Crowdfunding

Crowdfunding

Are you a start-up company looking for seed capital?  Rather than turning to venture capitalists, many start-ups are now turning to crowdfunding platforms.  Artists, filmmakers, would be writers and musicians  all apply for crowdfunding in order to roll out that first commercial project.  Crowdfunding is an ideal way to fund a creative project.  Creators do keep 100% ownership of their work but naturally there is a fee taken of the money raised, typically 5%.

Kickstarter
Kickstarter was the first of the crowdfunding platforms and appeared about 3 years ago.  Since then it has funded over 95,000 projects.  The most famous of these was the Pebble watch project which raised over $10 million when in fact they were only looking for $100,000.
Today there are scores of crowdfunding platforms each covering a different crowdfunding niche.
Here's a link to the alternative platforms.

How Does It Work?
The trick is to set a funding level that you realistically wish to achieve.  If you don't get enough interest to reach 100% of your funding you receive no funding at all. 
So how do you put forward your case?  You do this via a video of the proposed project, through graphics, informative text and FAQs.  The trick is to set up a stepped reward system for your backers.  Ideally the higher the investment in you, the more the backer receives in return.  You can see that it makes an ideal platform through which to generate advance orders.
Typically the fundraising takes place over a 30 day period.  The number of days remaining is displayed on the project page along with the number of backers to date and the amount of money pledged to the goal amount.

Things I have Noticed

• Filling out your Kickstarter project page reminds me a lot of LinkedIn, that the correct content is vital to tell your story and promote your project. 
• Remember its all about your "orientation" to the donor. 
• The donors need to be able to identify themselves in the project that you are promoting.
• Sell the benefits not the features.
• People donate for emotional reasons.  Typically this will be the reason why or how your project came about.  This makes for a good opening paragraph
• You need to promote this like hell using social media.  I noticed that the project videos received a lot of Facebook shares but very few tweets.  Personally I would rather see this the other way around.
• I would suggest having a well built up social network before the clock starts ticking on your crowdfunding project.
• Bring your offline contacts online and your online community offline.  Create a live event based around the project to raise awareness.  I would highly recommend a group photo of all of the participants, who can then be tagged on Facebook, so that your project Facebook page will get into the newsfeeds of all of their friends.

Zoobits
Cody Rauh, a colleague has launched a crowdfunding project to produce a series of children's therapy puzzles.  The purpose of these puzzles is to aid in the development of children with autism, patients with head injury, stroke victims and the recovery of war veterans.
Please give your support at  http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/codyrauh/zoobits
AND TELL YOUR  FRIENDS!

PS I just came across someone crowd funding for a new kidney.

Social Media Platforms Explained

The Donut Analogy To Social Media

22 Ways to Create Compelling Content [Infographic]

Like this infographic? Get more content marketing tips from Copyblogger.

What To Expect From Social Media

For the social media novice, the prospect of entering into the world of social media for the first time can be daunting. It can be perplexing trying to work out where and how to begin in the labyrinth of available online networks, each boasting mind-boggling numbers of potential new customers for your business. If only you could fathom a way in which to meaningfully engage with them! If, for example, you have never been “poked” or “retweeted”, probing this unknown domain with its unfamiliar vernacular and seemingly odd etiquettes could present a risk to your existing marketing efforts and, if handled incorrectly, may damage your existing online corporate / brand identity.
In this blog post you will find a few basic helpful tips for getting started in this space.  Ultimately you should the confidence to take your first steps into this exciting media, and to start to craft a sustainable social media strategy for your business.

Begin by “listening”
If you currently do not have any, or very little, social media presence, begin by “listening” to existing social media channels / groups that share your organisation’s interests. Open sites, such a Twitter, allow you to search their content streams using such tools as Twitter Search. The Google Alert service enables you to set up regular user-defined email alerts that monitor the internet for new content in a number of formats such a blog entries, videos, discussions and more. In taking this approach, you can start to compile your knowledge base of “who” is posting “what” content on your chosen topic or query, before getting involved yourself.

Taking your first steps
As you become more au fait with the various styles of language and different etiquettes used within social media, create new social media accounts that you feel best serve your business. All social media platforms vary in what they offer and some will provide you with much better access to your target audience than others. Advice about which social media platform best suits your type of business will differ, but ultimately you will get a strong feel for what is and isn’t working fairly quickly. Advice about specific social media platforms and their potential impact is widely available online.

