In case you haven’t noticed, the trend today in marketing is going one way. Back to the roots. Now if you’re like me you question things, and you ask yourself: “What the hell are the roots?” In my perspective there’s one root to any form of marketing. It doesn’t matter if you’re using social media for marketing, if you’re using print, TV ads, whatever.

When I look at marketing I tend to try to ask myself one question:

What is the value of what I’m giving these people?

This seems like a fairly straight forward question. But the reality is so many marketers aren’t answering this question. It doesn’t matter if you choose Facebook, Twitter, a Blog, etc. You absolutely must provide some sort of value to your consumer.

As an online marketing dude, specifically my blog – I know that the value I attempt to provide is knowledge value. The ability to give my readers the opportunity to think about what they’re doing in their online marketing strategies.

So I ask you if you’re reading this, to leave a comment and tell me: What value are you giving your blog readers, your consumers?

Image Credit – James Cridland

In the past 3 years, every job interview I have had has been one that I’ve either known the person through Twitter, or I had at least found the job opening through Twitter. The power, reach and possibilities that being able to seek information on Twitter gives any internet user is – to say the least – Amazing. When using only Twitter, I usually will tend to take two approaches, both of which are as effective. However, one is much more personal and probably better off for you in the end.

Hunt & Apply

In hunting and applying it’s a much less intimate and more of the, “Go on Monster.com and submit your résumé” approach. Here’s your opportunity to show your Search Skills.

Search.Twitter.com – depending on your industry you know what kind of job you’re hoping to get into. Hashtags like #jobs, #job, and #hiring are some of the most common, and usually lead to decent Twitter postings to a job description. By using Boolean search operators like AND or OR (they must be capitalized), you can add in multiple search terms and get rid of irrelevant posts.

For example, if you are looking for a freelance writing job your search terms might look like this: Freelance writing OR writer AND #Jobs OR #Job. This will find Tweets that have the words Freelance writing or in place of writing, writer. As well as the hashtags #jobs,or #job. The AND forces the search to include either of those hashtags.

Besides a solid Twitter search, there are many profiles which are automated aggregations of postings. One of the best ones for the D.C. area is the Washington Post Jobs. They have over 30 accounts with job opportunities listed in bulk on their Twitter feed, each feed for a different industry. See the full list. Looking for accounts like these are incredibly helpful, and you can build a list of only these feeds to keep a solid eye on them.

Build the Relationship

Thanks to Chris Penn‘s amazing email newsletter, he forwarded on this little gem of a tool.

Followerwonk.com – Similar to Twitter’s advanced search, but lets you search users’ bio’s. This is powerful. What followerwonk lets you do is target by keywords in Biographies and by location. In a job hunt this is crucial. For example, if I am looking for a marketing job in Raleigh, NC, I would try to reach out to a marketing manager or director of marketing in the area. Thus, my search terms would look like this: Manager OR Director OR VP AND Marketing, and in the Location use Raleigh, NC. Watch as the influencers/directors/managers, etc. all show up in your search results.

Tack these results into a list, and let the relationship building begin. Keep these prime users in a separate list, and engage them. Make yourself, your expertise, and the fact that you’re job hunting known. As these relationships build trust and the people begin to know you, your relationship with them gets stronger and stronger. When the time comes for you to tell them about your job hunt, you’re much more likely to be looked at more closely.

Never Overlook a Handshake

While a good Twitter search, or online relationship building never hurts, you must never overlook the power of meeting someone face-to-face. Be yourself, and be the same person you are online. Meet up for a beer, or lunch, or whatever, but being able to talk to someone in person holds its own power.

With the economy the way it is, the employment rate slowly rising again, and social media being a mainstream way of finding jobs, rules for personal branding and how to behave yourself online have become somewhat of a staple. For some that care they watch their mouths on Twitter. You could go back and find not a single four letter curse word or malediction to be seen since the inception of their account.

