Of all of the writing tips and advice, three themes emerged this year as best practices:

• Brevity • Authenticity • Customer Voice

Brevity – Online Content, Less is More

“Just because you have 140 characters you don’t have to use it. Stop writing paragraphs for social media. Stop writing before you think you are finished. Social Media is improv, you don’t have to belabor it. Often your first thoughts are the best.” Helen Klein Ross.

Ross is a veteran Madison Avenue advertising writer. She tweets as the online fictional character @BettyDraper for the Mad Men on Twitter team and her professional profile @adbroad. She is both relevant and entertaining.

Her solo panel this year, Writing with Betty Draper, did not disappoint. Ross shared her insights on writing specifically for social media. Her message is tell it right, not tell it all.

Authenticity – Trust, Transparency and Truth

In the new era of customer engagement brands must communicate through social media channels in which their customers expect them to be. If a company does not manage it’s own brand online the customers will do it. Social media is used for everything from lead generation to customer service and to the customer it is all the same.

Timeliness and transparency build trust with the customer. Publish now was another theme among many speakers this year, as the timeliness of social communications is more important than polished public relations copy.

Customer Voice – Real people communicating experiences is more valuable than traditional advertising content.

There were many campaign examples of big brands such as Ford and Pepsi that integrate the customer story into marketing in new ways. Customers are less likely to believe traditional advertising, successful marketing must now incorporate the customer voice.

@markysherwood from Saatchi & Saatchi, made a compelling statement at one of the Facebook marketing panels, his advise, “Switch from brand positioning to brand purpose”. As a global leader in brand management Saatchi is a good company to watch for best in class work.

A recent example of brand purpose is the Pampers “Miracle” campaign in which the P&G brand celebrates it’s 50th anniversary by including a series of “random acts of kindness” and stories of miracle babies featured on it’s Facebook page. 700 personal stories from parents were posted to the Facebook page before the campaign was officially launched. Pampers is combining the customer stories along with community mission in a very memorable way. See full story in Ad Age .

You might not have the budget of a Proctor & Gamble brand, but chances are you have a great story to share with your customers. If you don’t know where to start let Good Goliath help you build a social media strategy.

At SXSW Interactive I set about conducting a personal experiment to see if in fact I could network throughout the conference without exchanging a business card. I signed up with the SXSW official conference website and provided my contact information. I also downloaded a couple of mobile apps, developed for networking, Bump and Hashable.

After early registration on Thursday, I met up with a couple of local marketing friends and made a new acquaintance who also downloaded Hashable in advance of the conference. We connected and happily acknowledged one another on Twitter at a panel the next day. Early on I thought this Hashable thing is the answer to my paper clutter conundrum.

I signed in with Gowalla and Foursquare to nearly every panel and special event that I visited. People were connecting with me via Twitter as I added my voice to loudest online cocktail party of the year. So far the experiment was leaning towards digital dominance. I laughed when I discovered ketchup from my free hotdog had dripped into my badge holder which also included the few paper business cards I had brought along as backup. Who needs business cards?

My cavalier attitude wore off quickly after meeting a kindred marketing manager from Kansas City. We had just exchanged a great conversation about social media tools and when it came time to trade contact info I shared my quest to go digital and I also had to fess up that I spilled ketchup on my paper cards.

She didn’t know about Hashable. She had Bump still on her phone from last year, but didn’t know how to use it. We both made three attempts to make it work. We exchanged Twitter handles instead and I took her card only to loose it later in the jumble of tradeshow paraphernalia.

My next couple of exchanges were with people who immediately went for the old stand by paper card and by this time I had restored my small supply. I was disappointed as I really wanted to up my Hashcred.

The last day I did exchange info with another Hashable enthusiast. One of my coworkers connected with Gary Vaynerchuk. You can guess who has more Hashcred.

Results from this focus group of one:

Twitter

Exchanging Twitter handles was the easiest, fastest and most widely accepted way to digitally exchange contact info.

Hashable

There are some early adopters. The user experience could be improved. The app has features that I haven’t used yet, but I  do plan to continue my trial. It needs to gain wider awareness to really be effective.

Bump

It is ackward and hard to use and seemed to be last year’s news.

Final summary

A golden rule of marketing is, “know thy audience”.  The paper business card will still be around for awhile, especially among the non tech savvy.  I will continue to look for the best digital solution.

The title says it all.

