As a big college football fan I love it when you get a glimpse into the lives of the players and coaches off the field. ESPN recently did a story on the University of Georgia's coach, Mark Richt, and his family. It's really good...and I'll go ahead and warn you locate the closest box of Kleenex near you. You might want to have that handy.

There are three words you should never utter consecutively if you hope to have bloggers promote your company, products, or services. Those three words are: pay per post. If you're not familiar with the pay-per-post model that's great. In fact, stop reading this post. It's better that you don't know about it so you don't get any ideas that might tempt you down this road.

A pay-per-post promotion model is simply hiring bloggers to write about your company. For example, if my company came out with a new line of fruit scented highlighters and I was a pay-per-post kind of guy, I would want the top highlighter enthusiast blogs to talk about these sweet smelling markers. I would contact these bloggers and pay them to blog a glowing report about the highlighters. It's a simple transaction. I pay, they post. Just like advertising...but therein lies the problem.

Why It's Bad
Pay-per-post is a really bad idea at many levels, but my biggest issue with it is that it completely undermines the trust economy of blogs. Good blogs, and the bloggers themselves, are trusted by their readers. They provide content that has value. That content carries with it a sense of authenticity and credibility because it wasn't paid for.

Pay-per-post, then, is the "sweep the leg Johnny" tactic to getting blog readers to find out about your company. It's a seemingly quick and easy way to drive traffic to your website and it just so happens to violate about everything good about blogs.

Blogs were (and still are) built on knowing that people are sharing their own personal and biased opinions about things. When bloggers start accepting money to blog about products, and then don't disclose this information, they are selling out their own credibility. When bloggers sell out their own credibility, it brings down anyone associated with them. The readers lose trust in the blogger, the blogger loses readers and influence, the advertiser loses the blogger, and the advertiser is viewed negatively for trying to sneak their way into some positive blog coverage.

More specifically, here are three things pay-per-post does:

1. It promotes laziness within organizations that want bloggers to talk about them. To these lazy companies, it's the perfect promotional model because they get the exposure they want without actually creating content worthy of a genuine conversation. I understand the seduction here but it just cuts against the grain of all that makes blogs work legitimately for you when you do it right.
2. It discredits legitimate bloggers who know how to talk about products without hiding their biases. If more bloggers participate in pay-per-post schemes and continue to be found out, it will raise the suspicion of readers of all blogs. I personally don't think we're anywhere close to this yet but it gives us a glimpse of the slippery slope we find if this gains traction.
3. It discredits legitimate social media marketers who know how to engage bloggers the right way. Social media marketers and PR professionals who do their homework should have the chance to talk to bloggers and try to raise awareness for the company or cause. The good ones do their homework by being familiar and active with the blogs that influence the same people they hope to reach. They know how to pitch bloggers correctly and when to back off. They know the rules.

The bottom line is that you really can't afford to participate in a pay-per-post business model. You have too much to lose in the form of trust and credibility if you're found out. Instead, work on creating content that bloggers can't help but talk about. Create the best product, service, or event in your field so you couldn't stop the discussion about it if you tried. That's the way blogs and other social media tools will work for you. It takes longer, but it will hold up. It's kind of like building a brick house verses the straw house or stick house. Just ask the pigs. They'll help you out.

This is quite a different post from what I normally blog about because it's about what I do. The reason I'm writing this is to answer several recent questions from people asking what services I offer. In a nutshell, I do social media marketing consulting and speaking. So what's that all mean? Well, quite a bit, so I created a page here on the blog called: Hire Bill Seaver/MicroExplosion Media. It has information about the types of consulting I've done and different speaking sessions I lead.

There's also a bit on there about the new social media monitoring service I'm offering. This is the first time I've branched out into an actual service and I now have a staff to help with this. All the information about the social media monitoring service is on the "hire" page.

So, there you have it. That's what I do. If you have questions or want to talk specifically about something, please feel free to call or email me. If you have complaints, you can send those here.

In the spirit of Crocodile Dundee's famous quote, "That's not a flashlight. This is a flashlight."

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D99NHb6B03s]

I have said before that the average American is targeted with an average of 4,000 advertising messages everyday. We can't remember even ten of the 4,000 ads from yesterday because we have great filters in place to keep them out but that doesn't seem to stop advertisers from putting all those ads out there.

Now, despite what you may think, advertisers and marketers are people too. The problem is when a marketer is in his/her job it's easy to forget about the things they know don't even work on them. So while a marketer for a local car dealership knows he changes the channel when commercials come on TV, he keeps pushing those ads for his own company. It doesn't make any sense but it's happening today in virtually every industry.

