Yellow Dog Consulting

Sales & Marketing Consulting for solo-preneurs.

5 Ways I Have Grown my Twitter Followers

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Screen_Shot_2015-01-19_at_2.57.06_PMSure I don’t have millions of followers on Twitter, but I’ve amassed a few over the years, and I haven’t tried that hard honestly. I know I could do a lot more to get more followers, from better self promotion, to participating in a #FF or #TBT but instead, I prefer to actually connect with people.

A few months back I posted an article on how I’ve grown my LinkedIn connections and now I’m finally getting around to share how I’ve grown my Twitter followers over the years.

Here’s the 5 things I’ve done to grow my twitter followers:

  1. Connect with everyone WHEN you meet them – If I am going to an event, I’ll start following the organization around the time I register. I may look for the speaker (hopefully if I follow the organization they’re promoting the speaker), and if there’s someone I want to meet I may even tweet at them in advance. When I’m at a networking event, if someone mentions they’re on Twitter, I’ll pull out my phone and start following them right there.
  2. Tweet Along – When I’m at an event I will often live tweet the event. Apologies if you’ve had to slog through my Twitter stream! I use Twitter like I use to make notes. If I hear a good nugget, I’ll tweet it! It helps me to pay attention. If there’s a hashtag for the event, I’ll use it so others can find my tweets and I often find a few new followers that way too.
  3. Encourage people to follow you – My Twitter handle is on my business card, it’s in my email signature, it’s in my newsletter signature, it’s on my website and I talk about my love of Twitter often. When I speak, I mention my Twitter up front and ask people to tweet along.
  4. Follow the Leader – Follow people in your industry, follow thought leaders you admire, follow celebrities and pop culture folks that you enjoy. Don’t just use it for work, be a real person, it’s who we want to work with!
  5. SHARE – Dude, more than anything, you need to share other people’s content. Did you read a good blog post from a friend or colleague? Share that! Did something make you laugh and you think your audience will enjoy it? Retweet away! Also share when you meet with someone and had a good time. You will often see me tweeting “so great to hangout with @xxx today!” and stuff like that. Taking the social media OFF line and being real, is important! Who I tweet with online isn’t always someone I know in my real life, and that’s OK. I’ve made many friends from Twitter. It’s not as creepy as it sounds!

The Pros and Cons of Our 5 Favorite CRM Software Systems

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Today’s guest blog post is from my friend Elizabeth Harris at Resultist Consulting. When I saw this white paper she wrote on CRM’s a couple of weeks ago I KNEW my readers needed to see this. If you have a CRM, are considering a CRM, or don’t know what a CRM is, this post is for you!

pros and cons of our 5 favorite CRM software systemsKeeping up can be difficult but, if we have the processes and tools in place, we ride the wave. With the right CRM software solution, relationships become more than just a name on a list. The ability to listen, serve and move prospects to a win-win improves. Regardless of which is best for your team, CRM software is more than a list, it is a contact list with a brain.

When selecting a CRM software system, choices include a robust CRM software solution, a simple CRM designed for very small businesses or a free version to fit your budget. Wikipedia has a list of CRM software, but it lacks wisdom and is not truly helpful for making a decision that is relevant to you.

Automation is perhaps the most valuable aspect of CRM and it’s a shame that not all software packages offer it. Automation is the software’s ability to remind sales and marketing representatives to follow up with customers at the right time. Automation reminds you—or in some cases, actually handles the task for you – of needed activities such as following up 30 days after a sales purchase with another special offer or calling the sales prospect 10 days after the individual signed up for a trial.

Automation via CRM is a primary reason for pulling away from the old Excel spreadsheet and moving to a new system. The benefits outweigh any small learning curve needed.

Instead of walking through every detail and specification, we considered the pros and cons of each CRM solution and summarized them in a free white paper.

Our favorite CRMs:

  • Easily and cost efficiently integrates with HubSpot
  • Are easy to use (Apple-like intuitiveness)
  • Are reasonably priced (now and with future growth)
  • Offer a depth and breadth of support resources (from the platform provider and the “ecosystem” around the platform)

There are five favorite tools we think will work for most small to medium sized businesses. Here is a link to the brand new CRM white paper resource titled “The Pros and Cons of Our 5 Favorite CRM Software Systems.”

Since specifications and details are already available, I kept the content more specifically to the “pros & cons” with a few random thoughts.

As you consider our five favorite CRM software systems, look closely at your business processes, discuss with employees what they need and want, contrast that with your bottom line, and you’ll quickly have an accurate picture of the right CRM software for you.

Can you let me know your thoughts about this brand new CRM resource?

Elizabeth Harris, Resultis ConsultingElizabeth Harris – Resultist Consulting

Elizabeth Harris is the founder and CEO of Resultist Consulting. She works with small and mid-sized businesses to organize their sales and revenue processes to make them predictable and profitable.

Elizabeth has more than 20 years of experience as a proven driver of revenue, profitability and accountability. She is a complex B2B sales expert; adept improving businesses in competitive and changing market conditions. Resultist is her fifth business. In one of her previous businesses she grew it from $4M to $16M in annual revenues in 3 ½ years.

Hey Brands – What’s Taking So Long?

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drink more beerI got a text from my friend the other day:

New business idea for you. Call all your fav breweries and have them got on their social media stuff and set up a system to do so. Because it shouldn’t take a week to like my tweet.

I LOVE this! Here’s the deal folks – if you’re on social media you have to BE on social media. No phoning it in. This isn’t a one way street, this is a back and forth conversation with your network. My friend and I often meetup at the Taphouse for a beer or cider and we’ll tweet at the brewery we’re consuming. Often the breweries will comment back to us or favorite or re-post our tweets. And that’s super cool when it happens! Correction: It’s super cool when it happens within a day of doing it. But a week later? That’s lazy.

I’m not asking you to favorite everything customers say about your brand, but I am saying you need to be on top of it. 5 minutes a day is fine. Just pop into your social media accounts – check out who’s tagged you or commented to you. Answer questions, thank people, repost a couple of cool comments if they’re there. 5 minutes, not 5 hours.

If I like your brand I’ll be tweeting about it. As long as you’re on Twitter and also active. It’s not fun to have a conversation with yourself. And on social media it can be even more obvious when you are.