Niche Play, Social Interaction, Product Production: A Breakdown

Ideas are easy. It’s the execution of ideas that really separates the sheep from the goats.
Sue Grafton

Notes on finding your place inside a niche, interacting and developing content.

What does marketing really mean? I stumbled on this excellent article that further pushed me to define my target with a laser scope and my purpose with such simplicity, it bleeds obviousness. Still working on that as it goes hand in hand with playing inside of my decided niche of “online entrepreneurs”. The more resources I read (Under30CEO, MyWifeQuitHerJob.com, The Marketing Minute to name a few) the more it’s hammered into my head that

You must not “spray and pray” your message, get out the sniper scope instead.
You must not have vague “I do marketing strategy” sales package or product. Your product and purpose needs to be particular, well articulated and obvious.
You must convey these things upfront and clearly

I’ve been doing a lot of reading lately, 1 in 20 of the sites I’m stumbling/stalking scream generic in wordage, design, and service/product offering. So while I “play” in my niche I’m throwing words around in my forum posts, e-mails, tweets, to better hone how I can stand out or be dead obvious in order that people can’t question what I offer at IT Arsenal.

tech support for online entrepreneurs seems to be most blatant but i’m still playing
power up your online business
“tech evaluator” “auto response master course”
injecting more of my personality and subtracting the pragmatic machine

Niche Play (Using Klout for instant relevant social interaction)

I’ve jumped around on Quantcast, Delicious, Klout (just found this, it’s gold. look up a “famous” or popular tweeter, then see who they are an “influencer of” and go to their website for instant relevant and potential fan), and StumbleUpon to build on a few sites I find create real value to online entrepreneurs and that I want to be involved in. I’ve started to post regularly, or read and promote content regularly. I also organized them into their own folder on Google Reader, then used an option in Google Reader called “create bundle” which allowed me to make a blip of code that will update dynamically this list of sites on my website, so these sites I’m commenting on regularly are also seen on my website at IT Arsenal, if the owner so happens to check me out. This site list is still very volatile.

Social Interaction (the best method for reading and sharing in one move)

I’ve recently been reading Trust Agents (amazingly relevant and useful) and Seth Godin’s Bootstrappers Bible (completely not relevant to a lifestyle business and for some reason being sold for $613 on Amazon right now) … in Trust Agents one of the comments by Chris Brogan is that you should promote others content 12 times as much as your own. I love this idea, one because it falls in line with my mission and story as a tech support provider, but this instantly promotes people becoming your friends and fans. Promoting others content is a highway shortcut to building up a network of followers than being good or offering something.

I’ve been paying specific attention to linking people up lately on Twitter, and promoting my friends who I know offer some sort of service or run a business. Show some love to someone today, heck, show me some love!

The best ways I found of doing this are through the typical social mediums like Twitter and Facebook, but it’s not what services you use, it’s how. It’s not feasible to go to each individual site and click on a share button multiple times with multiple logins. You want an easy button with the biggest impact. Here’s the quick process, if you want a how-to, let me know at IT Arsenal.

If worthy, I open the article, comment on it, then mark it “shared” in Google Reader and add a short relevant comment.
Fancy pants technologies (Twitterfeed and Yahoo Pipes) are then used to blast it out on Twitter or Facebook automatically with my attached note (which I’ll usually place an @attribution to) and bit.ly link to the article. Bonus: This process also ads it to your Google Reader shared links, which people who use or follow you on Google Buzz will see as well.

You’ve probably noticed others doing something like this, it typically looks like this: “Reading: ARTICLE TITLE” … which is boring…time to upgrade that. Here’s the process I followed, which feels a bit sketchy because it’s from 2009, but it works out.

http://www.rsc-ne-scotland.org.uk/mashe/2009/12/festive-fun-auto-tweeting-google-reader/

Want a full blown how-to? Let me know. Niche site list set and growing, and my methods of interaction are in gear.

Product Production (Can I help you?)

