Episode 92 – Use earned media to build credibility.

My guest on the show today is Alexander Lowry. He is a professor of Finance at Gordon College and Director...

The post Episode 92 – Use earned media to build credibility. appeared first on Sideways8.

My guest on the show today is Alexander Lowry. He is a professor of Finance at Gordon College and Director of the school’s Master of Science in financial analysis program. He’s also a board of directors member for Fintech and Financial Services Companies, which means he’s transforming, accelerating and advising businesses that students he’s educating want to work for. Alexander’s work has been featured in the New York Times, in the Wall Street Journal, Forbes, and more. 

Adam: [00:07] Hi and welcome to the Good People, Good Marketing podcast, the podcast about digital marketing and how to make it better so that good people and good organizations can have good marketing as well. I’m your host, Adam Walker, co-founder of Sideways Eight, a digital marketing agency, and 48in48, a nonprofit dedicated to hosting events that build forty-eight websites for forty-eight nonprofits in forty-eight hours.

 

[00:29] My guest on the show today is Alexander Lowry. He is a professor of Finance at Gordon College and Director of the school’s Master of Science in financial analysis program. He’s also a board of directors member for Fintech and Financial Services Companies, which means he’s transforming, accelerating, and advising businesses that students he’s educating want to work for. Alexander, thanks for joining me on the show.

 

Alexander: [00:54] Adam, it’s pleasure to be here.

 

Adam: [00:55] So this is a little intimidating. You’re the first professor that I’ve had on the show. So, this is going to be great.

 

Alexander: [01:02] I’m just an average Joe, delighted to be here.

 

Adam: [01:05] I’ve been to enough school to respect people that are able to do what you do and teach at that level. So that’s very cool. It’s a really great thing to be able to do.

 

Alexander: [01:16] We were joking before and you’re the expert in marketing so we’ll both be learning from each other.

 

Adam: [01:20] Yeah, that’s great. That’s great. It’s going to be so much fun. So, let’s dig in here. So question number one: related to marketing, can you tell us something that you’re seeing that’s working well?

 

Alexander: [01:31] Yeah. So, the Master of Science and Financial Analysis, which is a tongue twister so we just call it Masters and Finance. Easier to wrap our head around. It’s a brand new program. We’ve had it about a year. I joined the college a year ago to launch it and lead it and develop it. Obviously a big part of that is the marketing around it, right? So I liken it to if a tree falls in the forest and no one’s there to hear it, did it exist? Same way of this program. We built a great program and nobody knows about it, that doesn’t help.

 

[01:56] So we have to be very clever. We’re a nonprofit so our budget is somewhat constrained. We have to be very thoughtful and very interested in the right ways to do it. So we’ve been doing what I call a lot of little experiments, and for me, and I’ll appreciate your feedback on this and what you recommend, I’ve been going after earned media. My perspective is clearly there’s an SEO component to it, right? So if we can get some search engine optimization in addition to what we’re doing, that’s a great thing because you have to build that up, but for me, if I can build some credibility with earned media in great publications, I think that’s a great start. It’s a good use for budget.

 

[02:28] So building relationships. We’ve been in the New York Times, in the Wall Street Journal, in Forbes, and I think getting our press out there in those sorts of avenues, which has obviously not been a big constraint on our budget, it’s just been a big constraint on my time, has been really useful for us. And we’ve actually had several people saying, “Hey, I heard about you. I read about you. That was fantastic.” And we think that’s been a very successful start.

 

Adam: [02:49] I’m officially jealous that you’ve been able to get into the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Forbes. I’ve been trying to figure out how to write for much smaller publications than that and I can’t seem to get anywhere. So that is remarkable actually. And honestly, you’re right. I mean, it’s a really, really smart way to spend your time because the only real investment is your time and the credibility you gain by being published in those publications is unbelievable. So not only are you getting eyeballs and not only are you getting some degree of traction to your site and to your programs, but you’re getting this insane degree of credibility, which is pretty amazing.

