M & A Rainmaker

The clue is in the title right ?

A Linkedin Expert is one who gets leads and sales.

The more leads and sales that you get ( of the right type ) the more of an expert you are.

That’s it then ?

An expert is ” a person who is very knowledgeable about or skillful in a particular area “.

To be a Linkedin Expert ( or any social media expert ) it is fundamental to understand the objective above.

It also fundamental to understand how to achieve this objective. The route to this objective.

Leads and sales don’t just happen.

There is a plan.

There is a process.

There is a strategy.

There is a system.

Here is a sketch.

To describe this a bit ….. it is mainly a digital model of what I call the Digital Marketing Ecosystem.

Out of all the people on the Internet some will become visitors of yours via social media or search.

Having found you on social media or by search they may visit your website/blog/landing page as they were led there from either one.

Some of them may subscribe for further information ( eg name and email ) and be added to a database ( right )

Some of them may go on to purchase something from you via one of your sales platforms eg an online shop.

Here is a sales funnel

You can superimpose the funnel onto the sketch.

The top of funnel says SEO ( Search Engine Optimisation ) , SMM ( Social Media Marketing ) and PPC ( Pay per click ).

Social Media and Search are your main sources of initial contact with a prospect. ( This could be organic – free – or paid ie promotion or advertising eg Google pay per click or facebook adverts ).

Please note that Linkedin ( L/I ) is just one source in Social Media.

The traffic ( flow ) goes from social media and search to a website/blogsite/landing page etc and then usually to an email sign up ( to the right ).

( In some cases email registration may kick off an automated email sequence. Check this article here for an example of how this works ).

The funnel indicates ” conversion rates “. They are particular to the example described by this funnel. What is certain is that there will always be conversion rates. So many coming in at the top, so many leaving/staying and so many becoming leads, prospects and sales.

Loads of things affect attraction rates and conversion rates.

Like … do you have a clear and ” attractive ” Brand and Story; are your adverts appealing; are your landing pages right; is your email sign up simple; is there an incentive to sign up …. etc etc etc which makes things complicated and challenging.

However, here we are just trying to understand the high level systems and processes.

A useful summary of the process ( coined by Inbound Marketing specialist Hubspot Inc. ) is:

GET FOUND, NURTURE, CONVERT and ANALYSE.

This equates to TOFU, MOFU and BOFU. ( Top, Middle and Bottom of the funnels )

What we are talking about here is called Inbound Marketing ( Attraction, Magnetic,

Pull Marketing ).

An option is to ” intervene ” in the process. Something that we often do. For example often people that like, comment, share e.g. our Linkedin posts we can chat to using Linkedin messaging. We MAY then call them by phone, skype, facebook etc. Ian Tomlinson is fabulous at doing this,

When everything is set up for Inbound Marketing you can also Outbound Market ( approach people in your target market that you want to ). Because your Attraction Marketing system is set up ( Brand, Story, System ) Outbound Marketing works really well.

In addition, when you are attracting people, intervening in the process and approaching people you can also network ( physically ) and meet people eg for coffee.

These multiple approaches have a cumulative result. The sum of opportunities is greater than the individual actions and processes.

A Linkedin Expert is only one if they also understand the systems and processes that lead to leads and sales ( conversions ) generally and on all platforms and search and paid and organic.

This article also published on Linkedin here https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/what-linkedin-sales-expert-chris-windley/

You know that saying – belt and braces – well having a couple of blogs at the top of a 100 and something million search needs a bit of that

When my Pinterest page suddenly dropped out of the Google search for Sales and Marketing Expert post the Hummingbird revision I had already planned for it – thank goodness !!

You have to plan ahead in most things and certainly when it comes to protecting a top ranking position in Google for a competitive search term like Top Digital Sales and Marketing Expert you do.

