Heard the news about Twitter? It’s yet another password hack, but it’s not really their fault. (Really!)

Since some of the things I’ve read required me to read them two and three time to understand what was up, and since I had a client ask me whether they should be worried about their account, I thought I’d share with you a very simple explanation for this latest Twitter security breach, and plan of action for you, in 6 easy points:

1. Some file-sharing websites/forums (also called “torrent” sites) have turned out to be hacker scams, thought out over the long-term. Hackers built online forums and sold them to unsuspecting folks, secretly keeping the ability to access complete lists of usernames and passwords for themselves.

2. As a sweeping generalization, people like to use the same username and password across all their different logins anywhere on the Internet whenever possible (from your newsletters to online banking to web-based email to Twitter).

3. When these hacker-compromised forums get popular and get enough users, there’s enough reason for hackers to go back in, pull the lists of usernames and passwords, and use them for nefarious purposes.

4. One of those nefarious purposes was to break into Twitter accounts - likely to send spam, scam people for more confidential information, et cetera.

5. So if you use file-sharing forums, or software like BitTorrent, and you want to keep using it, then you’ll need to change your password for Twitter (and would be advised to do it in every other online venue you use that requires a password).

6. And if not, then you don’t have to worry about it for the short term…but do consider the idea of changing passwords more frequently and (to be REALLY safe) use different passwords for different sites where possible, so they’re not repeated across websites/forums.

There. That was pretty simple, eh?

Posted in Insight + Action, Lessons Learned, Social Marketing | No Comments »

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 3rd, 2010 at 5:05 pm and is filed under Insight + Action, Lessons Learned, Social Marketing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Have you heard of Michael Stelzner? Or did you, like me, only know him as “that white paper guy”? (Which is actually intended as a compliment, since there’s no one else I think of when I think of white papers.)

Well, things have changed for Mr. Stelzner in the last year, and he revealed the back story of his transformation a few days ago during a fantastic webinar: “The Magic of How Rich Content and Social Media Can Land You on ‘Page One’ of Google.”

(Side note: Michael’s on the Board of Advisors for the International Social Media Association, and delivered this webinar on their behalf - it was a freebie for Founding, Platinum, and Premium ISMA members, and available to Basic and non-members for a nominal fee.)

It was the inside story of the success of his 2009 Social Media Marketing Industry Survey, which led to more than 40,000 downloads of the related report, more than 3,500 new email subscribers, 500+ news and blog stories, and helped change his brand positioning from just being a white paper expert to being a social media expert as well.

You’ll have to check out the further details at the ISMA site, but I wanted to share three quick stories for small biz owners, marketing professionals, and anyone tasked with creating social media campaigns.

1. Even the best don’t always hit their goals. In the Survey itself and in tweets about it, Michael wrote that he needed 1,000 people to take the Survey. He also made it very easy for people to share links to the Survey form. In 10 days, he got about 880 to take the Survey.

Do you think he was beating himself up over not hitting the goal? Heck no! He got more than enough responses to create a decent report, and he ran with it, without hemming and hawing about it.

2. Be open to surprise benefits. In the final report, Michael included links to a couple articles as additional resources. One of them was The Dark Side of Twitter: What Businesses Need to Know, a “MarketingProfs Today” newsletter article. On the strength of the report’s reception, that article became the most popular article of 2009 on the MarketingProfs site.

As he shared in the webinar, that was an unintended side benefit of the campaign. And with more than 360,000 members, you can bet that created fantastic exposure for him.

3. “Anticipation is a marketing super-weapon.” To propel the report to stardom, Michael used an age-old tactic. He emailed the 880 Survey respondents days before the report was ready to tell them it was coming, and to be on the lookout for it, promising some very surprising results. He reached out to industry leaders and media centers of influence in advance, and offered to make the report available to them a day early to get a jump on the story.

For an automotive analogy, imagine stepping down on the gas and the brake at the same time, then suddenly releasing the brake - and pressing a “turbo” button at the same time. Result? Explosive launch!

