{!date dayname+0}, {!date long+0} Dear {!firstname_fix} I hope you had a good week. Mine started well, with a presentation to the Academy for Chief Executives which resulted in bookings for four speaking engagements after people heard me talk about social media, especially LinkedIn as a business to business tool. That was a lovely start to the week. I also met Penny Power, the originator of Ecademy, at the Cherwell Valley motorway services on the M40 at 7.30am...! We hadn't planned to meet, but we bumped into each other as we had both decided at roughly the same time to stop for a morning coffee. It turned out I was the second person she had met that morning - and we were both going to the same event in Warwickshire. It just shows you - if you have loads of contacts, you increase the opportunities you have. Penny knows thousands of people, so bumping into them is commonplace for her, I suspect. Restricting your online "friends" could restrict your business perhaps.
YOUR QUESTIONS ANSWERED: What is the best day and time to send newsletters? Thank you to Matthew from Chippenham who asked this question, which is a real source of frustration for many other people I meet. Just when you should you send out your newsletters or post your blogs to get maximum impact? Some people will tell you because the greatest internet activity is on a Tuesday and Wednesday, those are the days when you should post material and send newsletters. But the reality is, much of that online activity is catching up with emails which were sent out the previous week. Equally, with so much mid-week activity online, your email can also get lost amongst it. As you know, this email is sent out on a Saturday each week. That's because many of you have told me this is a great day to get newsletters like this. Because I try to provide thought-provoking material, rather than "buy this now" kind of stuff, I know that many of you like to read this on a more relaxed kind of day, without the phone ringing and with less email interference. In other words, I send this newsletter out on a Saturday because that's what many of my readers tell me is best for them. What this means, in reality, is the best day to send your newsletter out or to write your blog posts is the day or time your readers reckon is the best. So, for my readership it is Saturday mornings. But for Matthew's readers it might be Wednesday night, or Thursday afternoon. Neither he, nor I know, until we ask. That's the point - the best day or time to send out your stuff is the one that most of your mailing list want it. So, the real answer to Matthew's question is to do some market research and then to test it. However, sometimes you will get conflicting results. You may find that many of your readers don't mind, saying that they will always read it when they get round to it, which may be a different day each week for them. And if you test it you may find that the "open rates" are pretty much the same no matter when you send it. In this case what you need to do is establish a pattern. Deliver regularly on the same day each week and people will get used to it arriving. The Sunday Times, for instance, comes out every Sunday. But it doesn't have to - all those feature articles, the supplements and so on could equally come out on a Tuesday. It's just we are used to that big pile of papers hitting the doormat on a Sunday. In other words, regular publishing is often more important than the day or time we choose. Select a day and time, stick to it and your readers will then get used to it and come to expect it. So, essentially you have two stage strategy in terms of deciding when is the best day to send out newsletters. Firstly, some market research and some testing. And then taking the results of that test, "plumping" for a day and time - and then sticking to it. Remember, you can always ask your question and get it answered in this newsletter by going to: http://www.grahamjones.co.uk/questions
WHAT I LEARNED THIS WEEK: Make sure you provide quality This week I attended two "webinars" - online conference presentations. I provide webinars to my clients - and will shortly be providing public ones (watch this space..!). So whenever I am an attendee I am looking at two things - the actual content I am receiving and the way it is being delivered, in case I can pick up any tips for my own webinars. The first webinar I attended was run by Citrix, the people who run GoToWebinar. Strangely, this was a webinar about webinars...! The second webinar I attended as about book publishing and how it can be used to boost a consultancy business. The webinar on webinars was professional. It started on time, it finished on time. It did exactly what it said it was going to do. There was an accompanying document, there was a Twitter conversation live as the event unfolded, using a hashtag and there were several opportunities to ask questions. I learned some useful hints and tips, was engaged in the event and there was no hard sell. The second webinar I attended started late and had to be get underway with the guest in control because the host hadn't logged on by the time we were due to start. He logged on a minute or two late, but mistakenly logged on as an attendee, rather than a host which meant he couldn't contribute as all attendee microphones were muted. The guest then had to try and connect him, while we twiddled our thumbs. The webinar had been billed as something which would provide us with 17 ideas for using books in business which we had never heard before. Wrong. I knew all 17 - and so do you probably, even if you've never written a book. Point number one was - wait for it - books can provide an author with credibility. Well, hold the front page, we didn't know that one..! This webinar got worse. Apart from grandmother sucking eggs syndrome, we were promised we could ask questions. It over-ran the time slot, so that opportunity disappeared. We were told we could Tweet if we wanted, but they were so busy running the webinar there was no way they would be following any conversation. Besides, there was no hashtag or Twitter name for this webinar. Worse, though, the last 20 minutes was a hard sell for a six month programme on how to write books within weeks. Bye bye, Mr Webinar. Two webinars, two ends of a spectrum. One, full of content, ideas, information and run completely professionally. The other, lacking in content, amateurish and a smokescreen for a hard sell. Guess what happened also this week? I decided that when writing my next book, I don't need the help of some "programme" which will make it all happen within weeks. Oh and I also decided to upgrade my account with GoToWebinar to the next level. Oh goodness - that was the webinar that DID NOT SELL...! Mmm. There's a lesson there. If you want to check out what else I've been doing for the past week, you can always look at: http://www.grahamjones.co.uk/week
THIS WEEK'S "MUST BUY": The Genesis WordPress Theme Framework Every now and then I get asked about WordPress themes. Many of my websites are run on WordPress, while some use Joomla. I choose depending upon the functionality the site requires. WordPress is a popular content management system that is easy to use, but the standard "themes" are, well, let's be frank, rubbish...! So, you need to use a well-designed theme for WordPress. There are three options. Option 1, get a bespoke design produced for you - if that's what you need, go to LA Marketing & Design who are WordPress design specialists. Option 2, is to design it yourself - and the best way of doing that is with Artisteer. This is a theme design program which is very easy to use and highly flexible. Option 3 is to invest in a "theme framework" that allows you to produce flexible designs. My favoured one of these is called "Genesis" from StudioPress. To show the flexibility of this theme framework, take a look at these two sites which both use the same theme...! Firstly, WhyHowProveIt! and then The Credibility Pyramid. They are completely different, yet use the same basic framework. That's the beauty of the Genesis system, you can produce significantly different designs, easily. To find out more about the StudioPress Genesis system visit: http://GJurl.com/genesis STOP PRESS...! Don't forget.... The Social Media Guys are me, Nigel Morgan, who runs Morgan PR and Ant Hodges from ToInfinity, the online marketing agency. Tickets for our seminar tour are now on sale for just £47. AND you get bonus extras of personal consultancy for your company and entry into our "members only" Social Media Lounge. So, sign up now for the Social Media Guys LIVE! You can buy your ticket at http://GJurl.com/smgtour So, that's it for this week - see you in seven days...! Kind Regards
Graham Jones Web: grahamjones.co.uk Tel: +44 118 336 9710 If you no longer wish to receive this newsletter than you can delete your name from the mailing list by clicking this link: {!remove_web} Affiliate Links: Some of the links in this newsletter are affiliate links providing me with a small commission when you purchase the item. However, I only use affiliate links for products which I personally value. |