The Centripetal Network Consulting blogs that are currently ranking at the top of Google are the ” belt ” and this blog is the ” braces “. I do actually have a 3rd ” back-up ” which is a Pinterest page which complements an older Pinterest Page   which has been ranking very well for searches on Digital Marketing Expert UK fort some time. However, as I mentioned it fell out of the rankings recently. It might return.

http://www.buckarooleather.com.au/miners

Why so important ??

Obviously it is important to be found for the things that you do and provide. When you are providing a service that includes being found in search engines then clearly it is important to be found and to be found easily and quickly.

The top 5 or 6 positions of the first page of Google are the sweet spot and that is where the current blog posts are. Around 40/50% of all the traffic goes to the top position and the remainder is spread between the rest – typically.

Of course the reason why we want to rank high in Google is because it is a major source if not THE major source –  of traffic to our blog and website.

Everyone that wants visitors to their web or blogsite needs to spend time working out what they want to rank or be found for and then how easy or difficult it is to do that. There are various tools that we can use to help with that task.

Of course Pay per Click is one way of getting found on Google but it is an expensive way and we always recommend that you build a strategy around ranking naturally for key words and phrases.

If you are looking for looking for a New York Experienced Specialist Startup Recruiter who can operate  anywhere in the world but based from the East Coast of America near New York then a social media recruiting phenomenon, Vincent Wright, is looking for a selected number of partners to work with – but if you want Vincent to help you then you are going to have to move FAST !!

I have known Vincent for years – since my first days on my first social network – Ecademy. We have kept in touch over the years and I am amazed that he has found time to make this offer to work with people.

He is the founder and developer of so many social media initiatives like Brandergy.com, MyLinkedinPowerForum, and BrandingVentures.com. He has huge networks on Linkedin. He is also the most experienced New York based Specialist Startup Recruiter that I know.

I have copied Vincents messages to his community on this subject here:

Keep STRONG!!

If you are looking for looking for Sales, Marketing, Administrative, Recruitment or Technology support anywhere in the world but based from the East Coast of America near New York then a social media phenomenon, Vincent Wright, is looking for a selected number of partners to work with – but if you want Vincent to help you then you are going to have to move FAST !!

I have known Vincent for years – since my first days on my first social network – Ecademy. We have kept in touch over the years and I am amazed that he has found time to make this offer to work with people.

He is the founder and developer of so many social media initiatives like Brandergy.com, MyLinkedinPowerForum, and BrandingVentures.com. He has huge networks on Linkedin.

I have copied Vincents messages to his community on this subject here:

Keep STRONG!!

If you are looking for looking for Sales, Marketing, Administrative, Recruitment or Technology support anywhere in the world but based from the East Coast of America near New York then a social media phenomenon, Vincent Wright, is looking for a selected number of partners to work with – but if you want Vincent to help you then you are going to have to move FAST !!

I have know Vincent for years – since my first days on my first social network – Ecademy. We have kept in touch over the years and I am amazed that he has found time to make this offer to work with people.

He is the founder and developer of so many social media initiatives like Brandergy.com, MyLinkedinPowerForum, and BrandingVentures.com. He has huge networks on Linkedin.

I have copied Vincents messages to his community on this subject here:

Keep STRONG!!

When Kelly Kim of  Twylah was asked recently ( for Inbound Marketing Summit 2012 ) what defined Internet Influence she referred to someone else’s definition which was that REAL influence generated ACTION amongst the influencer’s ” followers “.

An action could be anything from liking, favouriting, sharing or RT’ing something through signing up for a newsletter or something to attending an online or offline seminar to actually buying something and everything in between.

Amongst the characteristics of a great influencer ( Kelly commented ) was the tendency to share not only their own ( original ) content but also other people’s content.

She often recommended doing ” Things you would do normally ” like ” saying Good Morning and Good Night “. Kelly is one of the best
” Community Manager’s ” I have come across.

