My friends at Point To Point in Cleveland invited me to guest post and it just went live. The post, titled, “Playing the name game when it comes to online reputation management” comes with a back story.

You see, in February 2007 I was contacted by their president, also named Mark Goren, to discuss our “Google problem.” Since that first chat, we’ve become friends, done a little work together, and continue to serve as each others’ mentor.

The guest post talks about the importance of filtering out bad information from social media monitoring to collect results that are most relevant to your search strategy. Using the example of our name, I illustrate how to do so through simple search.

Why does this relate to planting seeds? Because the more content you produce through different social networks or the more you’re being written about, it’s vital to know where conversations are taking place if you want to manage your reputation online. In some cases, it may even make you want to distinguish your name somehow, to help make it easier to search for. Cleveland’s Mark Goren did so by using his middle initial, which you can see on the right sidebar on P2P’s blog.

Mark is a great guy and the team at Point To Point is at the top of their game. I encourage you to learn a little bit about them, their award-winning work and their unique charity, Change for $20, which they launched last year for the holidays.

To learn about how Mark and I met, read this old post.

To read today’s guest post, head on over to P2P’s blog.

To check out Change for $20 (which is probably the first thing you should do), visit the site.

As I wrote in the original post, and still believe very strongly today:

The world is smaller than ever. People are meeting new people and making new friends every day. It’s all about reaching out, connecting and making meaningful relationships. Last night’s chat was just one more powerful example.

And so is today’s guest post.

Terrence Paquet, AKA Wordboy, is a friend of mine, a copywriter I used to work with at BCP in Montreal. As you can tell by this interview, he’s a good guy - and he thinks he’s pretty funny too. Terrence has been Planting Seeds online for a little while and, like a lot of people, his activity goes in spurts. He’ll be on the networks for a bit and then off writing a children’s book or screenplay or a series of short stories or something else.

In this interview, Terrence explains what’s he’s gotten out of his social networking, which networks he likes and where it’s all leading. I think you’ll be rooting for him by the end of the interview.

• So, what got you into social networking?
The original lure of social networking for me was the ease with which I could connect with all kinds of different people around the world without worrying about things like hygiene, pants and the complications of local indecent exposure laws. But as I got deeper into it, I recognized it as an unparalleled method of getting people to discover my writing without having to actually go through the trouble of forcibly confining them to a cage in my basement while I read my stories to them over and over again.

• How did you get started?
When I finished writing the book, I went the usual route of trying to find a publisher but that entire industry is going through some major changes. I realized that I would need to find other avenues to explore. I fired off an email to Joe Wikert of Wiley Publishing who read what I had and came back with two suggestions: the first was psychiatric counseling which, as we all know, ain’t gonna happen. Not after that last ‘incident’. His second idea was a blog. This was right around the time that Christian Lander from Stuff White People Like hit the big time with a book deal so I guess he thought this was a similar style of writing. Although, truth be told, I use more intelligenter words than Christian does. Once I decided that was the best way to go, it was just a matter of working on the content and getting the word out.

• What were your goals for the blog when you began?
The goal was, and still is, to have people discover my particular brand of genius, or as my doctor calls it “delusion”. I was hoping that my daily postings would serve as a platform for my wit, my je ne sais quoi and my talent for playing the pan flute with my ass. But most of all, I wanted visitors to read my stories, buy my book (even though it’s not for sale yet) and see that someone just like them could make the American dream come true (even though I am Canadian). To do that, I knew I had to reach millions. And not just those who are incarcerated or learning English as a second language. Every day people. Tax paying citizens. Oh hell, tax evaders could read my tales too and I’d be okay with that. Because more than a writer, I am a whore. Willing to do whatever it takes to make enough cash so that I can finally live a life of gross excess and reckless abandon.

• When you started blogging, how quickly did you start to see its effectiveness?
I must say I was pleasantly surprised because the response came almost right away in the form of encouraging comments from readers, emails from fawning teenage girls and subpoenas from angry lawyers. I was tracking with Google Analytics so I could see who was reading, where, when and for how long. Although I couldn’t tell what they were wearing when they were reading my blog, I always imagined it was something lacy. The daily tracking of readers became an addiction that was hard to shake. It was kind of like stalking without leaving the confines of your court-ordered area. Even better was the fact that I am able to write back right away to thank people for talking the time to read and to ask if they can lend me $20.

