Top Tips for what to say in About Me videos for your website

Posted on March 2, 2012 by Nicky Kriel

Are you uncomfortable about being filmed? Maybe you have decided to film an “About me” video for your website, but you’ve got stuck. You don’t know what to say. I asked my friend, Alan Donegan, who is a presentation expert if he could give us a few tips.

This video goes more into the thought behind the series of tips.

So Here’s -
Top Tips for what to say in an About Me video: #1 When to say your name

Top Tips for what to say in an About Me video: #2 Getting Engagement

Top Tips for what to say in an About Me video: #3 Getting Attention

Top Tips for what to say in an About Me video: #4 Telling Stories

Top Tips for what to say in an About Me video: #5 Think of your audience

And finally, my About Me video.

If you want to contact me http://www.nickykriel.com/contact-me.

To find out more about Alan Donegan, his website is www.enjoypresenting.co.uk and you can find him on Twitter @AlanDonegan.
I would love feedback about my video, thank you. Do you think I listened to Alan’s tips?

LinkedIn Today: How to use it

Posted on January 29, 2012 by Nicky Kriel

Did you know that LinkedIn makes it easy to find articles and news that are relevant to you? In fact, they present it to you on a plate.

Have you noticed the LinkedIn Today on your Home Page? Are you using LinkedIn Today to help you?

What is LinkedIn Today?

Just below your update box, you have the top articles that are currently being read and shared on LinkedIn within your industry and among your peers.

LinkedIn will look at:

the industry that you are in
who you are connected to
how often articles are been shared, liked or commented on
which recent articles your direct connection have shared

How to use LinkedIn Today

Tailor your LinkedIn Today

The first step is to make sure that headlines you get, are tailor-made for you.

By clicking on the “See all Top Headlines for You” this is what you see:

By clicking on the “See all” for either the Top Sources or Suggested industries, this is what you’ll see:

You can choose which sources and industries are relevant to you specifically by clicking the Follow button.

Read the Headlines

It is a very easy way to keep up to speed with what is happening in your industry. It is worth creating a daily habit for yourself. Even if it is just read one article a day!

Comment on the article

Very few people leave comments on articles and there is a very good reason why you should consider doing it.

It’s an opportunity to form a relationship with the author
It’s an opportunity to show that you are a thought leader (although you have to say more than “Nice post”!) A thoughtful considered response is ideal if you have the time.
Other people can read your comment so it increases your online visibility
Most comments you leave require a website address. This creates a backlink to your website
Each comment can be found by search engines. It gives people who are searching for your name, a more rounded view of you.

Caution: Be aware that if you write a ranting comment on someone’s post it will reflect badly on you.

Share the article

Share the post you have read on LinkedIn, adding a comment to your update.

By sharing good quality content, you get associated with the content.
You don’t have to write everything yourself.
People appreciate people who share good sources of news.
It is an easy way to update your LinkedIn Profile
Which in turn gives you better visibility on LinkedIn

Simple really, isn’t it? Let me know if you have been using LinkedIn Today by leaving a comment below.

Your Personal Brand on Social Media

Posted on January 3, 2012 by Nicky Kriel

Are you still trying to hide behind a company logo? Are you still not sure about what to reveal about yourself on Social Media. I have news for you:

Being bland, faceless and vanilla, doesn’t work on Social Media.

Forget: Business to Business (B2B) and Business to Consumer (B2C). You need to start thinking

People to People (P2P).

People want to connect with people. People do business with People they know, like and trust. Social Media is SOCIAL. It is hard to strike up a relationship with a business spewing sales messages constantly. So many businesses think that Social Media is a just a free advertising platform. They constantly broadcast marketing messages and then they wonder why it is not working for them.

As a small business, Social Media offers you a great opportunity to level the playing field, but you need to willing to show that you are a real person.

When we use platforms like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn we let people sample what we are like and form an impression about us over time. I have had so many phone calls which start with something like, “I have been watching/following you for some time now and I would like to do business with you” from people I haven’t met yet in real life.

When you are yourself, you attract people who are like you to you. It is incredibly hard work, if not impossible, creating a persona and maintaining it over a long period of time. It is far easier being yourself.

“Be yourself, everyone else is already taken” Oscar Wilde

I found this very powerful YouTube video from Gary Vaynerchuk, who is a best selling author, very successful wine merchant and Social Media speaker. I happen to agree with him and would love to know what you think about it.

Leave a comment below and let me know what you think about showing your personality on Social Media. Are you being yourself or are you still hiding?

