Do any of your profile visitors sound like potential leads? If so, see how you’re connected to the person and ask for introductions from your LinkedIn connections. If you can’t get a warm introduction but still want to reach out, craft a highly personalized message to the person.

You can also use the “Who’s Viewed My Profile” feature as a source of affirmation. Perhaps you sent a LinkedIn message or email to someone. Check to see if that person followed up by viewing your LinkedIn profile.

5. Follow Your Target Accounts on Social Networks

Maybe you’re new to social selling, or maybe you’ve fallen behind on your social listening. Whatever the case may be, take the time to follow your target accounts on social networks. Look for both the corporate profiles, as well as the social profiles of the individual buying committee members.

On LinkedIn, you can search for company names and people’s names using the search bar at the top of the page:

On Twitter, you can use the search bar at the top of the page, or you can use their advanced search, which you can find here: http://www.twitter.com/search-advanced

In fact, we wrote an entire blog post on how to use Twitter’s advanced search for social selling.

6. Engage with Social Updates from Your Target Accounts

It’s important to research your target accounts on social media. Not sure how? Check out this blog post on social listening for sales reps.

Remember, though, that listening will only get you so far. There comes a time when you need to engage with your prospects and current customers. When you see the opportunity to add value, don’t let it go to waste. Add an insightful comment. Link to a relevant piece of content. That will help you get buyers’ attention. Not only will the poster see your comment, but others will see your comments, too.

7. Dive into Your Analytics

As a social seller, you should share insightful pieces of content on a regular basis. To find out what’s working for you, you need to dive into the numbers. If you’re using a social selling platform like Trapit, you’ll have access to a dashboard of statistics.

If you don’t have Trapit, you can use Twitter’s native analytics here: https://analytics.twitter.com/

If your sales team uses Sales Navigator, you can check your Social Selling Index. But keep in mind that there are some downfalls to the SSI.

8. Reshare a Popular Post

If you share a great piece of content only once, you could be missing out. Your buyers may have missed it the first time, and your new followers may have never seen it. There’s nothing wrong with re-sharing a great piece of content. So, go for it.

9. Read about Your Industry

Top sales reps understand their market and the markets of their buyers. To have better conversations with buyers and to position themselves as trusted advisors, sales reps need to continuously self-educate.

One way to do so is by perusing the conversations related to specific hashtags on Twitter. If you’re looking for hashtags to follow, you might want to check out: http://hashtagify.me/

Additionally, a good social selling platform will continuously surface content about your industry and your prospects. Take the time to stay informed.

What Tips Do You Have?

I hope that you found these quick tips helpful. I’d love to hear if you have any quick tips for boosting your social selling. Leave them in the comments section below.

If not, check out our cheat sheet for social selling. It’s full of more quick tips.

Whether you know it or not, your sales team has a lot of power at their fingertips. By using LinkedIn and Twitter, sales reps can grab the attention of their customers. They can communicate directly with them. They can personalize their interactions. And ultimately, they can use social networks to improve their productivity and generate revenue.

Still not convinced? Here are nine stats that you need to know about social selling.

1. It would take 6,264 cold calls to close 4 deals. (HubSpot)

Is cold calling the most efficient way of generating sales opportunities? Certainly not. So, why do sales and marketing teams keep buying lists and hiring more sales reps to make more cold calls? There’s a better way…

2. 84% of C-level/vice president executives use social media to support purchase decisions. (IDC)

“But my buyers aren’t on social!” That’s one objection that many sales reps raise. Truth be told, sellers won’t know if their buyers are on social until they look. The stats suggest that there are plenty of executives who use LinkedIn and Twitter to inform their buying decisions. So, it’s worth a try, isn’t it?

3. Top social sellers have 45% more opportunities per quarter than social selling laggards. (LinkedIn)

Wining and dining customers is sexy. Compared to an evening at a trendy restaurant, engaging buyers on LinkedIn and Twitter doesn’t sound as sexy, but social selling does pay off. Every quarter, the best social sellers always have more deals in their pipeline.

