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A Tested Social Media Success Formula: Talk as Yourself, Not about Yourself

by Dan Zarrella on January 9, 2012

image of narcissus staring at his reflection

Over the past few years, I’ve conducted a number of focus groups on subjects ranging from email marketing to blogging.

When I ask participants why they’ve chosen to receive emails from a particular source, read a specific blogger, or follow a certain Twitter user, they give me a variation on the same answer:

“Because I like their unique point of view.”

Readers will only listen to you if you’re giving them something they can’t find anywhere else.

Why would they pay attention to you if you’re saying the same things that everyone one else is saying?

That’s common sense — but is there evidence that supports it? Actually, yes there is.

My numbers-based research has confirmed the importance of uniqueness and novelty. The data shows that novelty is contagious; ordinariness is not.

If you take a look at the graphic below, you’ll see that Retweets contain more unusual words than ordinary Tweets do.

Zarrella Graphic

No, that doesn’t mean the word commonness gets Retweeted less often. ;) It means that Tweets with uncommon words get Retweeted more often than the usual things we see every day. Having a unique way of expressing yourself will earn you more Retweets.

Escape the echo chamber

Your readers don’t want you to say the same things everyone else is saying.

If you simply regurgitate information from the echo chamber, they won’t spread your content, and eventually they’ll get bored and stop listening.

Heeding this advice, it could then be easy to conclude that you should talk about yourself as much as possible. Because after all, what is a more unique perspective than what you’re doing, thinking, and feeling?

Well, that’s a little right, but mostly wrong.

First of all, when I’ve studied Twitter accounts, I’ve found a negative correlation between self-reference and number of followers.

In other words, the more you talk about yourself, the fewer people are interested in following you.

Zarrella Graphic

And when you’re talking about individual Tweets, Retweets tend to contain much less self-reference than ordinary non-contagious Tweets.

People don’t want to listen to you Tweet about yourself all day long, and they’re certainly not going to Retweet it either.

Zarrella Graphic

So where does all of this lead us?

People want to hear our unique perspectives and points of view. But they don’t want to listen to us talk about ourselves.

Talk as yourself, not about yourself

Your take on industry news is interesting. Your daily minutiae is not.

Your unique analysis of best practices is something I’d like to read. Your regurgitation of time-worn adages is not.

Whether it’s your personal brand or a corporate brand, you have a set of characteristics and perspectives that allow you to look at the world in a novel way. Use that.

About the Author: Dan Zarrella is HubSpot’s Social Media Scientist. For more social media science like this, buy Zarrella’s Hierarchy of Contagiousness on Amazon. It’s $7.99 for the Kindle version (which will work on any computer or device) — and if you’re an Amazon Prime member, you can even read it for free.

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7 Marketing Links You’d Be Crazy to Ignore

by Robert Bruce on December 2, 2011

The Lede | copyblogger.com

The best (and shortest) business book ever written.

Why visualizing your success could actually be hurting your chances for success.

The #1 overlooked skill for every author, and how to get 7,000 Twitter followers.

Oh yeah, make sure to follow @copyblogger on Twitter to grab these links — and a lot more — every week.

This is The Lede …

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7 Unwritten Rules of Social Media
Well, now they’re written. This is a very good and basic structure for operating effectively within any social media.

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The Best (and Shortest) Business Book Ever Written
You’ve heard about this author all your life. You’ve probably even quoted him a few times without knowing it. Have you read his amazingly practical business philosophies?

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If You Want to Fail, Visualize Success
The word counterintuitive doesn’t begin to describe the results of this research. What do you think?

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10 Ways to Get Your Emails Read
You do know that not everyone is opening your emails right? Number 4 is a bit vague in its counsel, but there’s a lot of solid, specific advice in this list to help you along in your email marketing.

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How to Get 7,000 Twitter Followers
The lesson in this story lies under the surface. This is not necessarily a tactic to be replicated, as much as a philosphy to keep in mind: Strategically enter the conversations that matter to your business goals.

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The No. 1 Overlooked Skill for Every Author
A powerful observation made by well-respected writer and editor Jane Friedman. Copyblogger hasn’t been teaching this stuff for almost six years just for the hell of it, it really matters.

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The Secret of New Marketing
I would promise not to link to Seth in every edition of The Lede, but that could very possibly become a lie. There’s just too much in his archive that needs to be read, spread, and understood … like the link above.

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Did you miss anything on Copyblogger this week?

About the Curator: Robert Bruce is Copyblogger Media’s copywriter and resident recluse. Get him on Google+.

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Is Your Social Media Strategy Stalling Because You’re Not Doing This One Thing?

by Dan Zarrella on August 17, 2011

image of scientific flasks

Marketers of most stripes know how important and powerful calls-to-action are.

If you want someone to take a specific action, you have to actually ask them to take that specific action.

But, it seems like social media marketers have either forgotten CTAs, or rejected them altogether.

A researcher by the name of Irving Kirsch at the University of Connecticut did an interesting experiment with hypnotically suggestable people.

Half of the subjects were put under full hypnotic trance and given a stack of 30 post cards.

They were given the hypnotic command to mail one card back to the lab each day for 30 days.

The other half of the subjects were simply asked nicely, given social requests without hypnosis to do the same.

Can you guess which group mailed more postcards back?

The second group ended up mailing more cards back. Social requests can be just as powerful as full-out hypnotic suggestions.

So why are social media marketers afraid of them?

The power words of blog commenting

When I studied blogging, I found that blog posts that included the word “comments” typically got more comments than blog posts that did not.

