We recently had the honor of participating in the new tips booklet produced by Paulette Ensign of Tips Products International.

This was an esteemed group of social media experts and how they were able to use social media to their advantage. Here are just a few of the tips they shared from “Tips from a Collection of Experts”.

Susan Chodakiewitz of Booksicals. 

• Invite visitors to participate in some aspect of your product. It can be to help name a character in your book or the location for the setting of the book.

Dr. Debra Condren author of Ambition Is Not A Dirty Word

• Take the pressure off. Hire a Virtual Assistant with social media expertise.

JoAnn R. Corley-Speaker, Author, Coach

• Use a company Facebook page to indirectly advertise. Have the page show pictures, videos, and audios of customers talking about and/or using your products or services.

Jan Wallen-Selling Your Expertise LLC

• Differentiate yourself. Write your profile like a story. Tell people why you and your company are the best ones to hire so they contact you.

These are just a few excepts from the booklet. To download your free copy, you can go to http://www.serenityva.com/tipsbooklet.htm

The Women’s Business Alliance Power Sabbatical is your opportunity to take – For Yourself! – 2 ½ days + 2 nights to:

–Rejuvenate mentally and physically. Unplug, get away from it all in a serene gorgeous setting. Be catered to and taken care of (what a concept for us women!), including dining on gourmet healthy food prepared by Marconi’s amazing chef. Take advantage of gorgeous natural surroundings by starting your morning and ending your day with a solo or group power walk or hike. Breathe the fresh air. Enjoy the stars at night and the peace and quiet (no ambient light or noise pollution here!) Even use your free time to take a swim in Tomales Bay (wet suit optional!), visit the quaint town of Marshall, kayak, or horseback ride on the beach.

Recharge your ambition. Launch – or re-launch – your dream in a powerful way. Recharge your business and your goals. Or finally give yourself the space, resources and support to give the business you’ve been struggling with the power to lift off. Get clarity on your ambitious goals. Figure out what’s working and what’s not. Redefine your targets. Get unstuck. Fire up your ambition. Keep yourself on target to do meaningful, challenging work that pays you what you’re worth. Stop settling. Stop selling yourself short. Get your ambition mojo back – you know what I mean: that feeling that you can’t wait to bounce out of bed each morning (no matter how tired you might be) because work feels like play. Keep your commitment to yourself to make the contribution you were born to make – and surround yourself with supportive peers to help you achieve the goals you have stars in your eyes for.

This is an opportunity to restore your sanity and recharge your business by retreating to a stunning, peaceful conference center in an historic park setting and interacting with innovators like yourself. I’ll be leading the charge and together we will make sure that You — and Your most precious ambitious goals — are the agenda. And of course, a huge part of recharging your business and dreams is making sure that you, yourself, get plenty of downtime – space and time and the serenity to unplug and think and be taken care of.

Break isolation. Stamp out your fear and resistance by interacting with ambitious, creative innovators – women just like yourself who struggle with the same fears and doubts as you, even as they are fighting the big fight to hold on to their big dreams. Get your brain cells firing and reignite your passion for what you do or want to do though 2 ½ days of custom-tailored small-group coaching and brainstorming with me plus 20 other women peers. The ideas will be flying around the room. And You and Your goals are the agenda.

Where:
The perfect venue is the gorgeous setting at the Marconi Conference Center overlooking Tomales Bay in beautiful West Marin County, San Francisco Bay Area. Marconi Conference Center is approximately a 90-minute drive from San Francisco International Airport, Oakland International Airport.

When:
September 16-18, 2010

So register now as there is not a greater feeling in the world than coming together with supportive, talented, thirsty-for-knowledge, open-minded, fired-up, ambitious women, such as Debra Condren, author of Ambition Is Not A Dirty Word,  to link arms and help each other make our ambitious dreams a reality.

If you’re active on Twitter, you’ve probably seen at least one reference on your own profile page to Twitter lists.

They’re a powerful way to categorize Twitter users according to their area of expertise, or the topics of their tweets and then, once the list is created, let anyone see it. They save valuable time because when you create a list, every tweet from every person on that list feeds into that particular list. You don’t have to drink from a firehose on Twitter to be able to find the tweets from people who have a particular expertise.

But don’t be fooled into thinking that that’s the only way to use Twitter lists. They’re powerful tools that can help you do valuable research, track down experts in a particular niche, find people in your target market, spy on your competitors, find journalists who cover your industry, and so much more.

They’re also an excellent way to determine how other people perceive your expertise and your brand. Here’s what I mean.

