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Digital Marketing Strategy, PR and Messaging

Soulati-'TUDE!

I Married My Blog

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wedding-bouquet.jpgThis is a true story. I finally found my soul mate, and it wasn’t the opposite sex or even the same sex for that matter. It is my blog; hands down.

This blog, named ever so rightly as Soulati-‘TUDE!, is approaching a birthday in March. It is turning the big 4, not the big 4-0, but the big 4. I’d hasten a guess that four years of straight blogging as a professional is akin to the big 4-0. You know, something like cats have nine lives or dog years are longer than one human year.

My blog has become:

  • My obsession (it tells me to write without even speaking)
  • My OCD (I have to write or else I succumb to the next bullet)
  • My guilt
  • My happiness (I’m thrilled when I know I’ve written a winner)
  • My sadness (I’m gloomy when I need a break and then force myself to write)
  • My investment (Uhmm, yeah, time is money)
  • My professionalism (It defines my read next bullet and competency)
  • My brand marketing (Indeed)
  • My influence building (Writing gives me influence, right?)
  • My authority (The content I write builds authority, authenticity and thus creates influence)
  • My emotion (Agony, pride, laughter, happiness as above)
  • My daily activity and neglect (It’s a totally consuming)
  • My love (Right?)

I am totally immersed eye-deep in this blog after 650+ posts, 10,000+ comments and four years of lessons to navigate the complexity and rewards of professional blogging. Add all the guest posting I’ve done and NOT captured here, and that post tally is likely up to 700 now.

Is It Time For A Divorce?

Do you think all marriages end in divorce? There’s a great piece of data somewhere that supports something like that, I’m sure. For a blogger to divest herself from blogging, the outcome would be much like a divorce – extreme sadness, too much time on hands, where to write and about what, how to keep the brand front and center and alive, and how to share with a community that’s invisible yet not.

After four years of blogging, I’ve learned this:

• I have mastered the content strategy – my content is my craft, and it’s NOT an echo chamber at all, ever.
• Data and analytics continue to plague me because I’m a creative, presenting creations via words for everyone to see.
• Digital marketing is more challenging than one thinks, and I’m unhappy having to make it happen.
• I write my best work for others and love guest posting for the ability to showcase talent in another’s house or use a different voice than how I pen for me.

Rocky Start to 2014

I’ve not been posting much; first time ever, and can’t say the guilt has consumed me…yet. This break was unplanned and it was necessary. As I continue to ponder what it means to be married to my blog, I came to the understanding that MY BLOG OWNS ME. It is in charge, top dog, drives the ship, dictates decisions and eats my money. But, with every unbalanced marriage where one partner holds the upper hand, there is some balance of give and take and partnership, too.

In this partnership of four years that is truly 10, I married my blog and continue to work through the kinks and experience every growing pain and emotion, whether happy or sad. One day soon, we will make money together (we’re already making music) and add more variations of bread for the table loaf by loaf. As blog and blogger continue to evolve, inspiration comes from bread crumbs and eventually loaves are baked until it becomes a bakery.

You know, If You Give A Mouse A Cookie.

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The Happy Friday Series: The Happiness Crusade

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Arminda_Lindsay.jpgOn the AllArminda blog, Arminda Lindsay wrote a post Oct. 23, 2013 sharing this story below about launching her happiness crusade. I extrapolate that blog post right her and make Arminda the subject of this Happy Friday Series. P.S. You can also find her writings at YumVeg.com where vegan food and cooking are her delight.

I had the distinct pleasure of meeting Arminda IRL at ConvergeSouth where I had the opportunity to keynote the content marketing track of that conference. During that time, she permitted me the opportunity to corral her into doing a Soulati Media On The Street (below).

(What I love about this post is that I get to combine my two faves into one — The Happy Friday Series and Soulati Media On The Street!)