• What other social networks do you actively participate in? Which is your favourite and why?
When I began this I looked high and low for different ways to get my name out there so I joined the Humor Writers group at Ning, I set up a Facebook account, Twitter, Plurk, MySpace, etc. All of them in their own right had generated considerable page views for me, particularly Facebook, and helped to build the base I was looking for. But by far, the biggest response I received was when I started posting on Webceleb. Although it isn’t technically a social networking site, for some reason my “style” clicked right away with those people. I suspect this is either because most of them are on drugs OR I am the only one on that site with a third nipple. For the record, I have no way of backing either assumption up in a court of law.

• Do you have thoughts on how you’ll continue to extend your web presence?
Once, when I first started, I wrapped my torso in aluminum foil and barricaded myself in the house in the hopes of attracting some much-needed media attention. Unfortunately, no one came or even called to see how I was doing. I gave up after four hours when I developed a rash from the tin foil. Today, I think the game plan is to just keep writing and getting the word out through interviews like this one. I’m currently on a self-imposed hiatus while I redesign my webpage because right now it’s a simple blogger account using their templates, typeface, etc. Lets just say it doesn’t scream “professional.” Once that’s completed, the idea will be to resume regular postings and kick my brand up a notch. But I want to do it right because if you’ve ever been kicked up the notch, you know how difficult it can be to walk normal the next week.

• Do you have any tips for people, individuals who are looking to draw opportunities from their social web efforts?
Firstly, I would say that the only way to do this right is to do it often. Spend as much time as you can every day networking with people who share the same interests as you do. In other words, plant your seed. And I mean that in a non-sexual way (although you can network that way too). I would also stress the importance of defining who you are, what YOUR brand is and how you want people to see you BEFORE you start. When you decide on that, stick to it and make sure that everything you say or do, in all the networks you participate in, works toward building your brand. Finally, I would counsel people to stay away from crotchless panties. I have it on good authority that the rashes are especially bothersome during the warm months. (For those keeping score that’s two rash references and counting.)

• Tell us a little bit about some of the projects and opportunities you’ve gained as a direct result of your online networking.
About 4 months into it, I was contacted by Billiam Coronel, a writer in L.A., who found the blog through my postings on Facebook. Billiam did stand-up for 15 years, appeared on the Tonight Show, wrote for Family Guy and has a few feature length movies under his belt*. He has credentials I can only dream of. He wanted to know if I’d be interested in writing for his website AnimalInternet.com, which I was all to happy to do for him - on a few occasions. To make a long story short, we are currently writing a screenplay together that I hope will take me from squalid poverty and worldwide obscurity to extreme wealth and celebrity rehab as fast as possible. The point is, without social networking none of this would have been possible.

*Note: He didn’t write the movies, he just keeps them under his belt for some reason (insert third rash joke here).

Josh Peters is a freelance social media consultant and corporate trainer from Salt Lake City, Utah who, when not frolicking in the fields of social media, enjoys working on his startup RoyalAnts, watching horror movies with his wife, and playing with his dogs. He blogs at Shuaism and would really like to connect with you on Facebook, LinkedIn, and/or Twitter.

Josh has a unique challenge for Planting Seeds readers - check it out near the end of the post!

Guerrilla Social Media Marketing: Guest Post and Articles
By Josh Peters

What’s the best way to get your name spread around town? Have someone else do it for you!

The last Guerrilla Social Media Marketing (GSMM) post was about using tools to create a features and benefits list to extol the virtues of your brand and get others to spread it for you. This one is about sharing your insights, which I thought was appropriate since I’m guest posting here on Mark Goren’s fantastic Planting Seeds blog.

One of the age old guerrilla marketing tactics was to write articles for local newspapers, dailies, or newsletters on subjects you were familiar with. This usually pertained to your business and at the end of the article the publisher would allow you a little byline about yourself and your business. This was the epitome of a win/win situation. You received free publicity and the publisher received valuable content for their readers.

The same thing works today as it did yesterday and will work tomorrow. If you can’t tell that’s exactly what I’m doing with the GSMM series (in fact the whole GSMM series is a case study of its own ideals). I wanted to spread the ideas and help as many people as I can by posting the entire series on other people’s blogs. This works for me because I get my ideas in front of their readers, they win because they get free content and get to take the day off.

When posting on someone else’s blog there are a couple of things to remember and consider. Since people like lists, and since you and I are both people I’m going to “list out” some key points.

