I have worked with many companies as a consultant in various capacities, taking the roles of marketing, support and customer service departments. In the age of social media, how you respond to your critics can have a major impact on your business. Most companies prefer to use to tools to water down the message, wear down the crowd, and claim victory when no one is left commenting or complaining; only to later discover they have lost large portions of their following and customers. The big lesson here is quite simple; address the persistent questions and clever criticisms and never let them linger or go unanswered. I have witnessed several start-ups go under by taking an attitude of ignoring their users and especially the negative feedback. Caught up in the other aspects of your work, you not likely as familiar with the user experience as your following of customers and readers. Their feedback is incredibly useful and important. In order to succeed, at some point, you’ll have to deal with negative feedback and find a way to make it work for you.
Social media and the Internet provide an environment of immediate response, obligation and opportunity for the entrepreneur. It is unrealistic to address every comment and comprehensively respond to all the feedback you receive on your blog or website, but your goals should not be to avoid or block negative feedback from appearing on your site. You want to welcome all dissent and criticism in an environment that you can control, manage and manipulate. Your goals should be to efficiently manage negative feedback and prevent it by maintaining an image of acknowledgment, embrace and resolution. If faced with an issue where your job and reputation were on the line, would you rather have a conversation with the opposing party over a nice meal in your home, or at a press conference? The choice is clear, as are the consequences of ignoring conflict. You can embrace conflict, disagreement and dissent on your terms or ignore it and face it in a much more public forum where the stakes are greater. In this post, I’ll discuss strategies and tips to help you manage negative feedback on your blog.
What is Phonebooth Free? from Bandwidth.com on Vimeo.
Info: Phonebooth is a VOIP phone service like Google Voice but with a feature set ideal for growing businesses . Phonebooth has similar features to Google Voice: visual voicemail, redundant data centers, call routing and a slick interface. Phonebooth pushes the solution a few steps ahead of Google by offering HD voice qaulity, conference calling and an auto-attendant “Press 1 to annoy your customer” menus.
Price: Phonebooth offered a free service (no longer available) and has a pro plan that costs $20 per month per user
UPDATE- THERE ARE NO MORE FREE ACCOUNTS AVAILABLE- I Repeat NO FREE ACCOUNTS- If you’d like an invite to Google Voice instead email me: nicholas@heroikmedia.com
My Thoughts on Phonebooth Pro
I think for a growing company, Phonebooth would be a great tool. They take out a lot of competition and cost with their simplicity and consumers love simplicity when it comes to technology. (Insert Fisher-Price to Mac reference- on 2nd thought Win 7 is pretty user friendly and awesome as well.)
You may have already read about reasons why we are such WordPress junkies but this latest update from WordPress adds some simple yet needed improvements that allow it to continue to be the best blogging platform around.
New Features to WordPress 2.9
-light photo editiing crop, aspect ratio, flip, etc.
-Add URL to embed video rather than
-Trash feature- go dumpster diving to retrieve that post you accidentally deleted.
-batch plug-in update- The ability to update all plug-ins at once is now native and WordPress will automatically check compatibility.
Here’s a video rundown.
If you plan on being popular, plan on being secure.
If you run a popular blog, take pride in the huge target you have earned and take security seriously. Getting hacked is an embarrassment to you and the team that manages the blog. Don’t let it happen. While it is humorous to see a hacked site tagged up by a 14 year old on an ego-trip (an “I remember when I had my first beer” moment), it does in fact suck to deal with the aftermath. Here are some tips and tools to protect your blog.
1. Change the Default Login Name.
Every would-be hacker appreciates the default admin account and the lazy admins who keep them. Having an admin user account solves half the puzzle for them; they have the user name and now all they need is a password. Get rid of this account.
The default username is admin. You can make it more difficult for the hacker to crack your login credential by changing the login name.
In your WordPress dashboard, go to Users and set up a new user account. Give this new user administrator role. Log out and log in again with the new user account.
