5 Genius Tips For Building A Community In A Digital World

Your Dream Business

English - February 04, 2019 01:04 - 22 minutes - 40.5 MB - ★★★★★ - 34 ratings
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Previous Episode: Mastering Pinterest For Business With Alisa Meredith

Next Episode: The Key To Instagram Success With Jasmine Star

KEY TAKEAWAYS COVERED IN THE PODCASTCarrying out surveys and polls are a great way to find out more about your customers. Using Instagram Stories, Facebook, Twitter or even programmes like Response Suite will allow you to easily find out exactly what your customers need.If you start building a relationship with a potential customer and client, consider following them on another platform as well. This is ideal if it’s someone you want to build a longer-lasting and valuable relationship with.Creating a video welcome or response for those people you want to make a strong connection with is a great way to personalise your response. Whether it’s welcoming people to your new membership, replying to webinar signups or replying to people on Twitter – they’ll absolute love the personalisation.The most important thing you need to do when building your online community is reply to absolutely everyone that starts a conversation with you. Whether it’s replying to an Instagram comment, responding to a tweet or answering a DM. Make it personal and take the time to show you’re thankful they’re connecting with you.When it comes to social media you should be engaging more than you’re posting.People love to receive gifts in the post as it feels personal and shows how much you value your relationship with them. Whether it’s brownies, a personalised card or a box of goodies - it will encourage people to share it when they receive it.
THE ONE THING YOU NEED TO REMEMBER ABOVE ALL ELSE…The key to creating a community is making sure you’re engaging with as many people as you can. Don’t used canned responses and take the time to personally respond to each and every person that connects with you. Pick up on something personal and tailor every message you send.HIGHLIGHTS YOU SIMPLY CAN'T MISS#1 Understand Your Customers More – 04:00#2 Connect with Customers in All Areas – 07:25#3 Make A Person Video for People You Really Want to Connect With – 09:45#4 Make Sure You Respond to Everyone That Starts A Conversation with You - 13:15#5 Send Them Something in The Post - 15:30
LINKS TO RESOURCES MENTIONED IN TODAY'S EPISODEBonjoro App Episode 41 Episode 39 Personalised Card Company UK Personalised Card Company US
Transcript below

Hello and welcome to this week’s episode of the podcast. How on earth are you? Can you believe in February already? I’ve got to stop saying this for two reasons. One I feel so old when I talk about how time flies and things going really quick but to me it’s one of those things where if you tell yourself something enough it will start to happen or believe or whatever. So if I constantly tell myself oh the time’s going so fast I haven’t got enough time then that’s exactly what’s going to happen. So I’m going to try not to say that anymore because I don’t think it’s good for me to think about how fast things are going and who wants to wish their life away Hey.

So if you remember back about four ish weeks ago I did an episode episode 46 where I talked all about my team predictions for marketing for this year and things that I think you should think about doing or start doing or just be aware of because I think they’re going to be getting bigger this year as we go on and one of the things which obviously was not a surprise is the fact that marketing is becoming more and more personal. We are having the ability now to connect with people on lots of different levels.