Now for those of you who know me understand that my mouth tends to get away from me, on a very frequent basis. But rules like: “Don’t cuss on Twitter”, “Don’t show yourself drinking”, “Build productive relationships”, for the most part are just there to cover your ass. The best and most productive relationships I’ve built on Twitter have been because I have been “myself”. No bars hold, it has been pure, simple honesty and opinion. Which, isn’t that what social media has been about? Building these relationships? No one wants to engage in nonversations as my friend Morgan Siem (@morgansiem) would put it.

So if you’re Blogging, Tweeting, Facebooking or linking on LinkedIn but you’re becoming a simple square only reTweeting obvious content (say the same links 5Million people Tweet a day by Mashable), where’s your originality? Breaking the rules and breaking the mold makes you stand out. Am I advocating that you go out and berate everyone who says something you disagree with, absolutely not. But proving your knowledge by aptly advocating your position and opinions with well thought out discourse, never hurts.

Breaking the rules doesn’t mean go against the grain. I will never advocate someone to do something against the law or their company/university disciplines. But many of the so-called rules that have been established for social media have become a way for everyone to fit in a mold of uniformity. Social media gives everyone a voice, and if you’re not creating your own, whose are you miming? Take the time to develop the same personality you have offline into the same persona online. There isn’t a difference.

Stand out, and make yourself memorable. You won’t do that by following the same rules as everyone else.

Image by – Whologwhy

For anyone going to Internet Summit 10 in Raleigh, NC, here is your invitation to connect with me!

Here are the best ways to find me:

• Mobile – Call me or Text! – 919.442.8194
• Twitter – @gregdelima
• LinkedIn – Greg de Lima
• Foursquare – Find where I’ll be!

Here is my “Route” through IS 10:

• PreCon – I’ll be in the Social Media workshops for the pre-conference.
• 3:50-5: Integrated Social Media Marketing
• 5:20-6:30: Advanced Email Marketing Practice
• Next Day – 8am – Enterprise in 2011
• 9:40 – Maximizing Email Marketing
• 11a – Delivering Social Media ROI
• 2pm – Search Marketing
• 4pm – Reputation Management.

After Internet Summit I will be going to the TIMA  Summit After Party at least for a while.

Keep an eye out for my Live blogging updates, on this blog, and also on eWayDirect who has been kind enough to sponsor this broke college kid to attend his first conference.

I can easily say that the majority of us have most likely been to Disney Land, or Disney World. Disney is an experience that will always stick in our minds. We pass it on to our children by having them watch the films, get the toys and put out kids in a world filled with Disney fun.

Why shouldn’t, then, the concept of having an experience with a brand extend to online?

Building these communities is easy.

A post on OpenForum told us about the 6 Benefits of Building a Brand in the Blogosphere Age, going as to say “A brand is the culmination of the total experience your market has with your company.” Of all the benefits that are possible, the experience that you get with any brand will always be the lasting impression.

When a company incorporates Social CRM, and culture into their business, this transforms not just the way the employees behave as part of the company, but extends all the way back to the consumer. It tells them that, here there is more than just a quick relationship for the sale. There is an entire new experience that you will never forget.

Experience Builds Value

The unique aspect of every brand is the experience that a person has with a company. Say you’re Coca-Cola, you understand their brand and you value them as a drinker of Coke. What happens then, if you go on a tour of their factory in Atlanta, but you have a terrible tour guide, or the factory is downright nasty? You’re probably not going to stop drinking Coke, but will you think less of them and their approach? Probably so.

The value of an experience really isn’t quantifiable. You can’t open up your favorite analytics dashboard and measure experience. Like the OpenForum post says, “Choose who you are.” Embracing the experience that every single person has with your company is a definition of your brand and its value.

So the question is, what is the experience that you’re giving people with your brand?

Image Credit – David.nikonvscanon

Do you remember the old Smash Mouth song, All Star? The lyrics at one point say, “Only shooting stars break the mold.” Do you have to be a shooting star though, or are you the guy who sits behind a desk 8hrs a day and gets home feeling unaccomplished? The problem remains that no one wants to create a stir, or be a cause for uproar or commotion.

Psychologists would call this groupthink.