Go to Users again. This time, check the box beside admin and press Delete. When it asks for deletion confirmation, select the “Attribute all posts and links to:” and select your new username from the dropdown bar. This will transfer all the posts to your new user account. Press Confirm Deletion
2. Check the permissions on your WP directories.
Log-on to your web-host and check your file permissions. There are very few cases where 777 permissions are required for WordPress to properly function. Be weary of changing your permissions to 777. This makes it easier for malfeasance to occur.
2. Set User Permissions for your contributors.
If you work on a team, remember that not everyone has to be an admin to contribute. Limit user rights accordingly and manage your users.
3. Keep track of those who have access.
Unlike other internet crimes, assaults on a blog are usually perpetrated by someone you know; someone you’ve interacted with, an angry tech, admin vendor, etc. Keep tabs on the people who have a little more inside info than your average reader.
4. Back-Up Your Database.
If something does go wrong you can always restore your database.
5. Keep your WordPress Installation Up-To-Date.
Don’t worry about your plug-in compatibility. Content should take priority. You may hear other WordPress “gurus” tell you to hold off on the upgrade due to plugin compatibility issues. If security is a concern, ie you use the blog professionally or if you have a popular blog, keep it up to date. The minor annoyance of a few incompatible plug-ins every now and again are worth trading for a safe and secure blog.
A note about the old plug-in compatibility argument-
Sacrificing security for plug-in compatibility is like asking to trade a cage for a pearl necklace when being dropped into a shark tank. If the plug-in is that important- contact their support page and hound them to update.
A Few Plug-Ins That Will Help You Secure Your WordPress Blog
WP-Security-Scan informs you of holes in your security system and plugs a few of them and makes recommendations for others. Warning- We don’t recommend changing the directory structure of the blog, unless you really think “they” are after you.
WP-Database-Backup can automatically back-up your WordPress database and related files and email them to you. This is an essential plug-in.
Log-in Lockdown prevents brute force attacks by blocking an IP range after multiple failed log-in attempts. It’s easy to configure and use.
Chap Secure Login encrypts your login to prevent people from sniffing your password.
Role-Manager allows you to set capabilities for specific user groups.
WP-Secure Remove Wordpress Version- Removes the WordPress Version and Entire meta data to prevent hackers from using the information to find vulnerabilities in your blog.
Who Am I?
My name is Nicholas McGill and I am Heroik. I live my life differently than most without opting out of society. I find ways to help people communicate, share, connect and discover their HeroiK virtues.
Details
Name: Nicholas McGill
Occupation: Social Media Director
Company: Heroik Media
Website: www.heroikmedia.com
Contact: 530-400-0539
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thechivalrous
Email: nicholas@getheroik.com
What Do I Do?
I am the Social Media Director for Heroik Media, a digital think tank that specializes in social media and digital product management. We work and contribute to various projects and companies with teams across the United States.
I live for adventure and find it everyday whether I’m working with my clients or getting lost on vacation. I take work as seriously as I take my play and rarely have a dull, full week of the 9 to 5 office life. I’m a happy, functioning workaholic and adventurer. I can’t always afford to leave work behind in my travels so I spend quite a bit of time finding new ways of minimizing my work load and bringing small tasks with me while I play.
What am I Working on Right Now?
I am most excited about unveiling the new Digital Liquidity website, and relaunching a more visual version of my personal creative blog Last of the Chivalrous. I can’t wait to share the presentations, ideas, photos of my travels and new writing. They will both be up in January, 2010.
I recently launched the Heroik Media site and am working on this site Get Heroik right now. We’re taking new approaches to business, design, marketing and social media and helping others become Heroik. The deceptive nature of marketing and how it is still playing out in Social Media is appalling. We are helping businesses re-discover the value of virtue. Think small town accountability and community involvement meets the big city.
How Do I Keep This Playful Balancing Act Going?
I live my life like a Super Hero. I romanticize my life to make it more FUN! Every task becomes a quest and action-packed adventure. At the hard points in life, I look back to familiar story-lines of the childhood heroes I read about in comic books and saw on film. I am a total nerd Batman fanatic and I use it to inspire myself to push harder, play harder and do more whether I’m working, working out, writing, traveling, you name it, I channel my inner Uber Hero.