I am just going to jump into this blog post with both feet. I apologize if I splash you a little bit but I just had to jump and get this done.

I have been working on this post for weeks in the anticipation that it was going to be an epic ground shattering post about the state of social online marketing. I started to outline the rise and demise of Google and the emerging kings of the hill- Twitter and Facebook. After nearly 1000 words I began getting lost and falling asleep and came to the conclusion that my readers would probably do the same thing. In light of that I thought I would start with something simple – Who I am and what do I bring to the table at Good Goliath.

Here it goes. Enjoy.

Hi, My name is Dan Masters

I am a Web Strategist here at Good Goliath. It’s OK if you don’t know what that is. I personally had to look it up on the internet not because I didn’t know what it was, I just didn’t know what the title was for a person that does what I do.

A Web Strategist is kind of like an ambassador between the client and the tech guys. I speak the client’s language and I also speak the tech language so the client doesn’t have to know it. I am the guy that brings all things together in a project.

The thing that I really like about this position at Good Goliath is that I am involved with clients from the very beginning so I get to see ideas fully develop into the results that were anticipated.

My Background

I have been involved in web design and development since 1999. I remember the Y2K bug and marveled at my first development desktop computer with it’s 333Mhz process, 16GB of memory, and 13″ CRT screen. It was smoking hot and I thought I was a stud.

I have seen the internet grow up and mature and love that I have been apart of it. Today I love the fact that I can update a website from my iPhone while waiting to pick up my kids from school in my car. As much as the internet has grown in the last 10 years it is still in its infancy and I look forward to seeing where it is going.

As mentioned I have done a lot of design and development both as a freelancer and also while working for several large companies such as AT&T, Learning Tree, and Coremetrics. I have worn a lot of hats and love the experience and skills I have gained through each of them.

What I Bring to the Table at Good Goliath

So all this stuff sounds good but what does it really mean and how does it benefit both the client and Good Goliath?

My personal love for all things tech means that I saturate myself daily into the what and why of the internet. This benefits clients and Good Goliath because the online marketing climate is changing almost daily. Six months ago Twitter and Facebook were “nice to haves” in regard to your online strategy but today are necessities.

Because I have stayed up to date with trends like this both on a marketing and technical side has allowed Good Goliath to plan, execute, and monitor new campaigns for clients that incorporate social media. The addition to our existing client’s marketing plans were seamless because we were able to start talking to them ahead of time. Clients don’t just come to us for single actionable projects, they come to us to help them navigate the ever changing arena of online marketing. Due to my personal love of this area it is easy for me to communicate to both the client, the designer, and the developer about these trends and changes and how they should be executed.

Other things that I bring to Good Goliath are that I am a pretty nice guy and most people think that I am pretty good looking. I am not sure how the last item is relevant to online marketing but I thought I should mention it.

The Wrap Up

So there it is. My first post here at the Good Goliath blog. I promise not to talk about myself as much is subsequent posts. I thought that I should just let folks know who I am and where I am coming from before publishing posts about why you need an online marking strategy and meteors that might crash into the earth. Hopefully I can stay focused on the former and latter never happens.

Cheers!

For me SXSW in the 90′s was all about the music. Today SXSW is all about connecting. I am a marketer because I love the art of communications. We all know that advertising has shifted from the sleek and sophisticated Madison Avenue broadcast tv spot to full customer engagement with today’s social media networks. The SXSW Interactive Conference gives us marketers the opportunity to explore and experiment with cutting edge tools. At the same time we are professionals who know the best practices of both marketing communications and real life relationships. Our challenge is in how to use the new shiny tool without jeopardizing ourselves or our clients best interests.

I am kicking off today with the Writing Workshop with @BettyDraper aka Helen Klein Ross the Founder Brand Fiction Factory and then I am moving onto the Future of WordPress with Matt Mullenweg. It’s going to be great and I am especially looking forward to using both Hashable and Bump to connect with other attendees and replace paper business cards.

I am here to learn the best from the best. I am here to first hand experience the latest in technology and to know what makes practical sense for my clients. I skipped RISE this year even though I wanted to participate and support my fellow entrepreneurs. We have to make choices with our limited time. My choice was to take care of my family, my clients and prepare for SXSW.

My iPhone and iPad are charged. My bag is packed with a snack, ibuprofen and band-aides. I’m ready and I can not wait to share my insight with you.