Remember

• The blog, ezine, site, etc you’re putting the article is not allowing you to post a 300+ word advertisement of yourself. They are expecting content and value.
• Make it the best advice or content that you can. Don’t just slop something together and throw it out. Their readers will be judging you on your post/article.
• When sending your article make sure you attach all relevant images, don’t create work for your host by making them hunt for images.
• Ask if your host wants to have anchor tags for links or just the links so they can add them.
• If you’re a pain to work with it dramatically decreases your chances of being asked /allowed back.

Consider

• Their audience and if your content fits their subject or audience.
• Your language and writing style and if it’s going to fit or if you’ll need to change it around a bit.
• If the blog or other online publication is really the right fit at all. You don’t want to make a Meatball Sundae.
• If it’s something you will enjoy doing.

The blog is pretty much the hub of social media. It’s a point to gather, discuss, and share ideas. Your information can be tweeted, bookmarked, emailed, and shared from that one location in an instant.

If you run a blog for your company then writing a guest post will probably come easily to you, if not you might want to find someone in your company who does like to write or perhaps runs their own blog. Either way the rewards alone for guest posting will be great for both exposure and experience. It’s something you can link to from your own site and point customers to help build your credibility. It’s a great way to build out your body of work and share your ideas and your passion.

Some people have even turned it into a regular gig and its helped them gain great exposure for their own stuff while working with big names in the industry. Look at how Jesse Stay has helped grow himself and his Twitter service Social Too by becoming a regular guest on Louis Gray’s site. This also helped Louis Gray by giving him someone else to help pump out great content.

This is the part where I tell you how I’ve applied this idea to myself and give out a project that I’d like you to get involved with.

Me: You’re reading it. I’m doing 50 guest posts to spread the ideas of GSMM, start new conversations and look at tools from a new perspective.

You: This is going to be easy. I want you to do a guest post somewhere and then comeback and post the link in the comments here. If you’ve already done a guest post somewhere then I’d like you to post both your blog’s link and the link to your guest post in the comments.

I’d love to see you readers fill the comments with examples of your work. If you want to plant a seed the best way to do it is to share what you’ve done. Go ahead and brag a bit. Give us your blog link, a link to your best guest post and if you have a story about how that guest post helped you (or didn’t) leave that too. All examples will also get linked from the Guerrilla Social Media Marketing resource page!

Thank you for reading,

Josh “Shua” Peters

•

This is part of a year-long project about taking offline guerrilla marketing ideas/tactics and applying them to social media marketing. If you enjoyed this post and would like to host one of the Guerrilla Social Media Marketing series on your blog, please email me: shua (at) shuaism.com. To easily follow the series please subscribe to my feed via RSS or email.

Instead of turning to Google Notebook to share links with others, here’s an alternative using Delicious that will allow you to accomplish the same thing, while keeping your links in one account.

While, technically, there is no feature that allows you to create a notebook for link sharing similar in functionality to what Google Notebook can do, if you use Delicious creatively, you can get around this.

Here’s how:

• Create a generic account on Delicious that you’re comfortable sharing access to

• Add the generic account to your personal network on Delicious

• When you bookmark something you only want to send to the shared account, hit “Do not share” and tag it with “for:sharedaccount’susername”. Of course, you can also add other tags.

• The bookmarked item will appear in your timeline unshared and, at the same time, it will appear in the shared account’s inbox

All in all, it’s really not all that different than having a Google notebook for link sharing. Sure, you may not be able to export the Delicious links from this account to Google docs and so forth (like you can with a Google Notebook). However, you’ll benefit by having all your links in one place, ready to be categorized and searched with all your other links, the ones you’re happy to share with a wider audience.

Do you have any similar tips you’d like to share? Please do!

Peter Korchnak and I met online after he invited me to post on his blog last week. Peter is new to blogging and is doing a great job himself of Planting Seeds to make new relationships. His presence here is proof of that. Here’s his post:

One of the most frequent questions people have been asking me since I started my Sustainable Marketing Blog is, “Do I need a blog?” Usually what follows is variations of, “Everybody tells me I need to do it, so should I?”

Reports abound about social media becoming mainstream. It seems only customers have reached the tipping point. Many nonprofits and businesses, particularly small ones, remain in the dark. I’ve been to social media workshops where the expert presenter’s points go right over audience members’ heads, leaving them with more questions than they came with. Yet I’m already hearing social media enthusiasts pronounce the death of LinkedIn and blogs.