When you get one person within a group, that person is simply going to conform to the group. That person does this so that they don’t bring about conflict or “dissonance” to the group. We generally don’t want to become the person that breaks the monotony of business, and create something new.

Chris Brogan in his book, Trust Agents, brings up a good point within the first few chapters; Tinkering or Programming. If and when our usual jobs get to the point that they become boring, or non challenging, that is when we need to learn to break this mold. In the book’s context, branching out and creating a challenge for yourself either within the context of your business or going outside of the business bounds and building your own “game”, of sorts.

Seth Godin, in Tribes, reiterates heretics. The people who have gotten out of the typical realm and established a following of their own. People with ideas, ambition and most importantly passion. These heretics become the people that we follow and look for to become our “Trust Agents”, people with whom you build relationships (business or friendship) for the long-term improvement.

If You Have Passion You Can Break Out

Often, we doubt our abilities. We doubt whether or not we can take off on our own and not be penalized for the actions we take. If you have passion for something that you want to do, what’s stopping you from taking off and reaching your escape velocity?

I want you to leave a comment and tell me, what is your passion and how are you thinking of expressing it?

Image Credit – Goosmurf

A couple of different posts have inspired this one. One of which is from the OPEN Forum and the other from the Harvard Business Review. The reason for investing in people, isn’t so we can sit back and place an ROI on every single connection that we have. Investing in people isn’t quantifying the value of each Twitter follower or Facebook “Like”.

Just because we can measure the ROI of an individual, doesn’t mean we should. Bhargava describes the quantification problem as,

A nice example of where the measurement problem lies because most of us are not used to quantifying the value of social relationships and conversations.

My way of seeing the situation though, is that measuring is what the accountants want to know, it’s what finance wants to know. Good for them. As marketers though, we need to understand the intrinsic value over the dollar value of these connections. Where is the dollar value of having someone talk to their close friends about you (positively of course)? Where is the value of a unique interaction? Granted, while you can quantify a good lead, it’s much more difficult to put a number to the individual transactions that got you there. Don’t ever take the people you meed on a daily basis for granted. These are the people that you will build trust relationships with and have a quality relationship for the improvement of your business.

Trust relationships extend to other businesses too. The HBR article also stuck a nerve with me because it showed that business don’t really care anymore. We’re not taking action to prove that our clients are worth our time, effort and expense. Constantly businesses unintentionally devaluate their customers and don’t entirely try to extend themselves to reach a new understanding with them.

Listen to what people are saying about you, keep a constant eye on Google Alerts about you and your company. This will give you invaluable insight to the relationship you’re maintaining with your customer base. Being able to understand how and why people trust your company over others gives you a whopping competitive advantage.

Are you investing in the people you work with? Are you investing the time and dedication to your clients? I want you to leave a comment below, and tell me: Why do you think people aren’t focusing their resources more on the way we interact with each other and our clients?

Wikipedia defines leadership as:

The “process of social influence in which one person can enlist the aid and support of others in the accomplishment of a common task.”

My favorite part is the term social influence. This emphasis on social influence hasn’t changed with the rise of social media, marketing, and networking. We are simply using different tools to get to the same means.

I finally got around to reading Seth Godin’s Tribes. This book if you haven’t read it focuses on how leaders become leaders and why.

Ambition to make a change and be a part of a movement are prime aspects of a leader, or as Godin might say, a heretic. Are you willing to make the move to stand up to what you believe in? Are you willing to put forth the effort and become something much greater than yourself? Godin describes heretics as the people willing to leave the mold and do something for themselves. We often think of the heretic Martin Luther, who posted his 95 theses on the Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany. Luther is a perfect example of a leader. Someone who believes truly in their changes and is willing to break out and become this social influence for others, is who we would call a leader.

Leaders know their people

A proper leader will understand the community he leads. Whether it’s an online community or a local community, the fact that these people are together is because of a common belief. Leaders understand how their “followers” think, act, and more importantly do. Not only by tapping into the thought process of the followers, but being able to reach out and find new members is a unique aspect of good leadership.

