The website OklahomaMinerals.com has an interesting video series on “Famous Oil Men.” These are very brief—the one we’re linking to is less than three minutes long—and they are well done. This installment is on Harry Sinclair, founder of Sinclair Oil. Find it here.
Harry Sinclair – Photo: WIkicommons
As the website states, Harry Ford Sinclair (born July 6, 1876, in Benwood, W.Va. – died November 10, 1956, in Pasadena, Calif.) was an American industrialist and founder of Sinclair Oil. He was implicated in the 1920s Teapot Dome Scandal, and served six months in prison for jury tampering. Afterwards he returned to his former life and enjoyed its prosperity until his death.
The video goes into greater detail, of course. For the remainder of this post, we share with you some passages from Wikipedia.com’s webpage on Harry Sinclair.
In 1910, four businessmen: Eugene Frank Blaise, Charles J. Wrightsman, William Connelly, and Harry F. Sinclair bought the failed Farmers National Bank in Tulsa. They created a new entity, Exchange National Bank, and named Sinclair as President. This bank, later renamed as the National Bank of Tulsa, was a forerunner of the present Bank of Oklahoma.
On May 1, 1916, the highly successful Sinclair formed Sinclair Oil from the assets of 11 small petroleum companies. In the same year, he bought the Cudahy Refining Company of Chicago, owner of several oil pipelines and refineries. By the end of the 1920s, Sinclair Oil refineries had a production capacity of 80,000 barrels a day and had built almost 900 miles of oil pipelines. The company was ranked as the seventh largest oil company in the United States and the largest in the Midwest. Harry Sinclair’s business acumen made him an important member of the local business community and he helped organize the State Bank of Commerce, which later was acquired by the First National Bank of Independence, of which Sinclair served on the board of directors.
Sinclair Oil SignHis brother, Earle W. Sinclair, served as president of Sinclair Refining Company until his death at age 70 of heart disease on September 21, 1944.
Harry Sinclair’s high-profile image as a reputable American business leader and sportsman came into question in April 1922 when the Wall Street Journal reported that United States Secretary of the Interior Albert B. Fall had granted an oil lease to Sinclair Oil without competitive bidding. The oil field lease was for government land in Wyoming that had been created as an emergency reserve for the United States Navy. What became known as the Teapot Dome scandal ultimately led to the United States Senate establishing a Committee on Public Lands and Surveys to conduct hearings into the circumstances surrounding the government oil lease. The result was a finding of fraud and corruption that led to a number of civil lawsuits and criminal charges against Harry Sinclair and others. In 1927 the United States Supreme Court declared the Sinclair oil lease had been corruptly obtained and ordered it canceled.
Two weeks after Harry Sinclair’s trial began in October 1927, it abruptly ended when the judge declared a mistrial following evidence presented by the government prosecutors showing that Sinclair had hired a detective agency to shadow each member of the jury. Sinclair was charged with contempt of court, the case eventually winding up before the United States Supreme Court who, on June 3, 1929, upheld Sinclair’s conviction. He was fined and sentenced to six and a half months in prison, which he served as prisoner #10,520, at the District of Columbia jail.
While in prison, Sinclair was allowed to work as both pharmacist and physician’s assistant, and it was while working within these capacities that he was allowed to be taken by car to attend to the prisoners assigned to work details at the city wharfs. Public attention and perceived favoritism prompted George S. Wilson, District Director of Public Welfare, to order an end to these rides, but rumors of Sinclair’s preferential treatment continued.
After serving his short prison term Sinclair returned to his successful business. He had owned a luxurious French Renaissance-style château on the southeast corner of Fifth Avenue and 79th Street in New York City. His reputation destroyed there, Sinclair sold the property in 1930. Located in the same area as several major museums, it was eventually acquired by the Ukrainian Institute of America and is now open to the public.
Harry Ford Sinclair retired as president of Sinclair Oil and Gas Company in January 1949. He died a wealthy man in Pasadena, Calif., in 1956 and was interred in the Roman Catholic Calvary Cemetery, East Los Angeles.
Before we jump into the reasons for social media and touch on the application of social media for the oil and gas related businesses, let’s look out over the horizon of social media with a little bit broader view. Let’s start with Instagram. Instagram is one of the fastest growing social media networks, is known for a lot of things – like being a place for showcasing beautiful photography, being the second most used social media platform in the United States (behind Facebook), and being a good place to build a brand and a reputation.
On Instagram, some high achievers are just everyday folks who have been successful in earning the title of “influencers,” even achieving virtual celebrity by using the digital photography platform to brand themselves and garner an audience.
Instagram offers such good opportunities for this type of brand development that lots of people seek the fame and fortune Instagram can deliver. Some “Insta” users will go so far as to do photo shoots in exotic locations in dangerous situations in order to gain notoriety.
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EYES ON THE SPIES
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Seeking a different kind of brand attention, in April [2019], the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) of the United States executed their first Instagram post with a cleverly staged photo that was captioned, “I spy with my little eye…“.
Why would the CIA be on Instagram? The primary objective for this particular social media mission was to collect, evaluate, and disseminate information, all in an effort aimed at recruiting talented Americans to serve. The CIA joined Instagram as a place to scope out potential new recruits.
BASIC SOCIAL MEDIA TACTICS FOR OIL & GAS
In this article, we will hit the highlights of some basic tactics. We invite you to apply these tactics to your own social media practices. In addition to a few hows, we want you to understand the reason why your energy sector company should use social media. So, if you are standing at the crossroads of making a decision on whether or not to use social media, we hope this will tilt you in favor of a yes.
THE COMMON GOOD
Beyond Instagram, all businesses, benefit from the development of a solid social media presence. But to reap the benefits, you must post strategically and in keeping with the social media trends. In each of the major social media networks – Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, and LinkedIn – you find a different audience with different expectations. And, while they are all unique, there are common aspects as well. Some of the more obvious commonalities include:
Users – Each network has millions of daily users. Therefore, social media is a great place to find a new audience.