My standard answer to questions about blogging is, “It depends.” The answer disappoints, and I follow up with questions of my own: “Does building a community around your brand fit your marketing strategy?” and “What are your marketing objectives?”

What I often get is even more bewilderment. Leaving aside the peculiar fact that many organizations don’t have a marketing strategy to begin with, social media seems to be regarded as the new cure-all, rather than a range of tactics. True to its nature, social media has created an awesome buzz about itself.

Venturing on the social media path without a marketing strategy is like putting the proverbial cart before the horse, and riding without a map and without knowing the destination. There is a difference between following the herd just for the sake of doing what everyone else is doing, and doing something that is strategically used and brings good returns.

A truly widespread adoption of social media will require a cultural change among businesses and nonprofits. Metaphorically speaking, it will be a shift from immediate gratification of packaged foods to long-term sustainability of growing our own food. That’s why I think conceptualizing it in terms of Planting Seeds is so helpful.

Under right conditions, a seed germinates, grows into a plant, then flowers and produces seeds, which can then be planted and yield even more seeds. The seeds require long-term, patient attention to thrive and yield their bounty, but they eventually take a life of their own and reward our care with flowers and fruits and new seeds.

The same goes for social media, indeed total online presence. Know what you want - a field cultivated with your brand and tended to by your brand community. Listen to conversations out there to figure out the right places to plant and the right tools to use. Participate in communities, consistently and with perseverance, and watch the seeds of engagement blossom and bear fruit. Replant the new seeds and repeat.

Presented this way, blogs and other social media tools may no longer be thought of as a quick marketing fix, but rather as a sustainable marketing lifestyle.

•”

To learn more about Peter, connect with him here:

• Sustainable Marketing Blog
• Semiosis Communications
• Blog Catalog
• Delicious
• Flickr
• LinkedIn
• Slideshare
• Upcoming

•”

As you may know, there’s an open invitation to write your own guest post over on PlantingSeeds.ca. Just visit the site, look for the “Be My Guest” section along the top navigation menu and enter your post. As long as it’s on topic in your own way - that’s just short of saying, “Anything goes” really - I’ll post it. Also, if you add your networks along the bottom of your post (with links), I’ll happily point people in your direction.

Remember, I may own the URL, but I’m striving to make this site yours as much as it is mine. If you want to see any content highlighted here - videos, slide presentations, links or, your thoughts - please feel free to let me know and we’ll make sure you can easily plant seeds right here. The floor is yours!

Now that I’ve received my three soft cover copies of The Age Of Conversation 2, I’ve started to read each chapter. It didn’t take long to see that some of these chapters will, in one way or another, support the Planting Seeds analogy.

As a result, I’ve decided to start a series that will highlight these chapters. What I’ll do is highlight the name of the chapter, its author, the section it’s in, the page it’s on and the sentence or paragraph that most supports what we’re trying to get across here at PlantingSeeds.ca.

If you have thoughts or recommendations on other chapters that do the same, I’d love to hear what you think. I’ll be posting these as I come across them in the book.

Domain-Free: The Internet is a journey, not a destination
Mike Arauz
Section: Manifestos
Page: 4

Context: In this paragraph, MIke is discussing how it the Internet was thought of at the end of the 20th century.

“When we set out to create something new for a client or for ourselves, we began our ideation within this familiar frame ‚Äî create a desired destination. Create an isolated place on the Internet where viewers or readers can be gathered (and counted). Use interruptive messaging in an attempt to get the audience to leave a more familiar environment, and visit the place where we’re keeping the content. If the visitors like what they find, then we hope that they tell their friends and send them back to our special online island. This approach is now obsolete.”

Mike is dead on, and he goes on to explain why “this approach is obsolete” in the rest of his chapter.  His explanation mirrors the importance of planting seeds online and why it’s important to get others to do the same on your behalf.

***

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Tags: PlantingSeeds, Planting Seeds Online, PlantingSeeds.ca, Mike Arauz, mikearauz.com, Age of Conversation, ageofconversation.com, Age of Conversation Manifestios, AOC, AOC2, Age of Conversation 2, Age of Conversation 2 - Why Don’t They Get It,

An excellent way to Plant Seeds is to be invited to add a guest post at someone else’s blog. Today, I’m happy to report, Peter Korchnak has introduced me to his readers by honouring me with a forum on his blog.