There’s a 2010 Survey report being created as I write this, and if you want to get your hands on it, keep an eye on Michael’s excellent Social Media Examiner for details.

Posted in Dances With Gurus, Social Marketing, Storytelling | No Comments »

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 2nd, 2010 at 11:33 am and is filed under Dances With Gurus, Social Marketing, Storytelling. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

The Deal: Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD) Info Summits - short blasts of info for adventurous entrepreneurs!

Time: 4 minutes, 18 seconds - give it a listen with the Audio Acrobat player below.

Featured Expert: Our own Allen Voivod, Certified Social Media Strategist and Co-Content Lover in Chief.

Summary: Seems like a paradox, doesn’t it? Setting an intention for the outcome you want, but being emotionally detached from the outcome? There’s a way to reconcile the two, and even if you have two left feet, you’ll be able to put it into action for yourself and your own work.

Teaser Quip: “The path doesn’t look like what you always expect it to look like.”

Idea Path: Great minds in self-improvement >> desired results >> control through letting go >> value judgments >> the dancing analogy >> firmness >> accept and add >>how it applies to networking and business meetings >> having something to play off of >> purpose creates opportunity

For More Tips, Tricks, and Occasional Falsetto Voices: Join Us on Facebook!

Posted in ADD Info Summits | No Comments »

This entry was posted on Friday, January 29th, 2010 at 6:34 pm and is filed under ADD Info Summits. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Big news! We  just got word that we’ve been invited onto the new Kiva blogger team, to support their mission to connect people through lending for the sake of alleviating poverty. An honor beyond measure, indeed.

In case you haven’t heard of them, Kiva is the world’s first person-to-person micro-lending website, empowering individuals to lend to unique entrepreneurs around the globe.

Basically, you can lend as little as $25 to a resourceful mother, entrepreneurial collective, budding leader, and/or talented artisan and they turn that modest amount into ventures that bolster their communities, feed their children, and foster better, brighter futures, all thanks to your loan.

And YES, it’s a LOAN. You get your money back. In fact, Kiva loans boast a repayment rate of more than 98%.

Since it was co-founded by spousal-preneurs - Matt Flannery and Jessica Jackley - and since we’ve been invested in the like-minded MicroCredit-NH for four years, you can imagine how well we jibe with Kiva’s vibe. And yes, that rhyme was too good to resist.

But there’s bigger news to be shared. Kiva made it to the $1 million round in the Chase Community Giving challenge, along with 99 other deserving non-profit organizations. Now, if it were any other organization, $1 million would do $1 million worth of work. For Kiva, and the entrepreneurs they support, $1 million will go much, MUCH further. From the Kiva Blog:

Winning the Chase Community Giving challenge would enable Kiva to make critical investments in staff to strengthen and expand Kiva’s Field Partner network while building and improving the Kiva website to better educate, connect, and serve Kiva lenders. By investing in Kiva’s unique model, we can generate about $10 in loans from the internet community for every $1 of award money we spend building and improving the platform.

You read it right - $10 million in loans to lift hard-working, business-minded people in third-world countries out of abject poverty. They can do it…with your vote. But you only have until Friday January 22nd to help. Here’s all you have to do:

1. Go to Facebook and add the Chase Community Giving application. (If you’re not a big fan of adding apps, don’t worry - you can always remove the app after it’s all over.)

2. Once the app is added, you’ll see a prompt asking you to become a Fan of the Chase Community Giving Fan Page in order to be eligible to vote.

3. Finally, go to the “Leaderboard” (everything on the site is prominently marked), and find “Kiva Microfunds” in the list. Currently, they’re #14 with a bullet. Click on their link, and you’ll be brought to their page.

4. Vote for ‘em!

5. Take Chase up on the convenient offer to post a note to your profile that you voted for Kiva, so you can spread the word far and wide through your network. Think Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, your blog, YouTube — all those social channels, there for you to make the world a better place with a few quick shout outs to your Friends, Fans, Followers, Subscribers, and Connections.

Easy peasy. That’s how a few clicks turns into a cool $10 million!

