Most restaurants that participate in a Taste Of event are well intentioned in that they want to bring in more customers and hope to use this event as a platform for attracting new customers. While giving out samples of their food is a start, I believe is simply old-school marketing. In fact, that’s what everyone else is doing at the event!

If these restaurants were coming to me for marketing consulting, here are some simple and yet powerful tactics that I’d offer them to attract new customers;

1. Give out coupons with each order that will encourage them to come back to your restaurant at a future time and spend more money.
2. Give out brochures or business cards with each order as well. Amazingly, most of these stands didn’t have brochures or list their address anywhere on their signage!
3. Incorporate your online social media presence (assuming you have one) into your print handouts. For example, include Twitter and Facebook profile urls into your brochures. Encourage them to follow or add you by giving away a discount or freebie.
4. Collect email addresses of the patrons.

I’d also devise a long-term strategy that would incorporate word-of-mouth tactics into the above.

I always tell my website clients to not waste a visitor by simply letting them browse your site and then leaving. I tell them to have a newsletter for them to subscribe to, or to integrate their Twitter, blog, or Facebook accounts into the site so they can connect with customers in other places long after they’ve left.

The strategies and mindset used for website marketing is the same at an offline event like this. Chances are, a one-day Taste Of event will not make or break your business. However, developing strategies and tactics that will encourage customers to ‘connect’ and remember your business long after they have tried your samples is a strategy that will handsomely payoff in the long run. Don’t be myopic and focus on just today. Innovate and be creative.

Twitter is a new channel for businesses to learn to leverage. While email marketing is still a viable marketing platform for many businesses, let’s face it; there’s alot of noise in that crowd. How many of us are already subscribed to newsletters and ezines that we barely have the time to read? Twitter is still in it’s infancy and there isn’t as much noise. And on top of that, there are quite a few applications such as Tweetdeck that allows us to filter who we follow into specific categories. It’s a new channel that allows you to accomplish the same goals as other online marketing tools; staying top of mind to the customer.

This is a Smart Social Media Strategy that I recommend to many businesses.

Like they keep saying in the Web 2.0 age, “It’s all about the conversation.” Most likely, you are having a monologue instead of a dialogue. No one cares about the products and services you are pedalling.

Create a conversation that gets people responding, commenting, and talking to YOU!

I just got off the phone with a colleague who started a Facebook group around a very unique opera duo. What’s so unique about them? They’re twins and total hotties. That unto itself is marketable. He created the group but it was mostly friends who joined. Not much happened after that. Such a shame.

I always tell clients to create a solid content development strategy for their blog. But the same can be said to a Facebook page or group. You gotta get people talking. Create a sense of community. Get them talking in a way that help fuel word of mouth of your product or service.

Forget creating a fan page of your business. Think bigger.

I see Fan Pages devoted to generic concepts like cuddling, hugging, and sandals. Hundreds of thousands of people are expressing themselves through better known concepts such as these than your teeny weeny unknown product.

I wouldn’t be surprised if there are people who are Fan Page squatting the way many do with domain squatting. Domain squatting is the concept of buying a domain and sitting on it with no intention of using it. It is used with the sole purpose of owning it and selling it later to a higher bidder. Except the real difference with Fan Page squatting is that “domain” is not entirely inactive. Fans are joining, posting and adding content to the page thus making it more valuable real estate.

Creating a Fan Page centered around a generic product or concept is a Smart Social Media Strategy that Sachi Studio is recommending to clients.

The goal of this series is to share best practices in social media and help other aspiring book authors learn to use this medium to increase book sales and exposure of their work. Let’s begin.

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1. What do you think is the biggest challenge that most book authors face when trying to use social media successfully for their book?

Many authors think of social media tactically as a way to promote their book. The advantage of using social media is that these tools are a great way to strategically build an audience for the long term. But building an audience takes time and hard work. Authors should be thinking long before the book is even written how they can start to build that audience.

2. Care to tell us how much time you put into social media on weekly basis? Where is the time divided?

Probably 10 hours a week. My co-author, Ben McConnell, and I both write for our blog and we try to post 2-3 times a week. We also have started a new online community, the Society for Word of Mouth (SWOM) and I probably spend a hour a day care-taking for that site.  Also I have Google and Twitter alerts set up so that I know when people are mentioning us or our books online. We try to respond to these mentions as much as possible.