Like-minded Interests – Users tend to associate with like-minded people around a particular interest or group. People with an interest in the oil & gas sector will connect on social media.
Conversations – People participate in conversations around the things they find important and enjoyable. Your business has the opportunity to join in and be a part of their conversations.
To underscore the value of conversational interactions on social media, SmartInsights released an enlightening report earlier this year entitled, Global social media research summary 2019. In the study, the researchers asked the question, “How do social users interact with brands on social?” The researchers inquired about positive responses to social media, and negative responses as well. When the question came to positive responses, the data showed that 48 percent of respondents are prompted to purchase when the brand is responsive with its social following. In addition, forty-two percent are prompted to purchase from the brand because of what they found in the educational content published by the brand.
The Common Not-So-Good
It is easy to see how this happens on many oil and gas company Facebook pages. The common not-so-good scenario plays out like this.
Employee Assignment – An employee is tasked with building and maintaining a social media account for the company.
Passive Posts
He posts repeatedly about the company’s services.
He posts “happy holiday” as the occasions arise.
Few Followers – He gets very few followers (other than his family members).
Effort Abandoned – The social media is deemed unfruitful and abandoned.
HOW TO TURN YOUR SOCIAL MEDIA AROUND
Let’s turn it around. Now that we see what doesn’t work for oil-related marketing, let’s focus on what does work. We’ll begin with the basic terminology – “social media.” The wise marketer understands that the business must perform in both capacities. The business must be “social” and they must serve as their own “media.” Those two logical but often overlooked concepts contain the secret of being successful as a business on social media, for oil and gas, as well as for any business..
THE SOCIAL ASPECT
Be mindful that people participate on social media for two main reasons: to keep up those they care about and to stay in the loop of what’s going on. Social media is predominately a conversational experience. By definition, a conversation is an exchange of sentiments, observations, opinions, or ideas. It’s a discussion. It includes interaction. So, you can see how broadcasting a one-way message of the virtues and benefits of your company does not elicit a response nor encourage a dialogue. Be social with your business page.
THE MEDIA ASPECT
The media aspect of social media is focused on the publication of news, helpful information, stories, and opinions that your community will be interested in. Think of yourself as being media, not just being a business with something to sell. An entity that is trying to “be” the media, or at least to be somewhat like media, is one that freely educates and invites discussion amongst the followers on its page and beyond. This aspect of social media marketing is driven by content marketing. Development of meaningful, useful, and shareable content is much more attractive to your audience than a simple post saying – “Hey, it’s Wednesday. We made it to ‘Hump Day!'” Too many of these quick and easy posts that have no real substance will lead you to the same pit of wasted social media presence as will the path of constant self-promotion.
1 – BRANDING
Today, branding is centered around building trust. Branding your company with personalized experiences builds trust with those who follow your page. There is an expectation that companies will be transparent and accurate. Those who are successful will gain positive recognition and appreciation.
At least 58 percent of U.S. consumers use social media to follow brands. (MarketingSherpa)
Bonus – Employee Participation – It’s a good practice to encourage your employees to be involved with your social media. Set out some guidelines regarding what is appropriate for them to communicate as representatives of the company. Then, enlist your team to comment, share, and engage with your social content. Set an expectation for your social media practice that presents the company with its “best foot forward.” The return on investment (ROI) for positive branding is not exactly measurable by analytics, but it is observable through the loyalty that your following shows.
2 – FOLLOWING
In keeping the focus on positive branding for your company, resist the impulse to amass a large, disconnected audience, and set out instead to develop an active, dedicated community. Interact with followers who engage, comment, and share your content. Create a company hashtag around your brand that brings you all together with a common interest.
3 – SEO (SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION)
One of the key benefits of an active social media business page is the positive impact it can have on your website’s SEO (search engine optimization). Of the many factors that are calculated to give a business an SEO score, one of the most important is your social media connections. (Yes, Google and other search engines examine and measure your “social” standing.) Search engines monitor whether or not people comment on and share your posts (the social part). Likewise, they monitor how much activity you generate of people clicking links that take them from your social media account to your website to read your content (the media part).
4 – REVIEWS
Once you have built a loyal following, there is another benefit you can derive. Reviews. Online reviews, like the ones on Facebook, have supplanted word-of-mouth referrals. Potential customers and potential hires will trust the comments that others share about your company more than what you say about yourself. Their comments are viewed as objective. Such reviews by your loyal followers elevate your company’s branding and expand your potential reach.
5 – RECRUITING
After you have done some work to brand your oil and gas related company on social media, and you have worked to build a loyal, active following, you will find social media a good recruiting environment.
As you publish words and pictures on your social media site, don’t neglect to incorporate stories and testimonials from current employees that relate what is it really like to work at your company day-to-day. These posts exhibit your company’s values. And, if you are hiring, the reviews that you’ve racked up will also work in your favor towards attracting quality employees.
Potential employees will learn about your company culture when they peruse your social accounts. There’s no better way to get on their radar than to get your following to network with you on social media. Social media gives you the opportunity to reach the person who is looking for the job. Many times it is enough simply to get on the radar of that job hunter’s friends or family members, most of who will likely know that that person is job hunting. They’ll share your content with that prospect and the connection is made.
We created and posted a “job opportunities” message for one of our oil and gas clients on Facebook a month ago, and the response was huge. The account itself had fewer than a thousand followers, but the post received 27 comments, 32 shares, and 2,341 engagements, all culminating in a reach of 8,807 people – more than eight times the following of the account. Social works!
These recruiting stats underscore the opportunities that are available to employers who utilize social media to identify job seekers.
