Your Digital Marketing Coach with Neal Schaffer

Are you providing true value and building a relationship with your email subscribers? If not, it's time to do a hard reset with this advice from Neal Schaffer. Key Highlights[02:27] My Advice on Email[03:17] Why Email Marketing Is Still Critical[03:29] Why You Need to be on Multiple Social Media Platforms[03:57] Build Your List[05:01] The Other Thing You Should Be Doing[06:35] Getting to the Core of Your Email Marketing[06:57] Never Buy List from Third Party[08:50] Go Big or Go Home Approach[10:08] What Is Something Unique to Maximize Your Social Business?Notable QuotesAs you know, social media permeates everything, it it becomes part of what companies naturally do, it becomes part of their infrastructure. Social is being used, regardless of industry, regardless of department.And my advice really is I really, after you listen to this podcast, I want you to do a hard reset, and alt control, delete on what you've been doing an email and I want to share with you what I've been doing an email.What I learned that and I talked about this in the podcast was that email is like any other form of relationship building.First of all, well, let's first understand that email marketing is still critical that even with social media, people are not on social media all the time.You know, I think a lot of content marketing efforts, people forget about those downloadable resources that can help lead people into your marketing funnel, and they concentrate on blog posts and social media posts.If you don't have a process for it, you have nothing. And I want my newsletter to become one of those newsletters, something truly incredible that people will be waiting for.If you're looking to bootstrap this, to help you really create a compelling email newsletter. So don't just send out email newsletters because you have a list. And don't send them out weekly, because you feel you have to, I want you to do a reset. And I want you to really think about what value is that newsletter providing to your subscribers, not to you as a business, but to your subscribers. Learn More:Buy Digital Threads: https://nealschaffer.com/digitalthreadsamazonBuy Maximizing LinkedIn for Business Growth: https://nealschaffer.com/maximizinglinkedinamazonJoin My Digital First Mastermind: https://nealschaffer.com/membership/ Learn about My Fractional CMO Consulting Services: https://nealschaffer.com/cmoDownload My Free Ebooks Here: https://nealschaffer.com/books/Subscribe to my YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/nealschafferAll My Podcast Show Notes: https://podcast.nealschaffer.com

Neal provides advice to hotels - which is equally applicable to any brick-and-mortar establishment - on creating photographable memories to help your customers promote your presence in social media. Key Highlights[02:30] What Else You Could Do to Increase Engagement?[03:44] Why Reviews for Hotels Are Still Critical?[04:26] Why Visual Aspect is Successful for Hotels[05:13] The Missed Opportunity[06:32] Leveraging Images Shared on Social Medi[06:44] Create A Photographic Memory [08:02] Recognize People Sharing Their Experiences in Your HotelNotable QuotesYou know, I think hotels, obviously, from a marketing perspective, have a few things that they can do if they are affiliated with a certain brand. Obviously, they have a branded websites, where it is a search engine where they can be found if someone is looking for a hotel of that brand and a certain city. So that sort of passive traffic.This leads to my point, which is for hotels, I believe to be successful and social. It comes down to often that visual aspect. I'm talking about what is it that when someone stays at your hotel now I talked about all these other avenues these other engines that are out there that will lead people to potentially staying at your hotel To ensure if you tweet, you're on Facebook, what have you, these are other avenues that may help people discover your hotel, especially if you use paid social, which I would recommend, obviously, for one of those reasons.But going beyond that, the missed opportunity that I find with hotels and social media is what you do after you have the customer, once someone has committed has booked a room at your hotel has checked in at your hotel.And after they check out of your hotel, have you knowingly maintained a relationship or created a relationship which social is really the perfect avenue for you to do that with, but to create an experience that would make them want to share with the world?It's about creating areas within your hotel where people can create a photographic memory.Creating an area just like you would want to create shareable content if you were blogging or creating content. But above and beyond that actually engaging, curating, responding to those that are already promoting your company out there and social media.  Learn More:Buy Digital Threads: https://nealschaffer.com/digitalthreadsamazonBuy Maximizing LinkedIn for Business Growth: https://nealschaffer.com/maximizinglinkedinamazonJoin My Digital First Mastermind: https://nealschaffer.com/membership/ Learn about My Fractional CMO Consulting Services: https://nealschaffer.com/cmoDownload My Free Ebooks Here: https://nealschaffer.com/books/Subscribe to my YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/nealschafferAll My Podcast Show Notes: https://podcast.nealschaffer.com