3. Where can we find you online? Please list the urls of your profiles for these sites (or whichever you feel comfortable listing) (ie; twitter, your blog, Facebook, etc)

• Blog: CHurchoftheCustomer.com (currently at 196,000 RSS subscribers)
• Society for Word of Mouth Online Community: theSWOM.org
• Twitter: http://twitter.com/jackiehuba
• Facebook Profile
  

4. I know you¹re active on both Twitter and Facebook. How have those platforms helped you with the book?

One of the challenges that authors face is that after the initial book promotion is over, how do you keep buzz going for the book? By participating in social media, whether it is using Twitter, or commenting on blogs, people will click to your profile and find out more about you. This way, you will have people who may have missed the initial launch publicity find out about the book. Facebook and Twitter are two such examples of how to connect with people who can check your profile and learn about your book.

A word of warning: resist the urge to constantly Tweet or mention your book in your conversations in social media. No one likes a braggart.

5. What are some practical WOM strategies that you can suggest to book authors trying to use blogging as an online marketing tool?

Use a blog as the main website for the book. Share a sample chapter on the site. Upload a video summary of you talking about the book. Using polls or trivia questions related to the book to get readers involved. Give away copies of books to those who participate in discussion on your blog.

6. Any interesting story or benefit that you care to share from using social media successfully?

It’s important to track what is being said about your book online. Use Google Alerts on the title of your book.  One day I received an alert about a blog post with a negative reviw of our book “Creating Customer
Evangelists.” The blogger outlined some of things he didn’t like about the book. I posted a comment to the blog post, thanking the blogger for posting his feedback and gently corrected a few of the inaccuracies he had assumed about the book. His next blog post was titled “Jackie Huba is my favorite author!” He was amazed that I had seen his comment and would take the time to respond. By participating in the blogosphere, authors can create positive word of mouth and turn detractors around.

7. What¹s the best advice that you could give to other book authors who want to explore how social media can help them and the promotion of their books?

Start building your audience with social media now. Don’t wait until you are ready to promote your new book.

Her blog on marketing to women, WonderBranding, has won awards from Marketing Sherpa and Forbes.com, and was featured in Seth Godin’s ebook, “Bull Marketing.” Michele is also the marketing columnist for Inc.com, the web companion to Inc. business magazine.

The goal of this series is to share best practices in social media and help other aspiring book authors learn to use this medium to increase book sales and exposure of their work. Let’s begin.

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1. What was or is the biggest challenge that you found when you started to use various form of social media such as blogging as a marketing tool?

When I started blogging nearly five years ago, I was lucky to get advice from other bloggers on the biggest challenge, which really was two-fold. One – be prepared to add fresh content on a regular basis. I’ve seen more blogs die on the vine because of initial enthusiasm followed by the reality of what kind of commitment it takes. Two – the time you need to take to read other people’s blogs, join in the conversation, and build relationships. The old adage “No man is an island” couldn’t be more true than with the blogosphere – it really does take a village, and the more you connect with others, the more success you have.

2. What was the most unexpected result or surprise that you got when you started using social media applications?

The biggest surprise for me was the openness of other bloggers and how they welcomed me into the fold. What an amazing community – I now consider many of marketing’s biggest and best minds to be personal friends, first thanks to the blogosphere and now to apps like Facebook and especially Twitter. For me, the day would be empty without some interaction with my Tweets.

3. With the launch of your new book, what social media tools do you intend to be using the most in order to get exposure for it?

The book has been out for a few weeks now, and Holly (my co-author) and I decided to be judicious with our time and energy. Since we both have long-standing blogs of our own, we decided to just keep writing on our existing blogs rather than create a whole new blog for the book. We do have a website for the book that’s gotten a lot of attention, and that directs visitors to our individual blogs. Plus, web visitors can sign up for a weekly newsletter tip that’s delivered by email.