Since our face-to-face, we’ve had a session during which we spoke about the journey from personal to professional blogger, and she’s received some homework to rocket launch her goals. I love this woman’s heart and spirit, watch and listen:

Arminda Lindsay Says:

On February 13, 2012, I started a 21-day “dopamine challenge” titled Creating Positive. Many of you joined me in that initiative (and it’s not too late to get started) because happiness is year-round and a lifetime journey. While there have been many changes in my life since I first penned that post, one thing is for sure: my heart is still full of gratitude. It’s so full that I keep writing out more and more.

My list is growing and I’m filling up notebooks. Pages and pages of things for which I’m grateful and/or that make me smile and bring me happiness. My list is very personal and unique to my life, as is your list. This is the reason I can pick up one of my notebooks and open to any page and start reading through my list and immediately begin to smile as I am instantly transported to another day, place, and moment in time that ignited a spark of joy in my heart.

Shawn Achor (whose TED Talk inspired me to start my own challenge) writes in his book The Happiness Advantage that

“. . . our attitudes and behaviors don’t only infect the people we interact with directly — like our colleagues, friends, and families — but that each individual’s influence actually appears to extend to people within three degrees. So when you. . . make positive changes in your own life, you are unconsciously shaping the behavior of an incredible number of people. . . . [T]here are nearly 1,000 people within three degrees of most of us. This is a true ripple effect — by trying to make ourselves happier and more successful, we actually have the ability to improve the lives of 1,000 people around us” (p201).

That’s empowering. To me, at least. And I love that by embracing the life I live I have the potential within me to positively impact the lives of thousands of other people. Thousands.

I can’t wait for happiness to find me like some elusive carrot forever dangling at the end of its proverbial stick. You will never reach it if that’s your aim. Your “I’ll be happy when _________ ” will forever evade you.

“Waiting to be happy limits our brain’s potential for success, whereas cultivating positive brains makes us more motivated, efficient, resilient, creative, and productive, which drives performance upward” (Achor 4).

Motivation? Efficiency? Resilience? Creativity? Productivity? Yes, please!

Happiness is now. Happiness is your choice. Happiness is within you.

Come on my happiness crusade and create positive in your life today, tomorrow and always! Will you join me?

Branding Versus Monetizing A Blog

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coupons.jpgThere’s a solid distinction between branding yourself via a blog and monetizing a blog. In various conversations of late, I’ve grown to understand that difference and would like to share here.

Before I do, let me also share that I’m a late blogger bloomer. There are many, many others doing this in their sleep and who may also have the privilege of surrounding themselves with a team of accomplished experts.

As a core public relations solo professional, my skill set is in earned media, owned media and shared media – not digital marketing. That, in HubSpot school, I’ve had to learn on my own.

It’s resonating.

The goal of any professional blogger is residual income; earning cash via a blog on a consistent basis until you become rich, rich, rich!

Monetization Is Elusive

And, this quest is so very elusive.

When you first jump in to blogging it is not and never can be about monetization.

For the first two solid years, all you’re doing is building a solid brand as an influencer. Perhaps it takes you three years to do that. The goal, even though you never stated it outright, is to earn a reputable brand as a professional blogger so that others pay attention, maybe hire you, and at the very least, they read your meat when you post.

Are you nodding your head? Hope so, because ultimately that brand you’ve powered up contributes to the methodology with which you will eventually monetize.

I’m working on a post I hope to turn into an infographic about what I just mentioned above. It paints the visual timeline of this progression, and sets some expectation (from my experience only) for those in the midst of professional blogging and wondering what’s next.

I’m going to use my friend Tim Bonner again as an example. He was so transparent to share how he has found a way to monetize online. No, I didn’t say he was monetizing his blog! Tim stated clearly that his blog has never made a single English pound. I concur!

My blog is set up to build a brand. Only this year in year three of blogging have calls to action and landing pages been added so peeps can purchase my first book, Writing with Verve on the Blogging Journey.

Back to Tim. As a stay-at-home daddy to two toddlers, Tim has found time to research the best way to earn cash. His first attempt failed, but his second is successful and on the uptick.