 

Alexander: [03:26] And I appreciate your thoughts on this because I’m just considering this a workshop session that what we’ve been trying to do is I see this at an early investment of time trying to build a relationship with those reporters that hopefully become repeat exercises, right? Once you’re on their shortlist of people they trust, hopefully you’re not having to do the same amount of work to get repeat opportunities in those great sort of publications. So you build that up and hopefully that pays off in a virtuous circle over time. The other part of it is how do we use social media? Again, thinking about platforms that perhaps don’t cost as much money, just more time to build that up. And when we can do publication saying, “Hey, we’ve been listed in New York Times,” and you’ve got the article link, you’re throwing New York Times in there. My assumption being, again, you’re getting more publicity and credibility as you’re putting that out there. So we’ve been trying to leverage those same opportunities in different ways.

 

Adam: [04:11] I mean, that’s brilliant, really, because people, they key in on certain words, right? And so if you say, “I was published in the New York Times,” you immediately have credibility whether or not… whatever you’re doing, it doesn’t matter. You have credibility immediately. You must be doing something important if The Times is covering what you’re doing or are even willing to put your words out there. Same thing with the Wall Street Journal and Forbes. It’s brilliant all around. It’s really, really smart. And then you can even leverage that in social media. You can promote those articles. You can promote posts that are talking about how you’ve gotten coverage in those publications and really grow organically in that way, well, I guess semi organically with some paid search, that way as well. So I think it’s… wow. That’s fantastic. You’re the first person I’ve interviewed that’s doing that and I think it’s brilliant and I wish I could do it more easily.

 

Alexander: [05:00] Well, that’s the key word there is the “easily”, right? Because all of this takes time and energy to figure out. So I’ve found Haro, if you’re familiar with that, Help A Reporter Out, to be really useful. And to me, sometimes you’re not really sure because there’s a lot of anonymous and confidentials. How many valuable ones are there? Not many people who are actually writing for The Times or the journal are going to put that in there. So you’re investing, you’re trying to figure it out, but I think you’re also crafting your message better and you’re getting smarter at it with the more practice you’re taking, learning the right ways to make the pitches. So I think that’s a useful time. I think it’s well spent if it’s gonna pay off, but you really have to put enough effort behind it to get that initial traction and actually make a go.

 

Adam: [05:38] I think when you’re looking at earned media like that, it’s a time investment, and to some degree, gamble because you’re right. It’s gonna take a while to work your way up to being able to be published in some of those larger publications. But it’s doable. I mean, I have friends that have done it, that started with nothing. They’re basically one person companies and now they have access to write for Inc.com because they’ve just sort of slowly worked their way up there. They’ve gained credibility. They got publications in smaller stuff. And that leads to larger and larger and larger things. And frankly, I’m trying to do the same thing. I mean, maybe this is an embarrassing thing to admit. I’m not sure. Maybe it’s not. But I’ve written some articles for Godaddy’s blog, and that’s about the highest level of publication I can get at this moment, and that’s fine. But hopefully I can leverage that into bigger publications and bigger and bigger and bigger. So that’s great.

 

Alexander: [06:30] I think that’s exactly what we all have to think about, right? You don’t start playing… I know I live in Boston, but I’m a New York fan. You don’t start playing center field for the Yankees, right? You start out in the farm system. You go through A and AA and AAA and you move up along the way. In the same point, I know an author. He’s getting publicity smartly in the same way you’d be doing for his company. But basically, he now writes for Forbes. And before that, he wrote for Inc. And before that, he wrote for… etc, etc, moved up from the farm system and you build that credibility.

 

[06:57] But partly for us, so it’s not only the great publications moving up the list, but also in the beginning from an SEO perspective, getting coverage on a wider range of sites. And people talk about the different strategies. Are you getting back links and what’s the quality of them? But I also think there’s a quality and a quantity component early on. As much as I was testing out my messaging and figuring out what resonated, I’m also getting it spread out across different places and we all know that there are some sites that are very willing to put whatever they can out there because they know it’ll get them eyeballs. So it’s a quid pro quo game in some ways.

 

Adam: [07:26] It is, yeah. It’s worth our time, especially if you’re someone that’s good at creating content. I mean, there are those that can write content quickly. It comes to them easily. There are those that it’s just very difficult and laborious. And I think if you’re someone that content sort of comes to easily, there’s no reason not to go after this sort of thing.

