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Kerry Gorgone Joins #Blogchat to Answer Your Legal Questions About Blogging!

Kerry Gorgone Legal Blogging

UPDATE: Here’s the transcript from an AMAZING and insightful #Blogchat on the legal issues of blogging with Kerry Gorgone!

I’m very excited to welcome my great friend Kerry O’Shea Gorgone back to #Blogchat this Sunday (5-21-17) to answer your legal blogging questions! Kerry is an attorney and also one of the most decorated business podcasters on the planet! Her Marketing Smarts podcast is acknowledged by all as one of the best podcasts on the internet.

The topic we’ll discuss is The Legalities of Blogging: Protecting Yourself and Your Content, starting at 8pm Central on Sunday, May 21st!

We’ll have a slightly different format for this #Blogchat. Since I know many of you will have specific legal questions in regards to blogging, we’ll split the conversation into two 3-minute blocks:

8:00-8:30 PM – We’ll cover Protecting Your Content. This will include how to copyright your content, what to do if someone steals your content, etc.  Kerry has already written a great post on this here.

8:30-9:00 PM – We’ll cover Protecting Yourself. This will include discussing proper disclosure of sponsors and ads around your content, etc.  Kerry has also written a great post about this on her site.

 

And remember, #Blogchat is sponsored this month and next by Marketing Writing Bootcamp from Marketing Profs. Click here to learn more about the 13-class course AND get a special $200 discount just for #Blogchat participants!

Hope to see everyone at #Blogchat Sunday night at 8pm Central! Make sure you are following Kerry on Twitter and bring your legal questions about blogging!

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The Fan-Damn-Tastic Marketing Show Episode 31: The Legal Concerns of Social Media With Kerry Gorgone

IMG_9824I am thrilled to welcome Kerry O’Shea Gorgone as the first guest on The Fan-Damn-Tastic Marketing Show!  Kerry spoke at the Y’all Connect conference in Birmingham last week, and I was lucky enough to get a few minutes of her time to talk about some legal issues regarding social media and marketing in general!

PPC_200x200 Standard no codeBut first a reminder that this episode is brought to you by the Marketing Writing Bootcamp, from Marketing Profs.  The Marketing Writing Bootcamp begins on June 11th and features 13 classes with almost 8 hours of instruction!  You can learn more here about the Marketing Writing Bootcamp and if you enroll with promo code FANDAMN you’ll save $200 on Marketing writing bootcamp. Plus, you’ll get over $1,000 worth of Marketing Profs seminars, classes, and video tutorials, free – just for registering!

Kerry was kind enough to talk to me about two topics for this episode of #FanDamnShow.  The first was legal implications of live-streaming, and how to know if your social media contest is legal.  Here’s the Show Notes:

1:50 – What do brands need to know if they plan on using Meerkat or Periscope for live-streaming

3:00 – Prepping your live-stream, what you need to know before you get started

4:00 – Some music artists are encouraging fans to live-stream their concerts.  Is this ok?

5:45 – How to carefully plan your live-stream

6:45 – What if a brand’s fan creates a live-stream promoting that brand, could the brand be liable?

10:00 – What Kerry does for MarketingProfs and also what the Marketing Writing Bootcamp is all about

14:15 – The basic differences between a contest, a sweepstakes and a lottery (Hint: You may think you are running a contest but you may actually be running a lottery, be careful!)

16:40 – What to do to make sure that you are running a contest and not a lottery

 

Kerry has also written a couple of great posts on these topics:

Live-Streaming With Meerkat & Periscope: A Marketer’s Legal Checklist

How to Keep Your Social Media Contest From Becoming a Trial

Influence Marketing and the FTC’s 4Ps of Disclosure

I hope you enjoy this special episode of #FanDamnShow with Kerry Gorgone!  Please give it a listen and let me know what you think in the comments! Here’s where you can download and listen to the episode directly.  And if you can, please subscribe to The Fan-Damn-Tastic Marketing Show on iTunes, and I would *love* it if you could review the podcast on iTunes as well.  Also, #FanDamnShow is now available on Stitcher as well!

Also, don’t forget that sponsorships are now available for The Fan-Damn-Tastic Marketing Show. This page that has all the information on how your brand can sponsor #FanDamnShow and the rates. Please note that all available sponsor slots (starting with July) will be filled on a first-come, first-served basis, so please email me if you are interested in sponsoring #FanDamnShow.

We’ll talk again next week!

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Legal Issues Associated With Blogging: Tonight’s #Blogchat Topic With @KerryGorgone!

Here’s the transcript from tonight’s #Blogchat with Kerry!

Tonight at #Blogchat (Nov 9th, 2014) we’ll be discussing the legal issues associated with blogging with my good friend Kerry Gorgone!  Kerry is an amazing woman with an incredibly diverse skillset.  She’s a lawyer, a former college instructor, she’s a speaker, and she’s also one of the best podcasters in the world. Currently, she develops marketing training courses for MarketingProfs. It’s her talents as a lawyer that we’ll be calling upon tonight as she helps us understand the legal issues associated with blogging.