I take fun seriously. I like to plan, take precautions, charge the camera batteries and pack the utility belt so I am prepared to maximize my good times. Bringing the camera, the dog, and friends are essential to my happiness. I prefer to have witnesses and to catch it on film so that I can look back, remember and share my stories. I use the memories, wrecks, road rashes and photos to propel me forward in my work and training for my next exciting adventure.
Professionally
1. I do what I love and use my experience to help others.
I have been a writer in denial my whole life and often get teased as the “English Major” although I am far from it. I realized one day that I sort things out through expression, writing and art. I have an over-active imagination and try to find ways to use it to help people and make a living.
2. I decide and dictate my value, demanding control over my time and appropriate sums for my services.
Society tries to trick you by assuming power to assign your value. It is the nature of the market-driven society to tear your down and attempt to destroy your self-esteem so they can get more out of you for less money. At times I am required to defend my decisions and demonstrate my value but I do so with pride and without fear, thus preventing me from living the life of a cubicle-locked, indentured servant.
3. I constantly educate myself. I focus on refining myself by studying anything that interests me and I find ways to apply it to what I do. I burry myself in books, mentors, classes, workshops and adventure and pool all of that experience to apply it to what I do.
4. I communicate and connect with the world on my terms. Sometimes this means I’m on a mountain top, or in my kayak on the lake, getting paid to have a conference call with a client. The signal is great and view is better than any office or board room I know. I find that I can work more efficiently with a clear head and open space to organize thoughts and action items.
5. I discover and invent new ways of expressing my opinions and new methods of reaching out to others.
6. I utilize my over active imagination and creativity to bottle these experiences up into products and services.
7. I work with a team of super heroes. I am lucky enough to work with Rock Stars of business, design, entertainment and technology. We work independently and together as needed and I learn from every engineer, client, designer with whom I work. I am often found to be obnoxiously curious.
8. Everywhere I go, I look to inspire and be inspired. The people I meet and things I learn that reinforce my confidence and ambition to become Heroik.
9. I refine my ideas by writing often. Whether a simple tutorial, guide or retelling of my struggles and adventures, I process and grow through writing and expression.
10. I make mistakes; some that cost me greatly and work hard not to let them happen again. I’m sure I’ve made hefty contributions at some point to someone’s pyramid scheme.
11. I make technology work for me, not me for it and I help others do the same. Look for Digital Liquidity in 2010 and you’ll find out how I do this 
My Name is Nicholas and I am Heroik.
We are the biggest WordPress junkies you are likely to meet and there are oh so many reasons for it. WordPress is one of the most popular and powerful content management/ blogging platforms around. It is free, simple, feature rich and keeps you in complete control over just about every aspect of your project.
Simplicity.
It is as simple or as complicated as you wish it to be and comes in several varieties. The basics are fairly easy to learn but the more you play with it the more you understand what it is capable of doing for your business.
Flexibility
Unlike Squidoo, Blogger and other platforms that limit the use of code like JAVAscript and HTML, WordPress is very flexible and allows you to add just about any widget or code that is displayable on the web.
Scalability
You can scale it up or slim it down to fit your needs, budget and team. It can be used as the blog of a working mom or transformed into a full fledged e-commerce site for a snowboard company.
Mobility
It can be accessed via the web from anywhere or through an app on a mobile device like an iPhone or BlackBerry.
Delegation & Easy Management
WordPress allows you to delegate the work and manage multiple users. Imagine easily collaborating with multiple team members to add content and features to the same place at once.
Speed
WordPress is easy to install and configure with very little downtime. It is a peppy installation that allows you to work as fluidly and as quickly as anywhere else on the web.
Plug-Ins
There are currently over 7,000 plug-ins found on the WordPress Site and thousands more commercial plug-ins found elsewhere. The plug-ins make it easier to manage the site, spread content and provide different ways for your audience to interact with the content.
Media Rich
It would not be successful without the ability to easily and quickly display stunning visuals in multiple ways courtesy of some awesome plug-ins.