 

Alexander: [07:43] I think we’re constantly trying to get smarter about it. So it sounds like from your reaction that this is a good thing to do. But what would you say is the next level? What’s the next step that you recommend as a professional taking it forward?

 

Adam: [07:54] Well, I mean, for one, more articles, right? Like that’s always going to be your next step. You just want to write more. Can you just have a weekly article? That would be great. So more articles is the first. But I think then beginning to promote them to build credibility would be the next thing. So thinking about what can you promote in Facebook or Linkedin or really wherever your prospective clients happen to be, but what can you promote? Which articles can you promote to gain more eyeballs there? And then, how can you use that, ultimately, to also build a list? I mean, if you can begin to build a list of people that are interested from an email perspective, then you can begin to not only reach out to that email list, but then you can also target that list through micro ads as well allowing you to get in front of them in very many different channels and gain more exposure and then ultimately gain more marketing speak conversions or sales or just whatever it happens to be, right? So I think that’s how I would look at it. I would determine what can I do to leverage this content to build my email list and get in front of more audiences.

 

Alexander: [08:56] And that’s exactly the person I was talking about before who now writes for Forbes that he, at the end of every one of his articles, and you would probably have the same on yours, it’s like, “I am such and such an expert, working in this area through this company. If you would like a free article about this topic, click here,” and then you go and you get them and you get their email address and you build that out and he was telling me that’s the way you have to do it. It’s very successful. So we’re going to have to implement that as well.

 

Adam: [09:19] Absolutely. And with you doing what you’re doing, you can create, I’m sure, an amazing white paper based on research and all kinds of interesting things that, I mean, honestly, will legitimately be a much better piece of content than half of the people out there that are doing the same thing. Marketing, in my mind, is always a best content wins sort of scenario. And so, you have this ability with these expertise, in this amount of research and whatever else that you’re doing, to probably build a much better piece of content than almost anyone else. And if you can do that, then you can build a list. No problem. It’s just a question of execution at that point. That’s fantastic. Alright. This is fun. Okay. I’m jazzed up. Alright. Alexander, question number two: what has not worked well, related to digital marketing, that we can learn from?

 

Alexander: [10:06] And this is where we’re experimenting and I’m a big fan of let’s try lots of micro experiments and fail fast and move on. I actually adopt the perspective of the Marine Corps in this regard of every failure should be celebrated because you’ve learned from it, you won’t repeat it, and you move forward. So for example, you were alluding to this before, right? You have content. How do you publicize it and get it out there? The two mediums that I use the most are Twitter and Linkedin to personally publicize it and the wider college then uses Insta and Book of Face and all the rest of them to get the stuff out there. So we were experimenting on some different adverts. Where is the right way to spend money? You were talking about like Facebook and where you can do the different opportunities. We tried some Linkedin as well.

 

[10:47] And my personal perspective as a businessperson, I think Linkedin is an amazing platform. I think that’s where a lot of the people are that we want to find that we want to meet that want to meet us. And yet, I did not find it was good value for money, which disappointed me because there was a giant disconnect there. And I look at Facebook and think, alright, there are some professional things in there, there are ways we can find students. It’s a great way to drill down into specific segments and it felt, value wise, a much better way for us to be using the money. So maybe there’s a better way to be using Linkedin for it, but thus far, we haven’t found it.

 

Adam: [11:18] I would say of the people that I’ve interviewed on the podcast, there has been one that has highly advocated Linkedin ads, but there have been many that have disparaged Linkedin ads. So I’m going to say I have to probably lean with the many on that. I’ve never seen a lot of fruit from it personally and maybe that’s a strategy issue. To be honest, I’m okay with admitting that. It could be that my Linkedin strategy is just not great. But I’ve seen a lot more with Facebook as well. I mean, it just seems like you can micro target better. You can target against specific email lists. You can build custom audiences. You can build lookalike audiences based on a specific email list or something like that. I mean, there’s just a lot of options there to really hone in on the very specific people that you need so that you’re not advertising to the wrong people. So I think that’s great.