Here’s a VERY detailed look at what we’ll be discussing tonight (thank you Kerry!)

8:00-8:20PM Central – What are the legal issues bloggers need to know if they want to run a contest on their blog?

Points to consider:
–> (Giveaways or Games of Chance/Lotteries vs. Contests of Skill)
–> IRS / Tax reporting
–> Stating contest eligibility rules clearly
–> Special considerations for Canadians

8:20-8:40PM – If a blogger receives a product from a company, do they have to disclose that?

Points to consider:
–> When to call content “sponsored” or “paid”
–> Do you have to repeat disclosures every time you post sponsored content, even if the content is old?
–> What’s the best way to disclose in a tweet or other short social post? Do you have to use a hashtag?
–> Disclosure’s a pain: why bother?

8:40 to 9:00PM Breaking copyright rules can cause expensive problems. What do bloggers need to know?

Points to consider:
–> Is it okay to use other people’s content? How much of it can I take? What are the rules?
–> What do I do if someone else is using MY content?
–> Where can I find images that are safe to use?
–> How can I protect my copyright in pictures I take and images I create?

 

Also check out this post that Kerry was kind enough to write here on protecting your creative works online.  I could not be happier to have Kerry joining us tonight, please make sure you are following her on Twitter!  See y’all at 8pm Central tonight!

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How Bloggers Can Protect Themselves Online: Tonight’s #Blogchat Topic With Kerry Gorgone!

Kerry

Here’s the transcript of tonight’s #Blogchat, click Transcript on the left!

Tonight (Nov. 3rd, 2013) we’ll be tackling a couple of legal areas of blogging that have always been requested at #Blogchat.  The one and only Kerry Gorgone will be joining us to discuss blogger disclosure rules as well as how to protect our work, especially if its stolen.  Tonight’s #Blogchat is sponsored by Pencils.com, please follow them on Twitter and check out their blog!

To prep for tonight’s topic, there’s two posts by Kerry that I want you to read and BOTH are bookmark-worthy.  Seriously you will want to save both of these posts and if you work for a blogging company you’ll want to share them with your team internally.

The first is a post on disclosure rules that Kerry wrote on her blog.  This covers exactly what you need to disclose when working with companies and how to do so.

The second is a guest post that Kerry wrote for us here on Friday covering how to protect your works online.  Please read both and make sure you are following Kerry on Twitter!

Here’s the schedule for tonight’s chat:

8:00 pm-8:30pm Central – How to Protect Your Content Online.  This for everyone that’s wondered what their options are when they see someone has published their post without the blogger’s permission, or is using a photo without permission, etc.

8:30 pm-9:00pm Central – Blogger disclosure rules.  If you are taking sponsors or working with companies, how do you disclose that relationship via social media?  Do you always have to?  Kerry will explain all!

 

I think this might be the most informative #Blogchat ever so make SURE you get your list of questions together for Kerry.  I’ll be posting the transcript here after #Blogchat so you can have that as well.

And make SURE you have turned your clocks back so you arrive on time.  See y’all tonight!

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Monday’s Marketing Minute: The Relaunch

So starting today, you will see a LOT more activity here. One of the things I have always struggled with when it comes to content creation is the content calendar. Figuring out what to write about and when to write it. I think I’ve finally hit on a content creation system I can use and replicate.

Starting today, there will 6 new posts a week.  Yes, I said SIX! And the content will be arranged similar to how a newspaper is organized into sections, or how a TV’s primetime schedule is organized.  Here’s what you can expect:

Monday – Monday’s Marketing Minute. A post with a few of the top marketing, content. customer service and digital stories that caught my eye within the last few days.

Tuesday – On Tuesdays I will have an ‘opinion’ post, similar to the Editorial section of a newspaper.

Wednesday – Marketing & Movies. This series is going to be SO much fun! Every Wednesday I take one of my favorite movies and talk about a great marketing or business example from the movie.

Thursday – Marketing Educational/Thought Leadership posts. These will cover a marketing topic, often related to digital, customer experience, brand loyalty, etc.

Friday – Friday Free-For-All. I’ve given myself permission to blog about ANY topic I want on Fridays. It could be marketing, it could be Egyptian archaeology, it could be astronomy. But I’d suspect business and marketing topics will be discussed more often than not.

Saturday – Since this is the weekend, posts on Saturday will focus on tools, how to get better at blogging or some other digital tool or application.  Much like how PBS, for instance, always runs programs devoted to home improvement, travel, cooking or crafting on the weekends.

I’m really excited about getting back to writing regularly and focusing on blogging, which is my first digital love and one I’ve been wanting to get back to for a long time.  I hope you’ll enjoy the copious amounts of content coming here.  On with the show!