I had the pleasure of interviewing social media marketing professor Niklas Myhr, who teaches at Chapman University here in Orange County, California, about his social media classes and advice for both professional MBA students as well as undergrads. Key Highlights[00:48] Introduction of Podcast Guest, Niklas Myhr[01:08] Who is Dr. Niklas Myhr?[03:22] Teaching Undergrads[06:12] Undergrads's Level of Aptitude[06:27] 3 Components for Every Social Media Professional[10:09] Connect with NiklasNotable QuotesI tell my students that if you find yourself in a situation where you basically can kill a brand overnight, and the company doesn't even know how much control of the cockpit they have given. Please try to get an executive sit them down for coffee, and ask them stupid questions about who are you? What are you doing? What's your voice, because they have built a brand perhaps for 50 years. And you can kill it overnight. It is a balance. I tell students don't consider it dangerous for you career wise to join a company that doesn't allow you to have a personal social media presence in parallel to your full time employment.I think that then they need to get out of this mindset that you should do one thing really well, instead of doing a mediocre job everywhere, I say that it's some truth to that statement.Even if you have a minimal presence, you need to be technically proficient, to develop a skill and a voice of your own on behalf of the brand.Storytelling is sort of the key element. And I think that successful MBAs that did this without technology before I tell them, if you're if you're good at building relationships, and trust, and networks, that's great. Those skills are still applicable in social media age, you just can do more of it faster.And I think that successful MBAs that did this without technology before I tell them, if you're if you're good at building relationships, and trust, and networks, that's great. Those skills are still applicable in social media age, you just can do more of it faster.Learn More:Buy Digital Threads: https://nealschaffer.com/digitalthreadsamazonBuy Maximizing LinkedIn for Business Growth: https://nealschaffer.com/maximizinglinkedinamazonJoin My Digital First Mastermind: https://nealschaffer.com/membership/ Learn about My Fractional CMO Consulting Services: https://nealschaffer.com/cmoDownload My Free Ebooks Here: https://nealschaffer.com/books/Subscribe to my YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/nealschafferAll My Podcast Show Notes: https://podcast.nealschaffer.com

Is your business changing? Offering new products or services or maybe concentrating strategically on one or two products instead of ten? Your content strategy needs to change as well. Learn what you need to do - and what to expect as a result - from this podcast.Key Highlights[01:03] Shifting Content Midshift[01:41] Shifting Content Midshift is Natural[02:58] How to Do It?[03:35] Another Way of Organizing the Buckets[04:21] Facts You Will Deal with When Shifting Content[05:28] Your Readers May Not Be Ready[07:09] Transitional Period[07:55] Focus on Relevant Metrics[08:23] Almost Do A ResetNotable Quotes But either way, shifting content midstream is natural businesses, organizations are dynamic, the products that you carry may change your industry might change, except if you're obviously very, very well established in a very, very stable industry.But things change, right. And what's going to happen is if you create your social media strategy, as outlined and maximize your social, and you do your PDCA, and you do your checking on a regular basis, you're going to notice that there's some type of content, invariably, that's going to do better than other types of content. And therefore, in some ways, you might be shifting a little bit more narrow, because you want to emphasize that content that is really engaging.It's not hard to do, it really comes down to those content buckets, and the weight of each of those content buckets, and the analyzing them and make sure that that weight and the names of the buckets are aligned with your strategy.And really emphasize the two or three buckets that you plan to blog most about, you could do something similar to what I did on maximize social business, which is organize all the buckets that I have into four major buckets, four or five major buckets, right