Community Presence & Support
WordPress is not perfect but luckily, the WordPress community is vast, making it easy to find a helping hand. We provide support for it along with several other platforms.
Themes
The theme selection and building customizable themes for our clients is probably my favorite part about WordPress. There are so many ways to go about the look of a site: create your own theme, select a free theme or purchase one. You can do many things to make it your own.
Ability to Stand Alone
WordPress stands alone as a website or a blog and it does extremely well at both.
How Blogs Have Changed Our Attitude About the Web
This website is obviously built on WordPress. I use the term is because blogging platforms changed the tense and web forever by transforming it into something that is constantly changing. A few years ago, it would be more proper to say this site was built on WordPress. Our ideas about the web have evolved from a static beginning to a living representation of ourselves and our digital lifestyles. Now many places on the web like blogs and social networks are in constant motion, they are fluid and ever changing. And when they stop moving, we think of the sites, profiles and blogs as dead.
Overall, WordPress is the solution that most closely embodies many the principles of digital liquidity- a concept that would likely not exist were it not for the invention of the blog.
Summary
Many marketing firms have failed to re-tool and upgrade their business model in the wake of social media’s rise and now fail to meet their clients’ goals. They apply old school one way broadcast marketing to social media often over-relying on technology and tools for a social web market they don’t understand.
When considering a commitment to social media marketing:
-Be weary of old marketing firms, try to spot those that have re-branded. They’ll waste your time and money.
-Marketing Companies that lean heavily on SEO should not be trusted. SEO is changing and it is not a fix all to improve web rank and increase business.
-The best way? Do it right. Create genuine content and provide infotainment-making genuine content popular is easier than faking it.
-Do your homework when shopping for marketing resources, especially in social media. Make sure that the business model matches the technology they’re using.
-Independent Studies show that tech firms are more successful in social media than marketing firms.
-Consider hiring a consultant, creating a plan, grabbing specialists for the individual parts.
Let me be clear, I’m not against marketing firms, I’m against traditional marketing firms. The firms that were extinct dinosaurs of yesteryear, that should have been out of business long ago yet they linger and remain, haunting us like the re-branded Loch-Ness Monster. They are now taking outdated approaches to the web and wasting money and eye sores for the entire world to see. If you wish to market on the web or in social media- be weary about hiring a marketing company.
We often find ourselves consulting with print media companies, participating in focus groups and providing feedback that goes against the very deceptive nature of traditional marketing and business thought. Marketing efforts in this day in age need to be more subtle and sincere, yet low and behold many firms and departments are discovering new tools to do the same old tricks.
Background & History
Marketing firms are less successful in social media marketing efforts because they are too immersed in the traditional business model that primarily consists of the business of bullshit. To the consumer, business language is bullshit. To the business listening to business language from another business; the language is also bullshit. At no point in the exchange is any of communication in the grown up game of Monopoly taken seriously or misread as sincere.
Marketing teams are the unfortunate middlemen charged with taking the corporate fecalith and simplifying it into a message that is shouted to the rest of us. Unfortunately for the consumer and all of humanity this has a reasonable success rate for a long time. Yet over the last 15 years or so, the natural immunity to BS has increased.
Most of us know to ignore traditional ad-space, turn the page, blur it, block it and focus on content and the task at hand.
A New Hope: Information Age & Social Media Saved Us
Thanks to a tanking economy, the Internet and information age, we live in a society of connected consumers that are resilient to traditional marketing methods. However, the business to business world is still slow to catch up and marketing firms are slow to change. They are still fighting the current and trying to use every tool new and old to take advantage of other businesses and consumers.
Adapting to social media and the web requires a complete business model make over for most businesses; a complete re-tooling and re-training and most firms cannot afford to do this. So what do they do? They do what they are good at. They fake it!
The Evil Marketing Empire Strikes Back
The old marketing companies just changed the names, picked up a new vocabulary and sling it about to generate revenue. These companies abuse words and rename a few titles and things in the same ridiculous way that most approach politically correct speech.
Deceptive Re-branding Examples
A marketing team is now often referred to as a team of “engagement specialists”-Wait- do they do weddings?