 

So one of the biggest changes we’ve all experienced in regards to covid in 2020 is shifting our personal spending from offline to online. Yet while eCommerce sales are setting records in the US, eMarketer has found that digital display ad spending for retailers won’t increase that much. Why do you think this is?  My first guess would be that retailers are restricting ad budgets across the board in response to overall lost sales as a result of covid. Let’s hope for a strong economic rebound later this year and in 2021.

 

 

We talk a lot about building great brand ambassador programs here, so I loved Goldie Chan’s article on B2B Ambassador programs because she asked several influencers with experience in this area to share what they have learned.  Plus it was exciting to see friends like Kerry Gorgone and Lee Odden featured! As a fellow member of Adobe’s Insiders Program, I can agree with Lee and Kerry on how well-structured the program is.

 

 

Joe Rogan is an interesting guy that often makes some really good points about business and politics on his podcast The Joe Rogan Experience. I thought this quote about Twitter was spot-on: “There is no empathy in these conversations and that’s a big part of the problem [with Twitter].”  He thinks Twitter won’t be around much longer, and I agree with him.  I don’t think we will have a Twitter in 2025.

 

I love this tweet from former Alabama/Oklahoma standout QB Jalen Hurts:

Companies are always wondering how they create and cultivate more fans. 90% of it is simply taking the time to acknowledge the ones you already have.

 

Finally, congratulations to my blogging friend, Helen Rittersporn on recently blogging for 2,000 straight days! Helen is a #Blogchat alum and has in the past sent me special postcards to mark her blogging anniversaries.  Here’s the ones she sent for her 2000th straight post:

You can learn more about Helen at her blog Anchored Scraps, which is devoted to ‘old-style correspondence through handwritten letters between kindred souls’. Lovely, thanks again Helen, I’m going to try to channel some of your blogging dedication in getting my blog back off the ground!

See y’all tomorrow!

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Why Great Storytelling is So Important to Your Brand

I’ve been working with my friends at MarketingProfs this Summer to create a course for their Storytelling Summit for Marketers, which launches on September the 10th. As a way to give you a sneak peek at my course, Storytelling on Social Media, I wanted to talk a bit about why it’s important for your brand to tell stories.

Stories power Word of Mouth. By using story, you have a way to relate information to other people via a method (the story) which makes the information not only much more interesting, but you also increase the chance that other people will continue to pass that information along by sharing that same story.

I am an Alabama football fan, as most of you know. Recently, I was talking to a friend about the last two seasons, and Alabama’s starting QB, Tua Tagovailoa. If I had wanted to simply share information with this person, I could have said “Alabama beat Georgia the last two seasons.” While factually correct, both those wins were wrapped in incredible stories that make the information (Bama beat Georgia) far more interesting and memorable.

In 2017, Alabama faced Georgia for the National Championship. Jalen Hurts was Alabama’s starting QB, but Tua was the gunslinging backup that dazzled fans every time he played. Every time Hurts struggled, the fans clamored for Tua to come in, but he never did.

In the NC game against Georgia, the Bulldogs jumped out to a big lead by halftime.  Hurts was having a terrible game for Alabama. At halftime, the switch was made to start true freshman Tua in the second half, and he led Alabama to a come-from-behind victory, sealed by a 41-yard TD pass in Overtime.

The following year Alabama played Georgia for the SEC Championship and the roles were reversed. This time Tua was the starter and Jalen was the backup. And once again, Georgia jumped out to a big lead as Tua battled injuries. In the 2nd half, Jalen was put in and as Tua did the year before, he led Bama back to score a late win over Georgia. Jalen’s heroics led to a very emotional postgame interview with Nick Saban:

Now isn’t that a lot more memorable and interesting than saying ‘Alabama beat Georgia the last two seasons’?

Brand storytelling is about using story to communicate information to your customers. Ideally, that information will be both interesting and relevant to your customers, and relevant to your brand as well. When thinking about creating stories for your brand, think about what stories you can tell that will be both relevant to your customers, and also speak to what your brand stands for and is about.

A very simple way to do this can be by utilizing the stories of your customers, which you are probably already doing with testimonials. You can also let your employees tell what it’s like working for your brand, this can help streamline the hiring process, reducing hiring costs.

Also keep in mind when you are thinking about telling stories, that you can always use hypothetical examples in your stories. In fact, mixing real examples with abstract ones is one of the best ways to teach difficult concepts. You can tell a story about how one of your customers uses your product, then add a hypothetical “here’s how you could use our product” story to supplement the customer’s story.

Just remember that storytelling is a wonderful way to deliver information to your customers, and give them a way to easily relate that information to others, enhancing word of mouth.  Besides, who doesn’t love hearing and sharing a good story?

If you want to learn how to up your brand storytelling game, check out MarketingProfs’ Storytelling Summit for Marketers. Courses go live on September 10th, with additional live keynotes on the 17th and 24th.