Follow Kelly on Twitter @kellyjaxzen

Investors Dan Keelan and Patrick Drew hired Good Goliath to help them launch their new investment firm, Next Step Capital Partners.

Primarily focused on Texas, the firm invests in early-stage, dynamic-growth opportunities in exchange for a share of future revenue. Revenue-sharing investment meets the needs of companies seeking funding for near-term expansion without loss of control, lengthy pre-money valuation processes, or undesirable debt financing terms.

Next Step Capital Partners approach to investing is different than traditional investment firms. Good Goliath leveraged the expertise of John Doherty, strategic messaging expert, to develop the company positioning and key messaging.

Good Goliath was given the challenge of a short timeframe to concept, design, develop and launch the website. Next Step Capital Partners officially launched within 30 days of their first discussions with Good Goliath. Our team also provided public relations consulting and local business media has published articles announcing the company.

See Austin American Statesman and Austin Business Journal

Good Goliath continues to provide marketing consulting, strategic messaging and website maintenance support to Next Step Capital Partners.

The Next Step Capital Partners Website can be viewed at nextstepcapitalpartners.com.

At Good Goliath we are committed to helping our clients put their inspiration to work. Our clients are great at what they do, experts in their industries. We help them tell their stories and build their online presence. We develop programs based on objectives and we measure and optimize along the way. Our client’s success is our success.

We have a great team of marketing professionals who know how to get results. Please visit our team page and get to know us. I am grateful to be working with such talented and creative people. It is my privilege to be once again working with Mindy Klement. Mindy is an outstanding account manager who sees the big picture and doesn’t miss important details. Mindy has helped big brands develop online communities and has lead many customer acquisition and demand generation programs. She currently co-produces strategic plans with me and runs the Search Engine Marketing program for the Business Bank of Texas, N.A. It’s great to be working together again. For more background on Mindy please see her website .

Mindy and I will be leading a RISE Austin session in March titled “Social Media isn’t Free”. We will be helping small business owners learn to develop social media strategy and budget resources to support these programs. Please look for event details soon. 2011 has gotten off to a great start and I am excited about helping our clients bring their message to market.

Visit Business Bank of Texas Website

Good Goliath lead the Business Bank of Texas team through the strategic planning process to identify their target audience and build a brand identity system. We provided a competitive analysis and an integrated marketing communications plan to promote the bank beyond designing and launching a website.

Strategic planning recommendations for a true web 2.0 site included a banking and financial blog to create customer engagement. We recommended guest authors who are subject matter experts. Ed and his team took this idea one step further and he reached out to his business contemporaries and comprised a community of business experts who are now blogging on behalf of the bank’s Business Resource Center on a wide range of business topics from accounting to sales strategy. The site hosts a variety of rich media including podcasts and video. This site is an example of a fully customized WordPress installation.

Ongoing SEO and SEM programs are in place with weekly analytic reporting and optimization of programs. The Business Bank of Texas website has over 240 pages indexed with Google, a Website Grader score of 83 and blog score of 93. 2011 plans include integration with Microsoft CRM and a variety of eMarketing and public relations programs.

Ed Lette, “Good Goliath is our marketing partner. They fully understand our business and have helped our team set measurable marketing goals to support our long term objectives. Kelly Jackson has assembled a team of top marketing talent that we couldn’t afford to hire individually. We continually receive positive feedback from our customers and shareholders regarding our new website and marketing programs. We look forward to 2011 and taking our marketing efforts to the next level with Good Goliath”.

Good Goliath was given the challenge of a short timeframe and small budget to concept the brand identity, design, develop and launch the website. Both deadline and budget were met. Good Goliath continues to provide marketing consulting, website maintenance, SEO and social media strategy to Talent 101.

Visit Talent 101 Website

I would like to place on record my sincere appreciation of the creative way Kelly Jackson and her team at Good Goliath have conducted business with us. It is very rare to find such high standards of sincerity, communication and trust-worthiness in the world of business today. It will be our pleasure to continue to do business with Kelly in the future and I earnestly recommend Good Goliath to any business in need of web/content development, video, social media strategies and other marketing services. - Jack Trompert | President | Talent101, Inc

The website was designed to communicate the Lott Brothers commitment to excellence. Good Goliath produced both the healthcare brand video and customers testimonial videos featured on the the site. The site also features a content section that highlights recent construction projects. The WordPress CMS is easily updated by the Lott Brothers staff. Good Goliath continues to provide website maintenance as needed.