By Karen Post, on October 20, 2011

If better restaurant marketing and branding are on your radar screen, check out my first DIY niche site dedicated to restaurant owners and marketing folks. It’s called Restaurant Branding Roadmap and all new opt-ins to the community will receive a free report on 25 things restaurant customers think that they don’t tell you. This project is the first of our many sites addressing DIY small business needs with quality, experienced and affordable business expertise. Currently Restaurant Branding Roadmap host a blog, a Twitter presence, a Facebook page and soon a Linkedin group to provide restaurant marketing and branding articles, discussions and tools. In January we will launch a membership-based course that will cover: concept development, community building, publicity, social media, grand openings and much more. If you’ve got friends in the restaurant industry please help us spread the word.

For more on restaurant marketing/branding, view:
5 profit producing strategies for restaurants or any business.
If you want to be a standout restaurant brand – don’t do these 5 things.

By Karen Post, on September 30, 2011

I highly recommend this book, Get Rich Click, The Ultimate Guide to Making Money on the Internet by Marc Ostrofsky to every businessperson and entrepreneur.

There are gobs of great books available on Internet marketing and I’ve read many. But this one is worth adding to your library of valuable references and tools. Not only is the author, Marc Ostrofsky a real-life success story (he had made millions with the Internet) which for me gives the book extra credibility, it’s also organized in a way that makes it easy to understand, access the learning gems and apply to your business.

The book covers just about every aspect of the Internet and how anyone can profit from it. Some of the more interesting sections for me were on URLs, keywords, and new vendors to help get things done. In addition to the book content, Marc does a nice job of making updates available on his website via his blog.

This book took me a bit to get through, not because it’s long, but I found myself stopping to try things and look up examples that he cites that made the content not only hit my brain, but really stick to it and become my new walking knowledge that I’m now using with my businesses.

Just a couple of my top take-a-ways:

1) Having a key word in your URL is golden.
My brand name and URL are proof of this. Many of you know I earned the #1 spot on Google last year for the term “Branding Speaker”. I’m now convinced that in addition to my voluminous writing, the noun in my name www.brandingdiva.com has paid off too.

2) Buying smart URLs can add to your wealth just like buying a prime piece of real estate.
They can be low cost, high return investments. Since reading Get Rich Click I’ve purchased over 50 new URLs that I’m going to start monetizing with parking pages and landing pages.

If you need one comprehensive book that helps you understand and profit from the Internet this one should be considered. It gets a thumbs-up from me.

I’m looking forward to his next book too that will be called Word of Mouse.

By Karen Post, on February 3, 2011

The TV broadcast industry does it with news scoop.

Tabloid papers do it with rumors of dirt.

Email marketers do it with headlines.

Flirty people do it with compliments.

Online marketers do it with time sensitive offers.

And dancers do it with a boa.

They all give you just enough to peek your interest, get your attention and then hook you in for more.

Now bloggers like me are doing it.

The next 5 days are going to be really big.
Some of the best blogging I’ve ever done. Check back and you’ll get some never before shared secrets, the skinny on this years Super Bowl commercials, full details on my next book with a major publisher and why I’m going to the Middle East.

Stay tuned. I won’t disappoint you.

For more on conquering customers, view: 3 free ways to help connect buyers to your business.

By Karen Post, on January 24, 2011

Standout brands are distinct, memorable and own their turf. Think about Target (hip, cool and great design), Alfec (the duck icon), and Lady GaGa (outrageous style, no borders behavior).

They didn’t copy the pack, they lead it with a set of unique attributes. If you want to break through a clutter of the same old boring stuff that 95% of your competition are doing, then be original, odd and offbeat. And avoid these 5 costly mistakes.

1) Don’t use other people’s quotes in your marketing content and social media. Create your own original quotes, ideas, opinions and and insight.

2) Don’t use the same colors and graphic styles that are everywhere in your industry. Break the rules. And then rule your category.

3) Don’t use the same tired copy points and words that your competition uses. Tell memorable stories and create your own words that are unique and belong to you.

4) Don’t use, over used stock images and photos that everyone and their uncle has used since 1982. Find compelling pics, try adding treatments to them with cropping, borders, colors and filters. Or take your own.

5) Don’t expect everyone to love your distinction. Change or an unusual approached often get resisted early in the game. How may people loved Google when it first launched?

When you find your solid path of brand distinction and stick to it, your marketing dollars will have more power to help build a strong and sustainable brand.

Also check out: The 3 A’s of an awesome brand name.

By Karen Post, on January 5, 2011

My wish list for the Branding Diva is fairly simple: make my projected profit numbers, live a high standard life, beat most of my opponents in tennis, have fun, stay healthy and earn the #1 organic search result on Google. The first five I mastered and was not surprised. The last one (a pleasant surprise) happened this last quarter.

I earned the #1 spot in Google results under Branding Speaker.

So how did I do that?
I did not invest any money with an SEO specialist or ranking company.
I did not call Google and beg.
I did not do the search result dance around a bonfire.

Here’s what I did.
The 10 steps that got me the #1 listing on Google for Branding Speaker.