 

PS: To wrap up the story with Tua and Jalen, at the end of the 2018 season, Jalen transferred to Oklahoma, where he won the starting QB job in the Spring. Last Saturday was the season opener for both Alabama and Oklahoma. Tua was amazing for Alabama, passing for over 300 yards and 4 TDs. But Jalen was the talk of the college football world, accounting for over 500 yards rushing and passing, and 6 TDs. After Week One, both are considered frontrunners for the Heisman trophy, given to the top player in college football.

 

BONUS: Well isn’t this awesome? Kerry at MarketingProfs has given me a $100 discount code to pass along to you, use code KERRYLIKESME to save $100 on the Storytelling for Marketers Summit!

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The Secret Language of Happy Customers

Let’s say you are a die hard fan of the movie Memento, like I am. Think about the conversation you would have with someone who just saw the movie for the first time last night. Most of their input would likely be along the lines of “WTF did I just watch???”

Now how would that conversation change if you met another fellow die hard fan of Memento?  You would have a COMPLETELY different conversation. You would get into dissecting individual scenes, the plot as a whole, you would question if it was really Teddy who slipped the note under Leonard’s door at the hotel, or was it someone else?

In her wonderful book Badass: Making Users Awesome, Kathy Sierra talks about how your most passionate users/customers have a different conversation than your regular customers. They are the ‘experts’ who hear music differently, the photographers who notice details in a landscape and how to frame a picture perfectly that the rest of us completely miss. They have a more advanced understanding of the things they are passionate about, and as a result, their conversations are more advanced as well.

I was remembering Kathy’s teachings when I recently heard the wonderful episode of the Punch Out podcast with David Meerman Scott as guest. First, David is absolutely brilliant and has some incredibly fascinating hobbies, so the episode is a must-listen purely for the entertainment value.

But David said something fascinating that ties into Kathy’s point about passionate users/customers having a different conversation around the things they love.  David said “It’s a way to form really strong bonds with people, around a shared fandom, a shared emotional connection. At one time I was like ‘this is a frivolous hobby’, but it’s not. It’s something that’s really important for us humans, to be around like minded people.”

Whenever I talk to companies about building a brand ambassador program, one of the key elements I always address is the need to have a way for the members of the program to connect with each other. It’s incredibly important to have people that share a passion around an idea, a belief, or even a brand, connect directly with each other.  I’ve often said that a rock concert is one of the greatest marketing inventions created. Think about what a rock concert is; you take hundreds if not thousands of fans of a rock artist or band, and stick them in the same arena and let them interact with each other. Being that close to so many people that share a similar passion or interest as you makes the entire experience that much better and more rewarding. It also increases your attachment and passion for the rock star.

So it makes sense to find a way to connect these customers to each other. Such customers are often great candidates for Customer Advisory Panels, or any group you create where you regularly solicit and act on feedback from customers. If you have a formal brand ambassador program, one of the important aspects is creating channels or tools that allow ambassadors to connect with each and become more comfortable together. This can easily be done with something as simple as a Facebook group or Slack channel.

Now, how could these special customers fit into your current marketing efforts?

Let’s remember we are talking about customers who are highly knowledgeable about your products and services. So much so that they likely will know more about your products and services than some of your newer employees. In other words, these special customers have the ability to be some of your best salespeople, if you tap into their abilities.

At this point, let’s revisit the buyer’s journey:

Buyer's Journey, Creating Better Content

The best place to utilize these customers would be in helping move potential customers from the Interested to Ready to Buy stage. Potential customers who are already interested are likely doing research on your products and services as the final step before committing to a purchase. Think of these customers as your ‘closers’, the customers that come in and seal the deal/sale for the person who is almost ready to make a purchase.

Let’s remember that customers who are in the Interested stage of the buyer’s journey are doing independent research. They are perusing your company website for specific product information and details. They are also searching for feedback from other customers. Customer reviews on websites such as Amazon are a common choice as its important to hear what people thought about your product or service AFTER buying it. Savvy customers will also search for complaints about your products and services, looking for common issues or problems that customers encountered.

Which is why it pays to engage with your more advanced customers and give them the incentive and structure to engage with customers who are in the ‘Interested’ stage of the buyer’s journey.  Encourage these customers to write reviews, publish blog posts, interact on message boards and forums.

The reality is that your most passionate customers are also your best salespeople.  Research has shown time and time again that we don’t trust brands, but we do trust other customers.

 

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What I Saw and Learned at Adobe Summit 2019

This year I made my third trip to Las Vegas for the Adobe Summit as part of the Adobe Insiders group. This is a group of influencers who serve as on site ‘correspondents’ for Adobe in helping to promote the event and share key insights. We also serve to advise Adobe on the focus, structure and strategy behind Summit, but that’s in a more limited capacity.

I wanted to share some of the things I saw and learned in my 4 days in Las Vegas for Summit. This post will be structured to cover two main areas. First, I wanted to discuss the event itself, some of the key takeaways and topics discussed. After that, I wanted to talk a bit about the structure of the Adobe Insiders group as I know many of you are working with influencers at your companies, and it’s always helpful to see how other companies work with influencers.