Social Media Strategy: Do you have one for your business?

Posted on November 10, 2011 by Nicky Kriel

Do you have a Social Media Strategy?

Or do you just have Social Media accounts that you use?

It is very easy to jump on the bandwagon and be on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn without having a clear idea of how you want to use them to grow your business. Time is a precious resource, can you afford to waste it?

This is a talk that I did for the Chartered Institute of Marketing (CIM) Surrey in September. I think that you will find the questions useful for your business.

I would love to have any comments and please feel free to share it.

If you would like to work on your Social Media Strategy, here are two courses coming up this month:

Half day Workshop -Guildford, Surrey 25th January – http://www.nickykriel.com/blog/social-media-strategy-workshop/

Online Class – 23rd January, 8pm https://student.gototraining.com/r/2256092646607407104

LinkedIn: 3 New things you may have missed

Posted on October 24, 2011 by Nicky Kriel

LinkedIn has added a few improvements that you might know be aware of yet and I thought I would share them with you.

Skills

Now you can improve the chances of people finding you by adding skills. I don’t think they will help you get found via LinkedIn search algorithm yet, but they may in the future. It is great way to find out which terms people in your industry are using. You will find Skills under the “More” tab.

Benefits:

Find out the keywords to be using
Find out relevant companies to be working with
Show your skills clearly

Classmates

Love this new addition! You can now see people you were at school and University in a very useful way. It shows you a summary of what your alumni groups are up to at the moment, where they are working, which industries and their location. Follow this highlighted word to give Classmates a go. I was shocked at how many middle-aged people were with me at University!

Benefits:

Find people that you have lost touch with
Increase your network with people you already know
You never know that one of your friends might be doing something very relevant to what you are doing now

Companies can now post updates

If you have a company profile, did you know that you can post updates to all those people who follow you. Great for raising your companies profile. They also provide metrics so you can find out which posts your customers found engaging.

Benefits:

Make your company page more dynamic
Share your news stories and keep people up to date with your business
People can respond to your posts from their update feed which helps you to engage in conversation
Raise your company’s visibility
Check the metrics to see which updates get the most engagement and do more of them!

LinkedIn has made changes which I believe are improvements. Let me know if you found this useful by leaving me a comment.

How to follow your LinkedIn connections on Twitter

Posted on September 28, 2011 by Nicky Kriel

Follow to get Followed on Twitter

One of the most frequently asked questions I get asked about Twitter is: How do I get more followers on Twitter?

My top tip is to follow people first.

The easiest people to follow are the people who you already know.
They are the most likely to follow you back
and are far more likely to engage with you.

Did you know it was very easy to follow all your LinkedIn contacts on Twitter?

Good reasons to follow your LinkedIn connections

Building a quality network is very important on any Social Media platform and why not use the quality network you have already built up on LinkedIn?
Twitter allows you to be more informal than LinkedIn so you will see a more rounded aspect of their personality.
A lot of the activity on LinkedIn is hidden in Groups whereas all Tweets appear in your Timeline
Twitter tends to have a faster pace and so you will get a more speedy response
You already know them so you will have things to Tweet about

How do you follow them?

Either you can go to each contact on LinkedIn and click on the follow button on their profile

Follow all your LinkedIn contacts in one go.

Go to “Who to Follow” in the top bar of your Twitter Account
Click on the “Find Friends” tab
Find LinkedIn “Search Contacts”
The first time you do this is you will need to allow permission for Twitter to access your LinkedIn account
You will be shown a list of LinkedIn connections who have a Twitter Account
Click on the Follow buttons
You can even save your LinkedIn Connections as a Twitter list

Easy! Isn’t it?

This is worth repeating every now and again because

you may have new connections on LinkedIn
some LinkedIn contacts may have recently joined Twitter

Let me know if you found this useful by leaving a comment below.

5 Ways to use LinkedIn as a small business

Posted on September 13, 2011 by Nicky Kriel

100 million business professions
World’s largest audience of influential and affluent people
Average Household Income $109k
45% of members are business decision maker
Growing rapidly – new member every second
Largely untapped
Can export contacts so you can own the data
Free database that can be searched

Ways to use it as a small business

1. There is no point in being fabulous if you can’t be found

LinkedIn Profiles have a very high Google Page Rank. There is a good chance that if someone is searching for your name, your LinkedIn profile will be one of your top search results. What does your profile say about you right now? Is it up to date? Is it filled in 100%?

