With thousands and thousands of new blog posts each day, millions of facebook updates tweets – how do you stay on top of the ball with what’s going on at the cutting edge of your market?
The mantra of the modern conspiracy theorist is: “Follow the money!” Well, there’s two mantra’s for staying on the cutting edge of your market:
- “Follow the conferences.”
- “Follow the blogs.”
One follows the offline conversation, the other the online conversation.
Attend the top conferences in your area of expertise. Shoot to attend a conference or seminar in your field at least once every two months. Not only will you learn plenty at these live events, you’ll network with new people in your market. Usually the business arrangement that comes from these relationships are translated in Joint Venture partnerships for product launches and cross-promotion.
In following the blogs, you’re following the latest publications from people in your industry. An excellent way to systemize your time reviewing these different blogs is to use an RSS Reader (Google Reader works great). For a more in-depth look at following the conversation in your field, check out the “Social Media Management Guide.”
Related articles
- Be social: How to keep your business blog regularly updated (marketing.yell.com)
- What I Read First – The Post Edublog Awards Edition (freetech4teachers.com)
- 10 Helpful Uses of RSS Feeds for Marketing (hubspot.com)