Retention is the new ‘Growth’ 

This was a big theme at Adobe Summit. The idea that by delivering amazing experiences for your customers, you retain them longer, reduce churn, and the associated costs from acquiring new customers.

This is, of course, a theme that’s near and dear to my heart, and was a big driver behind my writing Think Like a Rock Star. The idea that your current customers can do a much better job of acquiring new customers and driving growth than traditional marketing efforts. Tying into this theme was the importance of delivering amazing digital experiences to customers. One of the key focus points of the entire conference was the significance of personalizing the experience that the customer receives.

Now, this is where I want to play devil’s advocate a bit. Many of the sessions and discussions I saw and participated in at Adobe Summit around the idea of personalization centered on the idea of delivering a personalized experiences to the customer in order to complete a sale. This is understandable, as Adobe’s Experience Cloud suite of products are focused on helping businesses increase customer sales to a great degree. But when marketers think of personalization when it comes to digital experiences, this effort needs to be applied throughout the buying process, not just when the customer is at a consideration stage. In fact, the ability to personalize content and experiences prior to the consideration stage, is key to moving the uninterested or unaware customer to a point where they are ready to buy. ‘Personalization’ to many marketers means “how can we customize the sales offer to each individual customer, in order to increase sales?”, while ‘personalization’ to many customers means “give me relevant content and experiences at every touchpoint, regardless of whether I am ready to buy or not”.  That is a disconnect that many marketers need to be aware of, and address by closing that gap between customer expectations, and what marketers deliver.

Tying into the idea of delivering better experiences was the idea of the B2E business.  You have B2B (business to business) and B2C (business to consumer), but then you have some businesses that sell to both consumer and business customers. And in some cases, the buyers may be buying for both their business as well as personal (consumer) use.  So the idea of the B2E (business to everyone) was mentioned early and often at Adobe Summit.

The underlying idea was to stop thinking of a client as being solely B2B or B2C since we are rapidly moving toward a business environment where many companies will have both consumer and business customers, and marketing will need to reflect that and offer a sort of hybrid approach that’s still relevant to end customer.

BTW I would be remiss if I did not mention the exhibit hall/trade show area at Adobe Summit. Summit has always done a fabulous job with its trade show area. At many events, the trade show area is a huddled group of booths that event organizers are constantly pushing attendees toward, that most attendees really don’t want to spend time at. But Summit’s ‘Community Pavilion’ is so nicely done. The area has plenty of booths and all the things you expect at a conference exhibit hall. But it also has a ton of activities, food and drinks, and other attractions that suck you in and keep you in the area. All this is entertaining and makes you want to walk around and see the sights. And as such, increases the likelihood that you will stop by a few booths and talk to the exhibitors. With all the ancillary activities happening, it gives everyone a reason to come to the area, slow down and mingle. Which greatly increases the chances that more attendees will stop by more booths as a result.

 

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@kateoneill is doing some serious hand talking with @kerrygorgone #adobesummit

A post shared by Mack Collier (@mackcollier) on

In addition, Adobe provided ‘recharging stations’ throughout the conference area, which were greatly appreciated.  Adobe Summit has grown incredibly in just the last few years.  The first time I attended in 2016, I believe the attendance was 10,000.  This year, it was a little over 17,000. The event just keeps getting bigger and I honestly did not talk to any attendees who ever got tired or felt overwhelmed, just the opposite in fact.

Adobe Insiders Influencer Group

I wanted to shift gears a bit and talk a little about the structure of the Adobe Insiders group that was on-site and working with Adobe during the Adobe Summit.  2016 was my first year working with Adobe as a member of its Insiders group.  I believe the size of the group was under 10 in 2016.  I was also part of the Insiders group in 2017 when it was around 20 members, and this year the group totaled around 60 social media, marketing and technology influencers.

The over-arching goal of the group was to help promote the Adobe Summit and for each of us to share relevant insights and information from the speakers, keynotes and even attendees. Our feedback and insights were shared across all our usual social media channels, with an emphasis placed on Twitter since its much easier to track and access mentions on Twitter, especially at volume. The main hashtag used, #AdobeSummit, was a top trending topic on Twitter for pretty much the duration of the event. The work of the Insiders group played a big role in that.

I advise and consult with many companies who are working with groups of influencers or brand ambassadors. I always advise these companies to create platforms and channels to allow the group to become connected and to interact with each other prior to the event. Adobe did a wonderful job of facilitating communication channels for the group, including a private Twitter group, a Slack channel, conference calls, and even through #AdobeChat. It helped build camaraderie among the group, and by bringing some of the same members back every year, we form a bond as well.  Some of the members of this year’s group I knew from working with them in 2016 and 2016 at the Summit.

And what a group it was. I was able to see many old friends and a few people like Ann Handley and David Armano that I hadn’t seen in years.