I’m currently writing a new book for Bard Press which should be out in late 2009, and I am in the planning stages of how I’ll use social media apps like Facebook and blogging to really give the big push… this next book will be a biggie for me and I’m preparing myself to invest the time (and money!) it will take to go for a bestseller attempt.

4. Care to tell us how much time you put into social media on weekly basis? Where is the time divided?

Whoo-boy. I’d say between my blog, the Grokdotcom blog, the Inc.com blog and my time on Twitter and Facebook, I put in about 8-10 hours a week. A big chunk of that is offline, of course, doing the writing, because I want the content to be effective for the reader. And oh yes, there’s the time spent reading other blogs… guess you can add about four hours to that weekly total, at least!

5. What does your social media profile look like? Where can we find you online?

• My blog, WonderBranding, can be found at http://www.wonderbranding.com
• I write the marketing blog for Inc.com at http://www.inc.com
• I also write for the Grok blog (home of web wizards Jeff and Bryan Eisenberg) at
• You can find me on Facebook,
• Twitter
• And if you’d like to follow my dog, Penny the WonderDog, she Twitters as well.

6. What’s the best advice that you could give to other book authors who want to explore how social media can help them and the promotion of their books?

The best thing authors can do is spend some quality time (I’m talking HOURS) reading other blogs and see what it takes to build great content and strong readership. No matter if authors have published a book, are writing a book or are just thinking about writing a book, a blog is the best first step. It builds your writing chops as well as the confidence you need to write with conviction. Authors should also consider Twitter, which is not only fun, it connects you with more people that you dreamed possible.

7. Before the new book, The Soccer Mom Myth, was ever released; you already had a blog at Wonder Branding. How much did that blog help you in the creation and promotion of the book itself?

I’ve been blogging at WonderBranding for nearly five years. I followed the same advice I give authors above, and it really helped build my confidence. Because of the blog, I got the writing gig with Inc.com.

My posts for WonderBranding helped developed my ideas for The Soccer Mom Myth; often, when I was stymied over an idea, blogging about it helped clear my neural pathways and opened me to new angles of approach. Finally, it got the attention of Ray Bard from Bard Press, who also saw me give a day-long seminar last fall and then approached me about writing the book I’m currently working on. And if you know about Bard Press (they only publish a couple of titles a year at the most, and market the hell out of them – most of their titles become bestsellers), that’s quite an honor.

In the end, write good content and you won’t have to do a lot of marketing. If you’ve built a strong readership, been honest and authentic in your writing, and you’ve developed a community of other bloggers, promotion takes on a life of its own. It’s a world I love!

I’ve read enough on the site as well as other social networking sites and know enough people who are the experts on it, that I wanted to create a lists of resources to help further and accelerate your networking on it.

I hope you find these resources to be helpful;

Blogs and Forums On LinkedIN

1. Scott Allen has a blog called LinkedINtelligence. It covers all things LinkedIN. You definitely want to read the category that talks about how to use LinkedIN effectively.
2. Vincent Wright runs a Yahoo Group that covers all things LinkedIN. He also has a Ning platform called My LinkedIN Power Forum that is a bit more interactive as well. As an aside: I knew of Vincent virtually for a few years and finally had a chance to catch up with him over phone a few months ago. He is one of the most cerebral and intelligent business people that I know. I actually knew that before talking to him because of the way he articulates himself online. I could probably talk to him and pick his brain for hours on end. I usually don’t say that of most people.
3. LinkedIN Learning Center, which was just announced on the LinkedIn Blog, is a resource center to learn more about using every aspect of LinkedIn. I especially like how they created relevant user guides for certain types of professionals such as entrepreneurs, consultans, and VCs.

Articles On LinkedIN

1. Anita Campbell wrote a blog entry that covers why Entrepreneurs should use both LinkedIn and Facebook. It’s a great read because there is this endless debate as to which platform is more business productive.
2. Guy Kawasaki got a free LinkedIN Profile Makeover from the folks at LinkedIn. If you ever want to know how to increase the effectiveness of your LinkedIN profile, then this is a good visual read for you.
3. Kawasaki also blogs about 10 ways that you can use LinkedIn.