Starting to build your community
As your confidence grows, you will want to build a community around your chosen field of expertise. This involves locating like-minded people / organisations / customers and beginning to interact with them. This may take the form of commenting on other users’ content, inviting them to comment on your content, exchanging ideas / concepts (social media is a great place to ask questions), sharing information / links etcetera. Don’t be afraid to put others in the limelight, share with others what you know, show a human side and always remain courteous, helpful and supportive. Not all comments you receive will be positive or necessarily fair, so be prepared to engage with these conversations and to see them through to an amicable solution where possible. Bear in mind that you are not the only person in the social media space with something interesting to say; it’s not just about you and users can easily tune out! Ultimately you are trying to create a valuable community so remember, it’s a two-way street; if you ask for feedback, be prepared to help others when they ask for yours.

What can your community expect?A social media community will take time to build but don’t get frustrated. From the outset of establishing your social media presence, give your community a strong sense of what your specialist area is and how often they can expect to interact with you. By setting expectation levels, people know what to expect from you but ultimately that means an extra workload on your shoulders too. As your reputation and reach in the social media space grows, so will interest in you and your organisation’s products and services.

Create and plan like a publisher
Inevitably, as your social media efforts gather pace, so will the demand on your resources. The introduction of a weekly blog, for example, involving writing and moderating the content, responding to user comments etcetera will all take regular amounts of time and effort to manage. Add to this a successful spin-off webinar series, regular tweetups and before you know it, interacting with your social media community will become an increasingly time-consuming task. “Success” you may say. Indeed, but you need to schedule in the various workloads and additional resources associated with your social media efforts to ensure they continue to flourish. Keep in mind too that social media can have the effect of disarming even the most seasoned traditional marketer, so don’t assume they are the best suited to help with social media content tasks. By selecting someone already in touch with contemporary blogging styles and techniques, it can save valuable admin time and spare a few blushes. That said, bear in mind that whether it is one or more people sharing the job of managing your social media accounts, you should establish a set of social media guidelines for all staff (templates are readily available online).

Content strategy is key
Alongside your new social media strategy must sit your greater content strategy. This will involve the content that you have available now, together with the content you plan to share with your community in the future. Some of which you will know is in the pipeline, such as content created around an annual event, for example; some of which may come about via your social media endeavours, such as the opportunity to write a guest blog or to present at a virtual event. Either way, embracing the creative drive and editorial planning principles of a publisher will help you and your organisation better deliver good quality, original, authoritative and timely content resulting in maximum impact for your products / brands. At the heart of this will be a “living” editorial calendar that sets out the necessary content inputs by subject, type, author and deadline. This in turn will underpin and inform both your on and off-line content marketing strategy moving forward.

by Martin Maynard, Red Rocket Media

How To Build Your Online Business Community

Social media has the power to create a sense of community around your organisation.  A prime example of an organisation using community build is the Red Cross.  The question however is always how?  You know you have "likes" on your Facebook page, followers on Twitter and even the odd guest post on your blog.  These are the obvious things to do but is it enough?

Things to consider:

1. Your website/blog's shared purpose - You must have a buy in, something your readers can identify with and belong to.  Yours readers will be looking for like minded people with the same kind of problem or difficulty that you can solve. 
2. You are the leader - Communities need a spokesperson that is you.  You need to maintain the community'ss purpose and its direction.  Conversation and connections will need to be probed and expanded.  Use your personal story to illustrate the community's purpose, after all people have similar problems.  Find guest bloggers who can spread the word of your movement.
3. You are also the enforcer - some posts by members may need to be policed if abusive to other members or not in line with the site's purpose.
4. Aim for inclusion - make sure members feel their points and concerns are met.  Also you will need to be seen to be fair so that all members need to receive the same consideration and be heard equally
5. Create a Referral System - The best way to grow a community is to create a referral system, ideally with an incentive.  This incentive can be a prize for the member would refers the highest number of new members in a given time period.  Again such a referral system may will not suit all business models.  Another idea would be free admission to the community for getting two new members to sign up.  You need a self-perpetuating system build in or it all becomes an uphill struggle. 
6. Continuity is key - All of the participants must feel that there is a benefit to continuing to visit the community, otherwise your member numbers will dwindle. Increasing content is of importance here.
7. Your content - Growing a community requires content that is relevant to your target's interests.  This needs to be kept up to date.
8. Work with feedback - Be aware that you may need to rethink the community's purpose based on the questions you are asked by your members.
9. It takes time - And continual effort.  Do not expect a "critical mass" or "tipping point" number of followers that will arrive out of nowhere and make all the difference.  Should this happen (by some remote chance) then its a bonus.  You will continually win and loose new members even while growing at a steady pace. 
10. In practical terms - Spread your group's shared purpose on Twitter.  Retweet messages from like minded people.  Spread the word of your movement through bloggers already blogging in that space. 
11. Include outgoing links and related article on your blog posts.  Use an automated Twitter and Facebook feed on your subject matter to seed these online conversations. 