Posted in Agents of Karma | No Comments »

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 19th, 2010 at 6:09 pm and is filed under Agents of Karma. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

From Seth Godin’s excellent little read, Tribes, on “Belief”:

People don’t believe what you tell them.

They rarely believe what you show them.

They often believe what their friends tell them.

They always believe what they tell themselves.

What leaders do: They give people stories they can tell themselves. Stories about the future and about change.

Incidentally, this section was inspired (and completely includes) this post. At this rate, Seth’s next book will be a collection of haikus.

Posted in Dances With Gurus, Storytelling | No Comments »

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 10th, 2010 at 12:33 pm and is filed under Dances With Gurus, Storytelling. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Certain cultural trends are supposed to say something about us as a nation - the proliferation of horror movies in the 2000s as a response to 9/11 and the War on Terror, as some suggest, or the explosion of reality TV shows as a reflection of the splintering of TV audiences, a rise in celebrity voyeurism, the failure of old broadcast business models, and the adoption of web and mobile video platforms.

Phew!

So you’d think that looking at the most popular Facebook Fan Pages would tell us something about ourselves as a nation - or about Facebook Nation, at least.

So, make of this what you will:

1. Michael Jackson

2. Vin Diesel

3. Barack Obama

4. Facebook (Official Fan Page)

5. Mafia Wars

6. Texas Hold ‘Em Poker

7. Starbucks

8. Megan Fox

9. Lady Gaga

10. I [Heart] Sleep

11. R.I.P Michael Jackson (We’ll Miss You)

12. Twilight

13. Pizza

14. Will Smith

15. Dr. House

16. I need a vacation!!!

17. Coca-Cola

18. I really hate slow computers

19. YouTube

20. I hate waking up during a good dream and it won’t come back

21. I don’t sleep enough because I stay up late for no reason

22. Adam Sandler

23. Skittles

24. Linkin Park

25. Nutella

From a numbers perspective, at #1, the MJ Page has more than 10 million Fans, and #25 Nutella has more than three million. (Nutella? Really?!)

Here are three conclusions I think are fair to draw:

• If you want case studies of what savvy brand builders are doing to explode their audiences in Facebook Nation, look no further than this last. Break it down for yourself - how often are they posting? What are they posting? How are they interacting with Fans? What applications are they installing? Are they tagging Fans, favorite-ing Pages, sending updates, linking from other platforms? Use this info to help formulate your own Fan Page strategy.
• The concept of celebrity on Facebook looks a little different from celebrity in other media. Think of the media titans who aren’t on this list. Oprah Winfrey and American Idol are no-shows. There’s not a single player from ANY professional sport, either.
• Facebook gives us a meta-level conversation opportunity that we never knew we wanted, until Facebook gave us the platform to do it easily and virally. How else to explain the popularity of conceptual pages like ones about sleeping, dreaming, vacations, computers and (just outside the top 25) multiple pages about laughter?

What about you? What do you think Facebook Fan Page popularity tells us about ourselves?

Posted in Fun With Marketing, Social Marketing | No Comments »

This entry was posted on Saturday, January 9th, 2010 at 12:49 pm and is filed under Fun With Marketing, Social Marketing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Wanna up your Facebook Fan Page game? Check out how other people you respect and trust are customizing their Fan Pages, and put what you learn into action on your own Page. Here are three examples of how we’re doing that in our own business…

If for some reason the video embed doesn’t come through in your reader or on Facebook, just click this Facebook video link, and we’ll send you along to our YouTube channel!

Posted in "A-Ha!" TV, Social Marketing | No Comments »

This entry was posted on Friday, January 8th, 2010 at 12:26 pm and is filed under "A-Ha!" TV, Social Marketing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Some folks like to do their “Year-in-Review” stuff during the last week of December. Me, I prefer the first week of January. Hey, how can you review your year’s performance when you’ve got a few days left, anyway?

So I was doing a little analysis on the numbers and, if you don’t mind, I’ve got something to crow about:

13% of our revenue last year came from leveraged or passive sources.

Thirteen percent! That’s the best we’ve ever done in that area.