Books On LinkedIN

1. I’m On LinkedIn. Now What? Jason Alba writes a great book that answers the question the everyone inevitably asks themselves. It’s also available in ebook format.
2. LinkedIn For Recruiting. If you are a recruiter then I would highly recommend this book. I’ve known the authors, Bill and Des, for awhile and both are highly competent professionals when it comes to this topic.

My LinkedIn Profile

The goal of this series is to share best practices in social media and help other aspiring book authors learn to use this medium to increase book sales and exposure of their work. Let’s begin.

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1. What was or is the biggest challenge that you found when you started to use various form of social media as a marketing tool?

I think the biggest challenge is that to use social media well, you really need to invest the time to participate and share your real voice. For example, when I first launched the book – I asked bloggers to send me 5 questions as a virtual interview that they could run on their blogs. I got 55 responses, which meant I had to respond individually to more than 250 questions. The buzz resulting from that one activity was extremely high, but I had to spend quite a bit of time initially to do it well, and additional time to follow up and try to comment on those posts and continue the conversations. When you use social media as a marketing tool, you are making a commitment to start AND CONTINUE a conversation, and that can be challenging.

2. What is your preferred social media-marketing tool?

I am a big believer in not letting the tools define what you do, but rather getting smarter about your strategy for what you want the tools to do. I am alternately using blogs, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Dopplr, and del.icio.us to promote my book. They each have a role and I find them useful for different things. I can’t really choose one favourite.

3. What was the most unexpected result or surprise that you got when you started using social media applications?

I think the biggest surprise that anyone who starts actively using social media tools will find (and what I found when I first started) is just how accessible people are. I left a comment on John Mackey’s blog (CEO of Whole Foods) and he responded. I was able to get interviews with unreachable people to profile in my book. When Mark Cuban was competing on Dancing with the Stars, I could see his updates about how he was feeling five minutes before air time. That’s a pretty powerful idea. In part, that was why I felt my book was so necessary … because as social media offers more direct access to the individuals in your company (at any level), your personality becomes even more important.

4. What types of SM tools are you currently using? Please list the urls of your profiles for these sites.

www.personalitynotincluded.com – the official site for the book
www.thepersonalityproject.com – The Personality Project (a group blog companion to the book site)
http://www.twitter.com/rohit – my Twitter ID
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=7995589118&ref=ts – the official readers group on Facebook
http://del.icio.us/pnibook – my delicious account where I am tagging all the reviews and buzz about the book
http://rohitbhargava.typepad.com – my marketing blog

5. What’s the best advice that you could give to other book authors who want to explore how social media can help them and the promotion of their books?

The best thing social media can offer any author is a way to connect with influential voices who are currently talking about your subject, and letting people share your content and ideas with one another. The first point is about connecting your book with the people that can spread the word to all the right audiences. The second is about letting your readers and people who like the book spread the word about it. I would say that for any author, the trick is to try and focus on both of these pieces.

6. Can you quantify the results from using SM?

For me, the biggest benefit was obviously landing a six figure book deal … but more than that has been the ability to connect with more people and share the authentic story behind my book. I have never accepted advertising on my personal blog, so the results are more about reputation, speaking invitations and big things like the book deal. Putting all of those things together, I would say that starting my blog over three years ago was a best decision of my career.

7. What’s the problem with most blogs by book authors today? Do you think many of them lack a personality?

I wouldn’t say they lack a personality, but I think the temptation for many authors is to think about a book website and blog a bit more logically than they probably need to. My book site, for example, does have a blog and the general book information, but I also have a “Making of PNI” section where I share rejected cover designs, my original book proposal that I used to sell the deal, sketches of drawings that made it into the book and even a photo of me holding my week old baby in one hand while he was sleeping and making final edits on my book on the laptop with the other. All of it is meant to give people an inside look at the book and let them know that it is not faceless (and neither am I). I’m a real person that spent time writing the book and I’m approachable. Ideally, a blog should do that, and combine it with more current commentary that can help to keep your book fresh.

8. Before the PNI Book was ever released, you had a personal blog. How much did that blog help you in the creation of the book itself?