79 percent of job applicants use social media in their job search. (Glassdoor)
Job seekers rank social media and professional networks as the most useful job search resource, as compared to job boards, job ads, recruiting agencies, and recruiting events. (CareerArc)
A study from the Aberdeen Group revealed that millennials are changing social recruitment practices: 73 percent of millennials (18-34 age group) found their last position through a social platform. (CareerProfiles)
70 percent of hiring managers say they’ve successfully hired with social media. (Betterteam)
IF YOU DON’T DO ANYTHING ELSE
Social Media can and should be an effective marketing tool. It builds your company’s brand recognition, gains you a loyal following, lifts your SEO page rank, elicits good company reviews, and provides healthy opportunities for hiring your next employees. If you don’t do anything else, make a plan and get active on one network this quarter. You’ll be glad you did.
For further reading on oil and gas marketing
Here are some of our most popular content on marketing for the oil and gas sector.
It’s been a typical refrain from oilmen for a decade, maybe decades. Anytime you ask them why their company doesn’t have a website, they respond with,
“Oh, we just like to operate under the radar.”
And honestly, when you look at the antagonism oil and gas has had to deal with over this period, you can understand why they have been inclined to feel that way. They’ve been vilified by anti-frac’ing protestors. They’ve seen their compliance workloads escalate in the wake of heavier regulatory burdens. As an industry, they’ve been picked on by lawyers employing sue-and-settle tactics to make money, all under the guise of pushing endangered species listings. They’ve had their facilities surveilled with FLIR cameras and then been declared polluters – often groundlessly.
So they’ve hunkered down and decided, many of them, to stay out of the limelight. Why invite scrutiny, when you feel like you have a public out there that has it in for you?
The truth is that most of the public has no such hostility toward oil and gas. But aside from that, there are other reasons why it might be time to rethink this strategy that oil companies often have, of staying “under the radar.”
A website: your first, best shot
If that line of thinking ever served them in the past, the reasons to think otherwise are becoming more and more compelling. One flaw in the old ways of thinking is that those companies likely were misleading themselves in thinking they were achieving any kinds of safeguards. The truth is, no adversarial individual or agency was ever likely to begin any fault-finding with an oil or gas company by looking at that company’s website.
It was never a case of, “Oh, I see they have a website! I’ve got them now!” Not having a website is no real defense.
If an entity out there was ever going to make trouble for an oil and gas-related business, such trouble likely would start from finding some evidence of actual wrong-doing, and that sort of finding would be out in the field, not in a Google search. If an environmentalist, say, spotted an oil spill, he might then raise a hue-and-cry against the offender. But he wouldn’t be likely to start trouble against any business simply because that business maintains a site. If anything, a website would be that business’s first, best shot at making its true character known.
follow the flock
Truth be told, your peers are abandoning the “fly low” mantra. They are flocking to the digital revolution that has transformed the oilfield as a result of the convergence of two parallel phenomena: the “Great Crew Change” and the Internet of Things (IoT).
The “Great Crew Change” is a phenomenon that is revolutionizing the oilfield. As the industry’s older generation – Baby Boomers, most of them – keep retiring, the field is being left to the younger entrants. Millennials and Gen Z workers are filling the void, and these workers were raised on the internet.
The Internet of Things (IoT), meanwhile, is the web-based network of devices, sensors, and software that have been brought to play as the industry has revolutionized its technology base. The so-called Digital Oilfield is a manifestation of what the IoT is doing in O&G. Increasingly, devices and computers are interconnected in greater and greater breakthroughs of efficiency and optimization.
Into a digital dependence.
These changes have thrust the once-lagging industry into a digital dependence.
And if these reasons are not enough to convince O&G-related businesses to get with the times and get their websites launched or updated, there is the fact that O&G is in a hiring battle with all other industries for qualified help. And it is hard to attract good, tech-savvy help when one’s own company does not deal in 21st century tools.
For all ofthese reasons, there is a stampede going on, within oil and gas especially, to get websites established and get companies on the digital map with an established and active web presence.
it might be time to ask yourself...
And so, if you are one of those companies who have held onto the “under the radar” mentality, it might be time for you to ask yourself if you really want to be the outlier in that scenario. Do you want to wait another five years and be five years further behind the curve in terms of being found online and in terms of having any kind of name recognition or domain authority? Some of your peers are spending significant amounts of time and money to develop a presence on the web.
The question becomes, do you want to be around in five years?
[ut_header style=”pt-style-3″ align=”left” font_size=”30″ title=”6 WAYS A WEBSITE CAN WORK FOR YOU” css=”.vc_custom_1557255639017{border-top-width: 1em !important;}” title_color=”#000000″][/ut_header]
1. Use Your Website to Differentiate
You know you need to cut through the clutter out there and get your brand recognized for its clear and distinct differences and advantages. Your competition will want to blur the differences, and they’ll want to make themselves sound like they’re just as good, if not better, than you are.
2. Use Your Website to Educate
Put your website to work for you by telling your story—a story no one else can tell. Use your website to tell your company’s story through testimonials, case studies, anecdotes, statistics, successes, and many other angles. Educate your potential work partners in regards to what makes your company uncommon. Cultivate your customers with content on your website (this is called “content marketing”) in order to gain new business and strengthen long term working relationships. (Learn more about the importance of content marketing for oil and gas.)
3. Use Your Website to Dominate
A place to call your own: that’s what your website is on the Internet. When you own the URL (web address), then what you build on it becomes assets that completely belong to you. Unlike the “rented” ground, or rented audiences, you encounter with Facebook or Wix or Weebly, or with audiences that you reach with purchases of traditional media – audiences that are no longer yours when you stop “paying-to-play” – your website is all yours and your efforts there accrue to you.
On your own site, all the messages, images, and information you publish are totally in your control.
