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Really? We’re STILL Talking About Ghost Blogging?

What is it with these social media purists and ghost blogging? What exactly do they not understand?

Ghost blogging is a service that is provided by ghost writers. We transcribe interviews from our clients, get their approval for what we’ve written, and we post it to their blogs.

This is no more inauthentic than hiring a social media agency to run your social media campaign, or an ad agency to create your TV commercials. It’s no more inauthentic than private labeling/white labeling a product made by someone else — food companies do it all the time, and no one complains.

My friend, Doug Karr, recently wrote a post about Avinash Kaushik’s rather misinformed statement about “ghost blogging being the antithesis of everything social.”

Doug said:

It’s always interesting when someone with as much authority as Avinash throws out a rule like this. Not only do I disagree with Avinash, I know many, many companies who would disagree as well. Ghostblogging is not the antithesis of everything social… inauthenticity, dishonesty, and insincerity are the antithesis of everything social.

As a professional ghost blogger, I’m sick to death of people who paint ghost bloggers as some sort of moral leper, the used car salesmen of the social media industry. (Oops. There, now you’ve made me offend used car salesmen. Happy now?) These social media purists decry ghost blogging as being less than honest because CEOs of large corporations and small businesses don’t spend 1 – 2 hours a day crafting a single blog post.

“Oh, but if you were serious about it, you’d make the time,” they lilt, wagging their fingers at the slacker CEOs who whine that they’re “tired” after a 14 hour day. “Because social media is all about the conversation and community and the inherent good in other people.”

No it isn’t. Social media in the business world is all about making money. Businesses can’t pay their workers with conversations. You don’t appease shareholders with community. And their vendors don’t want to hear about all the good you’re finding in other people when they ask why you’re 60 days overdue.

If we followed the social media purists’ logic to its logical conclusion, we would not be allowed to use these other ghost-type services:

  • Businesses would have to produce their own ads, commercials, and graphics in-house. They could not hire an outside agency to do it. Or if they did, there would be a big disclaimer on it saying it was produced by that agency.
  • Software companies could not outsource their programming to freelance coders. They should do it all themselves.
  • Celebrities should not hire ghost writers to help with their books. They should be allowed to suck on their own.
  • Politicians would not be allowed to use ghost writers to write their speeches. They would have to mumble and fumble their way through every speech, no matter who they were. Or if they used a ghostwriter, they would have to interrupt their speech every 10 minutes with, “This speech was written by my ghost writer, Jeff Shesol.”

Ghost blogging is the last bastion of any kind of ghosting, where some purist thinks that we shouldn’t be allowed to do it because it’s “inauthentic.”

Do you know what’s inauthentic? Inauthentic is following fewer than 100 people while 25,000 people follow you on Twitter. f you’re in “the conversation” business, don’t you think you should have a conversation? Otherwise, you’re just holding a one-way broadcast with 25,000 people, and are showing that you’re not willing to listen to anyone else. That’s not authentic in the least bit.

Whether the purists like it or not, ghost blogging is going to only get more popular. As companies want to enter the social media marketing realm and realize they can’t, because they just laid off their best writers, they will look for other ways to gain that competitive edge. If they’re going to outsource their web design, their ad creation, and their strategy, why shouldn’t they outsource their writing too?

There are freelance writers in all other parts of business — marketing copy, TV scripts, radio scripts, ad copy, web copy, annual reports, press releases, white papers, grant proposals — so why is blog writing so different from all those other forms of ghost writing?

It isn’t. If you hire someone to write something for you, and you don’t stick their name on it, they’re a ghost writer. I don’t care if it’s marketing, advertising, or grants. They’re a ghost writer. No one is complaining about their inauthenticity or their non-transparency.

So the purists need to get off their high horse, learn how the world works, and accept the fact that ghost writers are skilled writers who are paid to provide a service for other people. And we’re going to be here for a while.

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John Uhri’s Sketch Notes From My Blog Indiana 2010 Presentation

I always love it when John Uhri (@y0mbo) comes to my talks at a conference, because he always creates awesome sketch notes for me. It’s actually very flattering and a great ego boost, so I wanted to show off the notes he did for me at Blog Indiana 2010.