Most importantly, a leader will be able to use this knowledge to increase their influence, not just for their benefit but for the benefit of the people as a whole.

Leaders know themselves

This also sounds somewhat out of place. But truthfully, if the person who is influencing you seems to not know what they’re talking about, or they themselves sound insincere or dishonest, would you be following them? Probably not. A sense of self and confidence is crucial in a leader. These are the people that understand themselves and what they’re seeking above all else, otherwise they wouldn’t be leading.

Where do you fit in as a Leader? Tell me your role as a leader in the comments.

Image Credit – paul-simpson.org

Note: This is a guest post by Michael Roper from getmusibility.com, Roper has been a friend of mine from Appstate for the past 3 years and is a smart as it gets.

Over the past month, two friends asked me a lot of questions about how to set up their first blogs. I realized they had a lot of misconceptions about how all the parts work together (the email address, domain registrars, hosting, blog installation, etc). For someone who’s never touched a server before, terms like ‘MySQL databases’ and ‘Advanced DNS Zone Editor’ can deter someone from testing out the waters.

So, here’s what you need to know and do from start to finish to get a solid personal WordPress blog on the ground.

1. Get a domain.

As a rule of thumb, get your domain from a separate site than where you buy web hosting. If you have your domain with your host, and you decide that you want to switch hosts next year, they might try to keep your domain or try to get you to jump through hoops and ultimately stay with them or at least pay them extra. Usually web hosts will offer you a free domain – do what you want with it, but I tend to warn people to not make it your primary domain.

Domain selling sites have a lot of bells and whistles they will try to sell you. If you want the WHOIS privacy, take it. But don’t pay extra for anything else unless you really know what you’re doing.

Email – Google Apps is king. Name.com and Domainsite.com have 1-click Google Apps installs. This means you click one button and a few minutes later, mail.yourdomain.com looks like Gmail. No mess, no weird formats, no additional logins.

2. Get a good host and make it easy on yourself.

You want a WordPress blog, so you want something that installs WordPress for you automatically. Most servers today do have a one-click install. I like hosts with cPanel (meaning control panel) and it’s program, Fantastico. You literally point and click to get started. By doing this, you protect yourself from a mess of extracting zip files manually and trying to get them uploaded to the right place and find out that your PHP isn’t the right version.

You also want a host that is fast.

Quick newbie notes:

Shared Hosting – It means that your server’s IP address (phone number if you will) is shared among hundreds of other sites. Imagine an operator connecting your call.

Dedicated Hosting – It means you have one of those IP addresses exclusively. It also means you pay a lot for that box holding your website. Unless you are expecting thousands of visitors, you don’t need this.

Shared hosting is where most people begin their first website, and you should too. If you choose a host that is super cheap ($4.00 a month or, free) your site is almost always going to be slow. That’s because the server is overloaded with junk websites eating up all the bandwidth. Pick a reputable host. I encourage people to go with Host Gator or BlueHost. It might cost a few bucks more, but you will be much happier.

There are plenty of excellent hosts out there. I encourage you to look for the following from where ever you choose:

1. cPanel
2. If no cPanel, one-click WordPress install.
3. Unlimited Domains (This means you can buy other domains, add a folder and have another website without having to pay for another host. This is the difference in the Hatchling and Baby plans at HostGator. Some hosts don’t give you unlimited MySQL databases, keep in mind you need one for any additional WordPress installation you may choose to add later)
4. Call customer support. Pretend you have a problem or a question with a website, see if you get someone who is polite and understands you.
5. Good feedback. Search for reviews a few pages deep in Google, on Twitter, and on forums. You’ll find out quickly if people are pleased with their service.

3. Install WordPress.

Usually your host will have a tutorial, if not look for Fantastico in your cPanel. It will walk you through it. If it doesn’t work immediately after you installed, just wait 10 minutes. It will work eventually. And if by chance it still fails to work, call those nice tech support people again.