The blog was of great benefit in getting the book deal, as I shared above … but when it came to writing the book, I used surprisingly little of my blog content. Readers of my blog will find that there is only one thing repeated from my blog in the book, and that’s the well trafficked Social Media Optimization post. When it came to writing the book and the flow of it, I found that my blog content didn’t naturally fit and wrote most of the book from scratch.

9. I see you are using WordPress for the PNI website as opposed to Typepad for your personal blog? I recently wrote a primer on why I believe authors should use WP as their web publishing platform of choice so I’m glad to see that you are using it.

I am a fan of both, actually … and I use Typepad for my personal blog. To be honest, the main reason for choosing WordPress was that with the customization I wanted, the designer I was working with was going to have an easier time getting WordPress to work. I think that’s the main advantage that most developers and creators of sites and blogs are finding with WordPress – its flexibility.

The goal is to share best practices in social media and help other aspiring book authors learn to use this medium to increase book sales and exposure of their work.

My first interview is with Daniel Pink. He is the best selling author of the books, Free Agent Nation and A Whole New Mind. His newest book is The Adventures of Johnny Bunko: The Last Career Guide That You’ll Ever Need. While there are tons of career guides written, this one is unique because it’s the first business book to be done in the Japanese Comic book form known as manga.

I’m hosting an evening with Dan and his new book on Wednesday July 9th in McLean. You can register and RSVP here. We’re giving away a copy of the book for every registration! Check out the cool embedded video trailer that he is using for the new book below. I can’t recall the last time that a book author decided to use a video trailer for a book.

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What was or is the biggest challenge that you found when you started to use blogging as a viable social media marketing tool?

There were a few challenges. One was the pressure to post as often as you must on a blog. I’m a book writer and some time feature magazine writer. I’m used to spending lots of time on my writing. Blogging has a very different metabolism. Another was the realization that there wasn’t perfect overlap between what I wanted to write and what readers want to read. Looking at which posts are popular and which aren’t is very revealing. But you can’t let that be your master. In other words, the Factoids of the Day on danpink.com are staying, damnit!

I see that you are just getting started with using Facebook and Twitter in addition to blogging as social media marketing tools. What prompted you to explore these? Aren’t you busy as it is?

The primary impetus with Facebook and Twitter was that I didn’t quite grok exactly how they worked and why they were important. Once I began playing around, I began to understand both their peculiar rules and potential impact. I’m not a rabid user, by any means, but I’m convinced they’re important.

What’s the best advice that you could give to other book authors who want to explore how blogging can help them and the promotion of their books?

Marketing is not a monologue. It’s a conversation Also, I’m sold on Seth Godin’s two-part formulation for any offering in today’s marketplace:

1. Make something worth talking about.
2. Make it easy for others to talk about it.

What’s the problem with most blogs by book authors today? Why do they fail to meet their goal of selling more books through their blog?

I’ll offer three reasons.

1. They still think marketing is a monologue.
2. They’re not fully committed to the medium (which is fine — but if that’s the case, one probably shouldn’t bother).
3. Their books might fail part one of the Godin test. (See above.)

I noticed on your Johnny Bunko website that you had a section called Contests. One of the basic principles that I encourage book authors to use when using social media is to incentivize the process in order to help them increase sales and exposure of their work. As of this writing, you haven’t given much away as to what or how your contests will look like. Are you thinking along similar lines whereby you want to increase word of mouth by incentivizing the process? Care to let us in on any plans that you have in store?

We haven’t quite settled on precisely what we’re doing. I think contests are just plain fun — and that people who participate tend to talk about the experience. But I don’t want to do a contest simply for the sake of doing a contest. I want the contests to be connected to the ideas in the book. And since the book is still in its early days, I want to give those ideas a little more time to seep out.

I notice that you insert a new page from the book for people to read as a new blog entry every few days. What is the logic to this? I’m assuming you’re using it as a teaser to get more people to buy? If so, is it working?

The goal is simply to provide more value and entertainment to people who visit the site. And remember: latecomers can read all the pages we’ve released on one fell swoop on the “Read the Book” page. If people who read these pages are entertained enough to plop down 10 bucks for the book, that’s great. But if they’re just seeking to be entertained for free, that’s cool by me. At least they’re reading my stuff.

Comments and feedback is encouraged.