Threadless Media

Hi gang,

I posted the slideshow below, along with bullet points for easy reference. Feel free to leave a comment at the bottom.

Thanks!
Bob

Strategy

• To listen to what people are saying about…
• To do market research.
• To keep others updated in your industry (news).
• To find out how you can serve your customers better.
• To provide customer service.
• To meet new people.
• To support current customers.
• To reach out to new prospects.

Key to Success
ENGAGE your followers no matter what your strategy is.

What to Tweet About

• Spam
• Self-promotion
• Babble
• News
• Pass along value
• Conversational

URl Shortners

URL shorteners allow you to take really long website urls and shorten them so you can share sites on Twitter (without using your 140 characters just for the link).

Examples include:

• www.bit.ly – Tracks how many clicks your link received.
• www.cli.gs – Tracks how many clicks your link received.
• www.tinyurl.com

Start by Listening

• search.twitter.com
• search.twitter.com/advanced
• backtweets.com
• collecta.com
• twitterfall.com
• tweetmeme.com
• tweetvolume.com

What should you search for?

• Your name
• Business name
• Product
• Service
• Competition
• Interests

Ways to Make Listening Easy

• www.tweetbeep.com
• iGoogle
• My Yahoo!

Choose a Name

• Use your real name/business name.
• Case doesn’t matter.
• Short is good.
• Avoid numbers and underscores.

Finding People to Follow

• twellow.com/twellowhood
• exectweets.com
• mrtweet.com
• twestival.com
• search.twitter.com

How to determine whether you should follow someone back

1. View their profile.
2. View their tweets.
3. Followers vs. Following ratio.
4. What industry are they in?

Tips on Starting Out

• Look for meaningful people to connect to & follow them.
• Don’t follow too many people at one time.
• When someone follows you back, thank them.
• Look for ways to connect (that’s what networking is about).

I really don’t remember subscribing to this newsletter below, though I’m not doubting I did. However, I’d like to point out a few items this newsletter did wrong and how easy it is to improve upon it.

First, here is what I saw in my email:

Second, these folks aren’t trying to sell anything so they probably aren’t concerned about open rates as much, but they gave us an example of how not to write an email newsletter.

Below is a table with a complaint, why it’s a complaint, and how many points they lose for their mistake. Shall we get started?

These guys lost 10 points. Ouch! If you follow these simple considerations, you’ll be good to go.

Btw. My point system is based entirely on my preferences. I gave them a -3 for the PHP List thing because I’m heavily biased toward Mail Chimp. Speaking of which, have you signed up for my newsletter?

I recently signed up for Batchbook. It’s is an amazing service and I’ve only scratched the surface (ok, to be honest, I’ve hardly used it the way I could. In time I will though.). There are seven reasons I Batchbook, the product and the company rocks (these are ordered from nice to have to awesome):

1. It goes with me where ever I am, regardless of what computer I’m on.
2. It integrates with Gmail and syncs my contacts.
3. It integrates with the worlds best email newsletter service – MailChimp.
4. It integrates with the worlds best billing software – Freshbooks.
5. They have a page for new customers to learn how to get the most out of their service.
6. They have webinars to learn how to use their product every other Thursday.
7. Pamela followed up with me:

Hi Bob,

Pamela O’Hara, owner of BatchBlue Software here. You recently signed up for a BatchBook contact management system account.
Just checking in to see if you have had a chance to try it out and how things are going.

A reminder on your account info:
Your account: http://…
Username: bob…
(if you have forgotten your password, use the “Forgot your password?” link at the bottom of the page)

We’ve just posted some great info in the Customer On-Boarding Guide on our site in case you missed anything when setting up the account.

Customer On-Boarding Guide:
http://www.batchblue.com/new-customers.html

Part 1: Adding Contacts & Communications

1. Importing
2. Adding new contacts
3. Setting up Outlook

Part 2: Customizing Your Contact Data

1. Categorizing contacts
2. Adding custom fields
3. Affiliating contacts

Part 3: Viewing Contact Data

1. Lists
2. Reports
3. Mailing labels
4. Mailing lists

Also, for the latest and greatest on BatchBook features as they roll out,
check in on the Product Updates section of our blog at http://blog.batchblue.com/?cat=40

Please let me know if you have any questions, feedback or interesting BatchBook stories. We especially like the stories!

Keep in touch,

Pamela
—–
Pamela O’Hara
President, BatchBlue Software
http://BatchBlue.com

Organize Your Business. Live Your Life.

Ok, so those are 7 great features, but here is why Batchbook gets it:

1. They made it dead simple to do the most important task of any business/business owner – KEEP IN TOUCH WITH MY CONTACTS!
2. But they took it a step further and made it dead simple to utilize other awesome applications I use everyday/week/month.
3. They do not leave me in the dark. Too often I sign up for a service and I just don’t “get it” or have the time to dig in like I want to. MAKE IT EASY FOR US!
4. Pamela followed up with me. I know it is most likely an auto responder, but it is from her personal business email account. She made herself accessible.
5. Bonus: They’re everywhere – blog, twitter, web videos, etc. Again, they are accessible.

To companies offering a service or product, here is my advice. Do these five steps and you’ll be my hero.