4. Draw your site on paper.

Something about drawing it out on paper saves a headache later. Make a chart of what information you have, and how you want it to be organized and labeled. Decide what buttons (pages) you want displayed, and decide how you will categorize your blog. Follow that chart, and your blog should make sense. Don’t add style, just focus on content. People usually find that they have too much or too little content for the amount of pages they anticipate the will need.

5. Go through all the menus on the backend of WordPress

If you got lost on how to get there, it’s yourdomain.com/wp-admin. Fill it out as you wish.

6. Find a great theme.

You can go with a free one, or buy a template from somewhere like themeforest.com. Or if you’re really trying to impress people, hire a professional designer (warning: it can get expensive).

A “great” theme is one that you don’t have to strain to read but is still visually pleasing to keep visitors on your site longer. A theme can also give you social proof and professionalism. If you want to be geeky about it, get one that is XHTML 1.0 Strict validated. If you don’t know what that means, ignore it.

7. Plugins

You can install them from within WordPress. You do NOT need to download them on your browser, upload them, and then log back in. Just go to the Plugins menu and add a new one. It will give you a place to search, then look for these:

Must haves -

a. All in one SEO

Go ahead and set up Google Analytics while you’re at it. It will ask you to verify your site, the easiest way is to “upload file” via your cPanel with Legacy File Manager. You will grow to love analytics, because you will see where all your visitors come from, how they found you, and how long they stayed.

b. Google XML Sitemaps

Go ahead and set up Feedburner. This redirects your RSS feed to Google. If you don’t already know what it does, it just makes your blog in a nice format for others to subscribe to.

e. WordPress Mobile Edition

Make it nice for iPhone people.

Tips: Keep Akismet, it will help eliminate spam. Also, don’t be afraid to delete plugins you aren’t using because they will slow down your site. Then, match plugins up according to your niche.

8. See where it takes you.

There’s no perfect template. Just keep posting and testing out new things. In time, you’ll create a nice online presence.

Productivity is an amazing resource, and for those who know how to do it well, everyone can attest to getting more and better work done. These five tools and techniques will help you not only start to be productive put keep you there.

1. Pomodoro Technique

The Pomodoro Technique stems from the Italian word for Tomato, pomodoro. The entire program starts with a kitchen timer, the one used when this technique developed looks like a tomato. This technique isn’t simply about seeing time as a constraint, but rather to see time as a multivariate resource. By being able to allocate, plan, and use the methods to change your perspective as a whole about time, lets you be more able to use time more efficiently.

2. Tackle Tasks One At A Time

Of course time here is your primary commodity. The more you get out of it, the better you use it, time becomes your friend. By multitasking, you reduce the ability to tackle efficiency. Your best bet to allocate time correctly is to take tasks one at a time.

Start by making a list of what is due for the day. Prioritize the tasks at hand, because the more time consuming or more important tasks should be the ones that require your most undivided attention. Once they are out of the way, you can sit back and tackle the tasks that “matter less”.

Use a note pad and write these lists out, scratch them off when done. The visual aspect of knowing what’s done and what is not is psychologically important, especially having a feeling of accomplishment. Chris Brogan and Mashable have both recently advocated not even checking email until later in the day.

3. Reevaluate Your Workspace

Lifehacker has made this a 10 point list. By using a new desk, taking pictures to find clutter spots, and many DIY tools let you find places where productivity is lost. Once you have found where productivity is lost you then have the ability to go back and change what’s necessary to improve.

4. Shut Off

If it’s not being used for your work, shut it off.  Get rid of it. Toss it aside. Any other way to say it, think of it. This one goes hand in hand with multitasking. Additional tabs open? Close them.

Cell phone texts? Turn it off.

5. Fina a Good Place To Work

Although, this can kind of go hand in hand with reevaluating your workspace, being able to have the right starting platform for work location is also key. This can mean working from home, coworking, Starbucks, wherever you feel fit the most. Wherever you decide to work from though, be sure to establish good habit patters. Once those are established, your productivity will be linked to your mind. Check out Mashable’s 37 Productivity Tips for Working From Anywhere.

What productivity resources do you use? Leave them in the comments!