Niche Blogging/Specialty Sites

Tim built a niche site (his second) on a topic and product he selected from Click Bank. It’s oriented directly to toddlers about two-to-three years of age (both genders). It’s also a topic Tim has knowledge of and a passion for; thus, he could write about 10 blog posts on the topic and insert said product into the niche site and BAM! After a month of wondering whether this was a bust, traffic began to build and sales happened. Tim’s profit is about $400; nothing to sneeze at as hosting a website costs nothing near that, and Tim’s time is devoted to being a parent and building his online business.

Maybe your niche can be about selling popular movies, cell phone accessories or electronics.

I love Tim’s story, and I do want you to check Tim’s blog out here; he writes about tech and more cool topics – all things he’s learned since being confined to quarters as a dadpreneur.

Do you understand the differentiators here?

Your primary blog will not make money outright; that’s not what it’s for.

Your niche site will; that’s what it’s for. You select a product with which you have a connection and build, test, rebuild, sit back, earn a bit here and there, reset, and gain your stride.

Simple? NO! Nothing is simple.

Either of these avenues – branding and/or monetization take immense commitment. To be successful you need to pull it out from the depths of your toes and work it every single day. People will understand what’s happening because stars are born every day; you just don’t know it’s going to be you until it is!

Who’s Monetizing Online?

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happy-sad-mask.jpgEvery day another someone from a really cool company, blog, blogging community, organization, or other network asks me to write for them, speak to them, brainstorm about the exchange of content, consider paying a fee to join a network, or hawk a product pitched from the far reaches of Russia and India.

And, I rarely say no because who knows what doors may open as a result of that opportunity?

What’s happening is my stretch is thinning dangerously. The offers are ubiquitous, and as a starter, I’m jazzed about what’s new and next. They say a sucker is born every minute; perhaps you’re reading one right now.

But, I can’t think like that. What I’m doing by accommodating most everyone’s requests is building a brand that appears to be #RockHot solid, so I’m told. It feels that way to me, as well. And, here’s the elusive question:

Who’s Monetizing?

The answer is…few.

  • My friend Tim Bonner, a UK stay-at-home dad, informed me recently he made $300 on his niche site. Not sure what he’s hawking, but I informed him in a tweet I was envious. I’ve also watched his meteoric rise from being a sometime daddy blogger to a snappy smart tech geek blogger who experiments with Google do-not-follow links and writes about it. Awesome.
  • I know my friend Jon Buscall, CEO of Jontus Media in Sweden, is an extraordinarily busy podcaster and dad to a gazillion Basset hounds. He has earned cash recommending podcasting equipment and selling it via an Amazon affiliate program.
  • In that same program, I made about $10 once, and I also was pitched to run a blog post on another blog for $75. My first book, Writing with Verve on the Blogging Journey (you can buy it on Kindle for $3.95), is a collection of blog posts about my favorite topic of blogging brought in $85 from the publisher (who took a cut after Amazon took a cut). That’s truly the extent of my monetization.
  • I know that SpinSucks Pro requires membership, and really good content is sold to folks on SpinSucks. People can register or buy into a webinar for $50 to hear professional speakers on professional topics. Good on them.

But, I want to know who’s truly monetizing huge?

All of the peeps above come from the content/traditional marketing and PR realm. The ability to monetize takes knowledge of API and back ends, building and programming of websites, addition of shopping carts and management of digital marketing calls to action, forms and landing pages.

Do you have all that knowledge under your hat?

Nope, didn’t think so.

The Conundrum of Monetization

That’s the conundrum of late. We who can develop the substance and slap a price tag on it need the techies to join the team and figure out the platform on which to sell the products. Recall I said Tim Bonner earned money on his “niche” site.

What that means is Tim found a specialty topic or product, developed a new site oriented to that product and began to sell. His earning potential is in its earliest stages; however, he’s found the methodology and hopefully the product to keep on with residual income.

