Can you believe it??

The end of financial year arrives this week!! So we all know what that means, Christmas won’t be far behind it. There is one great advantage that comes with the middle of the year arriving so quickly though. That is…

It’s Thirty Day Challenge time, (Renamed The Challenge this year) if you have ever talked with me one on one about marketing your business online. You will already know that I am a huge advocate of the Thirty Day Challenge. And before you ask…

No I don’t get paid one cent to promote it, no one does .

There are however some very good reasons I promote the The Challenge being…

• It is completely FREE

• Not only is it completely FREE but it is the best online training education you will get IMHO!!!

Ed Dale and his crew are right at the cutting edge of what is happening in the online marketing world, and  there is no holding back with the quality of the training they provide just because it is free. You will learn everything you need to know to promote your business online!

This blog and any other site that you see my mug plastered all over, is based on the excellent marketing principles taught on The Challenge. Just how do I know that theses guys are on the cutting edge of online marketing?? I know because of a little thing that you may of heard of  called Twitter. You see two years ago (the first year I participated in the challenge) Ed had us join twitter. This was well before Demi or Ashton and the rest of their celebrity friends even knew what Twitter was!!

Don’t believe me? Check the date I  joined Twitter below on my  profile for proof. It will show you that I started my twitter account over two years ago you guessed it. When I participated in the thirty day challenge for the first time!!

Here is where we are going to take the Challenge to a whole new level, and create even more benefit for you. As with anything in business if you have a team to work with, it’s a whole lot easier than flying solo. This year I am going to run a group from my facebook fan page, so that we can work together share the load and our experiences.I will also run some extra training sessions where we will leverage a few extras tool, like ustreamtv webinars and teleseminars.

All you have to do to join in is come and join us at  facebook.com/beaniesmarketingtips post a comment something like…

Hey Beanie I am here and keen to  join the Beanies Challenge Team.

That’s it you are set to go, and we will get to work learning some new strategies to promote your business online.

Project Grow

Being based in Central Queensland this year has meant that I have had the opportunity to get involved in an excellent program up here called Project Grow.

The GAPDL is running a series of information sessions and workshops to help small business owners  equip themselves with the tools necessary to get online, and take advantage of the social media revolution that is currently changing the way small businesses are marketing their products and services.

In my first talk  “Where do you buy a fridge @ 9PM on a Saturday Night” I touched on how my wife purchased a fridge online last Xmas and the spread the word through facebook .

I also talked briefly on blogtalkradio and ustream tv, which are both free online tools that none of the attendees had heard of before.

I will be running this presentation as a webinar in the next week, keep an eye out here or on facebook  for the details.

Hope you have a great week, and I am looking forward to working with you on The Challenge.

Profit and Enjoy

Cheers Beanie

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If you are new to my site you will quickly learn from reading my posts, that  I am not big on theory and would rather write about what I see that actually happens…

So this is another real life example from facebook. If you are a regular reader on this site then you have probable already read “Where Do You Buy A Fridge @ 9pm On A Saturday Night” which was a real life example of my wife purchasing a  fridge online, and spreading the positive news via facebook.

The fridge story showed you the benefits of a customer singing your praises using a social networking site. This is the flip side a customer with a cockroach in his salad, warning his friends not to let it happen to them!!!

Now as you know from reading my blog posts I often call social media sites like Facebook and Twitter, word of mouth advertising on steroids.

Now this hyped up word of mouth advertising can be working for your business or against it!!! This story falls into the against category.

What makes this story even more powerful is that it has these two other factors working with it….

• A visual representation ie; the picture of the cockroach in the salad

• The person who this happened too is very well known, for the purpose of post we will call him Roy.

Now Roy just happens to be a very well known business man who has built an international brand, and has also written a number of books. So you could say he knows a little bit about customer service. In fact poor customer service is one of his pet peeves.

When I was having a problem with my business early last year, I contacted him through facebook and he told me to ring him personally about my problem, which I did and he sorted it for me.

