Recently, I was in a conference in Las Vegas, speaking about the ” Social Media – Taboos & Innovative Uses”. The focus was to help professional women of different ethnic backgrounds understand how technology, specifically social media, help or hinder their personal and professional development. Though they all understood that these days you cannot afford to ignore social media as one of the key ways in which companies and individuals communicate, there was this FEAR of it as well.

Continue Reading my post on Active Garage: Social Media and Tribes #9: The fear factor

More and more, I am observing that people are denouncing Twitter and there is an emerging war between the “For” and “Against” parties. Most recently, retired basketball star Sir Charles (Barkley), on a CNBC replay said that, “people who use Twitter are idiots”. Well! it is these statements that categorize people into “those who have a life” and “those who don’t have a life”.

I am not here to say what is “Right” and what is “Wrong”. I am here to illustrate what Twitter can provide if leveraged strategically.

# Using Twitter is about reciprocation. You need to promote other people who work at companies you’re targeting and business leaders you respect. If you are looking for a job, the best way is to help people in companies that you are interested in. This is possible by sending a email newsletter to your network, a Re-Tweet along with a link to their website. This will eventually have a better reciprocation if you ask them help with your initiative.

# Using Twitter is about connection – Continue Reading this post on Active Garage – Social Media and Tribes- Is Twitter doomed to fail?

Recently, I have been to many conferences where people are talking about how they have an email account that is just set up to receive garbage emails. One guess for the what are garbage emails. These are emails from marketers shoving their premier offers on you. Asking you to buy this OR that. And somehow they even get your work email and stuff starts showing up in your Work Inbox. And if you are an iPhone user like myself, you spend 5 minutes in the morning TRASHING garbage in your inbox.

What does this mean for the marketeer?

They are still using this fast dying technique to spread the word on something they want to market. They fail to realize that EMAIL has become a JOKE. And it is the user on the other end who is having the last laugh. Dumping it because there is no scarcity of such offers so there is no value they hold for him.

What does it mean for the career of the marketeer?

He is outdated and the technological advancements won’t stop. Email is DEAD. The newer web marketing is based on the foundation of TRUST with your Tribe.

So, how do we go about BUILDING Trust within our tribe.

Getting back to BASICS.

Tribes are a concept that has existed for a long time. Like as in the older times, cyber tribes are build on the people coming together, being authentic with each other and being in constant communication – which is nothing like the one way communication we see in email marketing.

A marketer who has mastered the ‘The art of building a tribe” is Lady Gaga. She doesn’t just sing and entertain. She has connected people on an emotional level and has developed a Gaga “tribe” through a story.

Here is how to build TRUST with your tribe:

Continue Reading my article at ActiveGarage: Social Media and Tribes #2: DEATH of Email; RISE of branded Tribes

My passion has always been Marketing and I believe it the corner stone of each business. With Marketing, the common belief, is that you can help spread the word and get more people interested in your services/products….RIGHT?

WRONG. Marketing helps you tell a story and a narrative that is compelling for the receiver.

Marketing is SELF promotion that cuts the NOISE. And the objective of SELF promotion is to increase REVENUE – make more money. But we spend too much time on strategy and miss out the small stuff that is needed to have a higher impact.

The objective is to find the best resource equipped to market the sort of services you have to offer, then give that person a good block of stock in your offers and tell him to go ahead and promote you! And OfCOURSE! we have met people who do not believe in SELF promotion.

Here are the dont’s OF SELF Promotion:

1. Self advancement cannot be built on bluff, fear or flattery! Only morons and nitwits like to be flattered. People who think resent all forms of flattery. Insult to their intelligence.

2. Avoid GREED and HIGH PRESSURE. If your motive to market is GREED – most likely it is visible to everyone EXCEPT YOU. Build a pleasant experience and people will come back for more.

3. CONNECTION COUNTS: INAUTHENTICITY DISCOUNTS: There is a connection to making a sale through marketing BUT hit or miss method where you are unaware of what matters to your target market, usually, misses. So, don’t just say why it is important for you CONSIDER speaking to why it is important to the target.