A Marketer's Toughest Question
The hardest question for a marketer (or advertiser or public relations person) to ask is this: is it better to say and do nothing than to create another one of those 4,000 messages that get filtered out everyday? The short answer is, yes, but that's a tough pill to swallow. The fact of the matter is that marketers are paid to do stuff, even things that don't work. In many organizations it's better to do the same old marketing that doesn't work than to try something new.

The Necessary Shift for Marketers
It's necessary that traditional marketers shift their thinking. Rather than talking about yourself, your company, your product, or something else we probably don't care about, try adding value to the people you want to reach. When you add value to someone's life they may decide to give you the opportunity to talk with them again. The more value you add, the more opportunities you earn. That's what social media can do and why it works. It gives anyone the chance to add value to people you want to reach. It's the reason a guy in his garage with no marketing budget can compete with a multi-million dollar company. It's exactly the opposite of the 4,000 ads that get filtered out. Instead of being blocked, valuable content is grabbed. There's no worry about filters. The filters are down and the content is willingly taken and even passed along to other people who will find it valuable.

Though I've said this many times (so this is my apology to longtime readers) the best way to position yourself mentally for creating valuable content is to remember five things:

• Be entertaining
• Be inspiring
• Be educational
• Be informative
• Be outrageous

When you speak to these ideas rather than telling people why you're so great, you'll see they can figure that out for themselves...and then they'll tell some people for you. Or, just keep doing things the way you've been doing them...we don't want all those good filters going to waste.

In the latest episode of The New Mediology, my podcast with Nathan Moore, (available in iTunes or on the podcast page for listening online) was a discussion on what it means to be thinking about online marketing in an increasingly mobile environment. The iPhone changed the rules for the Internet in mobile devices. Now Google is about to jump into the game and Blackberry isn't planning to be left out either. These devices are changing the way people use the Internet and therefore will change the ways marketers will use the Internet to reach people. I don't want to be too much of an alarmist here but this really seems to be something to put on your radar screen now if it's not already. The good news is that if you're paying attention to this now you're much less likely to be left behind.

I love the Sonic commercials. They are some of the best and most original commercials on TV. These commercials really capture the idea of creating content that people want to watch. Just today someone told me they would pay to have a DVD of all the Sonic commercials. Well, this isn't a DVD with all the commercials but it's a step in the right direction...

This Saturday I'm speaking at Barcamp Nashville with my friend Steve Horton from the firm Katcher, Vaughn, and Bailey here in town. Our session is called PR 2.0: The Deer Have Guns Now. A very recent example of the deer (the public, bloggers, and social media in general) having "guns" to fight back now involves a recent case with 3M the manufacturer of Post-It Notes.

The Background
You can read the full story here but basically what happened is that about two years ago some people decided to play a joke on a coworker and put Post-It Notes all over his beloved Jaguar. One of the people uploaded the pictures to his Flickr page and before he knew it thousands of people were interested in this creative practical joke. It got picked up by major blogs like Boing Boing and Digg. ABC News even did a story about it.

The Problem
Several months ago 3M contacted the photographer to ask see if they could use the photos for an back-to-school promotion they were working on for the Fall. The photographer asked a professional photographer friend what a fair licensing fee would be for 3M and when he responded with it a 3M employee said they wouldn't be willing to pay more than what it would cost them to do the photo shoot themselves which was going to be between $750-$1000. The photographer countered with a $2000 license fee and never heard from 3M again.

Then a few months ago people started telling the photographer that they saw his picture at their local Office Depots, Staples, and Office Max stores. It turns out 3M decided to recreate the car and pass it off like the originals. They even have video on their YouTube channel showing them doing it (and note at the beginning of the video they say it's a video of "the Post-It car" not even "a Post-It car.")

To date, this story has been blogged about over 100 times including being covered by well known blogger/author David Meerman Scott. There are hundreds of angry comments for 3M on the blogs and on Digg.com as well.

The Bottom Line
The viral marketing idea 3M was hoping to capitalize on here is blowing up in their face. When you choose to go hunting for new business, new ideas, and new customers in the current online environment don't forget that you can get shot now as well. The traditional mindset for marketers is only that they are the hunters. Being the hunted is an unfamiliar position for them but one they will continue to find themselves in until they better understand the world they now live in.

3M's Opportunity
Ok, so all of that is the bad news for 3M. Frankly, they look like the big bad company that's too cheap to pay a little guy $2,000 for the use of the pictures. The good news for 3M is that they can still come out of this looking all right if they're willing to do a few things.