I like the definition of an influencer as someone who generates an action in their audience but the reason that I have the best network in the world is because MY network does business. We SELL STUFF !! Of course we don’t ram stuff down people’s throat. We are not in your face, pushy, salespeople but we DO have a goal and an objective ( on behalf of our clients ) which is ultimately, for example, to generate orders, revenue and profits for our clients.  I say for example because some of our clients might not want orders, per se , they might just want, for example, more users, more subscribers or more likes.

You probably didn’t even know that we SOLD STUFF ?? ( That’s because a) We don’t push stuff to people that are not interested in it and b) we research before we approach so you are highly unlikely to get an approach or a suggestion from us that you are not interested in or is not of value to you.

Most of us came from ” old school ” sales and marketing roles in companies that were regarded as leaders in Sales and Marketing. I am talking about companies ( that you would know ) like IBM and Rank Xerox. If you are too young for these companies then try Cisco Systems and Hewlett Packard. Yes, these companies are old school now but they were amongst the pioneers of modern sales and marketing techniques.

As those with some years experience in Sales and Marketing will know there was a lot of ” Push ” Marketing and Sales in the ” old days “.  What do I mean by that ??? Well to get people’s attention we advertised, we mailshotted, we ” cold called “, we made appointments and we had clever interview and sales techniques – we closed deals that way.

You must remember that we didn’t have lots of things that are taken for granted these days. Our ” communications channels ” were (snail) mail, the phone, maybe the fax and computers ( or computer terminals ) that accessed customer and prospect databases from our ” datacentres “. There were only just Personal Computers, only just mobile phones, no extensively available Internet, no easy to use CRM software. We did not work from home.

Now we still have the option of advertising ( in various places – tv, radio, print, social networks etc ) , we can still mailshot, we can emailshot, we could faxshot if we wanted to, we can pick up the phone and cold call BUT we can also put up a website and make sure it can be found; we can blog; we can build networks on various Social Networks like Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin and we can research online, using many different tools. We can also use tools like Skype to connect and present at very low cost.

So, in broad terms, instead of ” Pushing ” ourselves on the prospects we can ” Pull ” them towards us using ” Inbound Marketing “. We have many more potential communications channels to add to the phone, mail and email.

Now we use Google, Social Networks and other tools to research. We listen for relevant conversations across multiple social media channels

and bring that information into sCRM ( Social CRM ) software.

We track visitors to the websites that we build. We communicate with the subscriber lists that we have built up for our clients on websites and social media pages. We encourage people towards our clients e.g. Facebook and Twitter pages and then we engage with them. We build landing pages and call to action pieces. We build Internet ” Real Estate ” ( Websites, blogsites, social network pages ). When our clients are Found by prospective customers and converted into higher level prospects we use analysis software to see what worked and how it worked.

All the time we are moving toward our goal of getting more prospects and customers for our clients. We call THIS – ACTION !!!!

Here are 3 must watch marketing videos for #smwf

http://www.youtube.com/user/HubSpot?feature=autoshare

http://www.forentrepreneurs.com/sales-marketing-machine-webinar

http://www.lewishowes.com/marketing/inbound-marketing-plan/#more-2030

This blog is based on a recent  interview with Mike Volpe

http://www.mikevolpe.com/

by Lewis Howes – Author, Speaker and Entrepreneur.

The full transcript and  video is here, which I recommend you look at

http://www.lewishowes.com/marketing/inbound-marketing-plan/#more-2030

Why would you put your effort into Inbound Marketing ??

Inbound Marketing Budget & Results

Lewis: So, what I hear from that is that:

You spend more energy, time and resources or money on creating content, or creating free software, free downloads, free webinars.  So you’re putting that paid advertising money into the free stuff, which is converting twice as well as the paid stuff.  Correct?

Mike: That’s exactly right.

The cost is lower per lead and the conversion rate is twice.  So the cost per customer… it’s 3 or 4 times better. It’s fantastic.

And you’re right.  I think… so we spend some money on creating content and the way that you typically do that is that you end up hiring people.