Let the show begin….

Media was designed to be an medium for the message of man. It was a way to broadcast a message to be able to connect with a community that might have interest in what you might have to stay. MOST importantly it was the extension of our Human Tribe. A Tribe which was based on interaction of the social community – where commerce was created through referrals, recommendations and participation. The objective was to tap into the intrinsic behavior of the TRIBE and most often people were motivated by certain social behaviors and NOT necessarily by money.

In traditional media, the idea was to blast something to everyone who had a device like TV, radio to receive it. These medium was designed to interrupt people like an ad within a TV program, a song on the radio or an article in the newspaper. It was an intrusive way of marketers to grab attention and shove their message. They wished that people will be touched by their message and will be moved into action to buy, refer or participate.

Here is the major issue with all of this, the media channels eventually took over the control of what will be printed. Newspaper won’t print anything you sent them. Sometimes, you have to advertise with huge sums of money to get a spot on TV, radio or newspaper. Over time, the power of community to share information over media got depleted. And the Human Tribe which was based on many-to-many communication was reduced to a DICTATOR model of one-to-many communication.

And then arrived social media, suddenly you could print anything on your blog, upload any video and even make your podcast on whatever you fancy. And media became TRIBAL. We were able to share our opinions, our businesses and our tribes.

Continue Reading my POST on ActiveGarage: Tribal behaviors 2.0

Marketers have always thought that they market to each individual and sometimes have put a single community into a market segment. But this way of looking into the marketing is quickly fading.

Whenever I used to see a Pantene Shampoo advertisement, it used to be really concerning. Since neither the models nor the messaging resonated with me. I am an Indian-American woman and normally I did not see any ads that had models who looked like me. Secondly the messaging was very skewed towards women who for some reason wanted to look like models. It never felt that it was regular women.

And then came social communities – where people started to learn about products and services from people who shared their common interest. This was the genesis of Tribal marketing. In this case, it was not about individual consumption of products and services but people were more compelled by an activity that created meaningful relationships.

After all, we are social by nature and having the capability and social relationships are more important than ever. Now consider, if I went to purchase a Pantene shampoo and was able to build a relationship with a few people in the store who could tell me a little about their experience, share their hair stories and refer me to a promotion – this would create a social environment and a way to build relationships. And this is the essence of Consumer Tribes….

I recently launched 99tribes.com. It is fast becoming a resource for people who want to discover people who share similar interests on Twitter. And invite you all to join the fastest growing Tribe on internet. Ofcourse! your feedback will only help us make it better. Most importantly, I want to share it with your friends and help us get the word out…

Here is a brief Demo:

JOIN NOW: visit www.99tribes.com

Simon Sinek has a simple but powerful model for inspirational leadership all starting with a golden circle and the question “Why?” His examples include Apple, Martin Luther King, and the Wright brothers — and as a counterpoint Tivo, which (until a recent court victory that tripled its stock price) appeared to be struggling…

Learn to communicate from inside out – that is what GUT is…He explains the part of the brain that controls decision making. He mentions that businesses need to have the goal NOT to sell to people what they want BUT the goal to sell to people who believe.

A great example – on why money, connections, media are not the reason for business success BUT the belief in your dream to make an impact in the world. Don’t be driven by money BUT be motivated by “Why” you do “whatever” you do.

Entrepreneurship Journey of Anu Shukla, who shares how she started her career and the path she took…
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Interesting insights – how much money to build the prototype of her first company? how much time it took? how she found her first client? I believe this interview is an attempt to help us learn the how behind one of the most accomplished entrepreneurs in the business.

Business Tips via Mixergy, home of the ambitious upstart!

Passion comes from the latin verb patior, meaning to suffer or to endure…So, if this is suffering or endurance them why it tops the list for SUCCESS?

Top of the game vTalk: What is the BIG deal about Passion?