I would welcome comments or ideas, please comment below.

7 Reasons To Blog For Business

 We all know blogging is becoming more and more popular so why should we get involved?  I know everyone will have their own reasons in their own order of importance but here are a few you should consider.

1. Express Your Thoughts - Blogging is a perfect medium for this.  Typing out your thoughts at the time, will bring structure and clarify to your ideas.  There is plenty of scope to flesh them out. 
2. Share Your Thoughts - Having written a blog post it is easy to share it though the use of social media be it Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or Reddit. 
3. Get FeedBack - By allowing others to comment on your blog or website you connect with the wider community and invite feedback on your ideas. 

By sticking to a common theme you can share your passion, interest and expertise in a particular subject matter.  This is often referred to as niche blogging.  Niche blogging has many business advantages.  It allows you to

1. Raise Your Personal Profile - Blogging is definitely a way of standing out from the crowd, gathering a crowd around you and delivery your personal message to that crowd.  While more and more people are doing this, it is not for everyone.  Its worth mentioning that the marketing guru Seth Godin started off by blogging.  His first book was a collection of his first blog posts. 
2. Raise Your Brand - Be it your personal brand or your comany brand, it will be elevated through association with a blog.  Even if you are blogging just to be heard your blog will become your brand.  All the more reason to keep your blog consistant or to a theme. 
3. Show That You Are Human - A blog allows the writer and his followers to express their opinions and will bring across the humanity of those involved rather than just a corporate image.  Emotion is convincing and builds long term loyalty.
4. Show Your Expertise - Again by sticking to a niche area you can demonstrate the depth of your knowledge on the subject matter.  The first question you will have to answer is "how much expertise should I share"?  You may want to test the water.  Many argue that in today's world where you can google anything, that information has no real value but its implimentation does.  This means that you give information  away freely but charge for the strategizing and application of your intellectual propertery.  Depending on your business model you may have varying views on this.  Either way sharing your expertise will establish you as an authority in your field.  In many cases demonstrating your expertise will automatically raise your personal and/or band profile. 
5. Position Yourself - Your blog will show both your point of view and your strengths within a given niche.  This will automatically position you, show how you are different, relative to others in your field.
6. Influence Others - Having established that you are a credible expert and that you have a position or point of view on why things in your industry are the way they are or where they are going, it becomes easy to influence your followers. 
7. Drive Traffic - My recent experence is that blogging literally forces you to drive traffic to your site.  After all you want to be heard, don't you?

If you have any comments on the above please leave a comment below.

Powerful Uses For Google Alerts

Google Alerts is a free tool that is easy to overlook. Think of it as a monitoring station, where you can track news, blogs, video, discussion and books on your keyword subject matter.  You can set the frequency of the alert and have it delivered by email or RSS feed. 

1. Monitor Your Brand
One of the first uses of Google Alerts I came across was to monitor for customer chatter on your own brand, goods or service.  Find a conversation relevant to your company, product or service gives you the chance to jump in and engage with potential customers.  In the worst case of someone damning your brand or service you can jump in and intervene.

2. Monitor Your Competitors
Google Alerts is an ideal way of keeping abreast of your competitors' latest product launches or news.  It makes sense to know what your competition is doing.

3. Monitor For Customers
Keywords covering your product offering that your potential customers would be using can be monitored.  Just select "discussions", "as it happens" and select the frequency of update.
If someone is looking for your product you have a chance to get in front of the customer.  This is the core of inbound marketing, a social media strategy that drives lead generation.

4. Monitor Industry News
Google Alerts can be used to aggregate the best of the news in your industry sector.  You have the option of hand picking bits of news or feeding the highlights to your Facebook page or Twitter.  This can be done using the RSS feed selection.  The trick here would be to interweave this newsfeed with more personalised posts.  Blog aggregation can also be done with Google Alerts rather than Google Reader.  Again this is a handy way of compiling all relevant information for a blog of your own or an industry related company newsletter.

 Google Alerts