While talking with  him he told me something very interesting, that I only just truly recognized the profoundness of today. During our chat he said that things were about to change, the balance of power was shifting back to the consumer. Roy said for too long there have been many poorly run businesses that were treating their customer as idiots, and offering them substandard service.

This is not going to last much longer he said, the consumer is not an idiot, and the worm is about to turn. At the time I didn’t fully grasp what he was talking about, but today it dawned on me. The balance of power is going to swing to the consumer via social media.

Within seconds of receiving poor service these days, like a cockroach in your food you can have spread this message around the globe via site like facebook and twitter. So the days of average businesses providing sub standard service are quickly coming to an end just like Roy said.

Social media is here to stay, embrace it and leveage it so that you don’t end up another…

“There Is A Cockroach In My Salad” Story!!!

Profit and Enjoy.

To find out how your business can leverage online marketing tools, like Twitter and Information Products.

Call Adam Bean on 0414502809

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Today I am going to discuss with you exactly how you can use Twitter for your business. What we are going to do is look at some strategies that you can easily implement so that you get your followers actually promoting you.

As a business owner you know the extreme importance of word of mouth advertising. If you have read any of my previous posts about Twitter, you would already know that it is word of mouth advertising on steroids.

But Twitter is a two edge sword. If someone is unhappy with you or your business, and they are voicing those concerns via Twitter. Then that is going to spread like wild fire as well.

This is when the power of Twitter really kicks in to gear as this type of situation is a huge opportunity turn things around and turn them into both a happy customer and a raving fan all at the same time.

If you use Twitter correctly, you are able to reach far more people more effectively than any other form of advertising that I know of.

But and this is a big but!!!!

You have to use Twitter the correct way. It is far more credible for you if someone else is singing your praises, not to mention time efficient!!!

So how do we do it? How do we get people to start talking about our business about promoting us?
Well you are probable not going to believe this, but you already know the answer because your Mum told you what it was when you were a child!!!

Remember what good old Mum taught as kids? Surely you remember what she used to say about treating others as you would like to be treated yourself? This is so simple it is ridiculous yet I would estimate that it is something 98% of Tweeps overlook .

If you want others to promote your business then you need to do two things…

• Promote them first! Remember treat others as we want to be treated.

• Tweet information of value.

That’s it!! As I repeat over and over and over, Twitter is about three things.

• Engage
• Interact
• Add Value

So that is it for today, follow this simple strategy and start watching the results.

If you would like to thank your Mum for teaching you such a valuable lesson, please mention her in the comments section below.

To arrange a consutation about using Twitter for your business, Contact  Adam Bean on 0414502809

Profit and Enjoy

In the next post I am going to tell you about a tremendously incredible tool called Google reader, and show you exactly how in 15 minutes a day you can find all the valuable information you need for you followers.

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Should you automate your Twitter account,?

This can be be a controversial subject and there are all sorts of theories out there, but automating Twitter is not something I recommend. Certainly not for the way I use Twitter at least.

Let me state this very clearly I do not automate my Tweets, (I did toy with it for a very short time) but I will never do it again in the future.

The reason I don’t automate is because of my three core rules for using Twitter or any social media medium…

• Engage
• Interact
• Add Value

It is very hard to do these three things through automation in fact I consider it impossible!
Twitter is a real time communication tool so to use it effectively, people need to know that when your tweets are coming through it is actually you and not some Automatic Tweeting Machine.

The whole automation process isn’t I believe what Twitter was designed for, and pretty much nullifies the effectiveness of Twitter particularly for small business.

This post was supposed to wait for a few days while I finished writing my first series for a guest blog tour that I am currently undertaking. But the response to my first post (Twitter is about Quality) was so good that I brought it forward.

Now this is why I recommended the Tweeps that I did to you, have a look at their reactions, none of them knew that I was going to post about them and the way they use twitter.
And if they had an Automatic Tweeting Machine their tweeting wouldn’t be nearly as effective as it is.

These are the comments that I received very quickly I might add, three are locals to the Sunshine Coast and one from Victoria.
There response and willingness to interact and add value is the reason why they are in the small percentage of Twitter users that actually use Twitter effectively.