Take a look at this graph displaying the most commented-on words:

chart with data about blog comments

This is very simple, very powerful stuff.

If you want readers to comment on your blog, you have to ask them.

The power of the call to action

The most powerful evidence of the power of social calls-to-action is how effective “please retweet” is.

chart with data about retweets

I studied a a statistically significant sample set of more than 10,000 tweets and found that those that used the phrases “please retweet” or “please rt” were much more likely to be retweeted.

In the case of the longer “please retweet” the tweets were four times more likely to be shared by followers.

I’m not exactly sure why there is so much resistance in social media marketing circles to calls to action, but now you know the truth.

Calls to action work!

And here’s one for you: Get more social media data and mythbusting information by registering for the Science of Social Media webinar coming on August 23rd. Register today!

About the Author: Dan Zarrella is HubSpot’s Social Media Scientist. This post contains data from his upcoming webinar The Science of Social Media, taking place this Tuesday, August 23rd. Sign up now!



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4 Ways to Grow Your Blog with the Power of Experts

by Michael Stelzner on June 7, 2011

image of sprout in cement

Do you want to attract more readers?

Do you want to grab the attention of the big players in your industry and leverage their star power?

Silly questions, right?

In this article I’ll share how you can grow a loyal and sustained fan base by working with the top experts in your niche.

They’re out there, and it’s not nearly as hard as you think to get them on your team.

Why do I need an expert?

Everyone wants entertaining, useful content. That’s what content marketing is all about.

But they also want access to great people. When you present a new idea or a new voice to your audience, your blog becomes a valuable source people will want to visit again and again. Bringing in expert voices rounds out your site and adds dimension.

Getting outside experts involved also validates your own expertise. When you can attract the best, people will see you as an expert in your own right.

Finally, there’s an often-overlooked benefit of working with experts. If you work well together, some may turn out to be strategic partners who can take your business places you never dreamed.

Experts can include:

  • Authors, particularly those who have new books out
  • People who frequently speak on relevant topics
  • Bloggers who are creating exceptional content
  • Practitioners working inside companies

A quick example

When I started Social Media Examiner back in October of 2009, I knew next to nothing about social media.

But I knew that if I could attract social media experts and share their knowledge, I could quickly grow a large following.

We opened our virtual doors with live video broadcasts. I interviewed top social media experts including Mari Smith, Chris Garrett, Denise Wakeman, and Jason Falls.

Many of these experts tweeted their involvement to their followers. Within just a few weeks, Technorati ranked us as one of the top small-business blogs in the world.

I saw the value of outside experts as a great source of content. The experts saw the value of being involved with something exciting.

Want to know more about how to attract experts to your blog? Keep reading …

How experts can help you create valuable content

Here are four ways to work with experts for content:

1. The trade show interview

A great way to get content from experts is via an on-location interview. And there’s no better place than a trade show. You’ll find lots of experts around your particular topic, and they’re often in the right frame of mind for a quick interview.

In this video I’m interviewing Scott Monty of Ford Motor Company at a major trade show.

Click here to see how I supplemented the video with interesting text teasers from the interview to create a popular blog post.

Quick tip: Be sure to arrange the interview prior to the event so the expert is prepared.

2. The book interview

One of the best times to hit up experts is when they have a new book coming out.

The author is typically in promotional mode and seeking exposure for his or her book. And the book typically contains new ideas that your audience might be interested in.

When Seth Godin’s latest book was being published, I reached out to him and asked if there was any way I could help. I ended up interviewing him about Poke the Box and how he is transforming the book industry.

My audience found it fascinating, and Seth got what he wanted — to spread the word about the ideas in his book.

Quick tip: Record the interview and have it transcribed. This makes it easy to turn the interview into an article.

3. The guest post

If you have access to an audience that experts want to be in front of, consider inviting them to write a guest post for your blog.

We use lots of expert guest-written content on Social Media Examiner, and of course, so do many of your favorite blogs.

For example, here on Copyblogger, Brian Clark approached copywriter Roberta Rosenberg to write a series of landing page makeovers, which quickly became a valued resource on the site. While readers may not have known Roberta’s name before she wrote the series, her expert advice and guidance clearly shone through in the series.

Quick tip: Experts are busy, and writing a post (or a series of posts) is a big commitment. Be sure you can make a solid case why they should consider writing for your site. And if your audience is still small, “exposure” is not usually a solid case.

If you can’t make that case yet and your expert is a blogger, ask if you can write a guest post for their site. You’ll have to put some work in, but the benefits can be substantial.

4. The TV show

If you’ve got a charismatic expert who’s willing to enter a true partnership, consider inviting an expert to host an online TV show.

We asked Mari Smith (who happened to be local for us) to be the host of our Social Media Examiner TV series. She regularly provided hot tips on her area of expertise, Facebook marketing.

Here is an example of one of our episodes. As you can see, we combined Mari’s great stage presence with our own production values to create a high-quality viewing experience.

Quick tip: Again, this is a big commitment, so do everything you can to make the experience fun and easy for your expert. Come up with a regular show plan, and do as much of the legwork as possible.

Learn more about working with experts to grow your business

If this idea intrigues you, get a free sample chapter of my new book Launch: How to Quickly Propel Your Business Beyond the Competition. In the book I share how to find experts, how to develop relationships with them, and how to create content.

So, how about you? Have you worked with experts? Share your tips and experiences in the comments …

About the Author: Michael Stelzner is the author of the new book Launch and founder of Social Media Examiner.


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