 

Alexander: [12:06] And I do think as we talked about these experiments, I’m sure we will go back and revisit Linkedin and try a different strategy down the line, but when we think about the early days and starting up what’s successful and how to use it best, our time and our money, Facebook, to me, feels like the right place now.

 

Adam: [12:19] Yeah, I think that’s really smart. I mean, it feels, to me, too, and again, this is just a hunch, but it feels, to me, like Facebook’s put a lot more thought and intentionality behind their ads than Linkedin has. And it could be that Linkedin catches up and that they create this ad platform that’s just unbelievable and that you have to do it. But my perception of Linkedin at this particular moment is that it tends to be a bit of a ghost town and I just don’t see enough eyeballs there for me to really want to spend a lot of time there trying the ads, too. So yeah, it is what it is.

 

Alexander: [12:48] Which is fascinating to watch, right? Because the proliferation of video on Linkedin is such now that obviously changes our statistics. How long are people lingering? What does it look like? And we’re in finance, right? We can talk about lies, damned lies, and statistics. I can make the numbers tell you whenever they want to, but the reality is, what does it actually mean that someone’s watching a video longer? Does that make them a better customer? Can I target better? Can I use the money better? It means they can get higher rates for it. So we all have to sort of peer through it and see what actually makes sense.

 

Adam: [13:15] Yeah, I love that quote. I quote it often, especially when some of my team gives me statistics. I’m like, listen. It’s great. So that’s awesome. Okay. And then, last question: related to digital marketing, can you tell me something you’re excited about?

 

Alexander: [13:29] Yes. So the marketing team here has decided that Gordon College, we might be admitting we’re a little bit behind the times in this regard. There is not yet been a podcast within Gordon College, if you can believe it. There seem to be so many out there and this is another great example of finding the great micro center that you should be using to exploit and they’ve been telling that to me of like we need to use this as an opportunity of launching this 10 years from the great recession, etc, starting a podcast for you, getting it out there. And in some ways, for some people, that could be daunting, right? I don’t have the technology. I don’t have the setup. We don’t even have a radio station on campus. We have the room. We have the capability. We have the expertise to use it. So we’ve realized that people like yourselves who’ve realized this is a wonderful platform for giving back as well as for figuring out what is the right way to go forward for the business and we’ll be doing the same thing shortly.

 

Adam: [14:14] Oh, that’s great. And somebody else said that earlier, as a matter of fact, that I was interviewing. They’re excited about podcasts. I’m like, great, I’m excited about podcasts, too. That’s why I’m doing this. This is so good. What I love about podcasts is that you can create high value content very quickly and you can meet and interview very interesting people with a very low threshold, right? I mean, I get to talk to you. I can’t take you out to coffee. You’re in Boston. You seem like a nice guy, but I’m not going to fly to Boston just to take you out to coffee. But we can have this amazing chat about what’s going on in digital marketing on the podcast, and not only do I benefit from that, but you benefit hopefully and then our audience benefits. So I mean, it’s a win-win-win, really, all across the board.

 

Alexander: [14:57] And there seem to be so many… and maybe you’ve got a better thought about how to figure this out. There’s so many different opportunities. You think about length. Some people listen to it on the commute. Some people listen to it at the gym. Some people want a long one. Some people want a small one. There’s all sorts of different ranges and opportunities. So again, trying to figure out what your individual niche is and how you best utilize it.

 

Adam: [15:17] Yeah. Yeah. It’s tricky. So what’s interesting is I’ve got two podcasts. This podcast is, of course, focused on digital marketing and I tend to keep it around fifteen minutes. The shorter episodes are like twelve minutes. The longer ones are like twenty-five, thirty minutes. But average is about fifteen. And I think it seems to be really good because I’m just asking three questions. It’s bite size, thoughtful chunks. If somebody listens to it on one and a half speed or two times, they’re going to get the whole thing in less than ten minutes. And so it’s not a big investment of time, but it might give them sort of food for thought as they go about the rest of their day. And that’s kind of the idea behind this particular one is my audience are marketing professionals that are busy and maybe just don’t have a lot of time to invest in a podcast. I get that.