1. I did my own keyword research.
2. I added as many of these keywords into my web copy as I could.
3. I updated my meta tags.
4. I secured my URL for more than three years.
5. I tagged all my images with ALT tags.
6. I wrote relevant keyword content and posted it everywhere, creating links back to my site.
7. I set up and tagged all of my videos on YouTube which is owned by Google.
8. I repurposed every piece of content I ever wrote and posted it everywhere.
9. I set up all of my social media that link to my site.
10. I set up RSS feeds on my site.

If it worked for me, it can work for you. Good luck!

For more on how to get search results, view: Making history in Saudi and 5 lessons from the experience.

By Karen Post, on December 10, 2010

I sure hope so. Many other cool companies like TED, MTV and Vera Wang like the hairy, cute MailChimp guy.

Switching email services is always a bear even if it’s named after a monkey. We’ve been using Feedblitz for the past year and while I’ve been happy with the process of sending out the bi-weekly mail, I’ve felt it was hard to make changes and user-friendly-ness was more stress than I, or my team, could stomach.

This week we made the jump. There are still some fleas here, but know we are working on them. For example, the ezine won’t always be this long and next time you will see abstracts and then click through button.

Before we changed, we researched several options and my design and IT team recommended MailChimp for a few of reasons.

1) We could create an ezine from our weekly blog posts feed.

2) It allows a lot more design features. We like pretty mail.

3) But most of all it did not require our community, which has gotten pretty big, to have to re opt-in. I was concerned that this would loose folks because of the hassle and did not want that.

4) The cost was about the same as Feedblitz, under $50 bucks a month.

5) The platform works well with social media sites and apps.

On the downside, we also learned that programming know how is needed to break the standard feed formats.

We hope you like the new look and welcome your feedback. We’ve also made some changes to the site which I will be reporting back on whether they were worth the time and expense.

Thanks for your continued support!

By Karen Post, on May 23, 2010

(An honest break up after almost 4 years)

Dear Facebook,

I know we’ve known each other since 2006. Believe me, this is not an easy conversation to have. We’ve both been through a lot. I raised $750,000, you raised over $400,000,000, I have a small team of mostly volunteers, you have over 1200 employees worldwide. We both have made  our share of brilliant and stupid decisions. The spotlight and our 15 plus minutes of fame have been good. You’ve gotten a few more national, network shows than I have. That’s OK, I’ll be catching up soon.

I have to admit, I started my relationship with you because of intense peer pressure and the media hype. Everyone was doing you. And yes, I wanted to feel that connection too.

In the beginning you were a fairly low maintenance hook up. It was casual fun, a few applications and goofy ways to gift and entertain others. Then you got kind of way too social and now have hundreds of millions of others that you connect with too.  Some are respectable citizens, some are monkeys on the run from the St Pete police and some are pure creepy pedophiles. Maybe it’s my conservative values, but it’s feeling sleazy to me.

OK that lack of real intimacy was attractive at first. You never asked for more than my headshot and my hip cellulite was never exposed. And I enjoyed our time together.

But recently things have changed. You look different. Our goals are miles apart. I need to focus on things that move my business dial. You are all over the place. I’m a design snob and your environment is so yellow pages looking. And all those time sucking, useless apps are really starting to get on my last nerve.

I need a break. At least six months of no checking in, no dialogue, no meeting new friends or small talk with old ones. No wall talk, no pics posting and absolutely no video, unless 60 Minutes calls.

I’m leading a start up, with a clear business mission. I’ve got limited resources and need to get solid ROI on every investment of time. I’ve got to stay laser focused on growing a sustainable venture, not share beer shots with a bunch of people I hardly know.

Don’t take this wrong. You are great, for millions others out there. This is all about me. They are my issues.

So who am I seeing? Well it’s complicated. There are few. Linkedin seems to really meet my needs. And Twitter gives me instant gratification. And there’s a few blogs too, that I really value. I’m not committed to any one thing. You know that’s not my style. But this thing with you has got to take a serious break. It’s going nowhere. Call me selfish, but you do not bring me any traffic for time involved. It’s just freaking frustrating. In the past I’ve been on the down low about all of this, but I feel it’s my responsibility to tell my other friends, especially other startups and entrepreneurs. No one  or business person should ever feel guilt about not being immersed or active in Facebook. When you are running a business, you must spend your time on things that matter and make a difference.

I’ve thought long and hard about this. I believe this is the best for me and my future.

And one more important thing. I’ve respected your privacy. I’ve not shared your personal data or where you buy your underwear. I trust you will do the same.

It’s been fun, but I’ve had enough. I’m officially taking a Facebook break for at least 6 full months. If you need me, you’ve got my Twitter handle and my phone number. Do you still use a phone?

Anyhow, ciao for now!

Karen Post

President of Oddpodz

P.S., I’m serious as a heart attack. Social media is a wonderful thing, but every tool is not right for every business. (For a simple, straight forward  starter guide to social media, check out this Social media Ta-Do list.) If your time is limited, like mine, leverage what brings you leads and helps build your brand. Save Facebook for when you’ve made lots of money and you just want to kill some time.

By Karen Post, on March 19, 2008