Let your site function as the hub of your activity online. Because you have jurisdiction over your site, use that power to your advantage. Set out with a goal to build your website up to where you “own” your niche online within the industry. As we have already noted, businesses in the oil and gas industry have been slow carve out their online real estate. They have been slow to build their online presence. But that is changing rapidly. This is the shift we have seen with companies realizing that the new generation of O&G workers are turning to their devices to discover contacts and resources. It is another advantage you can exploit yourself. You can get in and stake your claim.
4. Use Your Website to Establish Authority
The winners in this new communication playing field are the companies who frequently publish informative and helpful resources on their website. These frequent content updates build your reputation online and give Google more occasions for sharing your website content with online searchers seeking answers to their web queries. (Making progress in this direction is called building “domain authority.”) Plus, you will benefit from other tactics such as “link building.” Link building occurs when you share links (webpage addresses) from your site, putting them out into circulation via messaging you do outside your website, in efforts on social media, or in email marketing, or in news releases. Readers who click on those links are brought back to a specific page (a landing page you created) on your website. Thus, your website increasingly becomes the “hub” of everything you do online.
5. Use Your Website to Attract New Talent
You can cultivate new hires before they ever submit a job application. Use your website to entice the top talent to want to work for you by dedicating a portion of your website to your company culture. Show them your company values. Tell them of your company benefits. Let some of your own team relate their experiences of why they work for you. Then, make it easy for the interested applicants to submit an online application right from a job board built into your website. (Learn more about using your website to attract new job candidates.)
6. Use Your Website to Communicate with Customers
Don’t let dropped communication or lost job tickets hurt your business. Use your website as a centralized location where messages can be tracked and documents can be stored and retrieved in the office or in the field from a device.
Portals – Your company can have a mobile friendly online portal for storage of important documents. Always have the latest version available. Set permissions for different users and control who has access to which documents. Use the portal for documents that need to be shared amongst your team members or shared with customers.
Job Tickets – Add job ticket software to your portal and manage everything from one cloud-based place on your website. Track the job status and even assign team members to team managers for better job monitoring.
[ut_header style=”pt-style-2″ align=”left” font_size=”30″ title=”BACK TO THE QUESTION: DO YOU WANT TO BE AROUND IN 5 YEARS?”][/ut_header]
Building a website is not a guarantee that you will still be in business in five years. However, not building a website does lay the odds in favor of the other guys who do.
It’s a good choice to invest in building your online presence and using your website as your hub. It is the starting place for the best possible program for jumping out ahead of the pack.
We want to be your partner. Let’s talk about how to get started.
Hiring is everybody’s problem in oil and gas. For those who are working in the SCOOP/STACK, the situation is not any different. The problem for oil and gas is two-fold. One, when times are good in the industry, qualified applicants are in short supply, and job poaching is rampant. So, competition is tough. Two, the industry’s workforce is heavily skewed to senior, late-career workers and youthful entrants, with relatively few workers falling in-between.
This condition makes for an oil & gas hiring challenge in that many Baby Boomers are retiring out of the industry, and leaving a void of experience, not to mention a void of bodies, in their wake.
Shifting Priorities
Young people did flock to oil and gas over a short timeframe. Between about 2009 and 2014, many young people entered the O&G workforce. But since then, young people have not been so enthusiastic about a career in the industry. As recently as five years ago, oil opportunities were dwindling and those entering the workforce looked elsewhere to establish their careers.
Today, as the United States has re-ignited as a world leader in oil and gas production, your industry finds it is not well-prepared. And your outfit might be in that very same tight spot. Maybe you didn’t attract your share of new folks to replace the Baby Boomers who are outbound.
Consequently, this somewhat sudden leap to international leadership has created a vacuum in a workforce pipeline that needs to be filled.
How can you reach today's job seekers?
The generation of folks who are roughly 22 – 38 are the Millennials. Born in the 1980s and ’90s, these potential hires have grown up with computers, and are daily dependent on the Internet that they carry with them. They would rather text than talk. These individuals “check in” instead of dropping by. They “face time” instead of having real honest-to-goodness face-to-face time. (Learn more from the “Workforce of the Future Survey.”)
Digital Dependence
Because they are dependent on digital dialogue, you need to make certain that your company has an opportunity to be a part of the conversation when it comes time to fill a position with your outfit. And if you want the top notch hands out there, you need to at least speak their language.
5 Steps to Whip Your Website into Shape for Job Seekers
Start by making sure your website reflects the heart of your company. Are you old school and out of date? If so, it’ll show in your website. Are you using modern technology to accomplish your oil & gas hiring needs? Your website needs to look modern and appealing enough to outshine the competition.
Make sure your company has a website. Many oil-related companies do not have a website at all, but this is changing rapidly. Don’t get left behind. (Learn more about O&G Websites.)
Make sure your website can be found on search. Of the companies that do have a website, most are not optimized for search nor optimized for mobile viewing.
Make sure your website can be found on social media. Of the Millennials – those 22-38 year olds – 73% found that last position through a social media platform. And Twitter is by far the most effective platform. Linking the job seekers back to your website to fill out the application further strengthens your company’s messaging to the recruits.
Why should he/she choose to apply for your job instead of another job at “Oil Company X” down the road?
What are your benefits?
What is your company culture? Is it a place where you would want your son or daughter to work? Then let the candidates know that.
Are you involved in the community? What are your company values? What is your safety record?
Make it easy to apply. Integrate a job board into your website and an online application into your site.
PUT A JOB BOARD ON YOUR WEBSITE
Since you are making a case on your website for why that quality candidate should apply for your open job, why would you want to link them off of your website to a 3rd party job listing? Give them the tools to apply for the job right on your website with an online job application built in.
While a very few may want the option to download the job application, print it out, fill it out by hand, and mail it back in to you, remember, you are trying reach the Millennials. Now that you have done a good job of convincing them why they want to work for you, they will want to take the easy step of spending just 3-4 minutes to fill out the application online and submit it you immediately.