Many people will search on LinkedIn using keywords. If you search under the relevant words or phrases that customers might be looking for, how do you rank? Have you optimised your profile yet for keywords?

2. Find out more about the potential business partner and customers

LinkedIn is a great resource for researching people before you meet up with them. Some things to look at

website(s)
social media
past experience
blog
testimonials – what are other people saying about them?
contacts – do you share mutual acquaintences that you could speak to directly?

3. Increase your network

Having ten or twenty connections on LinkedIn is not going to help you that much. It is not so much the people you know as the people they might know. The bigger your network the more opportunities you have. BUT, remember there is no point in just collecting people for the sake of numbers. You want to build a quality network of people. Each year of your life you meet new people. So who do you already know that you haven’t connected with yet?

past colleagues
people who were at school or university with you
people you have met networking (do you have a pile of business cards somewhere?)
people on your mailing list or contact list
people you meet through social events or shared interests

When was the last time you contacted some of your connections? I know someone who met up with an old colleague for a quick cup of coffee to stay in touch and walked away with eighteen days of training.

4. Set up your expertise in your niche

LinkedIn allows you to show your expertises by

Having your level of experience available for everyone to see on your profile. Have you filled your profile in thoroughly?
By actively taking part in discussions in Groups, you can display your knowledge by giving helpful advice and asking thought provoking questions
By using the Answers section of LinkedIn to field relevant questions and answer questions about your industry
By providing useful links to relevant articles in updates
By linking your blog so that you show your depth of knowledge

5. Find and connect with potential customers

LinkedIn is probably the world’s most useful database for a small business. You have 100 million business professionals data at your fingertips and it is FREE.

Learn how to use the advanced search function to find potential customers.
See how you are already connected to them
Do they share a group with you? Do you know someone who could introduce you to them?
Read their profile thoroughly
Make contact

This post is about the “what to do”, let me know if you want to know the “how to do it”.

K.I.S.S. on Social Media

Posted on June 13, 2011 by Nicky Kriel

Have you heard of the K.I.S.S. principle? You know, the acronym for Keep It Simple, Stupid? Well, for Social Media , the principle of K.I.S.S.S might be more relevant: Keep it Simple, Short and Shareable.

Why Simple?

People don’t have much time. In fact, you probably only have 1 second to make an impression.

When you Tweet,
post on Facebook
or update LinkedIn

Is it obvious what it is about?

I have seen paragraphs condensed into one tweet!! 140 characters full of abbreviations and acronyms. Would you be bothered to decipher it?

Keep one thought per tweet or post.

Action Point: Double check your tweet or post to make sure that it is obvious to the reader

Why Short?

On Twitter - you have a limit of 140 characters. Do not be tempted to do a longer tweet even if certain apps allow you to do so. It means your reader has to open up a new page to read the message and then close it down. Little things can irritate people, especially, when the same thing could be said more succinctly.
On Twitter - if you want people to retweet your message, you should only use a maximum of 125 characters or less to allow people to share your message easily with their followers.
On Facebook Pages – research has shown that the shorter the post the greater the response! In fact, 80 characters is the optimum length of a post to get the maximum response. How long are your posts?

Action Point: Can you make your post shorter without losing meaning?

Why Shareable?

If you are using Social Media, you want people to respond to posts and spread them around the Social Media Universe.

How much thought are you putting into why someone would want to share your post?

Do they make people laugh, smile or think?
Are they helpful, insightful or informative?
Remember: all your posts should be engaging, entertaining, educational or enriching!

Action Point: Check your posts before you share them and ask yourself, “ Would you share or engage with this post if you were reading it?”

What do you think K.I.S.S. should stand for? Leave your comments below, thank you.

Nicky Kriel | Social Media Coach & Trainer | Social Media for Business

Inspiring you to grow your business through Social Media

Category Archives: LinkedIn

What is Answers?

Where can you find Answers?

What is LinkedIn Today?

How to use LinkedIn Today

Tailor your LinkedIn Today

Read the Headlines

Comment on the article

Share the article

Skills

Classmates

Companies can now post updates

How to add the applications

Good reasons to follow your LinkedIn connections

How do you follow them?

Why LinkedIn?

Ways to use it as a small business

1. There is no point in being fabulous if you can’t be found

2. Find out more about the potential business partner and customers

3. Increase your network

4. Set up your expertise in your niche

5. Find and connect with potential customers

Why Simple?

Why Short?

Why Shareable?