Check this blog out!!

Since I started as co-chair for the marketing SIG I have been exposed to an onslaught of information on marketing - how surprising.

Being a nerd of sorts and not used to taking things at face value I set out to make sense of all this information, by doing the one thing that we nerds do when we need to learn something new. I went to the library, checked out a hefty stack of books and set out to read them all. The reading material was very nice and educational but something was missing, there was no excitement in their writing. None of the pleasure that a live person makes you feel when they speak to you about the subject that is close to their hearts.

I figured I have a better chance of finding something like that in blogs about specific marketing subjects. This way I could pick out the ones I was interested in faster. Right now, after doing my blog research, one of the blogs that I enjoy reading tremendously is Seth Goldin’s blog (http://sethgodin.typepad.com/ ). In my opinion it is very well written, very informative, very concise and always up to date with amazing insights - exactly what I was looking for.

To conclude my long intro and the short point that I made. Books are great if you know what you want to read. If you are new to the subject picking a bunch of books may prove a disappointment and drive you away. Find a good blog (pick your own criteria for what constitutes a good blog) and go on from there. I hope that my blog pick will help you lay one more brick in your brick path to a successful marketing career.

Social Media Marketing Best Practices

Meeting Preview
SDForum Marketing SIG April meeting - 4/13/09
By: Mark Helfen


Your marketing job is likely to completely change over the next two years, as social media becomes an ever larger part of the marketing mix. So says Sudha Jamthe, who will speak at the next Monday's SIG meeting, helping you get ahead of the curve.

I spoke briefly to Jamthe about her upcoming talk. She said that social media - Linkedin, Facebook, and Twitter among others - will become an increasingly important part of your job in marketing. A "social media mix" to add to the marketing mix.

"But only a handful of people know this. You should be one of them."

She believes that the combination of Web 2.0, and the new social media tools will change every role in marketing - product management and marketing, corporate communications, public relations, and the rest.

Jamthe works as a consultant to companies like Intuit, AOL, and Bebo, helping create a social media strategy in their marketing campaigns. She finds that customers are ahead of her clients in using products like Facebook and Twitter.

"Its more ubiquitous than people think," she said. Most of the marketing people she works with are knowledgeable about Linkedin. But her clients are "blown away" by what their customers are already doing, telling her "they had no idea that they can to that."

Jamthe's bio describes her as "passionate about social media," so I asked her what drove her interest.

She said the social media bug bit her about two and a half years ago. As a marketer, she likes to engage in conversations with customers. Before, she could only speak them at specific times - events, meetings, phone calls.

Now she can be connected all the time, and really get to know people. It takes the conversation to the "next level."

Like all good social media marketers, Jamthe has lots of ways to reach her:

A blog: http://coolastory.com
Linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/in/sujamthe
Facebook: http://sujamthe.socialtoo.com
Twitter: http://twitter.com/sujamthe

You can read more details about the meeting here

Getting in the spirit of the topic, I guess I should also show the following for ME....

Linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/in/markhelfen
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/people/Mark-Helfen/1423354725
Twitter: http://twitter.com/mark_helfen

Happy tweeting......




---
Mark Helfen is a Marketing Consultant and Freelance Writer. He can be reached at mhelfen@wordpixel.com

Upcoming meetings - April 13 and April 20

This month, the SDForum Marketing SIG will have two meetings.

On April 13, at our regular meeting, Sudha Jamthe will speak on the topic:

Social Media Marketing Best Practices


And on April 20, the Marketing SIG will co-host a meeting with the Startup SIG:

Strategic Pricing for Start-ups, New Products and Innovations

I will try to post additional information on both of these meetings over the next week, but in the meantime mark you calendar.

You can see more information on the SDForum meeting schedule at the SDForum calendar





Mark Helfen
mhelfen@wordpixel.com

Photos from the March meeting

Here are a few photos from our March meeting, courtesy of SIG co-chair Filomena U.

Write a book for fun and profit

Meeting report

SDForum Marketing SIG March meeting - 3/9/09

By: Mark Helfen

You may have thought that writing a book was a difficult task, taking months or years to complete, with little chance of ever getting it published and even less chance of making the effort pay off.

But at the SDForum March meeting, Mitchell Levy painted an entirely different picture.

According to Levy, CEO of Happy About Publishing, the correct thought process is that writing a book will help you gain credibility and drive customers to your service, consulting business, or company. A book you can write in as little in a few weeks to a few months.

If you have a reasonably good idea and marketing plan, Happy About will be happy to publish it for you.

“A book is the number one tool for a person or company to drive business,” said Levy.

The difference in thinking starts with Happy About’s business strategy. According to Levy, most publishers have a “venture capital” model – they fund a number of attempts with the objective that at least a few are “home runs” – very profitable books.

But Levy isn’t looking for home runs. He’s satisfied if “every book is a single.” A book can turn a profit if it sells between 200 and 300 copies. While the author can make money from the book, Levy prefers that they think of it as a form of business development.

Levy claims that being a published author gets the same credibility as getting a PhD, but faster and with much less work.

Getting Started

So if you think you want to be a published author, what is Levy looking for? If you send him an email (see below) he will respond with an outline of the marketing plan he needs. But he summarized with three main points.

1. You have credible expertise in the topic you want to write about. Someone reading a short biography would believe that you have enough knowledge to write your book.

2. You can write a good book. It doesn’t have to be a great book, just a good book. Or, as Levy phrased it, at least good enough so “it doesn’t suck.”

3. You have a marketing plan that will sell at least 200-300 copies.

The first part of your marketing plan is to purchase the first 100 of those copies, a requirement. Happy About is not a subsidy or vanity publisher, where the author pays for and buys all of the books - they invest their own money in the project. But authors do have some financial skin in the game – about $1000 for those 100 copies. Authors pay about half the list price, which is usually around $20.

If you don’t have 100 clients, prospects, or business partners to who you could either give away the book at no charge and gain resulting business, or who would pay for the book, you might not be a prospect for Happy About’s publishing program. But Levy’s entire premise is that the credibility you gain will pay this amount back many times over.

The rest get sold, either by you, directly by Happy About at their web site, or on Amazon. You promote this channel by a combination of public speaking, blogging, or being active on social media sites like Linkedin or Facebook. If you want to sell off your own web site, Happy About has the tools to allow you to do this. Their strategy is to do “print on demand,” so there is no inventory to carry.

You might make money from books sales – Levy claims that 80 to 90 percent of what he publishes turns a profit. But your principle objective should be the credibility you gain as a published author, and how a book can fit into your overall marketing plan. Writing your book will typically take 50 to 150 hours, or about 1 hour a page from start to finish.

So… pick a topic you are passionate about, fill out Happy About’s proposal and marketing plan, and start writing. I hope to see you interviewed on national TV in the near future…..

Happy About’s web site is here. Take a look at their range of titles for an idea of what they publish.

Levy’s email address is: mitchell.levy@happyabout.info, where you can request a copy of “Happy About Author Questions” to get your proposal started. ---

Mark Helfen is a Marketing Consultant and Freelance Writer. He can be reached at mhelfen@wordpixel.com