platforms, which go over all the different social networks, disciplines, which go over all the internal departments of a company, industries, write themes, and then marketing is one.But I don't think that you need to do anything different than what you've done. It's just blogging on certain topics more frequently than other ones. But you're going to have two issues that come up.So be prepared to take a hit. But really, you want to focus on that content that's going to help you achieve your business objectives. And in doing so, you're going to have to generate a new readership. So expect that engagement to go down and inspect other things to go down as you do that there's going to be a transition period.I recommend that you do something similar and let people know, you know, going forward, this is this is the plan, this is what we're going to talk about, we look forward to engaging with you and providing you even more resourceful content. So I think that it's not something that you haveLearn More:Buy Digital Threads: https://nealschaffer.com/digitalthreadsamazonBuy Maximizing LinkedIn for Business Growth: https://nealschaffer.com/maximizinglinkedinamazonJoin My Digital First Mastermind: https://nealschaffer.com/membership/ Learn about My Fractional CMO Consulting Services: https://nealschaffer.com/cmoDownload My Free Ebooks Here: https://nealschaffer.com/books/Subscribe to my YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/nealschafferAll My Podcast Show Notes: https://podcast.nealschaffer.com

How to properly build a sales funnel that flows from social media to your website. Where does the funnel building process start?Key Highlights[01:53] How to Properly Build A Sales Funnel that Flows from Social to the Website? [02:00] Where Does Funnel Building Start?[03:49] Attract People to Your Social Media Profile[04:53] Create A Landing Page Specific to the Social media Platform You Expect Traffic to Come From[05:58] Create Customized Page[06:14] Ways of Attracting People from Social Media to Your Website[07:09] Seamlessly Integrate Your Blog to Your Website[08:45] Social Selling: Employee Advocacy[09:06] One of the Case Studies Linkedin for SalesNotable QuotesI think if you can determine what those objectives are, you know, what you need to do, the next thing you need to do is obviously, dig a little bit deeper into social and try to figure out where your audiences how they use each platform, and what platform does it make sense to use what tactic in order to help you achieve your objective? If there's a sales funnel that flows from social to the website, well, you first of all need to attract people to your social media profile. And it needs to be very, very clear from your profile, how they can get to a relevant landing page.But at the end of the day, I think what a lot of companies miss out on and I talk about this when I talk about Twitter especially, and what I read When you do as well is to create a landing page that is specific to the social media platform that you expect traffic to come from a separate landing page.The more backlinks you get to that one page, the higher you know, the more authority, the more domain authority that page is going to have.On the other hand, it might be more effective from a conversion perspective, if you are able to describe your company in 140 character tweets, or to be able to show a widget of people that have recommended your company on Twitter by you know, showing a widget of all the favorites or a Storify. You want to seamlessly integrate it right to keep that funnel tight. And to improve the efficiency of that funnel to try to maximize the percentage and number of conversions you can get. And that it's the call to action.You need to understand where your sales are coming from what your website funnel looks like right now. And then do you have enough avenues for people to come from social media to your website? Learn More:Buy Digital Threads: https://nealschaffer.com/digitalthreadsamazonBuy Maximizing LinkedIn for Business Growth: https://nealschaffer.com/maximizinglinkedinamazonJoin My Digital First Mastermind: https://nealschaffer.com/membership/ Learn about My Fractional CMO Consulting Services: https://nealschaffer.com/cmoDownload My Free Ebooks Here: https://nealschaffer.com/books/Subscribe to my YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/nealschafferAll My Podcast Show Notes: https://podcast.nealschaffer.com

