Archive for ‘Uncategorized’
7 Kinds of Relationship to Social Media
By Rajesh Setty on Tue 25 Aug 2009, 4:00 AM – 1 Comment
My new column on ActiveGarage was published yesterday.
Everyone does not view social media with the same lens. Different people have different stands about social media. For some people it’s a nuisance and for others it’s their life.
I have grouped the kinds of relationships people have to social media in seven categories. You may be able to identify yourself in one of them or somewhere in between. You will notice that the investment you make and the returns you get are directly influenced by the approach you take.
As you can see, only in the last two kinds of relationships can you expect reasonable ROI from social media.
You can read about more here:
ActiveGarage: 7 Kinds of Relationship to Social Media
Posted under Uncategorized.
Behind the Scenes: Social Media Marketing Industry Report
By Rajesh Setty on Wed 25 Mar 2009, 8:45 AM – Leave Comment
My friend Michael Stelzner never ceases to amaze me. When I met him at San Diego, he was talking about creating a Social Media Marketing Survey. The report, called the Social Media Marketing Industry Report, was released on Tuesday and I had the opportunity watch how Mike and his friends worked hard behind the scenes to make it happen.
Please check out the report (it’s simply awesome) and those that are curious about how this all happened, Mike shares his secrets in this interview:
RS: Tell us Mike, what prompted you to embark on this exercise?
MS: Well Raj, we noticed there was no research on how marketers are actually using social media. Nobody examined the time commitment or the tools that folks are using. This surprised me and I decided to do something about it.
I put together a rather comprehensive survey and leaned on some of my high profile marketing peers to help me get the word out about the survey. David Meerman Scott, author of World Wide Rave, was the first of many to help me spread the word about the survey. Hundreds of folks helped me get the word out. About 10 days later we had nearly 900 marketers who participated in the study. That ensured a very rich set of data to dig into.
RS: Please take us through the project life-cycle. How did it evolve and its journey from concept to launch?
MS: It all started as an idea while driving to work on a Thursday morning. By Friday (the next day), I had the survey made and began collecting responses. We closed the survey 10 days later and began the process of analyzing hundreds of open ended responses and performing some analysis-this part took months. The man hours were pretty extreme as my team tried to discover the key findings. And I was really shocked at some of the results. Perhaps, more than anything, was the amount of time marketers are investing in social media and how new they are to this marketing frontier.
RS: You do so many things brilliantly. It seems like you have sixteen hands and two brains all operating at once. What is your secret Mike?
You make me sound like some odd alien creature 
. I’m just human like everyone else. But I am a highly disciplined guy with a small bit of creativity poured on top by my maker. For me, it’s about a vision. I start with the end in mind, and call on my resources to help me pull off what seems impossible to others, in a short time. Keep watching, there’ll be more surprises coming from me.
RS: Where can our readers get the report?
The report is available for immediate download here
Thanks Raj!
Posted under Uncategorized.
To “Let Go” List for the new year
By Rajesh Setty on Wed 31 Dec 2008, 5:00 AM – 2 Comments
How about creating a To “Let Go” List for the new year. The moment you let go of a few things that are not helping you, you create a space for new possibilities to emerge. Here are a few to get your juices flowing:
1. The feeling of entitlement
2. Chasing something that’s too good to be true
3. Lack of Accountability
4. Too much focus on the short-term
5. Too much focus on the long-term
6. Expertise in “generating excuses” for lack of results
7. “Undeserved” credit
8. Holding back on genuine appreciation
9. Expecting something for FREE
10. Not giving your best for FREE
All the best and have a great year ahead!
Posted under Uncategorized.
Making a “memorable” statement
By Rajesh Setty on Sun 07 Sep 2008, 9:51 PM – 2 Comments
You can say something
OR
You can say something in a way that is memorable
Obviously when you are making an important statement, the second option is preferable. However, wanting to make a memorable statement alone won’t be sufficient to make a memorable statement. For one, it requires you to PREPARE.
Raj Raheja from Heartwood Studios pointed me to a video from the recently concluded NVision conference where the organizers made a “memorable” statement about the difference between a CPU (Central Processing Unit) and a GPU (Graphics Processing Unit)
Watch this video (it’s only about 2 minutes) and you will see..
Have a great week ahead!
Posted under Main Page, Uncategorized.
The low cost way of building a Personal Brand…
By Rajesh Setty on Sun 10 Aug 2008, 6:00 AM – 5 Comments
Sorry. It was a trick title. There is no low cost way of building a personal brand.
For a personal brand to flourish, the marketplace needs proof. Proof comes in the form of accomplishments and thought leadership to begin with.
The wrong way to TRY to build a personal brand is to try to build it on weak proof.
The better way is to work on accumulating proof in the form of accomplishments and thought leadership to start with.
Why?
For one, it just costs more to build a personal brand on weak proof (if at all you can build one).
Posted under Main Page, Uncategorized.
I just remembered you…
By Rajesh Setty on Sat 09 Aug 2008, 11:17 PM – Leave Comment
Since last week, I have been receiving requests about the new search engine Scour. Some of these requests came from people I know but MOST of them came from long lost acquaintances.
The invitations are something like this
Did you hear about Scour? It is the next gen search engine with Google/Yahoo/MSN results and user comments all on one page. Best of all we get rewarded for using it by collecting points with every search, comment and vote. The points are redeemable for Visa gift cards It’s like earning credit card or airline points just for searching. Hit the link below to join and we will both get points!
http://scour.com/invite/<<affiliate_id>>/
I know you’ll like it!