I talked about 11 blog promotion tips to a rather full house. I was a little nervous before I talked, but then again, I’m always nervous before I give a talk. I worry that everyone has heard what I’m about to say, but it’s too late to go in and actually make any changes to the deck. I start having a Stuart Smalley panic attack: “Oh God, everyone’s going to see through me, and label me a failure. I’m going to die homeless and penniless and 30 pounds overweight.”

But then I gave the presentation and rocked it — even if I do say so myself — and lots of people told me they were hearing brand new stuff. (This was especially heartening, since those were the people who I thought would say I didn’t have anything new to offer.)

John says these sketch notes actually help him understand the presentation better than just taking notes, because it forces him to understand it enough to be able to come up with an image or visual cue about what it is. (Last year, he included a sketch of Peter Griffin because I made a reference to the It’s In My Raccoon Wounds” line from a Family Guy episode.)

Here are all of John’s sketch notes form Blog Indiana 2010.

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Ruminations of an “Outsider Writer”

Lately, I’ve been thinking about what it means to be a writer. What does it mean to be a good writer?

Can anyone do it, or is it something that should only be attempted by trained professionals?

I’ve been thinking about this after hearing a new term: outsider artist. An outsider artist is someone who did not get any formal academic training about being an artist. They’re totally self-taught, they picked things up by trial and error, or by asking other artists, but they didn’t pursue a four year art degree to learn all of the different schools and styles, techniques and tricks.

In some circles, outsider art — Art Brut, French for “raw art” — is a label given with some disdain. It’s said with a slight sneer, like the person who said it just got a whiff of something you stepped in. The outsider artist is not in that special circle. They’re excluded from polite society, and are looked down on, or talked about behind their backs. They are outside the circles of culture, acceptability, and the success that a $10,000+ a year tuition brings.

In other circles, being an outsider artist is a badge of honor. They’re the rebels, the artists from the wrong sides of the tracks. Many outsider artists are not discovered until after their death, if they’re ever discovered at all.

I’m an outsider writer. (A term I’m not fond of, mostly because the rhyming makes it sound silly.)

I was not formally trained as a writer, at least not four years’ worth. I took the required English comp class, a couple journalism classes, and wrote for my college newspaper. My writing skills are completely self-taught, sharpened over the last 23 years.

Does this make me less of a writer? Am I somehow outside the mainstream because I didn’t get the creative writing degree, or the Master of Fine Arts (MFA)?

I’ve met some of these MFAs and creative writers. Most of them are fine people who have skills I’m envious of. Some of these insider writers are not as good as they believe. Some of them just plain suck. And some of them are snobbish, arrogant, and. . .well, let’s just say I came up with a different meaning for “MFA.”

I’m often torn in my views on writing: on one hand, it’s an art form that should only be practiced professionally by people who have a mastery of the language, and can create compelling sentences and stories. Their work shouldn’t be clumsily manhandled by non-writers who claim to be “editing” it.

On the other hand, writing is egalitarian: anyone can be a writer. It’s something we were all taught to do throughout school and college. It’s something that even a person with a high school education can excel at.

Most days, I fall into the egalitarian camp. Anyone can be a writer. You just need the desire, determination, some basic skills, and a pen. From there, you can be any kind of writer you want. Who am I to say whether you’re “good enough,” or shouldn’t enjoy every apple of success you can grab? I’m the outsider, remember?

I’m an outsider writer, but I’ve claimed the awards and accolades the properly-trained writers should have gotten. You have to wonder just how good all their training is when a stone-cold noobie can make a bigger impact with one piece than the people who spent several years of their life preparing for.

I’m an outsider writer, and I wear that badge, that literary leather jacket, with pride. I’ve scratched and struggled for every success I’ve gotten, and I earned every one of my scars. I’ve spent the last 20+ years, studying, reading, practicing, and honing. I’ve been rejected by some of the best and the worst in the business. I like my outsider writer status. It suits me, and I wear it better than a lot of the insiders wear theirs.

Please note: I am not saying I can outwrite any MFA or creative writer. I’m not some Wyatt Earp wordsmith. Far from it. I have several friends who are trained writers, and frankly, they can kick my ass, and I gape open-mouthed at their ability to string words together. But I offer this idea of the successful Outsider Writer to anyone who has an urge to write, but thought that a lack of training or education should hold them back.

Are you an outsider or trained writer? Did you get an education in creative writing, or did you just figure it out as you went along? Are you better off or worse off for your choice? And do you wish you could do it any differently, if you had the chance?

