Marketing

You probably don’t want to be a bonehead marketer. So let me tell you exactly how I was one recently, to help you avoid the condition.

It started when I was asked to give a presentation on integrating Twitter into WordPress for the Dallas Fort Worth WordPress Meetup Group. Public speaking is something I like to practice whenever possible and I knew exactly what materials I wanted to talk about. So, I spent a good bit of time putting my presentation together and getting things organized.

Because the meetings are monthly, I had an entire month to plan and prepare. I created bulleted slides with relevant graphics. I painstakingly referenced two pages worth of resources so that my audience could take the information and use it in their own projects. It was important to me to provide as much value as possible to everyone who showed up to listen.

I even brought a projector complete with extension cords and remote control. Clearly I wanted it to be a successful event. So you can probably imagine how many people I told about the Meetup. Your probably guessing 10, 20, or 100 people, right?

Did I tell my friends, colleagues, or family? My neighbor, my barber, my banker, or my dog? No! I didn’t. I didn’t say one single word to anyone. I didn’t write about it on my blog, I didn’t post it on Twittter or Facebook. I did tell anyone! Why?

The simple answer is I didn’t think to. I didn’t think to say anything until just before the meeting. About 30 minutes before I was supposed to arrive and setup the projector, I talked with a few friends on Twitter while I was at a Starbucks across the street. But other than that, I just didn’t think to promote it. This is exactly how you find yourself being a bonehead marketer. You don’t mean to. It just happens. Oh, and it will happen.

What I should have done after being asked to speak to the WordPress group was take two minutes to create a quick outline of my promotion schedule for that month, and then put reminders in my calendar to prompt about specific actions.

I could have started by announcing on Twitter that I would be speaking at the next DFW WordPress Meet up. I could have invited locals out to the event and let others know they could download the presentation if they couldn’t make the meeting.

Then, I could have made periodic announcements on twitter leading up to the event. I also could have written about it on The Open Source Marketer blog and e-mailed an invitation to my mailing list.

I could have invited friends and colleagues who could have been interested in networking with WordPress bloggers and could have sent out an announcement to my own Internet Entrepreneurs Meetup group. And why didn’t I? Because I was a bonehead marketer. I got so wrapped up in making sure that I gave a good presentation that I forgot to tell anybody about it.

Now don’t feel too bad about lost opportunities because, you get to learn from my mistake, and overall 50 people still attended the Meetup. Plus, given the fact that our meeting room only tell 50 people, it wasn’t too bad that extra people didn’t showed up.

But don’t get me wrong, if 50 extra people had signed up for the event we would have just moved the meeting to a bigger space. It would have been a good problem to have, is all I’m saying.

So, learn from my mistake and don’t be a bonehead marketer. It’s extremely easy to get the word out about things these days. So, leverage that ability to help share your information with as many people as possible. It’ll help to ensure that your efforts and time are well spent.

Living and learning,

Charles McKeever
OpenSourceMarketer.com

Here’s a copy of the presentation. I’ll be writing more about integrating Twitter into WordPress in upcoming articles.

How to Integrate Twitter Into WordPress