Insofar as you are concerned, it’s good customer service. Where they are concerned, you’ve just sent them a message that you value efficiency.
Easy-to-Use for the Employer
With your own custom job board, you can easily manage all your oil & gas hiring steps right on your own website.
Add new job listings
Place job listings into categories such as by location or by skill set
Search and filter your job listings
Mark job listings as “filled”
Delete job listings as necessary
Simple Form - Add a New Job Listing
As the employer, you, or your HR manager, can easily submit andmanage job listings.
Job Details – The form allows you to input job details, including job description, job location, and details about your company.
Email Address – Each listing can be assigned an email address that job seekers can use to apply to the job.
Preview Listing – You can preview the listing before it goes live. The preview matches the appearance of a live job listing. After preview, you can publish the listing or edit it further.
Easy-to-Use for the Job Seeker
Each job listing shows the job description and company information in a clean format.
Google Map – The job location can link through to a Google map
Company Info – The company information section can show your company tagline or link to your Twitter account.
Online Application – Job seekers can quickly and easily fill out your customized job application while on your website
“Apply Now” Button – An “Apply Now” button is shown beneath the job listing and can be clicked to reveal your online application or your email address.
Search and Filter Oil & Gas Job Listings
Job seekers can search your job listings by:
Category
Job type
Keywords
Location
Job Seekers Stay Connected
Our search feature allows job seekers to stay informed when you post new job openings. They can subscribe to a feed containing new jobs that match their search criteria, and they will be automatically notified when you post a new job listing.
In the end, you are ahead of the game when you use your website as a recruiting tool. Your content will build a strong case to job searchers as to why your company is the best place to work. Then, your job will be to choose the best from the pack of top-notch job seekers who apply for your open positions.
Let’s talk about how to turn your website into a recruiting tool for your oil & gas hiring needs.
The Enneagram Personality Model is a psychological self-analysis that identifies any individual as to what personality type that person exhibits, from among nine different types. Just like people, social media platforms have grown personalities of their own that distinguish them each from one another. Although social media users find it necessary to utilize most if not all social platforms to keep their marketing machine running smoothly, those same users will show a definite preference for one specific social media platform over another, based on that user’s Enneagram profile. Therefore, a social media enneagram just might be a thing.
The Enneagram Test reveals not just your basic personality traits but also your basic fears and desires. If you would like to learn more about the Enneagram system or take the test to learn your type, you can do so here!
The Enneagram is a dynamic, growth-oriented inventory that aims to pinpoint one’s basic fears and motivations, in order to facilitate personal growth through a specific trajectory.
So we ask, what social media platform are you based on your Enneagram type?
Social Media Enneagram: LinkedIn – Types 1,3,5,8
For business not pleasure. Educational and informative content pertaining to business, work, and careers. More serious and purposeful.
Content you might find on on the social media enneagram of Linkedin:
Articles from businesses and industry outlets
Resumes
Job postings
Blog posts
Explanation:
If you’re a Reformer, Achiever, Investigator, or Challenger, you probably identify most with Linkedin. Whether you’re a rational perfectionist or someone who is purposefully principled, intensely innovative, or willfully self-confident, you probably find yourself sharing articles from Forbes or promoting your companies latest blog post. You are a thought leader and you may also be taking advantage of Linkedin targeting capabilities to grow connections within your industry.
Social Media Enneagram: Facebook – Types 2,6,9
The melting pot of social media. A wide variety of interests and shareable content. Entertaining, social, sharing feelings.
Content you might find on Facebook:
Memes
GIFs
Animal videos
Political views
Vacation albums
Family/kid albums
Explanation:
If you’re a Helper, a Loyalist, or a Peacemaker, you probably identify most with Facebook as your social media enneagram. Whether you’re interpersonally pleasing, engagingly committed, or receptively easy going, you probably find yourself posting photos from your family vacation, sharing one (or 10) of those cute animal videos, and liking and commenting on all of your friends’ posts. You like to share your own thoughts and feelings while creating and engaging in meaningful interactions.
Social Media Enneagram: Instagram – Types 4,7
Have a clever caption or don’t have one at all. Showing one’s day-to-day moods in a self-reflective and aesthetic fashion. Aesthetics are very important to this platform. People create an image on Instagram.
Content you might find on the ‘Gram:
Outfit of the days
Food/drink
Flat lays
Memes
Workouts
Play by plays via Stories
Explanation:
If you’re an Individualist or an Enthusiast, you probably identify most with Instagram. If you strive to express individuality, and avoid missing out on experiences, then you probably find yourself posting your favorite outfits, food, beverages, and music choices while keeping your stories constantly updated on what you’re up to. Aesthetics and captions are important to you, and these, when expressed to best advantage, help with maintaining a certain image that you can portray through the platform that is your social media enneagram.
So mix it up and level it out
Because these platforms are differentiated by their own personalities, it is vital that you utilize all of them to keep yourself and your business well rounded. Different types and personalities level each other out. Therefore just as you wouldn’t want a company made up of only achievers or only enthusiasts, you don’t want all of your content to go through ONLY Linkedin or ONLY Instagram. A healthy mix is the key to success!
THE LOWDOWN ON THE MARKETING BUDGET FOR OIL AND GAS: HOW TO BREAK IT DOWN
It’s your job to figure out how to get your phone to ring. For weeks you have been trying to figure this out. You lean forward and tap your keyboard to wake up your computer.”Maybe I’ll just Google it.”
Getting a website to show up on Google search results is a lifeline to any business today. As we visit with folks in the industry, we hear a couple of common refrains. First, there’s a shortage in the workforce in O&G. On top of that, your good guys get poached. You lose ’em because they are hired away by your competition.
And, second, if you are an oilfield service company, you gotta keep getting new business to keep the doors open, or the trucks running, or the guys busy.