So I think that in the long term we may have much more as the percentage of marketing budget going to the team and, you know, the people that are blogging and doing webinars and creating content versus buying media.

Building Versus Renting

And I think the interesting… you know, the other analogy if you think about it that way is that:

• If you’re buying media or advertising from someone else, you’re really renting the capability of attracting an audience because you have to pay them every time you wan to do an ad.

• If you’re building up your own blog, if you’re becoming your own media company, you’re building something.  You’re purchasing real estate and building your own real estate.  And obviously what you typically want to do is own those assets over time and things like that.

So just like you do with your blog and everything that you do, you’re building up yourself as this media agency, right?  And if you were to take a month off, you would still get a ton of web traffic because you’ve built this up over time.  If you stop paying that bill to that company you’re advertising with, you get nothing the next month, right?

So I think, again, you should want to build and not rent, and that’s another way to sort of think about it.

How would you start with Inbound Marketing ??

How To Start Inbound Marketing

OK. So let’s give them a good example.

• Say I’m a tech startup company.
• I’ve got 10-25 employees.
• I’m trying to grow.
• I’m trying to get more leads.
• I’ve got a free software, or a free service, but there’s a paid model as well, but I’m looking to get those free leads in to use the service first.

How do you guys collate the information through your blog, your books, your webinars, etc?  Do you hire… if you’re this company, do you hire someone externally?  Do you have members of the team who are doing different things; developers, CEO, running content?  Do you get all the members of the staff involved?  Or do you use one person?  How would you go about that?

Mike: That’s a really good question.

I’m a huge fan of getting the entire company involved in the effort.  I think we’ve had a lot of success and seen the best success among our customers if there’s more than one person.

Maybe you can have a leader, or a manager for your inbound marketing program, but unless you have multiple people contributing… you know, it needs to be the whole company.  You just sort of change your company philosophy to some degree to really make these things effectively.  We’ve seen the best success with companies that have multiple people contributing to the blog.

Because you get those different perspectives: the perspective from the VP of Engineering versus the VP of Sales and the VP of Marketing or the Co-Founders.  It’s going to be a little bit different.  And that helps you attract different facets of your audience.

Lewis: So, what if a company is not willing to do that?  Do you think you’ve really got to adopt this philosophy? Or you’re going to be struggling if you don’t?

Mike: You know…

• It will still work to some degree if you have one person sort of dedicated to it and spending some time on it.

• You will get better results if the whole team is dedicated to it.

IQMS Success Story

I’ll tell you a story about a company called IQMS.  They sell, sort of in that range, or I think they’re around 200 employees.  They sell ear piece software to manufacturers.  They’re based in California.  And what the CEO did, is he decided to basically…

You know it was like when Cortez came to the New World he burned his ships so all the people with him would committed to staying and making a life in the New World.

• He did that.
• He fired their PR agency.
• He cancelled all of their print advertising.
• And he told his marketing staff of only 2 people, that you need to embrace inbound marketing and make it work and here are your lead goals.
• And they said, “Holy crap! What are we going to do?” Right?  And then they said, “Well, I guess we really need to make this work.”
• So they started blogging.
• And the CEO was great because they did have that leadership above.
• The CEO created some content.
• Some other people in the company started blogging and things like that.
• And they’ve actually seen their business, I forget if it was 10% or 20%, buttheir business increased after having decreased the past 3 years.

And you know, we’re still not in a great economic environment yet, and they were able to see an increase in 2010 after having declined in 2008 and 2009.

He really attributes all of their success to that program and being really, really committed to it.

So again, you’ll have some success if it’s one person, but I would really recommend to folks that they think about really transforming their company.

Lewis: Gotcha.

How would you get started with Inbound Marketing ??

A Simple Inbound Marketing Plan

What would be a simple marketing plan for any company trying to get more inbound leads?

Mike: Yeah.

