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Marc Guberti

My Interview With Shannon Oleen

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Shannon Oleen is a motivational speaker who empowers young adults. Shannon has followed her passions for her entire life. One of Shannon’s big passions was sports. Shannon played sports in high school, and after a lot of practice, Shannon became an NFL cheerleader for the Kansas City Chiefs. After putting the poms down for good, Shannon pursued another passion which was to become a motivational speaker. I had Shannon on a Google Hangout which you can watch here (the noise in the background is my computer’s fans. Sorry about that). Here were the main takeaways from the interview.

  1. Success does not go to you; you go to it. If success came to us, there would not be thousands of books in the world about success systems that never fail and similar book titles as well. The road to success is the road less traveled. However, by taking that road, you will end up becoming successful by doing the things that you love to do.
  2. Patience and action lead to success. Shannon thought that when she became a motivational speaker, she would be able to quit her old job in 6 months so she could focus on motivational speaking. It took a lot longer for her to eventually quit her job, but by staying patient, she was able to quit her job and focus on motivational speaking. In addition, Shannon Oleen tried out several times for the cheerleader team, and after trying out many times, the Kansas City Chiefs had Shannon on their cheerleading team.
  3. We need to find out who we really are as individuals. In one of her blog posts, Shannon goes in detail about her 2 week canoe ride where there was rationed food and water. From this 2 week canoe ride, Shannon was able to discover who she as a person is minus all of the technology. Shannon did not use any social networks during the canoe ride, and although that alone is brave enough for a gold medal, there were no forms of technology or every day things we take for granted. It is amazing how much we take brushing our teeth and toilets for granted. This experience allowed Shannon to know who she is as a person, and that is something we all must do–find out who we really are minus the clutter. I’m not telling you to go on a canoe ride, but I am telling you to dig deep, remove the clutter, and figure out who you are as a person.

The entire interview has elements of humor and motivation intertwined into one. If you want to get in touch with Shannon, you can subscribe to her blog and follow her on Twitter, Pinterest, YouTube, LinkedIn, Facebook, and other social networks (just search Shannon Oleen, and she’ll show up).

 

The Social Media Grade Book

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The ways to be successful on social media are not written out. This results in many people not knowing how well they are doing on their social networks. My version of the social media grade book, provides some information into this problem. Here are some factors that go into consideration for how good your grade is.

  1. Real or fake followers. Having fake followers guarantees a low grade for this social media grade book. Being able to get real followers will prove that people are listening to your message. If you can get people to listen to your message, that is the starting point for success for any social network.
  2. Targeted followers. Having targeted followers is like the extra credit. Targeted followers are people who are interested in what you tweet about before they followed you while not every real follower will be interested in what you tweet about.
  3. Engagement with your followers. If you are able to talk with your followers and get them to share your posts, you are doing a good job with getting engagement. Having a targeted following really helps out towards getting more engagement.
  4. What you share. What are the rewards of someone clicking on the link to one of your tweets. Are they sent to a random article on the web, or are they sent to your blog where they can subscribe or buy one of your products? Does it generate a lot of retweets? The things that you share need to have an impact on your business, not someone else’s. It is okay to share other people’s content, but you should primarily share your content. In addition, your blog posts need to be stellar because that is the only way people will keep on reading your blog posts and your posts on social networks.
  5. How consistently and frequently you post on your social networks. There’s always that person who sends out 5 updates in 1 minute and then does not update their social media profile for the rest of the day. If you want to make it on the map, you need to be scheduling posts to appear on a consistent, frequent basis. I tweet every 30 minutes which is consistent and frequent.
  6. Your ability to have conversations with your followers via email. Once you start a conversation via email, that conversation can last for a long time. The first thing most people do when they get on their computers is check their inbox for new messages. Bringing the conversation to the inbox will allow you to have longer conversations which will result in future clients.
  7. The number of social networks that you use. It is better to have 100 people following you on one social network than it is to have 10 followers for 10 social network accounts. However, as one of your social networks picks up in speed, the others will gradually pick up in speed as well. Each time you get 1,000 followers on a social network, create another social network, and when that social network reaches 1,000 followers, repeat the process. If you have 10 social networks with over 1,000 followers each, some of your followers will decide to follow you on your other social networks. Then, all of your social networks grow and your overall presence on the web grows.

That is my version of the social media grade book. What are your thoughts on the social media grade book and do you think there anything else that I should add to it?

 

 

Take Advantage Of A Problem By Being The Solution

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If you’re like me, you use some of Google’s services and have no idea how half of them work. Adsense and broadcasted Google Hangouts are some of the services I have trouble with (I spent $15 to create a screen recorder for Google Hangouts so I can put those videos on YouTube). Chances are you are probably just like me or were just like me at one point. There are millions of people who have no idea how to use certain Google services or how certain features work. The worst part is that Google makes changes to many of its services every year. Someone who could host a Google Hangout in 2013 would have to relearn how to host a Google Hangout this year.

Let’s continue with my story of misfortune and hope that I am two for two. If you’re like me, you have watched videos or read articles on blogs to try to solve the problem. When seeing someone using the Google service that we cannot get to function, that person suddenly looks like one of those super humans chosen by the ancients or something cool like that.

While trying to find the fix for one of my Google services, I ended up reading 10 blog posts from the same blog dealing with this issue. I did not find the solution to the giant puzzle (trying to use a Google service that is not functioning properly). However, one blogger just got an extra visitor and 10 pageviews. Some people on YouTube got some extra views as well.

