In the wee hours of yesterday I was having an ‘entrepreneurial problem’, of not being able to sleep because of too many ideas rolling around inside my head – ever experienced that?!
One of them was to try out the popular presentation sharing website SlideShare as a way to test out an additional avenue to get traffic to my blog.
14-hours later it was featured on the homepage of the highly popular website, listed in not one, but THREE separate categories.
Today… I’m gonna tell you how I did it.
I wanted the traffic to be as targeted as possible, attracting my key prospective audience (startup business peeps and entrepreneurs), so produced a quick presentation entitled ’21 Ways to Beat Entrepreneurial Stress’.
Before I go any further, here’s the full presentation, as embedded using the SlideShare embed code:
All in all, it took me about 2-hours to research, design the slides and capture a load of images needed. Yes, I could have had one of my VA’s do it – but, the idea came to me quickly (and at a strange time in the day!) and I wanted to act on it fast. Rest assured, they’ll be doing future ones for me!
Here’s how I got onto the homepage of SlideShare, and how YOU can do it, too!
First up – A Nifty LinkedIn Strategy
This was actually way easier than I thought. I followed a very simple tip that my good friend, Lewis Howes gave me when I interviewed him for my upcoming podcast (launching VERY soon, promise!).
Basically, I logged into LinkedIn as usual. Did a search on ‘small business’ and ‘entrepreneur’ in the Groups section, and added myself to approximately 20 groups.
I then clicked over to my presentation on SlideShare, and hit the ‘share’ button on the left of the page to share it to a bunch of those groups. Even though this is only counted as ‘one’ on the share ticker of the page, it’s the additional sharing that takes place on LinkedIn that made the difference.
This was the first section that I got listed in, on the homepage. Confirmed with an email from SlideShare, below.
Second – Getting ‘Hot’ on Facebook
I then popped over to Facebook, shared a link to the presentation on my Facebook Page, and on my personal profile, too.
About 4-hours later (as I slept) I got another email saying that my presentation was the most active on Facebook for a certain period of time, and so SlideShare were going to feature me in their ‘Hot on Facebook’ section.
Boom! My second listing on the homepage.
Completing the TriFecta with Twitter!
So, I wake up, check my email and see all the action. First reaction “Holy Cow!”. By this point (around 8-hours after posting the pressie) I’d had around 600 views.
Second reaction… “How can I capitalize on this further?”. Although I didn’t email my list about my SlideShare presentation, I did ask for a little help to get trending on Twitter – the last of the listing trilogy that I wanted to grab, and by far the hardest.
It was clear that my usual ‘network’ had done their bit already and I needed to call in some additional help. So, I posted a quick message on a private mastermind group forum that I am a member of, which houses hardcore entrepreneurial types. No more than 1-hour later I received the final email from SlideShare, letting me know that I was no ‘Hot on Twitter’, too.
Slaaaaam dunk! The third listing on the homepage:
Conclusion: The Power of Community
Obviously, I could have posted this presentation on SlideShare and probably got some additional traffic from it without really pushing it ‘out there’. But, the ability to call on my various communities definitely helped me get it featured on the homepage.
Has it brought me in hundreds, or even thousands of additional visitors? No. And, although my opt-in rates did spike a little, there is actually no other way to really tell just how much traffic has come from this little experiment. But, one thing is for sure – as of the time of publishing this post – in less than 36-hours over 1,300 people have viewed that presentation. They’ve seen my name. My face. My branding… and my website address.
That’s HUGE!
And I was able to achieve this because of my Facebook and LinkedIn networks, and lastly because of Twitter and some brilliant, like-minded entrepreneurs willing to help out a fellow mastermind group member (Thanks, everyone!).
It’s clear that the power of building and taking part in different communities, away from your blog, is incredibly important. If anyone needs any convincing on this point, then send them a link to this post!
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The power of building and taking part in communities, away from your blog, is incredibly important! [Tweet This!]
SlideShare – The Next Step
All in all, I got 4 emails from SlidesShare in a short space of time yesterday, as you’ll see below:
In one of them (third one down in the image above) they offered me a one month free trail of SlideShare PRO, which among other things, allows you to track how people share your content on social networks and embed a lead capture form in your presentation to collect vital lead generation info from the viewers of your presentation – this is huge!
Think about it – put together a presentation full of value that focuses on a pain that the majority of your prospective audience is experiencing, and shows a solution to that pain, helping them out. Then include a capture form to ‘Get My Free eGuide on XXXXXX’, and you’re building a highly qualified pre-sales list. Massive.
I’ll be trying it out, and will be sure to report on the results. Promise.
Have you ever experience any SlideShare success? Do you have other nifty tips to share on gaining new sources of traffic, or capitalizing on a different audience than your immediate one? Please share below.
GET INVOLVED: It’s stuff like this that I focus on, inside my 7-Day ‘New Business’ Bootcamp – if you’ve not enlisted yet, do so below. It’s 100%, there’s no selling and I promise you’ll dig it!