For starters there were lots of platforms out there where we can connect with people but also that we are getting to understand them more and the technology to track what they do and what they like is greater than ever before and therefore we can send them really direct marketing messages which has got to be a good thing for everybody. Personally for me as a consumer I don’t want my time wasted with stuff I’m not interested with. So I’m more than happy for you to promote your products or service to me if I think or if it’s going to be of use to me. So I don’t mind that at all. And obviously from a marketing point of view I love the ability that we now have to understand more about our audience and to really kind of take hold of that part where we can directly target them with things that they want to get from us and things that they want to hear about. So personally I am more than happy with that side of my prediction that I think that that’s going to get bigger and better. So today what I wanted to talk about was how you can make those connections more personal more meaningful on a more sort of granular level if you like so more feeling almost not one to one but you know what I mean in a world that is so very heavily digital so obviously pretty much everything I do unless I do in-person consulting and training which obviously there’s only so much of my time that I could do that. And obviously it comes at a higher cost but pretty much everything else I do then is online. So you know you can listen to my podcast or go and download things or take part in a course or whatever. So how in a digital world do we try and make those connections feel as personal and meaningful as possible. So today I have come up with five great ideas in how you can do that in your business to ensure that you are building that amazing community who are loving you and want to work with you and are basically ready and waiting the next time you say hey I’ve got this amazing thing for you. And also how can you make them feel valued and wanted which they totally should be. And I know my community is totally valued because without you listening without people wanting me to help them I wouldn’t have a business I wouldn’t have the life I have. So I am so very grateful. So this podcast episode is showing you how we can really appreciate this people more. So my five tips. The first thing I’m going to talk about is understanding the more I know sometimes people get a bit sick of this bit like how much do we need to know our customers well you know what. A lot because there is always something we can find out about them there’s always a little detail that actually suddenly think Oh well that’s what you’re struggling with. That’s what I can help you with. That’s how I can amend my product or service so one of the things I’m going to mention here is doing things like surveys questionnaires polls and I’m not meaning like spend hours putting together some long arduous questionnaire that about three people are gonna fill in. I mean asking them two three questions that will just give you an insight to their world or give you a little bit more information so you can then target them a little bit better and not waste their time. Now I’ve been working with the lovely guys at response suite and I’ve been putting together my own survey and I’m gonna do a whole episode about this where I explain to you what I’ve done and how I’ve done it and what results I’ve got. And obviously I’m waiting to see the results and get them all together for you. So this is something that I am working super hard on because if I know more about you than I can make sure I’m giving you what you need. So things like that are really useful and even things like putting a poll in Twitter or Facebook when I was the last time he did that I have to say I don’t do as many as I should do. It’s like it with everything. There’s always something where you think I haven’t done that for ages but definitely think about asking them those questions getting to know them some more. Not only will it help you but also people want to be listened to and as a consumer I feel valued when someone says I want to know something or can you help me. And in most cases I happily fill in a questionnaire provide feedback give them a review because I want them to get better and I do it whether it’s a positive or negative experience. So actually I’m always really keen to give positive reviews because I think sometimes we’re really quick to go. This is where you can improve but we’re not so great to go. Actually this was brilliant. Thank you very much. So anyway I’ve sidetracked a little bit but definitely kind of one from a it gives you more information but two it makes them her makes them feel heard and valued. So therefore your connection with them is going to be getting deeper and then with amazing technology like using response suite those answers can be immediately integrated in something like infusion soft which is what I use and therefore imagine you get any email from me and me putting in there something that you’ve answered or me being able to say hey as a social media manager because you’ve told me you’re a social media manager and one of my surveys. It’s just a bit more of a personal connection you’re not just a hi first name or whatever it is they put in their email. You’re actually putting in some real information about that person. So that person is starting to get a real feel that you understand them and that’s what you want. You don’t as a consumer you don’t want to feel that you’re part of this massive marketing machine that is literally just churning and chucking data right there at you whether you want it or not. So use some of this amazing technology use things like response we use infusions off or you know click funnels or whatever it might be to get these different platforms to talk to each other so that you can better understand your customer but then prove to your customer you understand them. Tip number two connect to them in all areas. So one of the things I used to do especially in the earlier days I guess is if I would go and meet someone I would then come back to the office and I would go and find them on Instagram and Facebook and Twitter and LinkedIn and I would start to connect in other places because again imagine if you send me aD.M. in Instagram and then suddenly you see that I followed you on LinkedIn or something. It just makes you feel more like Oh you care You’ve actually gone to the effort to go and find me on another platform to understand me more to connect with me to get to know me. And you’ve actually gone and made that connection and that request. So I would definitely think about when you have a connection with someone on one platform that you potentially go and look if there are some rules especially if this is a contact that you really want to make a big strong connection with. So for instance if you are a big online business and you’ve got lots of followers that might not be possible. So you might just want to pick the people who are part of your membership or bought your product or are in your Facebook group or whatever it might be. So definitely think about going to connect with them in other places. You be the proactive one it’s not that hard. Granted it might take a bit of time but if you’ve only got you know if you’re starting off and you’ve got sort of 10 15 people in a Facebook group or a handful of coaching people or whatever then absolutely go and make sure that you’re reaching out to them in the various places and you’ll be amazed because that there are different platforms are used for different things. So for instance I am much more honest and visual if you like. It’s not that I’m not honest by the way on my other platforms but I’m much more kind of visual there I am on Instagram most days and I might go on really quickly and go oh this is just happened or this is just whatever that kind of rawness whereas I might not do that on Twitter and I definitely don’t do it on Facebook just because I don’t use the platforms like that. So actually going and seeing them in a different platform you can suddenly start to see a different side of them or a different thing that they do. So absolutely going on at one really simple one slightly time consuming but definitely worth it for those people that you really want to make a connection with. Okay. Number three and I love this one make a personal video to them. Now again I’m not necessarily saying everybody you’re connected with you’re going to send them a video. However if you are trying to really connect to some people if someone has purchased from you if someone signed up for your event if someone’s into your membership then absolutely go to the effort of doing some kind of personal to camera something there’s an app that you can get that will definitely do this for you. So an app that I recommend is called bond Zorro. I will link to all these things in the show notes but you can use bonds euro to send a personal video to someone if they’ve just joined your membership for instance and you can also get it. I’m fairly sure now I’m could be making this up. So I hope I’ve got this right. But I’m fairly sure that you can also get it to automate in the sense.

