Editor's Note: The following is an extremely insightful guest blog post about cultivating online influence written by Jeanne Hopkins, director of marketing at HubSpot, a Cambridge, Mass.-based Internet marketing startup whose software helps businesses get found online, generate more inbound leads, and convert a higher percentage of those leads into paying customers.
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On July 7, in the late afternoon, I tuned in to The Influencer Project. For the next 60 minutes (actually it was closer to 62 minutes), I listened to 60 online experts tell at least one proven way to increase your influence online. We’re talking real experts like David Meerman Scott, Anne Holland, Brian Solis, Todd Defren and our own Mike Volpe, and all of the unmentioned names are equal in expertise to those I mentioned. While some of the advice was obvious, like create valuable content or get on Facebook, what resonated was that these experts – all of whom have influence online, so they do know what they’re talking about – were passionate about their one or two tips.
As a sponsor for this event, we have permission from ThoughtLead, the program organizers, to offer our community both the audio file and the complete transcript. For those of you who don’t have 62 minutes to spare, I’ve taken the liberty of shortening it even more – to 60 sentences.
This will give you the headlines, but you may want to take the additional time and understand why these experts came up with their practical advice. I cannot remember when I've received this much solid advice in such a short amount of time.
1. Stop talking about your products and services and create valuable content.
2. Increase conversion rates on your landing pages by improving your buttons.
3. Build your thought leadership and digital influence through transparency.
4. Demonstrate commitment and increase your digital influence through consistency.
5. Know where you’re going, then make what you say about the people around you.
6. Follow better people.
7. Align yourself with outstanding strategic partners.
8. Make connections online, then meet the person in the real world, offline.
9. Create content that stands for something: ‘Higher purpose content marketing.’
10. Look under the hood of the shiny new technologies coming out.
11. Believe in ‘social objects’ as the way we socialize and share with others.
12. Avoid ‘incestuous blogging’ and look outside your circle.
13. Start talking to people.
14. Think about your narrative strategy because people connect with stories worth telling.
15. Find people who have your audience but not your products and co-create with them.
16. Establish influence either through complete honesty or absolute fakery - not in between.
17. Give your content roots and give it wings.
18. Try Facebook advertising.
19. Develop your online influence by getting offline and meeting people in real life.
20. Get very, very good at filtering and aggregating content.
21. Be early in the news cycles of any conversation of interest, then make context explicit.
22. Increase visibility through web video; the fastest way to get your message out there.
23. Feel passionate about your content and overcome your fears of reaching out.
24. Defy convention where it’s appropriate.
25. Share good content consistently.
26. Let your passion shine to create meaningful relationships and build deep connections.
27. Learn how to talk more about other people.
28. Get on Facebook, get on Faceboook now, and use it for your business.
29. Make people around you more successful than you are, and share stories from the heart.
30. Talk about what you know because content is always king.
31. Make something worth talking about.
32. Get your self properly interviewed.
33. Repeat your tweets.
34. Get more influence online by moving offline.
35. Really understand your audience, then build things that really help them.
36. Master one niche, own that niche, then use webinar marketing to promote your brand.
37. Think about what gifts and expertise you have that you can leverage to help others.
38. Map a strategy for integrating social media with other tactics.
39. Change from thinking about my influence to our influence.
40. Get active in other people’s communities.
41. Build "digital dimensionality" by showing your many different sides.
42. Listen to the conversations taking place around you, then start to engage.
43. Network with other influencers and make them aware of your consistent value.
44. Think about the authenticity, consistency, and depth of your voice and story
45. Be willing to shake up your world.
46. Learn to be a storyteller, understand the psychology of people, create quality content.
47. Share ideas liberally and get increased accountability from the digital community.
48. Establish your business model before you attempt to become influential online.
49. Be consistent, connect the practical with the profound, and listen for the silence.
50. Find a unique niche you can own, focus on it and become known for that.
51. Find out what social network your customers are using and be there for them.
52. Build a community of readers by figuring out ways to get people talking.
53. Make friends along the way by helping others achieve their goals.
54. Think about social media as strategy to enhance your existing marketing goals.
55. Be systematic in establishing relationships with those on the same business path.
56. Become an advocate for gifted up and comers as they enter social media.
57. Start the media arm of your company that educates, inspires and entertains.
58. Give more than you get and build trust and relationships over time.
59. Take a look at what you have that others can’t do and use it to get where you need to go.
60. Figure out your value, identify influential individuals and connect to them directly.
© 2010 HubSpot, Inc. Reprinted courtesy of HubSpot, Inc. All rights reserved.
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