“Thanks for including me in your list Adam. I’m very flattered.

Looking forward to reading the rest of the series of your Twitter tips for business.

Have a fun and prosperous new year! Keep tweeting!” @kikirobinson

“Hello Adam. Thanks for the great list. I have enjoyed meeting local Sunshine Coast and Aussie people on Twitter and have connected with them more than anyone else which is cool.

It\’s probably that I don\’t do scheduled tweets so my times often meet with local people.

Thanks for the mention and have a great new year”!  @ecwebsites

“O sweet as! cheers man , looking forward to reading the series ” @jam3rr

“Thanks for including me in this list Adam. I love Twitter and I am amazed at the impact it has had on my business in such a short time.
I look forward to reading your upcoming posts about this topic. There seems to be a lot of confusing information out there. So, it will be great to have some solid guidance for business owners.
Thanks”!  @PpcMom

Do you think that they could create that sort of interaction with automation?
No way in hell!!!
I know what you are going to say next, you don’t have all day to sit there Twittering away.
I realize that as your are a small business owner who is exceptionally busy, time constraints are a huge problem.

Us online marketers like to preach to you that you should be using Twitter and other social media tools.
Who has the time to do that? I think because we spend so much time on the internet us web marketers tend to forget sometimes that there is another world offline, and not everyone spends all day online tapping away at a keyboard like us.

So the key for bricks and mortar business owner like yourself when it comes to twitter is be consistent, if you can only spare 20 minutes a day do it at the same time each day, so that your followers get to know when you are most likely to be online and they can actually interact with you.

I hope that this post has shed some light on the whole automation process, in the next few posts I am going to show you how you can leverage Twitter to actually save you time.

Yes that is written correctly Twitter can actually save you time!! I am going to show you the right way to use Twitter so that you are getting the maximum benefit from it.
This is a little hint… Does word of mouth advertising effect your business??

Profit and Enjoy
Cheers Adam Bean
@beanie72

For any questions about Twitter please leave a comment I do answer them all or feel free to call me on 0414502809

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Twitter seems to have a bad name in the business community. I hear all the time business owners stating that they either don’t get twitter or they think it is a complete waste of time.

If you want to know just how much Twitter does actually impact business and what a powerful tool it is, you might like to read my post they are talking about you.

The reason I feel Twitter gets such a bad rap is because there is so much poor information about it out there.
Also the amount of garbage do this and you will get 100 followers a day programs, doesn’t help Twitter’s reputation amongst business owners either.

So what I am going to do for you is kick you of on the right foot with Twitter and show the short cut’s to using Twitter for business effectively and efficiently, so that it is an asset to your business marketing.

Below I am going to give you a list of what I consider the top Tweeps for the Sunshine Coast and then the top business Tweeps outside of the Sunshine Coast but still in Australia.

What I want you to do is only follow these guys for at least a month and watch how they engage interact and add value to their followers and community through Twitter.

I will link their twitter names to their twitter profile page to make it easy for you to follow them.

Alternatively I have created this list  social entrepreneurs that will make your life even easier you, as can follow them all by just following the list.

There is also one other to follow that doesn’t fit into the Sunshine Coast or Australian category but the resources and tips they post about Twitter make them well worth following to.

Ok first up the Sunshine Coast list…

• @ecwebsites

• @kikirobinson

• @AnnieInfinite

• @jam3rr

This are the Tweeps that fit into the rest of Australia category…

• @LanceScoular

• @DivineMissWhite

• @GWPStudio

• @PpcMom

One last one that is defiantly worth following for great Twitter resources and tips..

• @TwitterTips

I know the list is only small but as I said it is quality over quantity, and the worst thing you can possible do when you start out on Twitter is get inundated with garbage.

So follow these Tweeps and learn from them, please leave any question or problems with Twitter in the comments section below.
This is the first in what will be a series of posts about using Twitter effectively for business, so be sure to check back regularly for more great tips.

Looking forward to connecting with you on Twitter very soon.

Profit and Enjoy.

Cheers Adam Bean

@beanie72

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