All said, Adobe Summit was a wonderful event and I loved every minute it. Typically, I hit what I call ‘The Introvert’s Wall’ on the 2nd or 3rd day at an event. I get exhausted and honestly am ready to go home. That never happened in my 4 days in Las Vegas for Adobe Summit. The event kept my interest and attention throughout, and being able to spend so much time with my friends in the Insider group as well as my friends at Adobe made it a wonderful week. Information is already up for Adobe Summit 2020, and I hope I will see you there!

Disclaimer: Adobe sponsored my trip to Adobe Summit and the opinions I shared about the event here and on other social media channels were my own. 

#Blogchat’s Favorite Blogging Resources

#Blogchat happens every Sunday night at 8pm Central, and since 2009 has been one of the largest and most popular chats on Twitter. Over the last decade, we’ve had a lot of time to chat about our favorite tools, app, plugins and more. This page will be an ongoing list of many of the favorite blogging resources that the #Blogchat community uses.

Before I get to the list, I wanted to make special note that some of the resources listed here include an affiliate link. What that means is that if you click the link and buy the item referenced from that link, that I will receive a portion of the amount you spend. The price won’t change, in fact nothing will from your end, the seller will simply be able to note that I referred you to them, and they will give me a percentage of your sale in the form of a commission. Over the years, many #Blogchat members have asked for a way to help support my efforts to keep the #Blogchat going, and this is one way you can help. Any amount I collect from affiliate links will go toward covering my hosting fees and time spent on #Blogchat each week. Thanks so much for considering!

Also, note that all the tools referenced on this page are blogging tools that I either use myself, or have been recommended by multiple #Blogchat users. I am only including the tools that have consistently been praised as being valuable by the #Blogchat community. This list will definitely grow and change over time, so maybe sure to bookmark and check back often!

 

Free photo sites: These are sites that allow you to download photos, for free.  You can attribute if you want, but it’s not a requirement to use the photos.

UnSplash

Pixabay

Pexels

The the most with Pixabay right behind, then Pexels.

#Blogchat tip from Becky McCray:

Image creation sites/tools

Canva – One of the most popular blogging tools according to the #Blogchat community. Canva takes a lot of the visual/graphic design headaches out of the equation and makes it easier for bloggers to create custom images, infographics, and so much more.  It’s free to use and also offers some images and effects for a price, which is usually very reasonable. A wonderful resource I use and love.

PicMonkey – I’ve never used this site, but #Blogchat rock stars like Chris Brogan and Kerry Gorgone have endorsed it before, so it must be good!

 

Video creation sites/tools

Lumen5 – Lets you easily create videos for your blog posts.

 

Blogging Platforms (If you’re blogging for a company they often call this a Content Management System)

WordPress is by far the most popular blogging platform among the #Blogchat community. WordPress comes in two distinct variations:

WordPress.org – WordPress.org is free to use, but you must buy hosting, so this version is often called self-hosted. The platform is incredibly versatile, there are literally tens of thousands of plugins available that you can add to your WordPress.org blog that will add additional functionality to the site. Since WordPress is so incredibly popular, there are constantly new plugins and themes being developed for the platform, making it even more valuable. Just keep in mind that if you go the WordPress.org route, you will be responsible for providing your own hosting, which is typically anywhere from $10-20 a month, depending on the hosting provider you choose. When you hear someone mention ‘WordPress’, they are typically talking about the self-hosted version of the software.

WordPress.com – WordPress.com is also free to use. Additionally, WordPress covers the hosting for your WordPress.com blog, so it truly is free to use!  Additionally, WordPress.com handles all the backups and security for you. That’s the good news. The bad news is that you can’t use plugins on a WordPress.com blog, nor can monetize it with ads. You can customize your chosen theme to a limited degree, but there’s a fee involved.  Plus, WordPress.com could insert ads on your blog and make money from it. So if you simply want to blog, for free, and don’t want to pay for hosting, or worry about security and backups and don’t care about customizing your blog or adding a lot of bells and whistles, then WordPress.com could be a great option for you. If you want to sign up for a WordPress.com blog, please use this link, which is an affiliate link. Thank you!

 

Smartphone apps for blogging and content creation

Snapseed – Photo editor from Google

Adobe Spark – Another photo editor, from Adobe. One thing I like about Spark is it let’s you easily add text to a photo. If you’re at a conference, you can take a picture of a speaker then add a quote from them then save the photo and tweet it while they are speaking!

WordPress – This is the mobile app for WordPress. It gives you basic information on your WordPress site and, if you want, you can even blog from the app!

Google Analytics – If you have Google Analytics on your website or blog, this is a great way to keep up with your stats on the go.

 

Plugins, Plugins, Plugins! All the wonderful WordPress plugins!

There are so many incredible plugins for WordPress that the #Blogchat community loves.  Here are some of our favorites, and this list will be constantly updated.  All plugins are free unless noted as being Premium.

