Blog

January 8, 2014 by Wendy Hammond

The One Social Media Expert Whose Opinion REALLY Matters

I’ve been blogging a long time. So for the past several years, I have attended conferences and read everything I could about how to get followers and how to market myself on social media.

And now that I provide social media marketing services for clients, I read even more blog posts and ebooks about how to get more Twitter followers, when to post on Facebook, how to maximize email marketing, and the list goes on. I’ve joined LinkedIn groups and Google Plus and various membership sites. After awhile it gets to be information overload!

Some of my clients are simply overwhelmed. I am, too. At the end of the day, though, the one social media “expert” whose opinion matters most is . . . YOUR CUSTOMERS.

I’m not saying to ignore all the great tips and articles out there. It’s always good to be on top of trends and research. But the lens through which everything must be filtered is YOUR CUSTOMER.

One of my clients asked if I had come across any research that suggested what a business should put on their Facebook page. She was sure that a certain type of post would be popular, but it fell flat every time, no matter what time of day it was posted. To her surprise, though, photos of her suppliers turned out to get lots of comments and shares. I explained that no outside research would be as valuable as simply paying attention to what her actual customers were already telling her.

In short, my recommendation to busy people who already have too much on their plate and a limited amount of time to spend on their social media marketing is to spend most of the time listening to your customers (checking out Insights and other analytics tools . . . to be explained in later posts), not reading more about what “experts” have to say.

Have you learned anything surprising by listening to your customers?

January 7, 2014 by Wendy Hammond

These Four Letters Will Help You Lead ANY Meeting Well

Have you ever been in a meeting where you wished you could be anywhere other than sitting in an uncomfortable chair? Meetings that, despite having an agenda, seem to meander around. There is an agenda, and a chairperson, but when the topic is read, it’s a free for all and people throw up their ideas on the table where the word vomit sits. No conclusions are reached. The meeting minutes describe what was said, but no real decisions are made. It’s a frustrating state of affairs.

Four letters changed my meetings: ORID. I was first introduced to it in the context of someone leading a Bible study. ORID is an acronym that stands for:

Objective
Reflective
Interpretive
Decisional

Except that at the time, it didn’t make a whole of of sense to me. I mean, it did in my head, but I wasn’t feeling it. Then, at a facilitation training, someone added the following descriptions to the letters:

Objective (what)
Reflective (gut)
Interpretive (so what)
Decisional (now what)

It was my “a ha!” moment. Now, for very short meetings I don’t explain what I’m doing. I just let the conversation flow naturally but ahead of time I write

O (what)

R (gut)

I (so what)

D (now what)

on a piece of paper and jot down a question or two for each category. Every time I’ve done this, everyone is surprised that I was able to lead a meeting so efficiently and effectively even with just a few minutes notice.

Here’s an example: My team received a copy of the organization’s strategic plan in an email. I was asked to lead a discussion about it at an upcoming meeting. I asked people to read it ahead of time. Here are the questions that I asked:

What items in the plan stood out to you?
What were you surprised to see?
What were you not surprised to see?
How did you feel when you received this?
What is the most important item in this plan?
What do you think will be the most difficult to achieve?
How are we going to implement this plan? What should our next steps be?

So simple!

There is even a whole book (The Art of Focused Conversation: 100 Ways to Access Group Wisdom in the Workplace (ICA series)
) dedicated to using the method in the workplace, which is helpful, but once you have run through a few of them you should be able to come up with them on the fly.

Have you used ORID? What has been your experience?

January 6, 2014 by Wendy Hammond

Use Word Art to Help You Focus

Almost all time management/life management books tell you to make a list of values or priorities to help you plan and decide how you should spend your time. However, a list jotted on a day planner or printed out and tacked up somewhere is not very inspiring. So I decided to make mine into word art.

The great thing about word art is that you don’t need to be all that creative. There are lots of online word cloud generators that do all the work for you – all you have to do is type in the word and it does the rest. Wordle is the most popular, but since it uses Java (which doesn’t work well with Chrome) I ended up using Word it Out. (For a quick run down of some of the different generators, visit Educemic.com).