4. Social sellers realize 66% greater quota attainment than those using traditional selling techniques. (Sales Benchmark Index)

Of course, pipeline is only part of the battle for salespeople. The real question is this: Does a social seller’s pipeline turn into revenue? Ladies and gentlemen, it does. Social sellers are far more likely to hit their numbers than those who are cold calling. Investing in a social selling program does pay off!

5. The single most powerful behavior separating top sales performers from core performers is using social media as a critical channel to engage customers and generate leads. (CEB)

Here’s a chart summarizing what the Corporate Executive Board found:

6. IBM used social selling to boost sales by 400%, and they did it in one quarter. (IBM)

Some sales leaders worry about “burdening” salespeople with another task. They fear that social selling will distract sales reps, and it will take too long to implement a strategy.

If it takes you months or years to implement a social selling strategy, you’re doing it wrong. Perhaps you need to rethink your training, as well as your vendor selection. In one quarter, IBM saw a 400% increase in sales.

7. Buyers with larger budgets are more likely to use social media. Typically, their budgets are 84% bigger. (IDC)

Social sellers outperform traditional sales reps because they are able to engage buyers earlier in the buyer’s journey. Furthermore, sales reps on social are more likely to encounter buyers with bigger budgets. Anyone sales rep who has BANTed someone knows that that’s important.

In the IBM case study (see number six), content played a key role. IBM sales representatives shared a mixture of internal (company-created) and external (third-party) content.

Content is the grease in the social machine. It’s how people interact. It’s how sellers establish expertise. It’s how account executives come across as more helpful and less salesy. It’s how sales reps don’t scare away buyers.

Social selling doesn’t work if you’re pitching your product. Use educational content instead.

9. 89% of buyers turn away if the sales professional doesn’t have insights or knowledge about their business. (LinkedIn)

The ABCs of sales (always be closing) have changed. The best sellers spend time understanding their buyers. And once they understand their buyers, they offer insights to their buyers. That’s the formula for sales success – whether it is on social or elsewhere.

Are You Ready?

Now is the perfect time to start planning your social selling program. These stats show why social selling works, how it works, and what buyers are looking for on social networks.

If you’re ready to get started, grab a copy of our social selling workbook, and start planning your strategy!

Posted byMark Bajus

Social media is great, isn’t it? It can help increase business. It can help build brand awareness. And it can help differentiate your business from your competitors.

To maximize their use of social media, sales professionals must know what kind of content resonates with their prospects, and they must become reliable, trustworthy sources of information.

In a recent webinar, Patricia Hume of Trapit and Victor Gaxiola of Hearsay Social explained how your marketing and sales teams can leverage content marketing to build brand awareness, engage with prospects, and close deals.

Below, you’ll find 9 fantastic quotes from the webinar, as well as a replay of the event. Best of luck on social media!

9 Great Quotes from the Webinar

Victor Gaxiola: “It is not enough for an organization to rest completely on their own branded content. If you’re an insurance company or a financial services organization, yeah, you create content. But if that’s all your distributed teams are sharing, it can come across as corporate spam.”

Patricia Hume: “What kind of content works best for social business? It depends on your audience, and it depends on what kind of relationship you’re trying to establish. Content can start to help build a trusting relationship, and I would go as far as to say a friendship.”

Victor Gaxiola: “What I love about social is the ability to scale it. If this one article could benefit this one client, I probably have dozens of other clients who could benefit from the exact same information.”

Victor Gaxiola: “When you are faced against what I call ‘financial noise’ –The Suze Ormans and the Jim Cramers and the very loud, broadcast-oriented content sources – the advisor has the responsibility to curate and differentiate content that is interesting. Only that advisor is going to know what’s interesting because they know their clients best.”

Victor Gaxiola: “All content that you share on social needs to be respectful of your audience. Your audience has selected to follow you. You have to make sure that you don’t abuse that privilege of providing good content and information. The 4 Es ensure that your content will do one of four things: Educate, Enrich, Engage, or Entertain.”