• First, 3M should apologize. Tell the photographer they're sorry and admit that they were in the wrong there. Even if they weren't legally in the wrong they seem to have ripped off a bit of intellectual property just because they could. There is power in being genuinely sorry.
• Then, 3M should pay the photographer and use the pictures. Whatever the photographer's initial asking price was is what they should pay. Once they do that they should replace the YouTube video with the original pictures and any upcoming printed items that haven't been sent to press yet.
• Finally, 3M should start contacting the bloggers who covered this. This will take some time and effort to do but it will be worth it. Many of the bloggers will likely post about 3M's willingness to take the time to make things right. In the end 3M could really look like a company that learned from it's errors and change the entire conversation. Until then they'll just be the company that told him to take his Post-It Notes and stick it!

What happens when a New York times bestselling author blogs about and Atlanta Hartsfield International Airport employee who got fired for no apparent reason? Well, we're still waiting to see exactly, but here's what happened: last month author Andy Andrews recounted his encounters with a long-time employee at the Atlanta airport only to find out that the airport fired the guy. Almost immediately there were emails and inquiries to the airport about the employee mentioned in the post. By the next day the airport responded with a comment on Andrew's own blog post, and by the end of it all the airport employee (whose status was still undetermined) was getting job offers and requests for speaking engagements.

This is another example of the way social media is changing the ways organizations react and respond to customers. The airport responded (which is good) but didn't really try to resolve anything. The airport had a potential celebrity on their hands and the best they could do was say, "actually he's not fired and ultimately we didn't have any say in this to begin with."

So, what can we learn from this? How about these three things:

1. If you're not already monitoring what's being said about you in social media, it's time to start...right now. Go ahead. Get your Google Alerts set up as a start. We'll wait until you get back....
2. If you don't have a plan on how you're going to respond to blogs, comments, and social media feedback in general, go ahead and starting planning your response(s). Think about the tone, style, and degree of willingness to share more information you will provide. Don't forget that you're entering a conversation and conversations require listening not just talking.
3. And finally, if a bestselling author blogs about you and can generate that much response in less than 24 hours, don't you want to think about building on the opportunity rather than just giving an incomplete attempt at answering the questions and concerns? Be willing to let people tell you the way they want it rather than what fits your mold. You may have your own Mister Foster at your company who's already a rockstar to your customers. You just don't know it yet.

For a few weeks now I've noticed a few people on Twitter will throw in a little icon or image into their Tweets to convey an idea beyond the 140 character limit. At first I just thought it was a secret keystroke or maybe something people on Macs could do, or something else that I was clearly out of the loop on. As I've seen a few more people do it I had to get to the bottom of it so after a little research I found the source of these new little pictures embedded in Tweets.

It turns out some guys developed a little tool called TwitterKeys that lets you include all kinds of images in your Tweets. So if you ever wanted to add some wingdings or webdings or icons or little pictures to your Twitter messages then TwitterKeys is for you. I only have one request: use them sparingly. The cool factor is sure to wear off so don't use them just because you can, use them because they help you say what you were going to say anyway...only shorter.

He's a painter. Not a fighter.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CbvSms-1yj4]

Yesterday I received an email from Crossway, a publisher out of Chicago. The email basically said, "We got your email address because someone from Crossway knows you and thought you might be able to give us some good feedback. Please take a look at the two book cover designs below and tell us which one you like better."

That was it. They just wanted my age, gender, and to rate two cover design options for a book that's due out in a few months. They used the free form builder on Google Docs to create the survey. It was less than 60 seconds of my time but I have to think it was invaluable for Crossway.

This is a great way to tap into people's opinions to help your organization. You can do this kind of thing a number of different ways. Whether you ask the opinions of a small group using the forms on Google Docs or use your blog, Twitter, or Facebook to get feedback, don't underestimate the direct (and often very rapid) response you can get just by asking people for help. Sure, Crossway could have sent the cover to some people inside the company to look at (and they probably did to some degree) but why not ask people who are likely to buy it? You can give your biggest fans an inside glimpse into something they're probably already interested in and get their opinion in the process. They just promoted the book for zero dollars and got something of benefit in return. On top of that, I feel a little more special that I was on the list to get the email to begin with. Don't you want your customers to feel like that?