Go to your Twitter Home or Profile page and look under your photo on the upper right side. You’ll see the number of people you’re following, the number of people who are following you, and the number of lists you’re on. Click on “Listed.”

Instantly, you can look down the list and see which Twitter users have put you on one of their lists, and you can see the names of their lists. For example, I’m on a number of Twitter lists. When I click on “Listed,” a window opens and I can see that many of the lists include the words “virtual assistant”, “VAs” and “social media.”

If you aren’t on many lists, or you haven’t created your own lists yet, that’s OK. Joan Stewart, aka, The Publicity Hound is hosting a webinar  at 3 p.m. Eastern Time on Thursday, Aug. 26, called “How to Use Twitter Lists & Directories to Generate Publicity and Build Your Brand.” If the time is inconvenient for you, sign up anyway because she is recording it. You’ll get a link where you can watch the streaming video, or download the video.

Here’s some really bad advice that the so-called PR experts dispense: Your email pitches to journalists and bloggers should be as short as possible. No more than three or four words.

Why is it bad advice? Because it forces people to make their subject lines sound cute rather than informative.

Publicist Michelle Tennant, a master at booking her clients on top-tier TV and radio shows, often uses as many words as necessary in her subject lines so they scream, “Open me!”

And wow, do journalists ever open them!

During this webinar on “How to Tie Your Pitch to Breaking News and Make the Media Interview YOU,” Michelle dissected three email pitches that scored publicity in major media outlets. All three had the critical elements of an email pitch and made the journalist’s job incredibly easy. You can adopt them for your own use.

News is breaking all around you–and that’s the very best time to pitch. Joan recorded the webinar and you can watch it at your computer, or download it along with the MP3 file, the handouts and Michelle’s sample pitches. Read more about what she taught at http://budurl.com/pitchingthemedia

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Reprinted from “The Publicity Hound’s Tips of the Week,” an ezine featuring tips, tricks and tools for generating free publicity. Subscribe at http://www.publicityhound.com/ and receive by email the handy cheat sheet “89 Reasons to Send a Press Release.”

News is breaking all around you.

When you’re the local angle to a national story, or you can comment on the hot topic of the day, TV producers, daily and weekly newspaper reporters, and bloggers will practically be begging to talk to you.

But too many people who want publicity don’t bother picking up the phone or emailing. They think the media are too busy. Or they don’t know what to say.

What a mistake! This is the very best time to pitch.

What if somebody gave you step-by-step directions on exactly how to piggyback your story idea onto breaking news? Publicist Michelle Tennant, who got one of her clients booked on “Dr. Phil” the very day the client signed the PR contract, will explain the exact details of what she does when she pitches a client during a breaking news event. She’ll even show you the word-for-word email pitches she sent to the media–pitches that resulted in major publicity for her clients.

Michelle will be the special guest during a webinar hosted by Joan Stewart, aka The Publicity Hound, at 3 p.m. Eastern Time on Wednesday, July 21. Michelle will teach you how to use very simple email subject lines, include three important elements in every pitch, and the exact number of times to follow up.

She’ll also tell you about a free media resource website she uses, thus saving her thousands of dollars on media directories.

I currently manage and maintain several business pages for clients on Facebook.

Over the past couple of years they have seen an increase in sales and interest in their services as well.

When using this tool it is important to remember that Facebook is just that, a tool. It is one of many, but I have found it to be extraordinarily useful.

Here are just a few ways in which you can use your business page to promote:

1. Post items to your status updates that pertain to your area of expertise using keywords in the content.

2. Set up Google Alerts to find content to share with your fans. This can be from blogs and other websites.

3. Use the Events function to create events that you are hosting or promoting.

4. If you have a blog, import your blog into your “Notes” on your business page and you will have ready-made content every time you post a new entry to your blog.

5. If you know Facebook Markup Language (Facebook’s version of HTML) or know of someone that does, add your newsletter sign up box to your page. You can even add your products as well. See side bar at http://www.facebook.com/TheMusiciansGuidetoBrides

6. Create a music library of your music and share with your fans.

7. Post your videos to your page. If you are a musician, post your music videos. If you are an artist, post videos of the creation of your art.

8. Post photos and lots of them. They are a great way of showing you at your gigs, book signings or gallery openings.

There are many ways in which to use Facebook to promote. For more ideas on missed opportunities on Facebook, go to Serenity Virtual Assistant Services to receive your free tutorial on how to create a Facebook profile or purchase the CD  or transcript of “11 Ways to Avoid Missed Opportunities on Facebook”.

