Persuading The CEO

Convince a CEO to tell their employees to join your online community.

At a small business, that means 3 new members. At a Fortune 500 company, that’s 30,000 new members.

Reaching these people is hard. Thousands of salespeople fail every day.

Use the assets you have, your existing members. Put together a template e-mail and list of advice to persuade they can send to their boss. Something that will make an outstanding case for joining your online community. Maybe improve knowledge, find sales leads, better customer service or improve your reputation.

Collect a list of ‘e-mails that worked’. Let others see them. Reward the employees who succeed, encourage them to help the rest.

One solid recommendation is worth thousands of new members.

Comments

[PV Reymond]

Hi Richard,

I think the most important thing here is the information you are giving.

You go straight to the point... you explain your point very well. This is what I like the most.

You don't have a fancy layout - me neither, but it is not important, what really counts is the good content you are delivering.

Thanks,
^PV Reymond

http://www.startup-internetbusiness.com

[le]

gday there - over as one of your new readers from the world of chuck. coming to you from down under - hence as my day ends your is coming online.

being a gen x girl I am an 'ole school' marketer so during these two weeks and beyond I will be thrilled to tap into your best and most brilliant bits.

My best to you for a great 14 days of affirmation and learning - cheers le

[Lea Schizas]

What a brilliant idea. The Writing Jungle is for all types of writers and what I've done is invite authors from various publishing houses to be my guest bloggers. This way they get extra exposure by my readers and help to promote my blog.

[Betsy]

Here from Chuck. :) Testimonials, the most powerful tool a marketer has. I've RSS'd you and will catch up with your previous posts. And I'd really like to know why you're moving to Lithuania!

[Betsy]

Oops - messed up my own link! There it is.

[Betsy]

Oops - messed up my own link! There it is.

[Betsy]

Oops - messed up my own link! There it is.

[Mishi]

Hi Richard,

I found you through Chuck's blog project. Just wanted to introduce myself, seeing as I'll be lurking around your site for at least the next two weeks.

I'm a personal blogger, so I don't have very much (read: any) experience with business blogging. I'm also rather new to all of this, so I have very little experience with community building. I'm looking forward to keeping up with, and I'll be sure to comment as often as possible.

[Kate Y.]

Just arrived from Chuck. With Mishi's post, me too. I'm a teacher and not in business so I've got no experience with community building.

I live in China so like Le, my day is ending while yours is just beginnning.

Perhaps with relating to the CEO could be likened to contacting this head honcho blogger who's got lots of readers. With his one single recommendation to your website, you could get either a small number of his faithful readers (if it's a small blog) or a flood (like what our BLOGGING CEO, Chuck is doing).

[feathermaye]

Hi Richard,

I'm here from Chuck's group, too. :)

I'm a personal blogger, as well, and still relatively new to the whole thing. I dabbled with Squidoo about a year or so ago, but really had no concept of what it was supposed to accomplish for me, so it just kind of languished until I gave up.

I'm here thinking I might be able to learn a thing or two from you.

[Trina]

Greetings by way of Chuck's project. Looking forward to expanding my horizons in this new community. Populations in any community can be quite diverse,so,as a 'reader of blogs', your content adds diversity for me. Your nuggets of insight will give me small bits to digest at a time, and I suspect that will be good for me. What will keep me engaged (beisdes my commitment to the project) is your humanity that shines through.

[Karen]

Hi Richard... I'm here via Chuck as well. I am fairly new to blogging--to having my own, that is. I've regularly read a few written by people whose classes I've taken as well as some that I read for fun and learning. It will be interesting to see the bigger business side of things through you. Since you operate in the BIG world of blogging, you might be a good choice for my question.... Perhaps it's because I'm older and have had different schooling, but I notice some blogs with grammar and spelling mistakes. And, these are blogs aimed at customers of small businesses. There are a couple that have consistent typos. Even your first sentence has incorrect grammar. (I mean this in the nicest possible way. :-) ) One blog in particular is aimed at people who are starting their won businesses. After I told the owner her typos drove me nuts, she told me it was more important to her to get her ideas out than it was to properly present them. Now, me, when I went to university, I was taught that correct grammar and spelling showed respect for one's audience. Is this completely out the window in these modern times? I have loved words all my life and I have to say, when I see typos and poor grammar, I'm not as willing to plunk my money down for whatever is being sold. So, Richard, is this grammar/spelling thing something that doesn't matter anymore? I have a theory about text messaging corrupting modern language but that's a whole other post. :-)

[Karen]

Oh, man! There's a spelling a mistake in my post! OK, smack me back. :-)

[Richard Millington]

Thanks Reymond, Le, Betsy and Feathermaye. Tina, I'm so happy you said that.

Lea: Let me know how it goes.

Mishi: Let me know if I can help with anything. It's great to hear from newcomers. I wish I could be a newbie again, so much to explore and discover.