GOOD TIMING
As for the first need, finding the people you need to connect with is not as hard as you might think. In fact, as the workforce in the oil and natural gas industry continues to get younger, reaching out will just get easier. According to a recent study by the American Petroleum Institute, millennials (those roughly 22 – 38 years old) are already well represented in the oil and gas industry. Today they are one third of the workforce, and performing in every role. From managers to engineers to procurement specialists, these guys (and gals) who have grown up online are rapidly becoming the people you need to reach. And the API study predicts that by 2025 this group will constitute 41 percent of a company’s payroll.
What does that mean for you? You just need to show up in the places where the millennials are. And, that’s online because they carry the Internet in their pockets.
Fortunately, this is a really good time to develop your online presence. Because, honestly, most of your competitors have not. (See our recent report on the digital footprint of 100 oil and gas companies working in Oklahoma.) They have ignored their websites and not used their social media. Maybe the web wasn’t important before. But, that’s not the case today. Now, it is not only important, a web presence is vital. The good news is – the neglect by your competitors is your opportunity. Jump ahead of them and get out front. Beat the competition and position your company as the leader. Let them be the ones to play catchup to you.
HOW TO DIVVY UP THE MARKETING SPEND: TRADITIONAL THOUGHTS
Okay, now you know why the web is important – because more than 1/3 of the workforce eats, sleeps, and lives with their mobile devices in hand. How should you spend a marketing budget to reach them?
As a start, we do not recommend that you totally reject traditional advertising. Let’s look at a few. The phone book? No, that’s last century. But, what about trade shows? Yes, trade shows still bring you some value by getting your team face-to-face with folks. Then, what about advertising in trade publications? We are still a fan of trade pubs. Ads can deliver you exposure to your targeted audience. And ads can build your brand with them.
THE DIGITAL DEMAND
So, what about digital? This is where you need to put your biggest investment because there is more long-lasting value for your promotional spending. We’ll explain that a little later.
Do you need a website? Yes, without a doubt. A website is your hub. It’s the place where you are in total control of the branding and message about your company. Go deep here. What about social media? Yes, millennials (and their spouses) are on social media every single day. You want to show up where they are. Paid digital advertising? Yes, you will need to do some paid digital advertising on Google and on social media to help your content be displayed to the right people.
Now, here is our the recommended overview of how you should break out your marketing spend:
30% – Website/SEO/Content Marketing
30% – Social media management
20% – Trade shows
10% – Trade publications
10% – Paid digital advertising
BREAKING DOWN THE DETAILS
WEBSITES – 30%
The biggest portion of your marketing budget should be devoted to building your website and promoting it “organically.” This means that you want to develop strategies that will get people to come to your site “naturally” rather than through “artificial” methods, these latter being paid advertisements.
Organic marketing encompasses a variety of practices that flip the right switches so your website content shows up on Google’s search results page. These practices include SEO, adding content regularly to your website, building links back to your website, and good social media engagement. All of the “organic” marketing practices offer a strong payoff over time.
Social media management – 30%
Next, an equivalent amount of your marketing budget should be spent on social media. Here you want to develop a following on three different social media platforms. Your following consists of employees, potential employees, stakeholders, business partners and relations, and others interested in the oil and gas sector.
Gineers Now magazine’s article about marketing for oil and gas recommended utilizing these social networks for the industry:
Linkedin is best avenue for brand building and lead generation. There’s a gamut of oil and gas engineers, managers, and leaders who are frequently browsing on their news feed. Twitter is the best medium for spreading your latest news while Facebook is your best medium to engage with your stakeholders and employees.
O&G related companies should not overlook Instagram as a social network for reaching Millennials.
A consistent presence on social media is an important ingredient in a successful digital campaign. Depending on your company’s needs, the platforms you concentrate on may differ slightly from others in the industry. However, for the progressive in mind, consider Instagram. Especially consider Instagram if your audience is Millennials. Many in the 22- 38 age group prefer a daily dose of Instagram over some of the other social media platforms.
How frequently should you post on social media? Daily is optimal. Posting every day with a variety of content types will keep your followers interested and engaged. If you hire a content marketing team to take care of your content development, they can manage the regular releases on your website and your posts to social media. Moreover, they can build momentum on your networks and deliver a solid return from an ever-growing loyal audience.
Where traditional marketing is concerned, setting up a booth at a trade show is still a good way to get your name out in front of industry-related people. It allows you to get acquainted with new folks – especially business connections. The trade show expense is encountered in the cost of booth space, booth branding/signage, manpower, travel, food, collateral, and swag. After the event, about the only thing of value that continues to promote your business is your beer koozie, multi-tool, or keychain. The greatest value of trade shows lie in the connections made during the show.
TRADE PUBLICATIONS – 10%
Like trade shows, trade pubs are another opportunity to reach a targeted niche. The optimal value here comes when you run advertising consistently in the publication. Notably, there are some traditional advertising stats that say potential customers need to see an ad seven times before they buy. Some research takes that point even further and indicates that you have to see an ad seven times before the ad is even noticed. Whichever stat is correct, the key takeaway is that consistency and frequency in your advertising is important.
PAID DIGITAL ADVERTISING – 10%
Google Adwords and paid social media ads are the counterpoints to the organic marketing mentioned earlier. Organic marketing requires time. It takes time to build a repertoire of content that answers pertinent Google queries. Content must be well-woven with industry-related keywords and phrases so Google knows when to show your webpage (as opposed to your competitor’s webpage) to answer someone’s search question.
Paid ads are the “artificial” (as in not “organic”) way to get in front of your search audience. They give you the opportunity to buy your position on the Google results page. Your Google ads will target your audience using your industry keywords and phrases so you can jump ahead of your competition.