It’s great to make some in-roads and dig into my niche. I have my hands a bit dirty and it’s nothing more to manage than the simple website gigs, physical installs and JustAnswer questions I’m trying to dial back to make room for more sustaining and passive endeavors. The pipe dream of planning and thinking months of time will just open up for me to make the best most calculated moves are done for, so why not act, make a mess, and be fun and transparent about it? While defining my target market, which I mentioned at the start, I’m looking at what online entrepreneurs could gain from my tech expertise, (what’s your expertise?) These are where my thoughts lead. If you’re an online entrepreneur, by all means, SPEAK UP.

Backup Informer. My guide on backing up (you are backing up aren’t you?) is finally finished and being reviewed by a few peers. Notes below (this isn’t a sales pitch)

It’s good to send a “preview” copy to some trust worthy friends and potential partners for comments, feedback, and to work out the kinks.
Here’s a dead simple clip (javascript) of code for amateur password protection to a members page. (put in the <head> section and change “secretpassword”)
- <SCRIPT language=”JavaScript”> var password; var pass1=”secretpassword”; password=prompt(‘Enter Password’,’ ‘); if (password==pass1) alert(‘Correct Password! Click OK to Enter!’); else { window.location=”http://quickonlinetips.com/”; } </SCRIPT>

If you want to accept more than Paypal or Google Checkout, you’re going to have to pay a monthly fee. The bummer is most people actually prefer to use a payment gateway (meaning NOT Paypal or Google Checkout).
- Pat Flynn’s E-books the Smart Way reported just %3 of his thousands of sales were using Paypal. I’m sticking with Paypal/Google for the time being just cause this is my first product, but next time around I’ll consider a payment Gateway. I wonder what Adam Baker will do with this next digital product (Sell Your Crap) which looks like a stellar clean house guide.

Tech Evaluator (incubating, thoughts welcome)

The idea: A service that starts as an internal survey into what programs, web apps, and hardware you use daily, along with what you business mission is. I’ll provide improvements, enhancements, advice, etc on what’s available and what’s being used in your industry for best results.

Auto Response Master (incubating, thoughts welcome)

The idea: Instructional how-to on becoming a master of the auto-responce through the best tools available both as a marketing tool, and productivity tool in the common occurrence of personal/business e-mail mix. These can be a time defense superstar in your arsenal of technology for your business.

Support Secrets (incubating, thoughts welcome)

The idea: I’m better than Google. Here’s why. I have 10 years of selective and interpretive experience as an tech professional. Google can spit you out everything on anything, but “it” can’t sift through content or decisively tell what’s best for your needs. This service takes a survey stance and provides you the best places and people you’ll find support from for the tools you use for website development, marketing, productivity tools, and communication.

Marketing Power Tools (incubating, thoughts welcome)

The idea: There’s the service “Twitter” and then there’s the tools “Tweetdeck, Hootsuite, twitterfeed, etc” … do you know what the most powerful are and how to use them? This guidebook is your manual to the power tools of promotion. You’d think these tools would be common knowledge, but the truth of it is, you wouldn’t even know them if they hit you. Here’s an example, “What’s your Klout score?” or “How many people UN-followed you this month?” do you want to know why? The marketing tools of today can do things like nothing we can imagine, that is until we realize they are a website away. The message is yours, now find out how to amplify it.

A Real WordPress Backup (incubating, thoughts welcome)

The idea: Show me a service or website that will automatically back up both your wordpress database (mysql) AND all your customized FTP files with plugins and special .css tweaks? I can’t find one, so I’m offering you one. $50 one time set-up. Thoughts?

The Blog

Develop a posting schedule. IT Arsenal’s website has laid dormant for a few weeks as these revitalizations have gone into play, now it’s time to follow a golden rule of website content. Be consistent. Where is the content going to come from? It’s going to come from that Google Reader feed and twitter streams, I’ll take a step back and see what’s popular to my niche (online entrepreneurs) and I’ll add value and different perspectives on what’s popular and important (or I’ll simply relate the content to what technology is being used). One such post could be about that little sharing tactic I highlighted above. Whatever it is, I need some new paint and I need to be consistent about it.

I hope with these elements the site and who I am won’t come off as generic or boring, or as “another computer guy” … how can you laser in on your audience, dig into there surroundings and build something for them?

photo by by ˙Cаvin 〄

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