Many companies also over use buzz words such as buzz, communicate, youtube, engage, commit, viral, social media, etc. Sometimes they claim to be experts in unquantifiable, vast areas such as social media. This is like saying you are an expert in quantum physics. In areas where everything is theoretical, there are very few experts.
Tech Tools & Tech Fools
The problem with traditional and even “re-branded” Marketing companies, is that they take to technology like a 12 year old boy does to a slingshot. They are desperate to use new tools and prove themselves in the new marketplace and end up breaking something.
Misleading the masses about the power of SEO is a prime example.
S-E-No they didn’t! Yes. They did.
Traditional Marketing companies worship SEO and lead off strongly with SEO as a value propositon. SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization and the tools and techniques revolve around using descriptive words and “natural” language to increase page rank and visibility on the web as determined by robots and mathematical formulas. The Result of these efforts? They are by far less significant than the social layer of the web that now governs rank and visibility.
Even more problematic for the SEO minded is the fact that Google; the search leader and media giant, is dedicated to pursuing ranking systems based on natural language and genuine content; constantly eliminating the cheap tricks of traditional SEO keyword placement.
The firms and the clients that over use keyword placement are easy to spot. They use unnatural, slightly off word placement along with phrases and repetitive language in every aspect of their design to describe themselves and their products. Repeating words appear over and over as if binding a magical spell; advise, brand, communicate, interact. The goal here is to get you to repeat their chant so they can watch their rank increase. Meanwhile, the human population is completely confused by the experience and are not likely to use the product or services unless easily fooled.
Another favorite word twist that is interesting is when a company says they are “Creating Identity” when they really mean logo design. There is nothing wrong with logo design. Every business needs one but what they don’t need is the false sense of security that because they have a logo, they now have an identity. Let’s face it there’s more to creating an identity than a logo.
Flash Me
Going back to the slingshot example, you give a marketing firm a Flash guru and they’ll redefine annoying web elements. Every time you see those over animated websites that come off as more complex and blurry than the last Transformers movie, you are dealing with a company focused on the buzz of the word, concept and obsessed with the tool; not the client, audience, culture, interface or message.
Bottom Line:
Do your homework when shopping for marketing resources, especially in social media. Make sure that the business model matches the technology they’re using.
Companies fail at social media because they think of it as a business buzz word, hand it off to marketing and limit integrating all of its benefits into other areas of their business model. Social Media is a tool for businesses to honor their commitment to their customers, their identity in a community, their content, and improve the experience and their bottom line.
Companies fail when they limit social media to marketing opportunities. Marketing departments setup fan pages, twitter accounts and facebook accounts and shrug their shoulders when their following doesn’t lead to customers following through with the dollars. They ignore and dismiss 80% of the feedback from their customers that is not related to sales.
Social media is about marketing a companies ability to converse about their products and services and engage their customers. They get graded on the effects of the conversation on their products and services and that’s where most companies fail. They pretend to listen and pretend to be involved but forget that they are graded by the community of current and potential customer base that they are insulting in their patronization.
This is why we don’t blindly create applications/content. At Heroik Media we create strategy. The strategy and plan can be applied to all departments as it is rolled out to the community.
Something to Scare & Motivate You.
Do you know the secret to the successful rise of Wal-Mart? Wal-Mart, way back when, took advantage of technology to give themselves an edge on controlling prices and inventories. They utilized IBM main-frames to do it and grew into the big, bold, value broadcasting company they are now today. Like em or hate em, you have to admire their moves. Their practices became business standards for every industry.
Social Media provides a similar opportunity. It is a tool unlike any other. It is not as mathematically predictable as a computing platform. Management & accounting departments cringe at the thought of a resource vacuum that cannot be represented easily with numbers and letters while sales and marketing people get excited about the fact that there is finally a technology that takes full advantage of their communication skill-set. There are many ways to fail and many to succeed and in this market you cannot easily rinse and repeat your way to a bigger bottom line. Things change quickly, people change quickly and don’t fall easily for deception.
Why do we succeed? Read on!
We specialize in creating strategy and making impressions by creating Good Do-er companies, customers & consumers.