Digital Marketing Is An Answer

I see many of these passive income bloggers who started way early building an email list. Their lists are massive of trusting individuals who came to their site for some reason or another. When another product is hawked, that list of trustworthy and hopefully loyal community members are more inclined to make a second purchase. All of a sudden, that network of thousands is buying everything hawked by that trusted figurehead.

To make this happen, you need knowledge of digital marketing; inbound marketing as HubSpot calls it. I’ve been in HubSpot school all year. As a solopreneur, the ability to do it all is daunting; the time and knowledge and effort it takes to learn new things is terribly exciting, however extremely fatal to making a living the traditional way – with a handshake and results-driven pure work on behalf of a client.

Monetization Requires A Team

I’ve come to realize I don’t have what it takes to monetize alone. I need to build a team with a tech pro who can help program a site (a simple WordPress site is all we need), a digital marketer who can manage and nurture the list, design the calls to action and add them as widgets in the sidebar of the site, write the landing pages, and consult on that back-end of the site.

The most critical part of the team is one who builds the products and content to bring in the cash. That’s me. If I could free myself up to truly concentrate on product development and trust my team was standing by to facilitate their ends of the triangle, we’d be golden.

So, who’s on board?

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Target Buyer Persona When Writing

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mona-lisa-cubs-soulati.jpgWhen you invest in digital marketing school via HubSpot, as I have, what you’re told out of the gate is to know your buyer persona. Now that I understand that phrase better, it makes perfect sense. Quite simply, you need to understand the characteristics and demographic of the person most likely to hire your services.

Define Buyer Persona

What’s not as simple as defining buyer persona is writing to meet those criteria every day. To get there, you have to take a hard, introspective look:

What is your purpose writing blog posts every day, three times weekly or once per week?

If, when you look at a blank screen and see only obligation and weariness, then perhaps your spark for blogging has dimmed.

Instead of looking inward at only you, think about your audience. But, first, think about your business goals.

Bloggers have two paths to take when taking up the virtual pen:

  • Be a personal blogger and write to share about families, travel, school, emotion, etc.
  • Become a professional blogger where content is king and drives your business ROI.

It’s not easy making the leap. When a blogger writes solid and educational content with genuine authority on a highly consistent basis, that’s when things begin to happen.

Write For An Unknown Audience

How do you get there from here? You put yourself in the shoes of your buyer, reader, customer, prospect. What sorts of writing do you think your unknown audience wants from you?

You need to be developing #RockHot content every day; it’s imperative to ensure you’re climbing the rungs of the never-ending ladder.
Each of us who has been blogging more than three years consistently and has a goal to optimize a blog for monetization (the elusive), knows there’s a steep learning curve to the next plateau. To differentiate, it’s up to you to deliver content oriented to the reader you have never met.

The content you craft has to answer the question, “Does this blog post entice a total stranger to pay attention to my writing?”
Let’s get back to the buyer persona thing for a minute. In my view, keeping my target audience top of mind when blogging is a challenge. I have an incredible community built over time who are at varying stages of business success, who are personal friends, who are bloggers, who are business owners, and who are not likely to hire my services.

Here’s the rub…for all the people you know in your community, there are five handfuls of people you don’t know. It is these lurkers and occasional readers whom you want to lure back every day you post content.

If you’ve determined the characteristics and demographics of that occasional reader and defined your buyer persona, then perhaps the content you craft for your blog can be tailored to that group of people.

Switching gears to write for the buyer is a challenge for me.

Everything I read, every conversation I have, and each time I listen provides blog fodder for me. Because I want to teach and share my passion and enthusiasm for what I do, writing content to earn new business is where I struggle.

I’m working on it; trying to make the total leap to being a solidly successful business blogger who is regarded for authoritative content. Right now, the rocky path I’m on is exactly right. No one said a learning curve is without a detour, and I need to keep reminding myself that it’s OK to stay true to your school.

What about you…any hot tips to share about why you blog and how you regard your audience?