Design Plugins:

Thrive Architect (Premium) – Thrive Architect is a front-end, visual editor for your WordPress site/blog. It allows you to create gorgeous, functional posts and pages on your blog that will look like you paid a designed a fortune to create. Here’s a few examples of some of the pages I have created here with Thrive Architect. I cannot say enough good things about Thrive Architect. The team at Thrive Themes are constantly updating, improving and adding new features to Architect, and once you buy it, you get all the updates for LIFE. The current cost is $67 for a lifetime license, and it’s honestly worth double or triple that amount. Click this affiliate link to purchase your copy. Now I will say that Thrive Architect does have a bit of a learning curve to it, so you may make a few mistakes at first, I definitely did.  But Thrive has plenty of instructional videos at their site and blog posts to help you along, plus you get support for the first year. If you are a tinker that loves working on your own blog to make it look amazing, Architect is for you.

 

Security Plugins:

If you have a blog, it’s vital that you keep it secure from hackers and malware. If you have a WordPress.com blog (See above), this isn’t an issue, and some WordPress.org hosts offer security as part of your hosting plan. These plugins will help you monitor your blog and its files against intrusions. A word of advice: Always update all your themes and plugins, even the ones you don’t use. Often, plugins and themes are updated to address a potential security issue. Keeping your themes and plugins up to date is the best thing you can do to make your blog more secure.

Sucuri – This is the free plugin from Sucuri, it doesn’t do a lot by itself, other than alert you to potential issues, which is really all any free security plugin would do. Sucuri also offers a premium security service that scans your blog for security issues and can correct any that arise. It’s great, and I’ve been using Sucuri to secure this blog for years. It’s a bit expensive, but when you consider the alternative, it’s money well spent.

Wordfence – Wordfence is another security plugin that is free that can help you monitor what is happening on your blog from a security standpoint.

 

SEO Plugins:

Yoast SEO – This is probably the most popular SEO plugin among the #Blogchat community. It has all the standard bells and whistles, helps you set keywords, meta descriptions, etc etc etc for improving your blog’s SEO efforts.

All-In-One SEO – This is the SEO plugin I use on this blog. It has pretty much all the features Yoast has, and like Yoast, comes in a free and premium version.

I would suggest that you try both plugins separately, then pick the one you think works better for your blog. Both are solid choices and you can’t go wrong with either one.

 

Productivity Plugins:

Jetpack – Jetpack is a sort of all-in-one suite of features that adds to the functionality of your blog. It includes features to help with security, social sharing, analytics, SEO, commenting, spam, and much more. It even includes new themes for your WordPress self-hosted blog. The free version can be found here, and they also offer a Premium version of Jetpack with even more features (affiliate link). Additionally, Jetpack comes from Automattic, the same company that makes WordPress.

 

Plugins That Help You Monetize Your Blog:

WooCommerce – WooCommerce is a free plugin that makes it much easier to sell both physical and digital products on your blog. Like Jetpack, it is also made by Automattic, the same company that makes WordPress, so you know it integrates very well with WordPress blogs. You can also purchase a Premium version of WooCommerce that adds many more features such as the ability to add subscriptions and memberships to your blog. Click here to learn more about the Premium version of WooCommerce (Affiliate link).

 

Social Sharing Plugins:

Social Warfare – Social Warfare comes in a free and premium version. The free version is a stripped down version of the premium plugin, which I have running on this blog, so those social sharing buttons you see on my posts are from Social Warfare. You can check out both the free and Premium versions here.

 

Misc Plugins:

Akismet – Akismet is one of the first plugins every WordPress blogger should get as it does a great job of removing spam comments. It doesn’t get all of them, but it catches most, and it’s a big time-saver for bloggers and helps keep their blogs spam-free.

Smush – We all love adding purdy, high res images to our blog posts. Our readers love them too, but it creates a problem. Those high res images also make our site load more slowly, which degrades the user experience. Smush helps address this by compressing your images, making them load faster, and by extension making your site load faster!

 

Misc Blogging Resources:

Pingdom’s Site Speed Tool – This is great for showing you how fast (or slowly) your site loads, and it shows you how every plugin and element on your blog adds to the load time. It’s great to identify those plugins that might be slowing down your blog’s load time.

 

This page of blogging resources will be updated often, so please bookmark it. Also, please check out #Blogchat every Sunday night at 8pm Central!

Have a favorite blogging resource or plugin that isn’t listed? Add it in a comment and if I add it to this post, I’ll include a link to your blog when I do! Thanks!

Helping Companies Turn Their Customers Into Fans

Get More Customers 

Spend Less Money

Your current customers are your best source for sustainable business success. Most companies prioritize acquiring new customers over building better relationships with its existing customers. This is unfortunate, because your current customers: 
  • Cost less. It costs 6-7 times more to acquire a new customer than it does to retain an existing customer.
  • Spend more. Repeat customers are shown to spend on average 45-50% more than new customers
  • Acquire new customers, for free! Current customers are constantly promoting your company to friends, family members and other potential customers they come in contact with.
Your current customers are your best source for sustained business success. That's why I build programs, content and digital strategies that help my clients increase sales, grow its customer base, and lower marketing costs by better understanding and connecting with its current customers.
I want my next successful case study to be your company.