Patricia Hume: “Customers aren’t just looking for branded content. They are looking for the 4 Es to be present so that they feel like they want to return to your content, and then your brand becomes the place they go. And they rely on you to be entertaining and to be educational. That’s the difference between a good brand and a great brand these days.”

Patricia Hume: “When you think about your content, think about where your customer is in his or her buying cycle. There’s content that should be shared at the beginning of the development of a relationship–perhaps about an industry trend. And as you develop a relationship with that person and as you move them down the pipeline, there’s a point where it’s important to introduce more about your brand.”

Victor Gaxiola: “I think of social media as a cocktail party. You don’t go to a cocktail party or a networking event and just start shoving your business card in people’s faces.”

Victor Gaxiola: “Just having a presence on social media isn’t enough. You have to add value by sharing content.“

Want More?

Listen to the full broadcast!

Interested in learning more about Trapit?

Request a 15-minute demo of our platform!

There are two types of marketers: the “big picture” people and the “details” people. The former loves thinking about overall strategy, while the latter gets a thrill from the nitty-gritty tactical side of things.

You can identify these types based on their choice of writing medium. The strategy people love a freshly cleaned whiteboard that’s just waiting to be scribbled upon. The tactical people delight in breaking the spine of a new notebook and scrawling the perfect to do list.

Every marketing organization needs both notebookers and whiteboarders. Without the whiteboarders, you wouldn’t have a vision, and without the notebookers, nothing would get done because you wouldn’t have a workflow – a repeatable pattern of tasks – that support your overall content marketing vision.

In this post, we’ll address those repeatable tasks that support the whiteboarders’ visions. Specifically, we’ll look at nine ways your workflow can go awry.

Whiteboarders, use this post to understand why your team isn’t realizing your vision. And notebookers, use this post to troubleshoot your team’s workflow, looking for areas of weakness.

Problem 1: You haven’t defined your ideal audience.

Imagine this: A new marketing team member writes a thoughtful, witty post for your blog. After he sends it to the blog’s editor, she writes back, “I enjoyed reading your post, but it’s not a good fit for our site.”

Not only does the blogger feel slighted, but he just wasted 6 hours of his workday writing a piece that can’t be used without major changes.

In editorial processes, the idea of “fit” often overlaps with the idea of audience. Quite simply, a post that is a good “fit” for a blog means that it will resonate with the blog’s audience, and a post that is not a good fit will not resonate with your audience.

Take some time to define the ideal audience for your content. You can save your marketing team time and effort in doing so. Use this worksheet to help:

Problem 2: Your content distribution strategy doesn’t exist.

Your team just created a blog post that will solve a huge problem for your potential buyers. Kudos! But no one will appreciate the post if no one sees it.

You need a content distribution strategy. That is, you need a documented plan that indicates where you will share content and how often.

Not all marketing channels are created equal. Marketing teams should consider speaking with potential customers to see which channels they are using. Alternatively, they can make some educated guesses about where their potential customers will be. For instance, in the B2B space, chances are good that LinkedIn is a good fit.

Once marketers select their channels, they need to be patient and wait to see if their plan is working. It’s easy to say, “Well, we spent a month on Twitter, but nothing came of it. Clearly, Twitter doesn’t work.”

To help you choose your channels, you should download our content curation workbook.

Problem 3: You haven’t created an internal flowchart for your content.

Your content marketing machine can break down at several points.

Let’s say that you discover a great article that mentions your company, and you want your social media team to share it. Do you have a way to pass that article onto your social media team?

Or imagine that your content team has created a great e-book. Does your sales team know about the e-book? Can they easily share it with prospects?

To resolve these internal problems, you need to understand how your content flows from one marketer to the next and from one team to the next. Here’s an example of one paradigm:

You can read more about three ways to structure your internal content workflows here.

Problem 4: You haven’t assigned roles and tasks.

Who is supposed to respond to tweets? Facebook messages? LinkedIn comments?

Which team member is tasked with thinking of ideas for your blog? Writing your blog posts? Editing them?

Tasks can easily slip through the cracks if your team does not have clearly defined roles. In turn, your marketing workflow can easily break down. To remedy this problem, assign tasks and task owners for each marketing campaign.

