You’ve got to Tweet several times a day for people to know who you are. You need to post at least three times a week or more. Old posts serve absolutely no purpose and you won’t build brand recognition putting up a post here and there. Building traffic is about consistency and you’ve got to be out there all the time.  In the last few weeks I’ve been really surprised at the number of blogs I’ve run into that just aren’t kept up to date and many of them by some of the best photographers in our industry.

Facebook is the same. You’ve got to be involved to build traffic. You’ve got to be making a contribution for people to remember you’re out there.

Make it a point to at least “hit” the social media button in your day, first thing every morning. Try and develop a routine for both contributing to your own pages and reading other posts from people you enjoy. Pretty soon it’ll be second nature.

That’s it – end of point. Post and tweet regularly or forget about social media becoming an effective marketing tool for your business.

Think about it for just a second. Every morning you wake up and there’s at least one paradigm that’s shifted. There’s a new trend, a new app, an announcement of a change in technology that’s going to change our lives.  Think about all the tools at your fingertips. As Georgia put it:

The tools you have, literally at your fingertips are extensive. Just to name a few, you’ve got Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, blogs, websites, You Tube, Google+, Groupon, FourSquare, Living Social, mobile marketing and QR Codes. They’re all different, but each represents an important tool for marketing and growing your business. 

I was excited to talk to her about the challenges in social media, but I found her comments not only helpful in developing the right mindset, but a foundation before attending her program as well.

Being successful in social media is no different than in any other aspect of business. You have to have the skill set first, especially in business and marketing. Without that understanding and respect you’re going to flounder. 

You need to have a plan and understand clearly what your goals are. For example, are you after more clients, more transactions, building brand awareness or new revenue streams?  Each component of your plan has a different path of success under the social media umbrella.

As she talked about the challenges of keeping up with the changes I began thinking about my own frustrations with social media. Twitter, Facebook, my blog all take an incredible amount of time every day, and I’m barely scratching the surface.  

New applications appear literally every day and in order to take advantage of them and follow through with the right application you have to understand every aspect.

This is only a fraction of what we talked about, but it got me thinking about the time all of us spend on the computer and engaged in some aspect of social media.  Every day there are new apps announced, new vehicles to help expand our reach. How do we stay cutting edge?

The Internet changed everything we do and social media has completely changed the way we communicate. Without a thorough understanding of social media and the respect for the growth it can bring to your business you can never reach your full potential.

Over the years I’ve sat through a lot of presentations in my career, some incredible and many disappointing. This is one program I’m absolutely not going to miss.  See you in Vegas at DIMA!  Finding out more about Georgia and her program is just a click away.

The world is changing very fast. Big will not beat small anymore. It will be the fast beating the slow. Rupert Murdoch

We get home and realize we’ve underestimated jet-lag if we’ve traveled far. We’ve underestimated how tired we are from the trip, the convention and just hanging out with new and old friends. It’s justified procrastination, as we step back, all with good intentions, just to take a break for a day or two. 

Monday morning rolls around and we’re ready to jump on some of those new ideas to help grow our business. NOT – email and phone messages come first. After all, we’ve been away a few days and we need to follow up on messages and issues that came into play while we were gone.  Then, what starts out as just an hour or two to check email, becomes half the day and we still haven’t starting working on the new directions we wanted to take our business!

“Tomorrow…I’ll get started tomorrow, if I can just use today to catch up on blogs, all my messages and email!”

Well gang, you’re only human and welcome to real time life! Life just gets in the way and like so many of us you’re never going to get to those new ideas. That excitement and momentum you came home with has been trumped by life, your family, your business and the routine you were in before you left!

If you’re in the same boat with me, then we’re going to explore a series of ideas to help you through the challenges of fighting off the outside world. Harry Chapin once talked about his definition of a good day. I’m paraphrasing, but a really good day was pretty much when he got to work on the things he loved to do most, as opposed to the things he had to do and putting out other people’s fires.

Let’s start building your arsenal of things you can do to stay focused and motivated:

• Isolation!  Okay, it’s normally a pretty negative word, but in this case you need to pick an hour every day when it’s absolutely YOUR time. Shut off the phone, your computer and just close the door to any room you can just be alone in. One hour of isolation with just your thoughts! Trust me on this one – it works!
• One step at a time! You can’t do it all at once, but you can make progress with everything you’ve learned. Start by taking one idea from each speaker you’d like to implement in your business.
• Low hanging fruit?  What are the new things you want to implement that are the easiest to do?
• Keeping Inspired! Blogs, podcasts, YouTube and webinars – there’s so much out there and it’s free. The only price you pay is your time.  Look for people writing about things you find inspiring.
• Join relevant forums to help you keep in touch with the new members of your network. For example, following Skip’s Summer School my good buddy, Brent Watkins,started a facebook page for the event.  In just a couple of days 60 people, all dealing with the same challenge of getting back into the routine, joined the new community.