Kerry O'Shea Gorgone,

Director of Product Strategy, Training, MarketingProfs

“Since 2006, MarketingProfs has trusted Mack to help us create content, events and experiences that delight our customers. Mack literally wrote the book on how to create happy customers, and we continue to rely on his advice and mentoring to help us continuously improve customer loyalty and satisfaction. Plus, Mack is incredibly easy work with, which is always a plus! 


I'm so happy we hired Mack, and you will be too."



Here's How I Can Help Your Company Grow:

Consulting and Advisement

Whether you need an audit of your existing strategies, ongoing strategic advisement, or simply an expert to look over your shoulder, I can help. This service is perfect for businesses with a limited budget, or those who have an occasional need for help, such as in dealing with a one-time crisis management issue. I am happy to help give your team the direction and advice it needs, as necessary. 

Strategic Development and Execution

If your business lacks the skills or bandwidth to development complex digital strategies or customer engagement programs, I can help. Whether its creating a complete digital strategy or building a robust brand ambassador program from the ground up, I can deliver. If your business also needs help executing its new strategy or program, I offer custom packages to give your business every tool it needs to succeed.

Speaking

On-site speaking is a wonderfully cost-efficient way to provide training to your team all at once. Or if you need to bring in an outside expert for your user or customer conference. Each presentation is completely customized to your company's precise needs.

On-Site Workshops

On-site workshops are perfect when your team needs a hands-on, deep-dive on a particular topic or skill. My workshops are designed to facilitate group and individual learning so that your team can immediately put its newly-acquired skills to use.

Read Mack's Latest Blog Posts

Monday’s Marketing Minute: Spaces Leans Into Politics, Meta’s Twitter App is Closer, Apple Gets Branded Likes
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Let Your Courage Be the Master of Your Fear
In January, I decided to start reading the Bible.  Every day. And it's been an amazing experience, and I will[...]
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The Promise (and Peril) of Artificial Intelligence for Content Creators
Artificial intelligence is arguably the hottest growth area of business this year and could be for the rest of the[...]
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Meet Mack Collier:

Recognized by Forbes as one of the Top 25 Social Media Marketers in the world, I help companies like yours craft world-class digital marketing strategies. Success in digital isn't about understanding social media tools, it's about understanding how and why your customers are using those tools. Notice how many companies are looking for an 'Instagram Expert' or a 'Facebook Guru'? These are the companies that haven't worked with me. You've probably heard of some of the ones that have; brands like Dell, Adobe, Ingersoll Rand, Paper.li, Red Lion Hotels, Petals.com, MarketingProfs and Utica National Insurance. I give companies strategic advice and direction that enables them to more effectively reach their customers online via digital marketing and drive real business growth. Again, if you need a 'Twitter Ninja', I'm not for you. But if you need someone that can teach you how to better engage your customers online and drive measurable results for your business, then please contact me as I'd love to work with you.

Finally, I literally wrote the book on how to create a world-class Brand Ambassador Program, and that book is Think Like A Rock Star: How to Create Social Media and Marketing Strategies That Turn Customers Into Fans, published in 2013 by McGraw-Hill. Companies have been using Think Like a Rock Star as a template for building amazing Brand Ambassador Programs since 2013, and the book is an Amazon Best Seller.

One of the best audience growth rates was achieved by a website terrace-healthcare.com

What Clients Are Saying

Michelle Brigman,

Director of Social Media Listening and Engagement, Dell

“Mack’s expertise in social media is widely known & respected. When we invited him to help facilitate a customer event, we knew that his integrity, reputation, commitment to his customers, & knowledge would make for a great partnership. We were right. Our event was a success and we continue to value to his ideas about building stronger customer relationships.”

Ann Handley,

Chief Content Officer, MarketingProfs

“What I love about Mack Collier as a speaker at our events is that our audiences simply love him. Mack has a very direct, no-BS style. He doesn’t give a lot of theory or offer abstract concepts. Instead, he speaks directly about what works in social media and offers concrete ideas that attendees can take home immediately and implement.” 

Kelly Hungerford,

Director of Community, Paperli

“Mack’s record with building strategic brand loyalty initiatives and passion for connecting companies with consumers for win-win scenarios was the perfect partner for defining and structuring Paper.li’s 4 Pillar Brand Ambassador Program.

At the end of our twelve month engagement we had far more than an ambassador program: we had a blueprint for organic growth that proved to increase growth and loyalty simultaneously, exceeded stakeholder expectations and earned long-term end-user loyalty.

If you are working on customer retention and loyalty or just want to better understand what you need to do to move your marketing plans forward, I highly recommend working with Mack Collier for your next project.”


Contact Mack Today to See How He Can Help You Mobilize Your Customers to Grow Your Business!

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