Hey guys welcome to Shama.TV. Today I want to address a question that you guys have been asking me for a while, it is about my book, The Zen of Social Media Marketing. As many of you know, I published it as an Ebook and it did very well thanks to a lot of you guys who went out there and bought the book and sent me your nice comments, and publisher in Dallas picked it up and it will now be in book stores in March! So I’m currently working on revamping it up and I’m very excited about it! Now, this specific segment is to talk to you about the process. A lot of you guys have asked me, “Why and Ebook verses a print book? Which should I go with?” So I just wanted to give you some feedback and share my experiences of what that process was like. For me, when I started out, an Ebook made a lot of sense because for one, I don’t have a publishing background so I don’t have any books to my name, now I’ve got a decent online presence, but aside from that I’ve never written a book. So I thought okay what’s going to be the fastest way to get the information out there? I was getting calls on daily basis from people asking, “Can you refer us to a resource that kind of walks us through Social Media?” And honestly I didn’t know of any reference or book to give them that would really walk them through Social Media on a very basic level for business owners, so I decided to write one myself. My main reasons for writing it as an Ebook were one, because it’s fast. I didn’t have to wait for a publisher, as soon as I wrote it, I put it out there. So that was really easy for me. The second nice thing about writing an Ebook is that you get to keep all the profits. So whatever money I made off it, I got to keep for myself. The third good point about writing an Ebook is that you really have full control. You get to design the cover, you write whatever you want, and you can update it as many times as you like. So those are the main reasons why I wanted to write an Ebook.

Now, I think the biggest benefit of doing a print book is that it really lends a lot of credibility when your book has been published by someone other than you because of course you think your book is great, but it means a lot more when someone else who is essentially a pro in the book-world thinks your work is worth publishing. The second benefit is distribution. Obviously if you write an Ebook it’s not going to end up in Barnes and Noble, but if you write a print book, it just might. So in this case you would have a wider reach.

Now I think for me the process was really easy and I think that for this topic, I handled it well and I went at it from the right angles, so real quick I’ll tell you my story. I published it as an Ebook for all of the reason I just explained, and then I found a fabulous agent who read my book and she said “wow, this is great, let me start pitching it to publisher who might be interested.” Now, at this point what really helped us is that the book had already done well. It had already sold and the information was already out there. So we put the book proposal together, sent it out to a bunch of publishers, and we actually had a couple of publishers interested, but I decided to go with BenBella, they’re a local Dallas publisher, and let’s be honest, they gave me ice cream and apple pie, which totally sealed the deal since I’m such a sucker for sweets. So the process for me went really well. Now, my advice is, if you’ve never printed a book before but you know you have the knowledge and the expertise that you need to write a book, then I would definitely go the Ebook route and just get the information out there, and then if that works out then you should definitely try to attract an agent to that book and get it printed. So there’s lots of reasons to go the Ebook or the print book route, and for me I think that was a real gradual experience going from Ebook to print. So if you guys have any more question I’d be happy to answer!

Hey guys, welcome to Shama.TV! One question I get asked a lot is “What is the future of Social Media Marketing?” Short answer: Integration. I think we’re going to see a lot of things being integrated. Right now, Facebook let’s you know when it’s your friend’s birthday, I think the future will be when you walk into a grocery store it will say “Hey, you RSVPed to Bob’s barbeque, would you like to add a six pack to the cart for 50% off?” I really think that’s the future. Now that being said, I think people are focusing too much on the future. “What’s the next Facebook? What’s the next Google?” It’s not about what tools come up, guys, it’s about your strategy and it’s about having your basics completely solid. A lot of people talk about the future of social media while their website looks awful! You’ve got to have your basics solid and you’ve got to realize that the future of social media is going to be as good as your strategy. Do you have a strategy? Do you have some principles? Do you have some policies in place that you are going to follow? Really it is about finding the tools you need to get you to the goals you want to accomplish. So I think a lot of people work backwards. What’s the next cool thing? It’s not about the next cool thing, guys, it’s really about your strategy, your goals, and finding the right tools to help you accomplish those goals.

Hey guys, welcome to Shama.TV. I am reviewing a book today called Managing Online Forums by Patrick O’Keefe. I met Patrick at this year’s South by Southwest and he told me about his book and I just finished reading it. It’s fabulous. I think the name is a little deceptive because when I think of online forums I think of the 90’s actual online forum, but it’s so much more about community and creating successful communities. It talks about everything from promoting your site, to attracting new members, and how to ban IP addresses when you get spam, and it’s just an excellent book and I highly recommend it. Here are just some more of the things it will teach you how to do: choosing a name and domain name, handling software, settling online disputes among users. If you ever thought about starting a forum or your own online community, I highly recommend this book for you. It’s very applicable to any online niche across the board. Once again, it’s called Managing Online Forums: Everything You Need to Know to Create and Run Successful Community Discussion Boards.