You can also enter a website address and it will pull out commonly used words. I have made a few for clients to help me focus on their values when coming up with marketing ideas.

Once you have adjusted the options for fonts and colors, you end up with a piece of art that you can use as a screensaver or print out and post near your computer. Much more inspirational than a plain list of words!

Do you have a creative way of displaying your list of priorities or values?

January 5, 2014 by Wendy Hammond

How to Get Organized in 2014

Every year I promise myself that I will get organized. Somehow, my resolution to get organized doesn’t last very long. But with a growing client base and list of projects, I decided that I really need to get serious.

Over the years I have gone back and forth between a paper calendar/day planner and keeping everything online. My day job uses Google Calendars extensively, but I haven’t been happy with the tasks. I also have multiple projects on the go. We have tried Google Docs, Basecamp, and Big Tent. Basecamp and Big Tent were so clunky that I didn’t use them much at all.

I also tried to use the Franklin Covey PlanPlus online software, but in order to sync with my Google Calendar, I had to get the premium version. I also found the interface very clunky.

I think I have finally cobbled together a suite of solutions that will work for me! I will share my findings below:

Daily Appointments

Since I need to use my Google Calendar for work, I decided to not worry about trying to incorporate this into my planners. So my primary criteria was to find some way to organize my tasks and projects, not keep my schedule.

Overall Organization

When I logged into some of the project planning options, I realized that I had no idea where to even start when it came to personal goals and objectives. My business objectives are well defined, but what do I really want out of life? I found The 7 Minute Solution: Time Strategies to Prioritize, Organize & Simplify Your Life at Work & at Home at a local bookstore and it has been a lifesaver. I have been using a modified version of their planner sheets (printed on actual paper) as a way to keep myself organized throughout the day. It gives me a great place to keep track of all those ideas and “to-do” items that pop into my head.

Keeping Track of Projects

For larger projects, I needed something easy to use but robust. After much searching online, I came across Podio, which has turned out to be perfect! Best of all, it’s FREE. What I love is that it is super flexible (and free, did I mention free?) It is organized into “workspaces,” so I am able to set up a workspace for each client and even give my client access to that workspace. There are apps to help provide structure. For example there is a project management app, so everyone can get on the same page in terms of tasks and who needs to do what by when. I can also share files and social media calendars. It sounds sort of complicated but I was able to get it up and running within a day or two. Once it’s set up, I’ve found it MUCH easier to use and cleaner than Basecamp, Big Tent, etc.

I have had clients tell me, “I just need someone to tell me what to do and bug me about it.” With Podio, I think it will be easy to do just that. And who will tell ME what to do? Hopefully me, using the good old paper planner.

What systems have you found to help you organize projects?

January 4, 2014 by Wendy Hammond

The Importance of Work-Life Balance

So many small business owners and nonprofit workers struggle with work-life balance. There is always something that needs to be done, and when you believe in the cause (whether it’s working on your business or working for a charitable organization) it’s easy to justify working just a few more hours a day.

Early on in my career, I had a boss who insisted that I leave every day at 5 PM sharp, and who did the same so that he could spend time with this family. This seemed to go against the “get ahead” advice I had received in college, which was to get to work before your boss and leave shortly after. Admittedly, part of the reason he insisted that I leave right at 5 may have had more to do with the fact that we worked in a part of town where you didn’t want to be after dark, but over the years I’ve noticed that I perform much better when I give myself a mental break rather than working around the clock.

Every month the organization for which I work sends out a morale report form. It asks whether our work-life balance is satisfactory, and what our supervisor can do to help. As supervisors, we are also encouraged to ensure that our direct reports are working reasonable hours. Of course, there are some projects which require extra effort and time, but on a regular basis it’s important to make sure expectations are appropriate.

When a mountain of work is staring you in the face, it’s hard to break away. It helps to focus on the fact that some of our best ideas come when we have cleared our minds. Enjoying nature, working out, or spending time with friends and family has a way of helping to provide a different perspective. Of course, it helps to keep a small book and pen nearby (or a smart phone) to record any brilliant ideas that might come when you are not at work.

So, how do you keep the ideas flowing? Make sure you have work-life balance!

What are some of the ways that you ensure work-life balance?