One of our primary goals with our clients is their continued success beyond the time-line of our involvement. We focus on establishing themes that are pulled from the principles and values of the brand or company that we’re chosen to represent. The company or brand may evolve but its core principles; its mission and focus usually stays the same. We communicate these aspects as the virtues of the brand, and call attention to its champions and heroes.
Our goal, when creating campaigns and content, is to get people to connect with the inspirational, admirable aspects, the iconic imagery and epic nature of the enterprise as an amazing undertaking . In essence our job is to help the masses, our clients, customers and their clients and customers rediscover the value of virtue.
We view our efforts as the counter-balance to the business of bullshit. There are many firms and companies dedicated to deceiving the masses and selling more crap widgets and services through impressions that are surface shots and do not align with the company’s core. The nature of deception is negative and dishonest. Many think of corporations as “evil-doers” and it is no coincidence that companies like Google develop corporate mottos of “Don’t be evil”. Thanks to the information age, the internet and social media, consumers are more aware than ever and are building up a resistance to traditional impression methods.
Why do we Succeed?
We believe, we can change this dynamic and move it in a positive direction. Instead of helping a company dream up ways to deceive the masses, we help companies discover the virtues of their brand, broadcasting them outward, re-integrating those virtues into the company, its products and services and thus we help change the company into something Heroik.
We are not in the business of marketing deception. We create strategy and broadcast the virtues and heroic traits inherent in the company, the genius nature of the product or brand. Long after the initial impressions are made, whether on any medium, the audience views our client brands and our efforts as a unique angle and favorite chapter, an inspirational classic worthy of being re-visited. We’re interested in telling the epic, of the little and not so little companies that could, do and will continue to do good things, make good products and provide excellent services and engagements with their customers. We don’t deal with dishonest models. It’s bad for business and goes against the nature of our brand.
Most if not all businesses end up creating digital products of some sort. And these products, be it web-site, widget, application or gizmo, all require strategies to be integrated into the interface and end product. The interface must remind the user that they are dealing with something heroic, something that makes them feel closer to the good and virtuous and inspires them to continue on this path. As a result, we not only add to our client’s Heroik tool-belt, (cape and spandex optional), we also add to their customer’s Heroik tool-belt.
This focus shift can change the company’s destiny. All of the sudden, a company is reminded that the employees, partners, clients and customers all share something in common, they are all people. And all people desire to be happy and often measure it by success and wealth; and though we often hate to admit it, our happiness, success and wealth is directly tied to our relationships with people. Understanding this interdependent reality and how it applies to the corporate bottom line shifts the business model a bit.
Suddenly companies want to be more involved in the social exchange, maximizing their ROI in social media and revenue because they are focused on learning as much as they can from their community of employees, customers, competitors and the world at large. They focus on creating better products and services and simultaneously customers see that their feedback has effect and respond by purchasing more and establishing brand loyalty. That is
Why do so many companies fail with their social media efforts? Read On!
It is only fitting that our first blog post explain the fundamentals of social media.Many if not all of us are guilty of diving into these services without first understanding the big picture and concepts involved. We’ll be exploring many different aspects of these topics in greater detail in posts to come but it is important to have a big picture perspective on the monster that is social media.
The panoramic wide shot of the social media scene makes it easier for us to look at our decisions in the market and identify areas where we are perhaps under/over-involved. It makes it easier to identify the efforts that do not serve us in the ways that we desire with a birds eye view.
Here are some short videos that explain Social Media and other popular services/trends in plain English Courtesy of Common Craft. While watching these videos think about these questions.
Am I / is My Company reaching the promise of social media?
Have my efforts brought me closer to my friends, family, clients, customers, distributors, team-mates and so on?
Are my efforts being heard/seen/felt/experienced?
Am I really using these tools to become a more involved, smarter listener?
Which networks services have me feeling overwhelmed?
If you are still stumped on the answers or feel challenged by them, talk to us. We can help.
You can click on the links or simply scroll down to watch the embedded videos.
Social Media in Plain English
Social Networking
Blogs
RSS