In fact I’m positive this is the case that when someone physically does something you can get it’s a ping and it pings to one juror. On jury sends you a message to say is it’s an app to say you need to do this video for this person. So obviously it doesn’t need a video because the whole point is you record it personally for each person but obviously it gives you that notification that you need to do it. So that’s a really good one as well. Because imagine if you’ve just signed up for a cause to someone or you’ve to join someone’s membership and then suddenly within 24 hours they’ve sent you a video saying Hey Theresa thank you so much for joining. I’m so excited if you need anything just let me know or whatever it is you might wanna do the same with an event the same with if you’re doing a webinar maybe you know what’s really interesting is people get really hung up on the facts of numbers they get really hung up on how many people have got signed up for a webinar how many people have gotten a membership and people genuinely feel that if it’s not hundreds and hundreds that you failed well you know what. If you’ve say got I don’t know you’re doing a webinar and you get 30 people signed up hey more likely those 30 people to come to the webinar alive if you have sent them a personal video that says Hi Please come and join me on my webinar I can’t wait to see that I’ve got great information or whatever it might be. Honestly I’d be kind of blown away and I’d feel really like I’m going off to service. However I know. So I think the las Abi I want the millions. Don’t get me wrong would not be amazing and I’m not sat here saying I wouldn’t want millions but love the people that you are with right now love the people that you’re looking after and then they will grow and they will tell other people. Also when you do get to the larger numbers then you might need to sporadically pick people or you might need to put some more automation in place. So definitely think about ways in which you can connect with those people and make those people feel valued and video. Personal video you on screen Zain Hi Teresa. Obviously or whatever the name is. That is a great way of doing it. Now Bangura is a great app but you can also just send them a DRM in Instagram and record yourself. You could also do a Twitter video. I know Madeline Sklar and I talked about this on her episode which was Episode 41 I linked to that as well. And we talked about having a video sent to you via Twitter and how effective that is. So definitely think about doing some of that more personal interaction. Okay. Number four really simple again it’s like I’m giving you some fairly simple bits but actually we forget these things sometimes and they’re so important. Number four is make sure you respond and have a conversation to everybody that interacts with you. Now for me that’s like number one on my list really should have been first. That’s the most basic things the most important. If someone interacts with me now I’m going to sit there I always reply and someone is gonna give you never applied to me that time but I promise you unless somehow I’ve missed it which we’re all human and sometimes we do there’s my like caveat just in case but I can pretty much guarantee you that’s the first thing I do. If someone has gone to the effort of sending me a direct message where they’re talking to me about something I will always go to the efforts message and back the same if you send me a tweet if you comment on one of my posts I will always respond. Now sometimes it might take me a day or two but I definitely always respond because I am so very grateful for the fact that people are interacting with me and wanting to talk to me. So make sure if anybody is doing that you really do go to the effort in order to respond back and do don’t just respond back with a thumbs up or a thanks. I always try and use a number of words when I respond back. I try and pick up on something someone said because I want to show them I genuinely care and I’m genuinely thankful for them making the effort to come and connect with me. So make sure you respond and then also make sure you do the proactive work where you’re going and looking at what they’re posting and your talking to them. So it’s not just okay I’ll wait for you to speak to me and then I’ll respond but also look at what they’re doing and go and be proactive towards them again in Episode 39 it was Tyler J McCool talked about how you should be engaging more on Instagram than you’re posting and talking about going and having those conversations of people. So for me that’s a really crucial one. And really really easy simple want to do. Set yourself ten minutes a day where you’re going to search on a particular hashtag. Look at particular accounts and you’re going to comment and say something to them really good. Okay. Last but by no means least. Number five. Now this is old school but I love it. Send them something in the post. All will. The like physically post felt big. You would say Teresa. No I’m not. I love receiving stuff in the post. I can’t tell you how excited I get. I mean I am the amazon prime Queen. I do love an Amazon prime delivery but when I get something unexpected or someone sends me something. Honestly it’s such an amazing marketing tool. So for instance let me give you some examples. I’ve had some great ones so I signed up to James Webb Moores business by design and he sent me some stuff in the post. Brain is in fact it was no bearing in mind it’s coming from the. But this is a company that specifically does this sort of thing. So again automated. They obviously must send them a list or something that’s pinged to this company that says this person’s joined. Please send them and they get a letter and they get some brownies and that’s awesome. Brilliant. Thank you. Then I signed up to go to his event and I received a box with a what was in it again. So it was a gold ticket for the events. That was cool. It was some cards that are like motivational cards. There was a USB stick but a very fancy looking one with some presentations on that of other events and a letter again that kind of just said can’t wait to welcome you. But you know what it does it does two things One it properly stands. Like if they sent me an email with those things which they could have done potentially they could have allowed me to download the cards or watch the videos online if they sent me an email it wouldn’t have...