Here’s a sample template that you can use for your company’s blog:

Problem 5: Deadlines, schmedlines.

You’ve created a brilliant marketing campaign that centers on an e-book. This e-book promises to be so helpful and so creative that it is guaranteed to bring in twice as many leads as your other lead generation techniques.

But there it sits – a forgotten idea on your white board.

Your head writer promises to get around to it “soon,” while the rest of your marketing and sales team was counting on that asset. And you’re concerned, as well. You need the e-book to generate enough leads for your content.

So, what do you do? Before you fire your head writer, you have to ask yourself if you set clear expectations. Did you set a definitive deadline in your meeting and remind your content producer of it? If you didn’t, maybe it is time to set clear deadlines for your team.

For every marketing initiative, write out the steps that need to be completed and the order in which they should be completed. Then, go about assigning tasks to team members. Finally, come to an agreement about when each tasks hould be due.

Under problem number four, you can find an example.

Problem 6: Where art thou, content?

Did you know that only 30% of B2B content actually gets used?

Let that sink in.

70% of B2B content on the internet is wasted.

Part of them problem is that your customer-facing employees cannot find the content. To increase the findability of your content, you need to create a content marketing library, where you can:

• Share your company’s content
• Find and curate great third-party content
• Attach pre-approved marketing messages to the blog posts, e-books, templates, slide decks, etc.
• Assign roles and permissions that determine:Who can write messagesWho can add to the libraryWho can share content from the library

Problem 7: You can’t create enough content.

So, you’ve determined who your buyers are. You know where they are hanging out online. You’ve devised a content distribution strategy. And all your team members on the same page regarding their roles, tasks, and deadlines.

But what if you can’t create enough content? To keep your workflow going and to keep your audience happy, you need a steady stream of content.

For many marketers, that’s a problem. The Aberdeen Group has found that 68% of marketers are unable to create enough content to satiate their audience.

If you’re part of the 68%, you need a platform that enables you to discover and curate third-party content – not just distribute content. A good content marketing platform will help you find content that will position your company and its employees as trustworthy sources of information.

Problem 8: Your team doesn’t have a feedback loop.

For some content marketers, the workflow ends when they publish a landing page, a Facebook post, or a blog post. They hit “publish,” cross their fingers, and hope that people look at their stuff.

They forget to dive into their analytics and use those numbers to improve their content marketing. Picture the lifecycle of your content as a circle. Something like this:

Once your brand has published its content and once your employee advocates have amplified your content, then, you need to analyze its performance.

Is your content resonating with your audience? Are they clicking on it? Are they sharing it? Are they reading it? Are they leaving comments?

Take those numbers and draw actionable insights for your marketing team members. Maybe you find that no one looks at your infographics. So, maybe you shouldn’t spend 15 hours creating one.

Or maybe you find that your potential customers can’t get enough of your quizzes. Maybe you should make more of those.

Or maybe your blog posts that curate industry news are your most popular posts. But your new Director of Content Marketing wants to cut those posts from the editorial calendar. Is that a really good idea?

Without continuous analysis and feedback for your creators and curators, the performance of your content marketing will not improve. At best, there will be a few lucky “hits” among many “misses.” But more likely than not, your content marketing program will never take off.

Problem 9: Your team uses too many applications.

In January of 2014, there were 947 companies in the marketing technology space. By January of 2015, that number almost doubled to 1,876 companies.

Every marketing task has its own application. When you think about it, it’s kind of impressive.

But it’s spectacularly inefficient, too. If your employees have to toggle between too many applications, your workflow will slow down, and your productivity will come to a crawl. Research shows that 57% of workplace interruptions come from electonic distractions, including flipping between applications.

This poses a unique problem for marketers. Not only must they streamline their org charts. They must also streamline their technology. They need a small number of tools that enable their team to do more.

If you’re looking to streamline your content marketing workflow…

You should check out Trapit. Our product makes content marketing easy and can help solve your content marketing workflow problems.

Additional Resources: