Tomorrow I’ll be doing my workshop on social media marketing locally with my friend Renée Scherer of Presentations Plus. Once again, instead of talking about it, I’m going to link to yesterday’s post on LinkedIn, which will link to the previous day’s post, and I’m also going to link to my post from last week talking about the third phase of my social media marketing methods for this workshop, since something that’s there is something I’m going to talk about here.
 by Morgan Howarth |
Something that’s generally easier to do today is to create a social media marketing strategy using audio and visual media options to help get your message across. Just six years ago visual media didn’t really exist for the masses, and even when it went live in February 2005, I doubt anyone expected that YouTube could be used for the types of things it’s used for now. Back in 2004 we could create MP3 files as sound files that we could then somehow get to other people, but they were large files and we didn’t have the download speeds we do today, so it took awhile before people could listen to your media.
These days, getting a video online takes creating an account on YouTube or Vimeo or one of the other sites, uploading the video from your computer or flash drive, which will only take a few minutes depending on the speed of your connection, and not only are you set with your video being online but it creates both a link to the video and code for your video that can be embedded into yours or anyone else’s site that takes a liking to it. That’s what I did last week with the above link to Phase III, where I posted a video of Renée talking about both our event and the place it was being held. It literally took her a couple of hours to film the video (multiple takes), get it to someone who cleaned it up in a couple of hours, then get it to me and have me take about 20 minutes to create the account and get the video uploaded. Then the next day it took me a minute to embed the video into the post; just amazing stuff.
With audio, there are many options, free and paid. Free options include popping an MP3 file online, which I’ve done with the numerous times I’ve been interviewed on both this blog and my business blog. Because download speeds are faster now and MP3 files are more compressed, this isn’t as bad a deal as it was in the past. There are also ways to create podcasts, such as hooking up with a site like Blog Talk Radio or a podcasting service that lets you record a file and convert it to something where people can listen to it easily enough without worrying about the time or having to deal with large files. A great example of that is my friend Tim Dodge’s site where he uploads podcasts of books he’s written one chapter at a time, since he’s also reading them. You should check out one of his books, Acts of Desperation, which I actually got to read and critique before he recorded it. If you look at the page, you’ll see multiple ways you can listen to it. Start at the bottom then move up, then go to the first page to listen to the rest of it.
No matter which way you go, it’s good to know that there are these social media marketing options, whether you decide to create them yourself or have someone else do it for you. One of these days, I’m going to finally purchase a camera, and then watch me go!
The way to create multimedia is getting easier and easier. Cellphones can take video and upload it to youTube. More and more “still” cameras are coming with the ability to produce HD quality video clips with sound. Just amazing stuff and, like youTube, people will find ways to use it that was never thought off back in the engineering labs.
Excellent post, Mitch!
Thanks Scott. It’s amazing seeing what people can do these days, and there’s better things yet to come.
Good morning, Mitch.
As you know, I was on a very slow dial-up connection until this year, and I had to move to a different part of the county to get broadband. Now, I have very fast access and it’s opened a new world of communications to me.
I’ve been watching movies on Netflix, listening to Blog Talk Radio, and now I’m watching webinars on topics of interest.
In March, I bought brand new computers, an iPod Touch, a Flip camera, and a very good video editing application.
When I feel like working again, video is going to be an important part of it.
I have a couple of videos on YouTube for clients and I’m getting feedback on what I need to do to make them better. Version two will be online in a couple of weeks.
I intend to do promotional videos for all my clients and semi-regular videos for other things happening near Murphy.
Not too interested in audio except as it relates to video, however.
Video editing can be complicated, but once you understand the applications and how to use them, it can be quite interesting and not as difficult as it first appears.
On the other hand, I’m finding it very hard to get small business owners to do something as simple as saying hi, their name, the name of their business, and a brief overview of what they do.
They do this every day when dealing with customers and clients in person, but don’t want to be on camera.
I honestly think I’d have better “conversions” if I were trying to get women to pose naked for the camera than I am when asking business owners to promote their businesses.
However, as they see what others are doing, they’re at least willing to talk about it now. Most of them. Some are still adamant that they don’t want to do it.
We’ll see how it progresses over time.
Act on your dream!
JD
John, people are scared of anything they see as “talking in public”, and you throw a camera in their face and they suddenly clam up. It’s funny, but it seems to work out that way. It’s like a conversation I was having on another blog with Val, who comments on this blog, about the topic of trying to stay an introvert in a world where it seems everyone is trying to take away your privacy. I believe one can get the best of both worlds without going to the extreme ends if one decides what they really want to do, or what’s important to them.
And I agree, you’d probably do better asking women to pose naked for you these days. lol
Mitch, I can ‘t wait for you to start recording some videos! Once you start, you won’t be able to stop.
One of these days, DeAnna, it just might feel like the thing I have to do. lol