Kate: You're extremely right. It can be applied to a lot of things. The trick with CEO's, is that employees will feel at least an obligation to register (just so they're obeying the boss). Then you can develop content and relationships to keep them coming back. It's like with books, if a CEO likes a business book they might bulk-buy for their employees to read.

[Richard Millington]

Hi Karen,

What a tricky question. You're right that spelling mistakes and grammar are terrible. I admit I'm a hypocrite here. I sometimes run short on time and don't proof read my posts as I should.

Referring to the lady you mentioned, she's wrong. It's not more important to get your points across than worry about grammar. You show your reader disrespect when you do that.

However, I sometimes deliberately violate grammar if it helps make my point stronger. There is a difference there.

The other major issue is that language is evolving. It's been evolving for eternity and it continues to evolve every day. Shakespeare would be horrified by the way we speak. We would be horrified if we had to speak like Shakespeare.

Imagine how the English felt when they were forced to speak more like the Romans...or the Saxons...or the Vikings...or the many nations and people that have shaped and designed the language.

Is text speak a plague or an evolution?

Tricky question. What do you think?

[Chuck W.]

I asked my twitter crew, and I got an interesting link to this book: Txtng: The Gr8 Db8

Give it a search.

[Richard Millington]

I love the Jazz analogy. Writing blog posts is a lot like Jazz. Some rules must be strictly adhered to. Sometimes it's the new things that really stand out. The people that innovate or change the rules are the famous musicians.

Put in a word where they shouldn't be, remove a word when there should. And start sentences with 'And'.

Sounds like fun.

[Karen]

I, too, like the jazz analogy. In my love for words I do love to violate grammar and make new words. Like jazz, different syllables (notes) can have uncharacteristic accents or be run together (like "FeverBee") :-) or change font size midstream. I'm all for being creative. There's a tenant which was taught in art school during my days that went along the lines of: You have to know the rules in order to break them. Good writing is an art, non? One of the aspects I DO like about texting is how creative the language can be.

Yes, language is evolving. Of course, it must. That being said, isn't one of the first signs a civilisation is self-destructing is the deterioration of its language?

Thanks so much for answering my question, Richard and for the jazz analogy, Chuck. This has been something that's been bugging me for awhile. I'm happy to hear you agree with me regarding the blog owner's answer to me. You should have seen the typos in her class materials! And, it was an $800 class! On her blog she has a place for readers to notify her of typos. I don't get it 'cause (see? I can butcher words with the best of 'em!) I see her blog/tele-classes, etc., mentioned in some major blogs.

[Karen]

One last comment... I was reading a review of the book on Amazon and a teacher posted this as part of his review:

"Personally, I think texting is great: it keeps my minutes low, and allows me to give a premeditated response to incoming messages -- with more convenience than email offers."

I think 'convenience' is the operative word. I guess since language reflects the society in which it's spoken, we can safely say that our society is one based upon convenience. Thanks again.

[Kate Y.]

To Karen.No blog? I'm disappointed. I tried looking for your link. I was so ready to hop on your site and read! I'm so far loving your interaction with Richard on the English language.
Hope you can drop a line at either my blog or my email - ksirine.yu at the gmail. I look forward to hear more thoughts from you.

I too get sorely pissed off if I see any grammar mistakes. Violent ones that is. The ones that grab you and shake you in the head. I make spelling mistakes too especially 'from'. I often turn it into 'form' then I have to go back and re-edit my blog post because I'm pissed at that one single mistake and can't get it out of my mind. That's why I've stopped re-reading my posts again. It just triggers my OC compulsions.

I'm all for texting for convenience. Sometimes just to save space, my message sometimes make no sense. E.g. Lts c 8ch odr 4 2dy.dl lnk? (let's see each other for today. Download link?)

[Karen]

Hey, Kate... Actually, I do have a blog... a baby blog. It's also a very secret blog--I'm just learning how to do all of this and I'm reeeeally chicken! I hope to make it public soon but in the meantime, I'll email you. I could actually read your 'text' message! :-)

[Karen]

Hey, Kate... Actually, I do have a blog... a baby blog. It's also a very secret blog--I'm just learning how to do all of this and I'm reeeeally chicken! I hope to make it public soon but in the meantime, I'll email you. I could actually read your 'text' message! :-)

[Ulla Hennig]

Hi,
I have come over from Chuck as well. I am mostly reading your posts and the comments - not having so much so say at the moment. But I am here.

[Richard Millington]

How about this. Making errors is wrong. Not knowing you're making a grammar mistake, or a spelling mistake is bad.

Deliberately breaking or bending a rule, within contexts, can be good.

[Kate]

I agree with Richard on bending the rules. Hope you can share that baby blog soon Karen. :) Waiting for that email! And glad somebody could read that txt msg!