Part II, tomorrow will focus on some specific Internet destinations to help you through the process. This is about changing more than just your business, it’s about you working to develop a new routine to stay creative!

I just spent five days out of the office in Sarasota. The blog was all caught up with two posts in the pipeline when we left on Thursday. The minus side of being in a routine is simply how hard it is to break, when you really want to. Five days on vacation and the latest I could sleep was 6:25 a.m. I still couldn’t do anything without first checking email on my phone. and often I’d find myself at my laptop, even though there was no wifi! 

So, I’m curious about your routines! I’m also curious how many of you have built into your routine the importance of checking your website EVERY day! I spoke at the IPI convention a couple of years ago and loved it when an attendee told me that there were five people in his business and each morning everyone has a different page assigned to them to make sure it’s loading the way it should.

From that point on I set things up so one of the first things I do, right after checking email, is to check the site, in this case Summer School.Then it’s on to email followed by the blog, then Facebook and Twitter. It’s just part of the routine. And while I have yet to find something major not working the way it should,  I have been able to do a lot of fine-tuning.

So, here’s the biggest question of the day – do you check your website every morning?

• Check your site on Explorer, Firefox and anything else out there that your client base might be using.
• If you have a storefront, check to make sure the appropriate links to Paypal, Authorize.net, etc. are working properly.
• Check a couple of pages at random to see if they load fast enough.
• Check any links you have to other sites: Twice I’ve found links not working and it turned out it was a mistake I’d made and never caught it initially.
• Last on the list – pick something to proof-read. Trust me – you’ll ALWAYS find a mistake!

Your website is no different than any retail store or office. Not checking it every day is no different than Nordstrom’s forgetting to unlock the door and then wondering what happened to business! Most important of all, and just like Nordstrom’s, keep your “inventory” fresh! Your galleries have to show your very best work and your promotions need to always be current!

Peter, in 93 different video clips, personally wished every one of his 4100 friends happy holidays!  He not only went through his entire list of Facebook friends, but tagged all the videos with each of our names! Seriously, I’ve never seen anything like it!  It just made me smile! Think about taking on a task this extensive - I don’t think I know anybody else who would tackle a project like this, let alone follow it through to completion.

Whether you really know Peter Doyle or not is irrelevant. What’s important is that Peter NEVER does anything half way! Last year we had a great guest post from Peter when he was working on an incredible breast cancer project, “To Have and To Hold”.  This project was so well done, it deserves another moment in the spotlight!

Peter, I can’t top your holiday wishes to all 4100 of us.  All I can do is wish you the very best in 2011 and look forward to whatever you’re about to tackle next!

Happy New Year!

My first week or two in the area we grabbed lunch.   Then he came to Summer School with his wife Perla.  Add in a party or two, another Summer School and the mutual love for photography and you’ve got all the ingredients of a great friendship.

Brian, Perla and their daughter Sara were over last night along with my stepson Michael, his girlfriend, Megan and our grandaughter, Isabelle.   While the kids played, we had a blast as Perla demonstrated her unmatched expertise in the kitchen, better than Emeril could have done, with a feast of Mexican dishes.  It was incredible!   At some point I clinked glasses with Brian, “Here’s to Facebook!”

One of my most favorite images of me and Sheila is all thanks to Brian and actually ran on his blog early last week.

We all get different things out of social media.  For some it’s a link to friends and family, others are about marketing, but whatever the reason, the most fun, be it Facebook or Twitter, comes from actually spending time with the friends you’ve grown to “know”.   Webinars, podcasts, forums, chat rooms and virtual trade shows are all fun and they enhance our education and experiences, but there’s still nothing that tops human contact!  

Make it a great Sunday!   Enjoy your family, friends or just your ability to procrastinate and enjoy doing nothing!  You’ve earned the right!

If you’re a photographer, which about 99% of my Facebook friends are, then why wouldn’t you at least have a head shot in your profile?  And, with that head shot, if you’re new to Facebook and looking for other photographers why wouldn’t you have a camera in your hands or at least be creative.

Relax, I’m not picking on anybody who just has a great head shot or a picture of your kids etc. The issue is being new and not putting the right information in your profile, head shot etc.   When you don’t know somebody and they’ve got nothing in their profile then why exactly do they get upset when you don’t friend them?  This definitely falls under my “life is too short” philosophy.   Seriously, save feeling hurt, indignant and upset for the really great crisis moments in life!

From freelance writer Robert Brault I found a great quote for today:

Life is short, God’s way of encouraging a bit of focus. 

We all know the lizard from Geico…the golden arches of MacDonalds…if you’re local you can sing the Empire Carpet jingle and if you’re into any television series you know the music from all your favorites.  So, how are you going to get your target audience to remember your name just as well?

It would be the longest blog I’d ever written if I went into all the detail, but here’s the short version.  You need to weave a web around your target consumers.  You need to be in front of your target audience at every opportunity. 

1) Direct mail puts you in their mailbox.

2) Advertising gets you into the local papers and magazines.