Similarly, to get your name and your content in front of your audience on social media, these days you have to “pay to play.” Most of the social media sites force businesses to pay for ads that boost those businesses’ content so it will show up in their followers’ news feeds. With some social media sites – notably Facebook – one might be obliged to pay just to reach more of the news feeds of one’s own followers. Or the effort might get you into non-followers’ news feeds. Either way, you’re helped. But you’ve “paid to play.” And, while there is an on-going expense involved, social media ads allow you to rifle-shot-target your audience so you don’t waste advertising budget by delivering your ad to people who are not interested. Social advertising is sophisticated and can get you in front of the right audience on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook.
MAPPING OUT THE BEST PLAY
The investment in a website, content marketing, and social media keeps on delivering results. Unlike the paid advertisements that stop working when the ads stop running, the content that you put on your website and social media is a valuable resource that can be viewed weeks, months, and years after it is posted. In fact, as your content development increases your digital footprint, it increases the value of your business in the eyes of Google and in the eyes of your consumers.
For further reading on oil and gas marketing
Here are some of our most popular content on marketing for the oil and gas sector.
Workforce of the Future Survey: Nearly Half of Millennial and GenerationZ STEM Talent Are Interested in a Career in the Oil and Gas Industry
The oil and gas industry is facing strong competition in attracting science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) talent, with 44 percent of STEM Millennials and Generation Zs (Gen Z) interested in pursuing a career in oil and gas, compared to 77 percent in the technology sector, 58 percent in life sciences and pharmaceuticals, and 57 percent in healthcare—according to the inaugural “Workforce of the Future” survey released in mid-March by the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) at the Houston-based event known as CERAWeek by IHS Markit.
Identifying the Trends
The survey was commissioned by ADNOC to examine future workforce and employment trends in the oil and gas industry, particularly as the industry looks to attract STEM talent and enable the 4th Industrial Age. This is in line with ADNOC’s Oil & Gas 4.0 mission to help meet the world’s increasing demand for energy and higher-value products—by fostering a dynamic and performance-led culture that cultivates talent and applies the latest technology to optimize resources.
ADNOC's survey workup is available for anyone to download. Find them at http://adnoc.ae.
A Mix of Respondents
The survey interviewed STEM students and young professionals aged 15 to 35 in 10 countries—across North America, Europe, Asia, and the Middle East, representing a mix of significant global economies, and producers and consumers of oil and gas—and looked at their perceptions across multiple STEM-related industries, including oil and gas, and the skills they value and believe are required to succeed in these industries.
Key findings include:
“Salary,” “work-life balance,” “job stability,” “on-the-job fulfillment,” and “a good work environment” are ranked the top five drivers behind potential career choices for STEM Millennials and Gen Zs.
Young STEM talent also associate the oil and gas industry with high salaries and see it as an industry that is invaluable. “The industry pays well,” “the industry is crucial for their country’s economy and development,” and it is “an industry we couldn’t live without” are ranked as the top three positive attributes about the industry.
STEM Millennials and Gen Zs show the most interest in industries that they believe will be most impacted by new technologies. Globally, 42 percent say that new technologies will have a major impact on the oil and gas industry, while 56 percent say the same for healthcare, 53 percent for life sciences and pharmaceuticals, and 73 percent for the technology industry.
The Findings Related to Oil & Gas
His Excellency Dr. Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber, UAE Minister of State and ADNOC Group CEO, said: “The findings from the ADNOC ‘Workforce of the Future’ survey show that the more STEM Millennials and Gen Zs associate oil and gas with new technologies, the more interested they will be in a career in the industry. The oil and gas industry should position itself at the cutting-edge of technology and showcase how breakthrough innovation is vital to every aspect of our business—across the upstream and downstream value chain.
“As we enter the 4th Industrial Age, we need to come together as an industry and—with our technology industry partners—better highlight the exciting opportunities our dynamic industry offers to young talent with strong technology skills,” he added.
The results also show that STEM Millennials and Gen Zs appear divided on whether oil and gas is an industry of the future (45 percent) or the past (44 percent). The data also indicates a mismatch between what STEM Millennials and Gen Zs see as the most important skills to succeed professionally versus what they see are the most important skills for a career in the oil and gas industry.
IT and Creative Thinking
The results also show that STEM Millennials and Gen Zs appear divided on whether oil and gas is an industry of the future (45 percent) or the past (44 percent). The data also indicates a mismatch between what STEM Millennials and Gen Zs see as the most important skills to succeed professionally versus what they see are the most important skills for a career in the oil and gas industry.
“Information technology and computer” skills (37 percent) and “creativity and innovative thinking” (33 percent) are seen as the most important skill-sets for succeeding in the future, but only 18 percent see “IT and computer” and “creativity and innovative thinking” as important skills for a career in oil and gas. Similarly, while 26 percent say programing languages are key for future professional success, only 11 percent view it as an important skill in the oil and gas industry.
Changing world: The future—in oil and gas, at least—is a study in contrasts.
Experience Changes Perceptions
The data also shows that some experience in the job market and a tertiary education in STEM subjects can help change perceptions positively towards a career in the oil and gas sector. While interest is low among secondary school-age STEM students (37 percent are interested in a career in oil and gas), this figure rises to approximately half (51 percent) of young professionals being interested in pursuing a career in the sector—representing a 14-point increase.
H.E. Dr. Al Jaber added: “Oil and gas has always been—and will continue to be—an industry of the future that is at the forefront of technology and innovation. It is an exciting time for STEM talent to join the industry, particularly as we advance our Oil & Gas 4.0 mission and embrace new technologies and partnerships for digital and technological transformation across our entire operations,” concluded H.E. Dr. Al Jaber.
Millennials in the Current O&G Workforce
Millennials already account for more than one-third of the work force in the oil and gas industry, according to the American Petroleum Institute.
To download a copy of ADNOC’s inaugural global “Workforce of the Future” survey, visit www.adnoc.ae
Abilene Regional Airport went live with its new website on Tuesday, Jan. 15, making available a selection of new features not previously available to local air passengers accessing the former website.