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Not Every Social Media Consultant Knows What They’re Doing

I was tweeting with my friend and fellow social media consultant, Dana Nelson, a couple nights ago about a business presentation she was sitting in, when she quoted this piece of advice from the presenter.

“Posting your business on other business sites is lame – tagging business/ cross marketing does not work.”

Wait, what? Who said that, the business professor from Back to School?

Cross-posting doesn’t work? Creating visible partnerships is lame? Creating a referral network is ineffectual?

Look, there are a lot, a lot, a loooooooot of social media consultants out there. And they don’t all know what they’re talking about. It worries me that these people are spreading poor information out there. It’s like a volunteer sheriff’s deputy telling people you can’t be arrested for drunk driving if you’re wearing your seat belt. (Caution: You can be arrested for drunk driving, even if you are wearing your seat belt.)

And this 16-word piece of misinformation is a doozy, and so wrong in so many ways.

  • It’s a widely accepted fact in search engine optimization circles that promoting a business site on another site is going to give me some big search engine juice. Anyone who understands basic SEO knows that backlinks are what give your site a high search engine ranking.
  • Coke and McDonald’s would disagree with your views on cross-marketing. As would Pizza Hut and Pepsi. Or any movie studio with Happy Meal Toys and Burger King Kids’ Meal Toys. Or BarnesandNoble.com and Amazon. And any sponsors of any NASCAR or Indy Car racing team.
  • People buy from people they like, and accept recommendations from people they trust. If Dana recommends a good restaurant to visit, I’m going to believe her. Why? Because I like her and trust her. It’s the same with businesses. If a business I trust recommends the services of another business, I’m going to believe them. The smart thing for small businesses to do is to team up with allied businesses.
  • There are more business networking experts than there are social media experts (as hard as that is to believe). Nearly all of them will shout the praises of networking, referral sharing, and cross-promoting. And I’ll believe business networking experts who measure their experience in years and decades, not weeks and months.

This is just one of many reasons why you need to screen your so-called social media “expert” before you hire them. Especially if they blather on with inane bits of advice like this.

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5 Signs You Suck at Twitter

I’ve been playing around with Friend Or Follow over the last few days, and I’ve come to the conclusion that a lot of people suck at Twitter.

Friend Or Follow is a Twitter tool that shows people you’re following, but aren’t following you; people who follow you, but you’re not following; and people you have a mutual followship with.

I dumped over 500 people from my Twitter account this week with FOF. I checked out each account I unfollowed, and frankly, some of you people are just doing it wrong. That’s why I unfollowed you. Not sure if this includes you? Then check out the…

Five signs you suck at Twitter.

    • You claim to be a social media consultant/pro/expert/guru (CPEG), but your following to follower ratio is 10:1. That is, you’re followed by 5,000 or more people, but only following 500. Social media consultants looove to say “have conversations with people.” But shouldn’t people who truly value conversation be willing to, I don’t know, have them?. Or at least fake like you are? If you’re a CPEG, you should have a ratio fairly close to 1:1. This is not to say that everyone should have a 1:1 ratio. Just the CPEGs. (Pro tip: you’ll also have more than 200 followers. I’m just sayin’.)
    • Nearly every one of your tweets is some motivational or inspirational message. Why do I need to get ten motivational messages peppered throughout the day? If it didn’t help me at 8:30 — 29 minutes after your HootSuite-scheduled “Good morning, my tweeps! Make this an excellent day!” — then it’s not going to help me at 9:30, 10:30, and so on. Don’t regurgitate someone else’s cleverness, show me yours. If you really want to motivate me, tell me about the cool stuff you’re doing.
    • You’re trying to amass as many followers as you can. If you’re a celebrity, a public figure, or someone who’s really, really interesting, that’s great. If you grew your network through hard work and earned those followers, more power to you. But if you resort to computer scripts, trickery, and joining follower-building networks to boost your rankings, then stick with being a LinkedIn LION. Twitter is not a competitive sport. Despite what you’re already doing to LinkedIn and Facebook, Twitter isn’t just one more race to the bottom of mediocrity and uselessness.
    • Your Twitter bio has the words “money,” “fast,” and “make” in it. I spam-block every single person whose bio says they have some money making system they want to share with me. Stick to peddling penis drugs and fake watches by email.
    • Your time between tweets can be measured with a calendar. You don’t have to tweet many times a day, but at least once a day wouldn’t kill you. Even every other day would be fine. But when you’re only tweeting every 3 – 4 weeks on a regular basis, then Twitter isn’t a communication tool, it’s an afterthought, like calling your mom the day after Mother’s Day.