3) Email blasts and newsletters get you into their computer.

4) Links from everything bring them to your website.

5) Community involvement gets you physically next to them on various projects.  This is about you getting to know the people in your community and your neighbors getting to know you.

6) Publicity releases get you into the local paper.

7) A great image on a holiday card brings you into their homes at holiday time.

 8) Your business card and stationery remind them you’re a photographer.

9) Cross promoting with other non-competing vendors gets you into their heads via association with other business entitites in the community.

10) Being active on Facebook and Twitter gets you into their world of social media and makes you more accessible.

11) Writing your own blog and keeping it fresh with a consistent presence gives you an opportunity to show off your work and your personality,

12) Editorial gives you an incredible level of exposure and gives your publicity and advertising crediblity.

That’s it – twelve points of contact and ways to reach your target and build your brand, but it takes patience.  It also takes consistency and an unwavering dedication to delivering a quality product.   But even more important is your passion for the craft.  If you love photography and always shoot with your heart, then you can create images that tug at people’s hearts and word of mouth advertising becomes the mortar between the twelve bricks listed above!

But remember, nobody can build this “house” except you!

If nothing else I want to share the background of what happened yesterday.   Sheila and I had been dating for a year and a half, when we decided to move in together at the end of last April.  We’ve known each other since second grade, but were never friends through high school.  The friendship started up when I attended a high school reunion three years ago.

We had decided to get married in late August and even had invitations printed up for a backyard wedding.  We wanted very badly to have my folks here with us, but knew with their health problems that was unlikely.  So, we really started thinking about what most important to us.  We’ve both been married before, so it wasn’t our first rodeo!  The more we thought about it, the more we wanted to find a way for my folks to be a part of the day.

Yesterday was my parent’s 63rd wedding anniversary and it just made sense to take advantage of the great karma and get married on their anniversary date.  So at 7:00 am yesterday morning, Sheila’s friend Karen, the Chaplain at Akron Children’s Hospital where they both work, married us on our back patio with Molly the Wonder Dog as our witness.   The “wedding” could not have been more wonderful or had more meaning for the two of us.

So, thank you for your good wishes.  Thank you for continuing to show that social media is faster than the “grapevine” ever was.  And thank you for being such an important part of an industry I love so much.

Oh, and the answer to who was the photographer – oops, we didn’t have one.  But I did have a Flip set up on a tripod that captured the moment and the rest of the event was all shot on “neuro-chromes”!

Happy Wednesday everybody – make it a great one!

I’m going to profile one photographer a day in alphabetical order for the next few mornings.  All the links to their blogs, Twitter, etc. will be right here , so expanding your horizons will be just one click away.  

Scott Bourne:  Scott’s become a great buddy and we’re involved in the GoingPro project  together, but that’s not why he’s teaching at Summer School.  I love working with people who I truly learn from and Scott is at the top of the list.  Professional Photographer Magazine wrote a story about him as the “King of Social Media” and he deserves the title – just his blog alone gets close to two million page views a month, greater reach than most of the photographic magazines.  

Scott’s message is so strong and his willingness to help people utilize social media is unmatched.  People used to say you can’t be in business without a yellow pages ad…well today, you can’t be in business without a website and in turn, social media is a critical component.  How are you going to make your blog more effective?  How are you going to use Twitter to expand your reach? 

He’s done a few guest blogs here on how to get the most out of Twitter.  Plus his background includes virtually every specialty in professional photography and he’s got a great marketing head as well.  Technically,  he’s pure geek through and through – on a constant quest to stay on top of technology.   And it’s the same for staying current with the latest challenges in our industry.

In his controversial January 25 blog regarding too-low pricing he wrote:

“It’s impossible to run a sustainable business over the long haul, deliver good quality and care for the client at lowball prices. I’ve been around a long time. I’ve seen dozens of businesses fail using this model and more importantly (and more to the point) have seen dozens of brides’ wedding memories ruined by photographers who had no business being there in the first place. There’s no do-over on a wedding. It takes a decent budget to get a decent result. Good reliable gear with backups cost money. Training cost money. Quality wedding prints, albums, books and gallery wraps cost money. If you sell a bride a cheapo wedding album that falls apart because you couldn’t make enough profit doing the cheapo wedding shoot, how does that serve the client? These are people’s lives you’re messing with. What could have more value than the wedding album – the first family heirloom of a brand new family? Think about it.”

Scott’s program on Visualization will kick off the first full day of Summer School on August 9 at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas!  Then he’ll be helping me with some fun networking ideas at the end of that day.  One of the best parts of Summer School is just the ability to hang out with everybody and Scott will be there throughout the program to answer questions and help you with ideas to build a stronger business.

Want to learn more about Scott?  Follow his blogs, Photofocus and GoingPro.  Follow him on Twitter @scottbourne and @GoingPro2010.

Tomorrow we’ll take a look at Joe Buissink, repeatedly referred to as one of the top ten best wedding photographers in America!