If you head over there, you’ll be able to read my post, “Sustainable relationships start with Planting Seeds“. In it, I build on Peter’s post from a little over a week ago, titled, “Sustainability in Business: Naturopathic physician“. In that post, Peter told the story of Igor Schwartzman, a naturopathic physician and co-owner of the Whole Family Wellness Center health care clinic.

Without giving too much away, suffice it to say that Igor understands the concept of Planting Seeds.

Read both posts. I’ll be over there to field comments.
• Sustainability in Business: Naturopathic physician• Sustainable relationships start with Planting Seeds

Tags: PlantingSeeds, Planting Seeds Online, PlantingSeeds.ca, Mark Goren, Peter Korchnak, Sustainable Marketing Blog, Semiosis Communications, Guest Post

I originally met Melanie Notkin (@SavvyAuntie) online through Twitter. The former Montrealer, now living in New York, was beginning to Plant Seeds to generate awareness and interest in SavvyAuntie.com (site, blog), the new community for aunts that she was about to launch. Mostly, through, she was participating in online social networks to meet people and create real relationships that would lead people back to her site.

Now a few months post launch, Melanie recently posted a presentation to SlideShare that, in truth, is a case study for the Planting Seeds concept. (RSS readers please click through.)

After seeing the presentation, I immediately asked her to answer a few questions for this site.

Here’s that interview:

Planting Seeds: Tell us a little bit about Savvy Auntie and what a PANK is.

Melanie Notkin: SavvyAuntie.com is the first online community for PANKs -Professional Aunts, No Kids - the other 50% of American women who are not moms, but children are central in their lives, be they nieces, nephews, cousins or friends’ kids. So whether you’re an ABR (Aunt by Relation) and ABC (Aunt by Choice) and LDA (Long Distance Auntie), great aunt or godmother, this is the destination for you.

SavvyAuntie.com is like a parenting site for the non-mom, so she can learn everything she needs to know to be a wonderful aunt, find great activities, discover the hottest gift ideas and connect with other Savvy Aunties just like her.

PS: In just over two months, your company has seen significant growth. Can you talk about the $0 Advertising plan that fueled this growth?

MN: I don’t know if it was so much a ‘plan’ as it was the only strategy I had. I am completely self-funded and I don’t have a budget for advertising. That’s where social media came into play. By being active on Twitter, Facebook, my business blog, and other social media platforms, I was able to generate buzz around the launch of my site with people who believed in me and my company.

PS: If you were to give advice to a people responsible for building a brand, personal or corporate, what would be the top thing you’d tell them?

MN: Be authentic and find your voice. Connect with others. Brands are about trust and reliability. Think of yourself like a trustworthy, reliable friend to your consumers, and they’ll stay with you, through the good and the bad.

PS: How would you sell the potential of Planting Seeds online?

•Build it and they will come” is a nice idea, but it’s not generally the reality. You could have the most brilliant idea that solves the needs of millions of people (like a community for aunts, for example), but if no one knows it exists, they’re not coming. Sure, you could build momentum after the site launches, but it will take months. Why not create buzz while you’re building it? If you reach out to the community to help you plant the seeds for the business you are building, they will feel ownership on the fate of your success. And when the time comes for the site to launch, they will be your front line evangelists, blogging about it, tweeting about it, talking about it.

I began really connecting with people through social media almost a year before I launched the site. I networked with people in real life - attending social media events, lunches and breakfasts. I kept up the relationships through social media platforms like LinkedIn, Twitter, Plaxo and Facebook. About four months before I launched, I got super active on Twitter and began cultivating authentic relationships with people I admired and who I could learn from. I posted updates about my company and its progress on Facebook and Twitter. Then about three months before launch, I published my first blog post, revealing my dreams, details of how I built my business, and how incredibly nervous I was the night before I launched.

Hundreds of people knew that I was launching on July 9th. They Tweeted about it. They blogged about it. The reported on it. They told their friends. They celebrated with me. They launched with me.

I built it. They came. But the key was, they knew the address and couldn’t wait to see it complete. I guess they felt like they had helped plant the seeds and they wanted to see how my garden was blossoming. Lucky for me, the relationships I developed are completely authentic and I am now helping others in the same way. It’s a wonderful way to give back.

Off to buy a watering can…..

•”

If you have have any questions for Melanie or any thoughts on Savvy Auntie or the approach that’s been taken to market, leave your thoughts below. We’ll both be around to field your questions!