As these people get more visitors, pageviews, and views, their SEO increases, and they start to see traffic on the rise. What happened? These people knew the solution to a problem that millions of people have. Not all of these millions of people will get a solution from a single video, but as these people get more views for their videos about Google services, their other videos get viewed as well. In addition, their blogs also get more visitors and pageviews.

There are plenty of problems out there. If you are a solution to one of the problems that a large group of people have, numerous people will come to you to get the answer.

 

How We All Need To Think Of Excuses

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You could have come up with the best excuse for why your book did not get published when you said it would. The best excuse does not change the result–the book was still not published at the time you said it would be published.

“I didn’t study for the test because I had a project that week.” Although this excuse was well done, it does not change the fact that the person scored a low grade on the test.

“I don’t use Instagram because I don’t want to start from scratch when I have 500,000 followers on Twitter.” This is not an excuse. This is a logical reason. Focusing on the 500,000 followers on Twitter is more important than creating the Instagram account.

There is a difference between a reason and an excuse. An excuse is a cover up for a flaw on your part that could have been addressed better. It is better to admit mistakes than to cover them up so everyone can learn from those mistakes, not just you. A reason is something that makes sense but is not trying to cover up a flaw. Not having an Instagram account is not a flaw when you have a strong presence on Twitter. Likewise, not having a Twitter account is not a flaw when you have a strong presence on Instagram.

Excuses should not be tolerated. Mistakes should be admitted. Excuses are just the long route that ends up going exactly where the short route goes–the realization that there is a flaw. Reasons are good especially when they can be supported. Reasons are logical, and reasons don’t hide flaws because there is nothing to hide.

 

8 Ways To Increase The Amount Of Time You Have In Your Day

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If there was one thing we could all wish for, we would all wish that there were 10 extra hours in the day to get everything done. It seems as if our days are getting increasing busy, and there is less time to complete the tasks at hand. With a big pile of work, many people fear adding on to that workload, even if adding on to the workload means getting more opportunities. However, there are simple ways to hack the workload. In this blog post, I am going to reveal 8 of those methods.

  1. Identify any patterns that take up time. If you are scheduling tweets of your blog posts, chances are you search for the blog post on your blog, paste the link into Bitly, write the tweet on HootSuite, paste the link to your blog post in the tweet, and schedule the tweet. I have all of my tweets in a document on my computer which saves me from the first three steps. Joining HootSuite Pro allowed me to save even more time. It is easy to imagine that I save 4 hours every week.
  2. Choose wisely. Not all work is productive. Walking around your neighborhood with a flyer with a link to your blog is not as effective as becoming a guest blogger for a popular blog. Some opportunities are better than others, and it is important to pounce on the good ones when they come.
  3. Wake up earlier. This is an obvious, but easy way to get some extra time in your day. We are at our peak of productivity in the morning. By waking up at 7 am every day instead of 9 am, you will be able to be productive for an extra 60 hours every month. Imagine the things you will be able to do with 60 extra hours every month.
  4. Upgrade to save time. That’s exactly why I upgraded to HootSuite Pro for $9.99 every month. HootSuite Pro allows me to save a lot of time, and it allows me to organize my tweets and lists very effectively. What can you upgrade to save extra time. If you save an hour a day by spending $30 every month, you would have spent $360 for the year on those services, but you would have gained 365 extra hours. That’s enough hours to write a book, run it through an editor, get it copyrighted, and market it to the masses.
  5. Focus on what you are good at instead of trying to be something else. I decided to give coding a try, but it ended up becoming a very bumpy road. After spending a few weeks trying to learn code, I gave up. Now, I focus on what I am good at: my writing and expertise in social media, business, and blogging. I saved a lot of time by giving up on the coding early on so it would not swallow up any more of my time.
  6. Create rubrics. Imagine writing the same email, word for word, over 100 times, and the only thing different was the person’s name. I encountered this problem immediately when I submitted a query on HARO. Instead of creating custom messages, I created a rubric message for the people whose pitches I liked. Creating the rubric message allowed me to email hundreds of people within a week instead of sending out personalized messages which could take months.
  7. Do something incredibly time-consuming for a week while doing everything else at the same time. I will never forget the working curve it took me to send out replies to the people who sent in pitches to my HARO queries in 1 week. It was a time-consuming process. However, when I was done responding to people’s pitches, I had a big slice of time left. While I was responding to pitches, it would take me entire days to do all of my work. When I responded to everyone’s pitch, I was able to get my work done twice as fast and even able to extend my break by another hour. The reason summer is my most productive season is because I gain 8 extra hours since there isn’t any school.
  8. Hire assistants. Once you start to make it big time, have other people send out the HARO queries, respond to the pitches, and answer emails for you. Hiring assistants will be able to give you more time to produce quality products.

What are your thoughts on the list? Do you have any other suggestions? Please share your thoughts and advice below.

Why You Need To Pay Attention To Data On The Web

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The only data most people pay attention to are their own statistics. We know how many clicks our Bitly links get, how many people visited our blogs last Wednesday, and how many sales you are getting as an Amazon Associate. However, we need to pay more attention to data that exists on the web about customers.

I never thought of looking at the data on the web. I was focused on looking at my own data and finding ways to improve on that data. After reading Big Data Marketing, my entire aspect about collecting data changed. While it is still important to collect our own data, we must explore data on the web that can relate to getting more customers, increasing the percentage of deals gone through, and other aspects of business as well.

There are many sites on the web with data. By looking at the data, we can see the trends and rising industries. The reason we know mobile is going to be huge for businesses is because data indicates a big rise in mobile sales.

By looking at our own data, we are able to find ways to better ourselves. By looking at the big picture, we are able to expand on what we already know, think outside of the box, and get data results that we never thought were possible.