Are you having a problem aligning business goals with your social media activities? Whether you are a large or small business, solopreneur, non-profit, NGO, or religious organization, here are some ideas to help you begin Maximizing Your Social.Key Highlights[01:24] Catch Me at Social Media Marketing World[03:11] Building Social Strategies Aligned with Business Objectives[04:07] A Case Study I Did[05:48] How to Create Social Strategy[07:09] Leveraging Your Departments in Your Strategy[08:32] Start with the Most Critical Things to Your Organization.Notable QuotesI think that when you build your social strategy, it has to align with something that you want to achieve. I always talk about you know, whenever I talk about social media strategy and creating those business objectives at the very beginning, I start with the language of CEOs right the language of exile. It's either more sales or lesser expenses. And either those lead to greater profit. And indeed, there's a number of things you can do to help you achieve that.But obviously, social media really started out as a form of outward communications. So that's why you had public relations, you had marketing, and corporate communications are usually the early adopters. Moving beyond that we've seen, obviously, as more and more consumers engage with companies, we've seen social media for customer service come alive.And it's a matter of, you know, training, the rest of them, learning best practices, a lot of this training I do for a lot of companies, and really getting everybody involved in social selling.Every company has different business objectives. Every department has different objectives, different strategies for the year, but it really comes down to, you know, have a meeting, what are we trying to achieve this year, and it's very, very similar to how I consult with my clients. As I always say social media is half science, how far I can teach the science. But there's a certain application or the applied part of it is something that's going to be unique to your company, to your brand, to your situation, to your strategy, to your specific objectives for who you are, and why your business or organization is in existence. Learn More:Buy Digital Threads: https://nealschaffer.com/digitalthreadsamazonBuy Maximizing LinkedIn for Business Growth: https://nealschaffer.com/maximizinglinkedinamazonJoin My Digital First Mastermind: https://nealschaffer.com/membership/ Learn about My Fractional CMO Consulting Services: https://nealschaffer.com/cmoDownload My Free Ebooks Here: https://nealschaffer.com/books/Subscribe to my YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/nealschafferAll My Podcast Show Notes: https://podcast.nealschaffer.com

As companies create more content, more of that content will be illegally copied on the Internet. Find out what you can do to protect your content and fight those who steal it.Key Highlights[00:55] Today's Topic: Content[01:10] The Need to Create Exclusive Content[02:07] Don't Create Content Just for the Sake of Creating Content[02:47] The Importance of Content[04:33] My Advice on How to Avoid Content Scraper[05:15] How to deal With People Reposting Your Content?[06:03] Do Google Alerts[06:17] Using Plugins Like TyntNotable QuotesAnd one of the trends was undoubtedly the need to create exclusive content that you own unique and exclusive, that you can publish on your website share on social media, and what have you that perhaps some companies are trying to do too much engaging in social, when they should be creating more content that will help them scale their engagement.The more people that join social media, and the more content that we all publish, the harder it's going to be for any single given piece of content to be viewed by anybody. And that's just going to continue unless you adopt paid social, or pay a little bit for native or display advertising.When you blog, make accounts, and try to create unique content for unique audiences. Don't just copy and paste what you've done elsewhere, make something unique for that audience geared towards the audience.  And I think that your content marketing and social media efforts will be all the better because of that.So the first thing is if you're thinking of doing this don't unless you ask someone for their permission to republish your content on their website, you do not have permission.And it really comes down to us as content creators and content publishers, to let people know that it's not alright, now I take a pretty aggressive stance, and I don't, you know, time is money, I don't like to waste too much time on this.Some people think I go a little bit aggressive on it. Like I said, you know, if you publish content, you know, the time it takes to craft well thought content on the internet, it's not a trivial thing. And people shouldn't have the right to obviously, steal that content very, very easily.But, you know, if you had asked for permission, that's one thing, but I want to promote my content on my website, right? You know, what gives you the right to promote write your own content. That's really the message that I always tell people. If you have some expertise is something to share, add value to the blogosphere, instead of just copying everybody else's.  Learn More:Buy Digital Threads: https://nealschaffer.com/digitalthreadsamazonBuy Maximizing LinkedIn for Business Growth: https://nealschaffer.com/maximizinglinkedinamazonJoin My Digital First Mastermind: https://nealschaffer.com/membership/ Learn about My Fractional CMO Consulting Services: https://nealschaffer.com/cmoDownload My Free Ebooks Here: https://nealschaffer.com/books/Subscribe to my YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/nealschafferAll My Podcast Show Notes: https://podcast.nealschaffer.com

