Monetizing your Social Media Passion
Monetizing your Social Media Passion was a hot topic at Podcamp Ottawa. This session was facilitated by Robin Browne.
People generally made connections through Blog or podcasts. These mediums were used to communicate their passion on their niche. Although there were no direct monetary rewards for the time invested in publishing to these mediums they did get contracts due to fame in these respective areas. Susan Murphy agreed with this but did state that she blogged because she was passionate about it.
Give away stuff for free became the common theme in this discussion. The average person dabbling with Social Media did not generate significant revenues however the contract work came due to fame established with the respective audience following.
Freemium was the word of the day, this means some for free and some premium content.
Most people writing books did not make a lot of money as the Publishers did as the publishers take huge risks in producing and marketing the books. A successful author in Canada sells on average 5000 books.
One way to get exposure is to comment on other blogs outside your circle of friends. Check your Blog statistics to see how much traffic if any you get back from comments on other blogs. Banner ads do work however most people don’t look at them and are not effective way to make money.
Kevin Kelly came up about his theory on how to make money on line. A true fan will give you $100 a year for what you are selling. If you can get a 1000 of these fans you can make a living. Scalable to which city you live in. Have a donation box as this works.
Mark Blevis shared his journey in monetizing social media. He started out by developing content, perfecting techniques in podcasting and story telling. Attending events and recording them for his podcasts. If you jump into this and want to make money right away it’s not for you.
He suggested getting comfortable with the equipment, settings, venus etc. Learn little tricks, how to place it, edit etc… Respect yourself, your guest etc…. If trying to market you abilities in content creation, production.. worry about all of this later.
Everyone has their angle but no direct method. Trying to convince people that you are an expert. Need to have an angle. Invent a niche that you are in. Place yourself at the top.
More tips
Social Media isn’t a product. but a vehicle to communicate to large amounts of people to share information, communicate etc. Use the tools to make yourself successful.
That idea of specializing is important. General idea of joining communities and adding value.
An important part of your personal brand is to organize events that is key to your success. You have to create the opportunities and not wait for people to organize them.
Nothing happens in isolation anymore. It’s wide open. Bring social media into your current job.
Communicate internally within the organization
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