What is your Twitter pet peeve? What sort of annoying behavior have you seen?

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5 Ways Arts Organizations Should Use Social Media

Arts organizations are facing funding cuts all over the world.

For example, Scotland is cutting £2 million ($3.1 million) for the arts. The National Theatre of Scotland, the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Scottish Ballet, and Scottish Opera are all facing cuts of 10% in government funding.

This all got me to wondering how arts organizations could use social media to promote themselves, and find additional fans, attendees, and donors.

The Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra is one of the largest arts organizations in Indiana.

There are only a few arts organizations using social media, but with social media’s explosive growth, the organizations that aren’t are missing a great opportunity.

While you may think that social media is only for young people, this is a fallacy that has long been disproved. In fact, the fastest growing demographic on Facebook is women, age 50 – 60. If that demographic fits within your core audience, shouldn’t you be trying to reach them? And what better place to do it than where they are already?

Second, if your core audience is people in their 50s and 60s, don’t you want to try to reach a younger audience? Otherwise, your audience will get smaller and smaller as they retire, move away, and die. If a younger audience is using social media, then you should try to reach them in their world, instead of forcing them to come to yours. They haven’t come yet, and that’s not going to change any time soon.

So here are five ways arts organizations should use social media.

    1. Set up a blog and give readers a behind-the-scenes look at your organization. Your blog should be more than just a press release center. Don’t just make it a place to dump all your promotional information. Post photos of rehearsals. Let staff, actors, and performers post their thoughts on performances. Post diary-like reflections of preparing for an upcoming show or performance.
    2. Create podcasts of musical performances.If you’re a musical organization, create a regular podcast, and make that available to the public. People can listen to past performances and get an idea of what you sound like. But if you think “if people hear us on a podcast, they won’t want to come,” that’s untrue. (Did you know that was the argument by orchestras against selling sheet music, the Victrola, and radio?) The New York and Chicago Philharmonics have shows on public radio stations around the country, and the Indianapolis Symphony has a highlights show on WFYI, our local public radio station, and yet they still get people to attend. If anything, when people hear a performance, it makes them want to see it live.
    3. Create videos of performances. If you are a performing arts organization, try posting videos from past performances on YouTube, and then putting them up on your blog. This is especially true for visual performances, like dance and theatre troupes. This will let people know the kind of thing they can expect when they attend one of your performances. And if they like what they see online, they’ll want to be a part of the experience, and attend a show.
    4. Create a Facebook page for your organization. If there was a single social networking tool that was made for arts organizations, Facebook is it. Not only does it have the largest population of social media users (500 million people around the world), but it’s ideally suited for posting or reposting content from other sites. You can repost your blog content, videos, and photos to your Facebook page. You can ask your members and attendees to join, communicate with them directly, ask them to tell their friends, which will bring in new Facebook friends.
    5. Share your contacts with other organizations. Yeah, I saved this point for last, because a lot of you will think I’m crazy. But think about it for a minute: your biggest competitors are not the other performing arts organizations in the area, it’s television, movies, restaurants, and general laziness. You probably don’t share members, so you’re not competing for the same dollars. But sharing contacts could be a benefit to both organizations. For one thing, you can introduce dance fans to the music that supports the dancers. You can introduce theater goers to dance, another visual art form. And as you cross-pollinate your membership, both organizations will benefit, rather than steal members.How can you cross-promote with another organization?
      • Do a feature of each other in your respective blogs.
      • Promote ticket sales (buy one of ours, get one of theirs for 50% off).
      • Do a joint performance, like their orchestra playing for your opera. Have their chamber quartet play at your museum event.
      • “Like” their Facebook page, and encourage your Facebook friends to like it as well. Ask them to reciprocate.

      By combining your social media efforts, you can double your efforts, introduce a whole new audience — who is already predisposed to appreciating the performing arts — to your organization. The result is you’ll be able to add new audience members to each organization, and strengthen both.

What is your organization doing? Are you using social media, or do you want to try using it? And if you’re not in an arts organization, how have you seen other organizations using it?