#1: Website Grader

I think the first thing is, I honestly would recommend Website Grader. It’s totally free. I’d run my website through Website Grader. Usually for many of the smaller companies, there’s usually one or two small changes they can make to their site to improve their search engine optimization, or how they’re site is displayed in search engines.  That’d probably be the first thing.

#2: One Blog Article A Week

After you’ve made a couple of those changes, I think the next most important thing is just to start to create some content.  So I would actually say about one blog article a week is probably fine.

You know, someone like you, you’re passionate about the stuff and you create tons of content. You’re doing hundreds of webinars.  If you can do that, that’s fantastic.  But for many of these folks they’re really nervous about getting started so even one blog article a week will have an effect.

#3: Good Lead Generating Offer

And then I think the third component that you definitely need is:

• What’s that good offer that’s going to get people to convert and become a lead?

And usually I think a webinar is a great example of something that people can do.  And then you need to take that call to action, that offer to become a lead and put that on your home page, and put it on all of your blog content.

And I think that if you use just those 3 things, the blog articles and the SEO will start to attract more people to your site and you’re going to have that good call to action and you’ll start to get more leads through that call to action.

And then, you know, there are lots of ways to make it even better and do more with it, but those 3 things will get most people started.

The reason that I recommend that my clients use HubSpot Inbound Marketing software is because I want them to be in control of thier Internet Marketing spend and investment.

When researching for this article I quite liked this post here

http://www.wsiwebpro.com/roi-formula-internet-marketing.html

which offered a ” Common Sense ROI strategy ” which basically was ” Increase the traffic to your website OR increase the conversion of traffic to leads OR both “.

Within that simple advice are hidden some basic things that some people just do not understand.

As I have said in earlier blogs the key to a website is how often it is found by the right people ( for the product or service that you are supplying ) and it is of lesser importance what it looks like as long as it converts visitors to leads well.

As very few Internet Marketing and Website Design companies understand this very few of them ask a critical question ” What ( words and phrases ) are you trying to be found for and who are your likely customers??  ”

In fairness those that do often struggle to get a response because thier clients simply do not know the answers to these questions. ( The answer to the first part of the question requires that the client put himself in the mind of thier client and think what they would type into Google in order to find the product or service that they provide . The answer to the second part of the question requires that they understand the typical profile of thier target customer. )

When you have your website being found by lots of the right people then you have TRAFFIC !! The you only need to convert that traffic to a lead. ( To be a lead you need some information about the enquirer e.g. name and email address. )

Conversion of traffic into leads is an art that I will not go into here.

The reason that I recommend HubSpot Inbound Marketing software to my clients is that I want to know ( and they need to know ) how much traffic they have; how it is increasing ( hopefully ! ) over time and where that traffic is coming from.

Is it coming from e.g.

– Direct Traffic ( someone just typed in the name of your company – implying that your name is well known for that type of product or service )

– Organic Traffic ( implying that you ARE being found for the words and phrases that you have optimised for )

– email traffic ( implying that you are getting people signing up to your blog/website and your email camapigns are working )

– Referrals ( implying that other people are spotting and highlighting and propagating your information )

– Social Media ( implying that people are following your Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin pages and that they are following these back to your blog/website ).

etc etc

Once we know what is happening to our traffic and where it is coming from we can fine tune to get more and then to convert that traffic into leads and then, all importantly, into sales.

Once we know how many of what product or service we sold ( at what price and profit ) we can work out what our Return on Internet Marketing spend is.

Happy New Year !!

Over the holidays this video came out from Serial Entrepreuner, David Skok, who is clearly a HubSpot fan..

http://www.forentrepreneurs.com/sales-marketing-machine-webinar/

and it is really a great addition to the blog series that I have been writing.

In fact I would say it is really the linchpin of why I am interested in HubSpot myself – which is ” How to get more sales using HubSpot Inbound Marketing ” !!

So, I would really recommend that you take a little time to view the presentation/ slide show.