My firsthand experience of blogging on LinkedIn - and why and how you can leverage the power of the LinkedIn publishing platform.Key Highlights[01:41] How Are We Going to Use LinkedIn Platform[02:04] LinkedIn's Special Audience[03:33] Give Your LinkedIn Publishing Post Some TLC[06:02] LinkedIn Send You Lots of Traffic[06:31] Treat Your LinkedIn Homepage As Your Website[07:37] LinkedIn is About Quality[07:58] How to Get Access to LinkedIn Publishing PlatformNotable QuotesI'm sure you all are as well, even though it's not always possible, of really sending the right message to the right audience. And LinkedIn really is a special audience.I realized that, you know, the LinkedIn publishing platform is not worthy of a status update. It is worthy of something deeper. So it's my belief that if you give your LinkedIn publishing posts, a little bit of TLC, and this goes beyond just you know, publishing content, whether it's unique content, or duplicate content, of giving it a little bit of TLC, and really reserving what you publish on LinkedIn to that platform, and you're not just trying to lead people elsewhere.But I believe that if you do that, and if your audience is receptive, well, the LinkedIn audience is receptive to what you write, and they send social signals where they like it and they share it, and they comment on it. I do believe that you're going to get some pretty wide exposure for your post case in point. LinkedIn is its own ecosystem, its own ecosystem that can drive a lot of traffic. It's not going to your blog or your website, it's going to your LinkedIn profile, it's going to your content. But I will tell you, I always say, treat your homepage on LinkedIn as if it was your website. It's almost like your second website for personal branding for professionals that don't have their own website, it is their website.And therefore, if you don't have a website, it's going to be even easier for you to use LinkedIn as your blogging platform. But that is how powerful it is.So if you're thinking about just diddling with the LinkedIn blogging platform, and just posting links there and republishing your old content there, I really think you should think twice, and really give the LinkedIn platform, some tender loving care, really craft each post for that audience.You know, LinkedIn is not a matter of quantity, it's amount of quality.Learn More:Buy Digital Threads: https://nealschaffer.com/digitalthreadsamazonBuy Maximizing LinkedIn for Business Growth: https://nealschaffer.com/maximizinglinkedinamazonJoin My Digital First Mastermind: https://nealschaffer.com/membership/ Learn about My Fractional CMO Consulting Services: https://nealschaffer.com/cmoDownload My Free Ebooks Here: https://nealschaffer.com/books/Subscribe to my YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/nealschafferAll My Podcast Show Notes: https://podcast.nealschaffer.com

Your comprehensive guide to finding bloggers, auditing them, building relationships with them, and then inviting them to be part of your blogger outreach campaign. Key Highlights[00:57] Dedicated Page of All My Podcast[02:51] My Advice on Doing Blogger Outreach[03:10] 3 Best Practices on Blogger Outreach[03:44] Research the Blogger's Platform[04:46] Other Numbers You Can Determine[05:17] Analyze Their Influence[06:41] Outreach Campaign Starts With Developing Relationships[07:38] Make Sure The Person You Are Reaching Out to is Relevant[08:36] How to do the Actual Outreach CommunicationNotable QuotesSo I have experienced both from that perspective, as well as on the reaching out to other bloggers, but by myself, as well as consulting and advising other companies.But just a down and dirty thing you can do is to research their platform.I still think given, you know, all things being equal, I would prefer to work with someone that actually has a blog, that they're actually publishing their own unique content, their own unique perspective, there's a placeholder there so that when they promote you, it gets indexed by Google, it gets promoted, and people actually have a website they can go to, I just think it'll make your campaign all things given equal.  