– <<name of the sender>>
Out of curiosity, I wanted to find out what is behind this. It was not difficult to find that out. I found this in the rewards section for the site.
The top search engines make billions of dollars a year in advertising revenue, wouldn’t it be cool if the users got a piece of that too? Enter Scour Points! Every member is awarded one point for every search, two for a vote and three for a comment with a maximum of 4 points a search. Once you aggregate at least 6,500 points you can cash them out for a $25 Visa gift card… it’s more than you currently make from searching, right? On top of that, we offer referral points for the friends you introduce to Scour where you can earn 25% of the points they make. So if you invited 25 friends that used scour regularly in addition to yourself, that’s an easy $125 in your pocket for a year of what you already do! Check out how much you could earn with the Scour Points Calculator. This isn’t a pyramid scheme and we’re not trying to get you rich quick, we just think it’s a good idea to share our success with those who help make it possible.
Play a part in the Scour community and get rewarded for what you already do!
My thoughts:
1. This is a simple case of “selective withholding” of information. The invitation says “we both will get points” but does not say “the sender gets additional points (a fraction of the points earned by the receiver)”.
2. Please notice the emphasis in the rewards section – “This isn’t a pyramid scheme and we’re not trying to get you rich quick…” Just in case you thought it was one
3. I wonder how they expect to increase the quality of search results if most of the people who are participating (votes, comments, recruitments etc.) are doing this to earn points.
All the best to everyone involved.
Posted under Uncategorized.
Just being nice is NOT enough
By Rajesh Setty on Fri 11 Jul 2008, 10:24 AM – 3 Comments
It hurts to see many nice people struggle through life. Just like gravity doesn’t care who you are, the world doesn’t care how much money nice people make. The marketplace rewards value and it helps if that comes from a nice person.
If being nice is on one axis, having the power to make things happen is on the other axis. Being nice and having the power is the winning combination. Any other combination, a recipe for a short-term or a long-term failure.
Here is a Nice-Power matrix to consider
As you can see, if you have no power and you are not nice, you will be a “Clueless Loser” meaning, you don’t have a clue that you are losing or you know you are losing but have no clue why you are losing.
With pure power and no nicety, you will be an “Arrogant Loser” – meaning you may have a short-term win that will boost your arrogance even further until it leads to an eventual failure.
Being very nice but no power, you will be a “Charming Loser” – meaning people will love to be around you but won’t be willing to pay and engage you.
You need both – niceness and power. Only then you have an opportunity to “make it happen” in the short and long-term.
Posted under Main Page, Uncategorized.
Fulfilling the promise with ease…
By Rajesh Setty on Wed 11 Jun 2008, 7:31 PM – Leave Comment
How easy are you making it easy for people to get what they are entitled to?
Think about it. There are so many “Mail-In Rebate” offers that want you to do half a dozen things to get back what was promised. I am sure that the complexity of the problem precludes many people from completing the steps required – thus saving a ton of money for the merchant
Yesterday when I returned from North Carolina, I traveled by US airways and found that they now provide a way for flyers to text their information to earn “dividend miles”
Seems simple and clean – travelers are entitled to frequent flyer miles and all they need to do is send a text message and they are done!
Think about your own business and see what you can do it make it easy for your customers to get what they are entitled.
Good luck!
Posted under Uncategorized.
50 words; so many benefits
By Rajesh Setty on Sun 08 Jun 2008, 10:24 PM – 3 Comments
A mini saga is a story told in exactly 50 words – not 49 or 51 but exactly 50 words.
There are several reasons. For the reader, the benefits are simple – whether the mini saga is good or bad, it only takes a minute to read it.
There are multiple benefits for writing a mini saga. Here are a few benefits
1. Expands your creativity
“I didn’t have the time to write a short letter, so I wrote a long one instead”
– Mark Twain
Constraints expand creativity. When you are forced to think of the various parts of the story within 50 words, you have to put your imagination to serious work. Writing something long is easy. When you have to put everything in 50 words, you have to “leave behind” a lot. Deciding what NOT to include (and still bring forth everything you wanted to) requires a lot of creativity.
2. Stretches your thinking
OK you decide to write a mini saga. What will you write about? That question alone is enough to stretch your thinking. Your story can be about anything but if it has to be narrated within 50 words, then the choices are limited. You don’t have an option but to “stretch” your thinking in your question for a “good” plot.
3. Enhances your discipline
Trying to convey an idea in less than 50 words is hard. So, imagine trying to write a story in 50 words. You need a lot of discipline to make it happen – deciding what to write about, what to include and what to leave behind.
Here is a Squidoo lens with 25 mini sagas I have written over the last two years.
Enjoy and have a great week ahead!
Posted under Main Page, Uncategorized.
Business week says – “The Wave of Retirees? Not so Big”
By Rajesh Setty on Thu 22 May 2008, 10:28 PM – 2 Comments
The article in Business Week (May 15) nicely demonstrates the state of affairs for the Baby Boomers. Here is the link to the article:
Business Week: The Wave of Retirees? Not So Big.
In my opinion, while the article focuses on Baby Boomers, this has far reaching impact on other parts of the economy.
Rather than thinking about this generally, why not think about your own situation.Here are a few questions to ponder upon
1. When do you plan to retire?
2. How much money should you have to make this dream a reality?
3. How much money should you earn this year to reach the goal outlined in #2?
Don’t stop shying away from the question even when you know that the answers may not be pretty.
Have a great Friday.
Posted under Uncategorized.