Thing is, since 2006, we’ve been listening to various folks preaching the gospel of leveraged revenue - traditionally including workshops, speaking engagements, teleclasses, mastermind programs, and so forth - and passive revenue from information product sales and affiliate commissions.

Getting over the 10% mark is pretty significant for us. It’s funny, too, considering that 2009 was such a topsy-turvy year in the business world, and this is one of the results we’re seeing. (It’s a safe bet Melanie Benson Strick’s CEO Factor event from April plays a part in this result. You can see a few videos we recorded during the event on our YouTube Channel, “A-Ha!” TV.)

We had our eggs in too few baskets in 2008, and when the recession hit, it gave us a good punch. Our 2009 numbers were down from 2008, but I’m happy to say we’re a six-figure business for the third year in a row, and that’s a great feeling.

So, I’d like to encourage you to look at your business and ask yourself:

1. How could I share what I know to help people in a group setting?

2. How could I record what I know - in text, audio, video, what have you - to help people without me being there?

3. How could I help more people by letting them know these options exist for them - and are often less expensive than working with me one-on-one?

Because here’s what I know: Businesses are made of people, and people still need help. They’re also still being careful with their money, so they may be looking for ways to learn what you know without breaking the bank.

And if you don’t offer those kinds of low-cost, low-risk options…well, aren’t you selling your audience short?

Posted in Entrepreneur Diaries, Lessons Learned, Mood Boosters, Storytelling, Success Strategies | 1 Comment »

This entry was posted on Thursday, January 7th, 2010 at 11:02 pm and is filed under Entrepreneur Diaries, Lessons Learned, Mood Boosters, Storytelling, Success Strategies. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

I just went looking for the origin of the phrase “lightning in a bottle,” which is sadly lost in the mists of time. This post has a stamp of authority on it so particular to the British that I’ll consider the matter closed.

Which is a tangential side note to the major point of this blog post.

The whole notion of “viral” marketing - putting something out to the world that catches fire, gets shared millions of times over and elevates a product, brand, or idea to rock star status, has been likened to that “catching lightning in a bottle” idea.

It’s miraculous, unexpected, and utterly captivating, and the story of how it happened is often as compelling as the happening itself.

Our friend and uber-talented producer/sound supervisor Rick Sanchez of Post Haste Media just sent me this little note:

A story from the social media trenches. An ex-coworker writes a song, makes a video, posts it on YouTube on Jan. 1. It’s seen by Ashton Kutcher who then tweets about it to his million+ followers and in 4 days has over 20,000 views.

It’s early days yet in this story, but we’re going to be keeping an eye on how it progresses.

In the meantime, here’s the lesson for all of us, no matter what our business, passion, message, mission, or vision. It’s possible to catch lightning in a bottle, no matter how rare or random it might seem. Even if you’re not Ben Franklin. Or Ashton Kutcher.

From the mindset standpoint, here’s “all” you have to do:

1. Keep going out into the storm.

2. Stay consistent with your efforts.

3. Be open to trying new ways of making that magic happen.

That’s all…for now…updates as events warrant.

Posted in How do you "A-Ha Yourself"?, Social Marketing, Storytelling | No Comments »

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 6th, 2010 at 2:39 pm and is filed under How do you "A-Ha Yourself"?, Social Marketing, Storytelling. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

It’s Tuesday, so here’s a video note about Twitter,  which has completely embraced the myriad unexpected ways users have taken over the platform, and it’s reflected in one simple and meaningful change to their logged in homepage.

This little change may have gone unnoticed by many, because about 80% of Twitter users don’t go to Twitter.com to tweet!

(Tuesday…Twitter…apparently we’re about to get all alliterative up in this blog. Three guesses what’s happening on Friday - and the first two don’t count.)

If for some reason the video embed doesn’t come through in your reader or on Facebook (they’re touchy), just click this Twitter video link, and we’ll send you along to our YouTube channel!

Posted in "A-Ha!" TV, Social Marketing | No Comments »

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 5th, 2010 at 10:34 pm and is filed under "A-Ha!" TV, Social Marketing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.