5 Ways to avoid wasting your LinkedIn account.

Posted by Colin Clark on Jun 11th, 2009 | Comments home title

I’ve got to be honest, I’m in love with LinkedIn right now. Sure it’s boring and stale and has a clunky interface and a crummy API. The reason I’m in love is that it’s actually putting money in my pocket.

Why? LinkedIn is HUGE. Plus, you get to find prospects and find out who your contacts are connected to. What could be better than seeing into the other guy’s Rolodex?! Here’s what I’ve been doing lately to get the most out of the tool.

Guard your contact list. How many of your ‘friends’ are really friends. Would you be comfortable asking them to introduce you to one of their connections?
Reach out to your contacts and do in-person meetings whenever you can.
Offer to make connections whenever you ask for one.
Never EVER use in impersonal message when you friend someone on LinkedIn.
Never EVER friend someone on LinkedIn without attempting to do a face-to-face meeting. Remember, the point of networking on LinkedIn is to meet new prospects through the people you already know and help them do the same thing. Connecting with strangers defeats the point.

iPhone 3G S – Yes I'm excited – Yes I'm a little disappointed

Posted by Colin Clark on Jun 9th, 2009 | Comments home title

If you’ve read a blog in the last few weeks you probably already knew that a new iPhone was on the horizon. I’ve been hearing all the speculation and rumors about what the new superphone will be like.

Why am I disappointed? Well most of it has to do with the fact that Apple has already broken the mold with its previous iPhone offerings. When you revolutionize the market 2 years in a row it becomes almost impossible to do it again.

With that said, I fully anticipate buying one later this summer, I’m just not going to freak out like last year.

With that said, I’m super excited about the new iPhone operating system. They’ve made some amazing updates that solve the most common complaints that we’ve expressed in the last few years.

Here’s a few ways they could have impressed me a little more.

They could have included a REDICULOUS camera (I’m talking 7+ mega-pixels with a decent flash). Sure they made a nice update, but it’s probably still not juiced up enough to replace my digital point-and-shoot. It would have been pretty impressive to be able to roll the new phone saying, “it’s a revolutionary new phone, touch-screen iPod, internet communication device, AND IT REPACES YOUR DIGITAL CAMERA!” People would have totally freaked.
Why didn’t they give it a different design? Part of the fun of getting the iPhone 3G was seeing people with the old iPhone and saying “You’re still using that antiquated piece of crap?!” because you could instantly tell that the new phone was way better. It wouldn’t have taken much. Just a few little tweeks to give it some pizzazz.
More memory. If I’m going to be taking high quality videos with my iPhone I’m going to need more space than 16 gigs and I’m not willing to shell out the money for the 32 gig model. I know I’m being picky here, but flash memory is ridiculously cheap and it would have made a huge statement to start out at 24 or 32 gigs and go up from there.
I was hoping for significantly better battery performance. I talk on my iPhone all day and I’d like to not have to plug it in as soon as I get home from work. Actually I think I would take back my point about more memory in exchange for double the battery life.

Like I said, I’m a dork. I’m going to get the new phone, because it is going to be totally sweet. I’ve just come to expect a lot from the iPhone line and I think they could have delivered us one better.

The Social Media Salesman

Posted by Colin Clark on Jun 8th, 2009 | Comments home title

Of all the opportunities available to use social media to grow your business there is perhaps no other place where it fits better than with your sales force. When you combine prospecting activities with networking and social media, you get a truly effective combination. Here are some tips…

Use Twitter to stay close with referral partners. Twitter attracts a certain type of person. There are lots of extremely connected people there. Find them, friend them, leverage them, become one of them.
Use LinkedIn to see into the other guy’s rolodex. I’m a big fan of this strategy. Who do you need to meet? Who knows those people. You can find out in an instant on LinkedIn.
Blog for your prospects. Have you gotten any insights from the people you call on? I get em all the time. Why not give them credit and win some points with them as well. (by the way I’d like to thank Mark Hiatt who I met with today who inspired this post)
Find out witch services your best customers like to utilize and why. Let’s say that a lot of your customers like using Facebook. Get permission to engage with them there and make em your best friends. Then ask for referrals.

Ancillary Return on Investment in Social Media (marketing.blogtanker.com)
Steve Woodruff: Getting Started with Social Networking (mpdailyfix.com)
Dialogix.com.au – Monitoring Social Media (killerstartups.com)
Using Social Media As A Sales Tool (kylelacy.com)

Every web app I currently use SUCKS!

Posted by Colin Clark on Jun 4th, 2009 | Comments home title

Because Google Wave is coming!

Seriously, this is a brilliant product. Combining email, instant messaging, photosharing, and it’s embedable. Watching this demo has changed the way I use the technology that I currently have. What’s it going to be like when the product is released.

My one criticism is the presentation style… Steve Jobs is the only one that can pull off a Steve-note. Why is Google trying (and failing) to be as cool as him.

Debating the power of Google’s Wave (news.cnet.com)
A Peek at Google Wave (blogs.wsj.com)
Hands-on with Wave: Weird and quite wonderful (news.cnet.com)
Is Google Wave the Wave of the Future? (geeksugar.com)

Do you have a blogging nemesis?

Posted by Colin Clark on Jun 3rd, 2009 | Comments home title

I’m always looking for strategies to easily come up with quality content for blog posts. One of my favorite techniques is to enlist the help of my blogging nemesis.

A blogging nemesis is when you find a blog where you disagree with almost everything they say. You read their blog and get all fired up with ideas and great posts instantly come out.

I will rarely quote the enemy blog or antagonize them, but they will never know how many great ideas they’ve inspired in me.

Here are some tips for finding your nemesis blog…

Blogs of your competitors.
Blogs of thought leaders in your field that have conflicting points of view to your own.
Blogs that cover your subject matter that you think are dumb.
Blogs from rival (or obsolete) technologies