I received a call this morning from one of my clients, Anne Roos of Celtic Harp Music. She mentioned a radio broadcast from NPR that she had listened to. It aired on June 9, 2010.

The subject matter was very compelling and brought to light the issue of what happens to all of my email accounts, social media accounts and my clients accounts if I should happen to die.

Most of us don’t like to think of these things, at least, I don’t. It is not in the forefront of my thoughts. It is important though.

As a VA I have many clients that I have personal and financial information to. If something should happen to me, it’s important that there is something in place so that information remains private.

We back-up our computers, our websites, emails and blogs, but what about our social networking and financial information. Do our clients have something in place so if the worst happens, it is taken care of?

Anne spoke to me of setting something up on her end that would give me permission to close her social media accounts if that would happen.

What if you become sick? Debilitating sick? Would you like the word to get out that you are unable to do your job? It could end your business. Scary thought.

In today’s world of internet marketing and social media our private lives have become not so private. How do we protect the very thing that is private?

I would encourage you to talk to your clients, friends and family. You never know when the worst will happen.

We continually strive to provide timely, quality service for our clients. The special relationship that we have with them is both valuable and in some cases fragile. We understand that they have choices and that we must always be vigilant to provide exceptional value for them.

What do we do when a client notifies us that they are terminating our relationship? Our first inclination is to throw our hands up into the air, rail at the gods and wonder what it is that we did wrong.

Most times it is not due to an error, but if it is, do everything within your power to correct the error, even if you have already lost the client.

If it is because of your rates, decide if you are willing to bend a little. If this is not a viable scenario, explain it to the client and see if there is another option. Such as:

–Cutting back on the amount of work that you do for them
–Offer time-saving tips that will allow them to do some of the work for themselves
–Offer coaching as an alternative

There will be clients that just aren’t a good “fit” for either of you. If this happens, be gracious, offer suggestions of other VA’s that you think may be willing to work with them.

Sometimes clients just fall off the radar. It’s through no fault of your own or the clients.

The best thing you can do in any case is to move on. Don’t dwell on what was and concentrate on how you can better your business. Never assume that all is well in the relationship between you and the client. Touch base on a regular basis and not just through email.

PICK UP THE PHONE!

The countdown has begun . . . are you going to meet the deadline? Last week I shared on Facebook with you the exciting new Stay-on-Track program recently launched by Ariane — and today I am writing this blog posting to make sure you understand what it is that she is offering . . FOR F.REE!
 
If you are anything like me, you’re a visual-experience-oriented person — who sometimes struggles with online information, especially when it’s packed full of IMPORTANT career-boosting information. I get overwhelmed to say the least, and panic at the thought that my money will be wasted because I might miss some of the crucial information provided by the speakers. Will I remember what I needed to take away from the session, will I understand what they were trying to portray to me?
 
With the Stay-on-Track program, it’s like Ariane read my mind and said… “I will prepare the Telesummit for you in CD and transcript form — AND I’ll also give you the Stay-on-Track program to make sure you succeed!” She WANTS you to get all the fruit off the tree… and she makes that possible for F.R.E.E if you purchase the Home-study program on or before midnight (Eastern Time), on April 15th!
 
The Stay-on-Track Program is a simple system to organize, prioritize, and create YOUR action plan as you hear the Telesummit presenters — so you’re immediately able to feed your energy and the wealth of information into creating and developing your first project!
 
No more feeling like you are flapping in the wind… the Stay-on-Track Program allows you to be grounded in your creative process and utilize all the valuable information from the Telesummit Home-study Program!

This is an ongoing conversation. How does one measure their ROI on Facebook?

Facebook has provided a tool in which we can measure our ROI on Facebook if you have a fan page.  I can go into my fan page and look at the “insights” section on the left hand side of your page.  This is where I can measure exactly what kind of traffic I have had. It measures everything from male/female, to where your fans are coming from.

Of late, I have had some success with clients and their fan pages. For instance, I have several clients that have a newsletter. We have now taken those newsletters and “sliced and diced” them. We have posted them as notes on their Facebook fan pages such as Joan Stewart’s, aka, The Publicity Hound. What this has shown is an increase in sales.

How do we know that? Well, when I post the note, there is always a call to action. Such as, “read more at ….” or “sign up for my newsletter at….”. We have also been “tagging” her friends in these notes. You have to be careful when “tagging’ as it can be overly promotional, but if you believe it is of value to them, by all means, do.