I think it'll make it more successful.You obviously want to try to find someone that has large numbers in those social networks where you think you're going to be more effective. So this is how you get a little bit more strategic.But look at how these people are engaging on these platforms, right? If it looks like it's all automated, or they're just saying the same thing over and over again. And it looks like they're not being authentic. And you can understand why so many people like or follow them, it could be that they're buying fake followers or bid they're buying fake likes.Your outreach campaign starts with developing relationships with these people, right? So this is how you begin to reach out to them. And I really recommend you think a lot about this. But if it's not relevant to that person, it doesn't make sense, which is another reason why you develop a relationship beforehand to really make sure and ascertain that that's the right person from your campaign.If you don't do it today, start doing it tomorrow. And as you do it over time, you build a relationship so that when you contact them several weeks, a few months down the road, they know that you know who they are, and you already have a relationship, it's going to make your program all that much more, first of all successful at convincing that blogger and more successful. I think what most people forget, like I just said is that bloggers are average human beings just like you and me. They may be known as some sort of rock star in their field of influence. But at the Learn More:Buy Digital Threads: https://nealschaffer.com/digitalthreadsamazonBuy Maximizing LinkedIn for Business Growth: https://nealschaffer.com/maximizinglinkedinamazonJoin My Digital First Mastermind: https://nealschaffer.com/membership/ Learn about My Fractional CMO Consulting Services: https://nealschaffer.com/cmoDownload My Free Ebooks Here: https://nealschaffer.com/books/Subscribe to my YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/nealschafferAll My Podcast Show Notes: https://podcast.nealschaffer.com

Neal interviews Internal Communications expert Rachel Miller while in London about the role of internal communications, internal communications versus public relations, and internal communications best practices.Key Highlights[01:30] Introduction of Podcast Guest, Rachel Miller[02:50] What is Internal Communication?[03:27 Internal Communication's Role[05:09] Why A Separate Internal Communication Department/Specialist is Important[07:58] Clients Rachel Works With[08:29] Rachel's Blog URL[09:39] Rachel's Advice[12:34] The Approach Rachel Recommends[14:20] The Biggest Social Media Need in the Market[16:26] Make A DifferenceNotable QuotesThe key function and the key role of in internal communication is really to equip and enable and empower employees to have a voice inside an organization.So good internal communications, inside organizations are once you really understand the reality of the of the culture of the workforce.But it's more important than ever before that we really understand that it's not about the egos of being total communicate, it's about information flow inside organizations.And that's why I think internal comms is important is because it is that consistent message, it's that reality of understanding the workforce and understanding the culture and making it real for people.You know, communication is about real people telling real stories about what you know what they're working on.  So I think that one of the key roles for internal communicates is in be in separate function as a distinction is to be that functions to be those eyes and ears.So my advice always is you need to understand where you're going as a business, you know, what's important to you understand where the conversations are happening, and then make smart choices to figure out what what makes sense.Part of my role is really helping companies to think through that and not just introducing something because it's nice to be seen to introduce it, but really think through what is the behavior that we're trying to drive and how we need to communicate differently as an organization? And what do you expect from employees expect from you as a result?I think rather than thinking through organizations, I think what's important is for internal communicators, to equip themselves and to learn and I'm doing lots of coaching and lots of training here in the UK, particularly with groups of internal communicators to really get them aware of what's out there.Keep on sharing good stories, keep on doing what you're doing and constantly looking to learn and grow and make a difference for your employees.Learn More:Buy Digital Threads: https://nealschaffer.com/digitalthreadsamazonBuy Maximizing LinkedIn for Business Growth: https://nealschaffer.com/maximizinglinkedinamazonJoin My Digital First Mastermind: https://nealschaffer.com/membership/ Learn about My Fractional CMO Consulting Services: https://nealschaffer.com/cmoDownload My Free Ebooks Here: https://nealschaffer.com/books/Subscribe to my YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/nealschafferAll My Podcast Show Notes: https://podcast.nealschaffer.com