 

[15:57] So I try to keep it short. But then the other podcasts that I have, which is called a Tech Talk Y’all, we’re a self-proclaimed tech comedy podcast. So it’s where we talk about tech news and make each other laugh the entire time. But it’s like forty minutes and we dig into topics that are much more in depth. And it’s a co-host thing. So it’s not an interview style. It’s just me and a co-host sort of going back and forth. He’s kind of brilliant. And so, it’s one of those like I’ll serve up some fodder for him to dig into and give me like all this detailed information and then I sort of reel him in when he starts to go too far down the path. But it’s great and it’s good banter back and forth and we’ve actually got a great following with that particular podcast and it’s been a lot of fun.

 

[16:34] So, I think it just kind of depends on your subject matter and depends on who the people are. So most of the people for Tech Talk Y’all listen on their commute or when they’re running and so for them to listen at one and a half times, get it in under thirty minutes for a commute runs about perfect. So I think it’s just all about knowing your audience and then knowing what your content is and then how chunked up, how easy it is to break up that content.

 

Alexander: [16:59] Good advice.

 

Adam: [17:01] So hopefully that’s helpful. So let me see if I can recap what we’ve talked about so far so our audience has some good, clear takeaways from this conversation. So related to digital marketing, what’s working well? You mentioned that you’ve started a new Masters and Finance program, to make it sound easier. It’s a new program. You’re new to market. It’s small budget. You’re nonprofit so you do a lot of experiments. And in particular, you’re focused on earned media and you’ve been featured in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Forbes, which made me extraordinarily jealous. And then, also, you’re using social media strategically because that’s free to then refer back to the earned media and help to build that up as well. And I think we also kind of talked about the possibility of some gated content to build up an email list so that you can begin marketing to that list as well. You did mention Haro, Help A Reporter Out, has been really useful. And doing all this stuff with earned media helps you to better craft and refine your message over time, which I think is really actually very insightful.

 

[17:59] For question number two: what has not worked that we can learn from? You mentioned failing fast and moving on. Every failure should be celebrated because you learn from it. You said that while you appreciate Linkedin, it has not really worked great for ads, but Facebook has provided better value sort of in general. And I tend to see the same thing. And question number three: related to what you’re excited about, you said there’s not yet a podcast on campus, but there’s going to be, which I’m really excited to hear and it’s going to be epic, I’m sure. So if I can do anything to assist with that, please let me know because I’m becoming a bit of a podcast nerd. So I’ll be happy to help in any way that I can. Did I leave anything out from that recap?

 

Alexander: [18:37] No, Adam, that was great. I don’t know why your listeners listen at one and a half. They just need to go to the end and you’ve got a perfect summary of it.

 

Adam: [18:44] Well, there may be some that do that, but I hope they don’t because I think there’s a lot of value in the details. And if they listen at one and a half, I probably talk too fast for one and a half, honestly. I’ve been accused of that a time or two. Well, Alexander, this was so good, man. Do you have any final thoughts that you’d like to share with our audience?

 

Alexander: [19:03] I think opportunities like this to dialog with someone who’s an expert and knows more than you in the field and kick around what you’re doing and get some feedback, to me, is always invaluable. So delighted to not only learn with you today, but perhaps share some stuff with your listeners. It’s been great fun for me.

 

Adam: [19:17] Yeah, this is incredibly valuable. I really, really appreciate your time and I would love to have you back on the show and hear more about what you’re doing. You’re probably on some even bigger publications at that point. I’ll just be exponentially jealous. It’ll be great.

 

Alexander: [19:32] Well, Adam, it was a pleasure. I would love to come back.

 

Adam: [19:35] Alright. We’ll have you back. Thanks so much. Thanks for listening to the Good People, Good Marketing podcast. To get more resources about digital marketing, make sure to go to goodpeoplegoodmarketing.com where you can find more podcasts, blogs, and other fun resources. Also, if you want to find me, your host, you can find me on Twitter @AJwalker, and on my blog at adamjwalker.com, where I blog about leadership, productivity, habit building, and the craziness of having five kids. Thanks and tune in next time.

The post Episode 92 – Use earned media to build credibility. appeared first on Sideways8.