The Stats Say It All

This is one of the biggest advantages about social media for organizations. The opportunity for a company to connect with customers (and allow customers to connect back) is huge! It's no surprise that Cone Research just released some stats showing that 56% of American consumers feel both a stronger connection with, and better served by, companies when they can interact with them in a social media environment. The study also found that 93% of Americans believe a company should have a presence in social media, and 85% believe a company should not only be present, but should also interact with its consumers via social media.

The opportunities are there just waiting for you. If you're not sure where to start maybe it's time to ask your customers. They'll have lots to say. The real question is this: are you ready to listen?

Last week I reviewed Josh Oakhurst's free e-book called Viral Marketing Saladr. If you or someone you know is relatively new to web 2.0/social media/new media scene you'll be interested in getting a copy for yourself. Josh does a good job of giving an overview of social media marketing rules, myths, and many of the websites that are leading the way in social media. If you're familiar with social media tools and strategy this e-book may be largely a review for you, but if you're new or still unconvinced about the benefits of all that social media marketing has to offer your organization, you'll certainly want to check it out.

Last week I celebrated the one year anniversary for MicroExplosion Media and after doing social media marketing consulting for a year on my own and almost a year prior to that for another company one thing I've heard marketing directors, company executives, and small business owners ask about most is how to budget for social media marketing. This question usually comes once they're convinced social media marketing will work for them and they're trying to figure out how to put financial resources toward it.

Many companies are accustomed to creating marketing plans and budgets many months before they plan to execute the plan. They need the time to get bids on the campaign projects and begin the creative development. That's how traditional marketing budgeting has worked for a long time and it was easy for it to work that way because everything was done in print or a broadcast medium that had long lead times and buying cycles.

People Are Your Marketing Budget

Social media marketing is different and requires a different budgeting mindset. In traditional marketing you spend most of you money on projects and physical deliverables or ad buys. The shift in social media marketing is to put the money into people. The money has to be put into people because social media marketing requires time and only people have time to give. Whereas in a traditional marketing campaign you may set aside $50,000 in your budget for a large direct mail campaign, in social media you may take that same money and put it toward hiring another person dedicated to the social media space for the brand/product. In time, the marketing budget may decrease but that same money will be going into people who have a focus on social media and can then extend the growth of your brand with content, community, and conversation.

People Can React, Respond, and Rethink

The other reason to put the money into people is that the world of social media marketing allows you to move very quickly. If the market changes or a window of opportunity is available you need the human resources to respond and react quickly. This also means that you give yourself time to have great ideas later on. One of the biggest drawbacks to a long range marketing plan is that it doesn't give you the flexibility to come up with a better, more relevant idea later on. You can get stuck with something you know isn't going to be as effective because the environment you planned for nine months ago isn't the reality of the market today.

We all know business changes rapidly today so why would you still create your marketing plans the old way? It just doesn't make sense. Decide what you should stop doing, then start putting that financial resource into people who can really help you build relationships and create content that has value for the people you most want to reach.

I love football. I'm more of a college football guy but like the NFL also. I can't say I've really watched Canadian Football League football so if this touchdown celebration is any indication of how they play the great gridiron battle I think I'll pass. If this was a kids football game celebration it would be cute, but these are the pros...well, the CFL pros. Maybe we should revoke their man cards.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hwl7_6wHOvg]

I've always heard you can be the best by learning from the best, so if you want to learn one thing the world's most popular bloggers have in common it's that they post frequently. Very frequently.

According to the recent Technorati State of the Blogosphere report, 92% or the top 100 bloggers post at least twice a day. 87% of the bloggers ranked between 101-600 post at least twice a day, and 78% of the remaining top 5,000 bloggers worldwide post at least twice a day. It would seem that if you want to greatly increase the chances of growing your blog it's time to get posting. Here's the breakdown according to Technorati:

One thing to keep in mind here is that in many of these cases the blogs represented have more than one contributor. Also, many of the top 100 blogs, for instance, have entire business models built around them. They're valuable properties and they have the resources (and need) to feed the blog. It's their full time job.

I recommend people who are starting out blogging to post a minimum of once a week. For some people, even that seems impossible with everything else going on. Personally, I try for three posts a week and employ my meal verses snack ratio with those three posts (one meal, two snacks).

I've seen the benefits of blogging in many ways both personal and professional and my goal is not to be one of the top 5,000 bloggers in the world. Unless that's your goal, don't let this bother if you feel like you're falling short. Instead, learn from what they're doing. This has challenged me to consider whether or not I should post more than my three per week average. Whether you change your current post frequency or not, one thing we can take away from this is that if you need to give your blog a boost you very well may need to start blogging more often.