Airport Marketing and Development Manager Kate Alvarez, the client representative who contracted with site developer Jemully Media, sought a mobile-friendly approach. Using fresh graphics and streamlined navigation, Kate’s goal was to serve up a fuller array of services, information, and benefits.
The website, found at iflyabi.com, is a secure site and accomplished the mobile-friendly goal. In addition, passengers and visitors who are on-the-go have ready access to all the site’s features.
Good Afternoon and Welcome Aboard…
It’s a happy, welcoming feeling that the website projects. The site, in its new iteration, is intended to serve more than just the airport itself. Content on the site also celebrates the beauty and uniqueness of Abilene and the Big Country. Similarly, many of the area’s resources, facilities, events, travel opportunities, and community spirit are highlighted.
As before, the site carries flight information and links to car rentals, passenger services, airport tenants, airport directions, and other aids. The new version adds such features as weather alerts that impact flights at “ABI” and an expanded treatment of the airport’s VIP Rewards program.
Your Flight Crew Today is…
Jemully Media staff was happy to be the team to get the airport’s website off the ground.
“We’re excited about the launch of the new site, which employs better graphics and content and also functionality that was not available on the previous website,” said Kit Mullins, owner of Jemully Media LLC, the Abilene-based digital marketing agency that created the new site. “For many people visiting Abilene for the first time, the airport’s website could be the city’s opportunity to make a good first impression.
“The airport’s Kate Alvarez was one of my favorite clients to work with, ever,” Mullins added. “She is gracious, professional, and organized, and she has a heart to serve the community and Abilene visitors. Kate ensured that the site’s content reaches and addresses multiple audiences for the airport. And with the site’s mobile friendliness, fliers will find it easy to find what they need, whether they are at home on their desktop or en route on their mobile device.”
Jemully Media has done websites and web development for more than 100 clients over its eight years of existence.
“During our first year, we would have been a bit stretched to deliver a site of this sophistication and functionality,” Mullins said. “But now, with our experienced staff, we compete with bigger shops in bigger markets. Our Abilene-based work has won us clients from across the nation.”
Meanwhile, we’ll be passing over some points of interest. These would be other clients of Jemully Media. We give you a partial list.
Besides such local (Abilene-based) clients as Cadco Engineering, Integrity Wireline, VFW’s Southern Conference, and the Carl Spain Center at ACU, Jemully Media has created sites for law firms Wagstaff LLP and McMahan Surovik Suttle PC. Other, more wide-ranging clients include Yaggi Engineering in Arlington, Texas; Heritage Christian College Foundation in Frisco, Texas; Simply Essentials in Iowa.; and Scott O’Hara Consulting in Martinez, Calif.
Besides web development, the company concentrates on content marketing, social media management, consulting and digital marketing strategy. They are headquartered on the fourth floor of the Compass Bank Building, downtown at Third and Cypress, in Abilene, Texas.
The year 2018 was the year of a royal wedding, of Beyonce being the first African American woman to headline Coachella, and of the most deadly and destructive wildfire season in California history. These events garnered much coverage, as stories were splashed across news websites and social media platforms. Today’s content happens fast, and it happens on devices. The top marketing trends in 2018 tapped into our heavy use of the internet. Now that 2019 is underway, we can expect to see not just a continuation of these trends, but an acceleration of at least 8 up-and-coming marketing practices.
We now live in a world where many consumers prefer video over print media, and native advertising (defined later in this article) over traditional advertising. So what does this say about the direction marketing is moving?
1. Video Content
First and foremost, we are all aware that the popularity of video content has skyrocketed just in the last year or so. Believe it or not, Youtube is now the second most popular social media platform, just behind Facebook! As a point, some 72% of people would rather use a video to learn about a product or service, so consumers are literally begging for more video content. We can attribute some of the growth in popularity on the fact that resources for video production used to be much less attainable. Today, with technology advances, all you really need is some decent lighting and a smartphone. Video content is now a type of experience for the consumer. And, it is a great way to connect with your audience.
Nintendo uses Youtube as a social platform. They have almost 5 million subscribers!
2. Native Advertising
Now, let me define “native advertising.” Naturally and organically developed ads establish your brand or product within another environment, such as a publication, video, or graphic. Native advertising is designed to blend in with the surrounding content, as opposed to traditional advertising, which is designed to interrupt and stand out. One of the perks of native ads is that they don’t “feel” like traditional advertisements, so audiences are more likely to support and consume them. While native advertising has its advantages, it is still vital that you place your advertisements in environments that are relevant to your brand, product, or business.
Dell’s advertisement is discreet but not overlooked.
3. Permanent & Ephemeral Content
Next, let’s look at Instagram where usage is heaviest on weekdays. This is because users look to Instagram for a break in their days. Therefore, when posting permanent social content you need to decide whether you want your voice to be inspirational, beautiful, informative, playful, trendy, etc. From there, you need to create content that reflects that voice and should match your brand’s message. Temporary content – like Instagram and Facebook stories – have also been soaring into popularity this past year, and their user behavior leans toward quick and playful. Stories often employ a heavy use of features like Boomerang and polls – approaches that make the content interactive and provide the opportunity to show more of your brand’s personality and flair.
Starbucks connects with their customers by featuring them in their stories!
4. Micro Influencers
Likewise, let’s take a look at micro influencers. They are social media promoters who have a smaller following, generally ranging between 100,000 and 1 million. These influencers are valuable because consumers view them like a friend or a family member as opposed to an unattainable celebrity. Because of their affinity for these influencers, consumers are more likely to trust their recommendations. A micro influencer’s impact lies in their engagement rates, not necessarily their number of followers. In other words, even if they have a lower number of followers, the followers they do have are fiercely loyal, which drives engagement. They drive social buzz through more personal posts and are much more cost effective.
5. Mobile-first indexing
Today, if someone has a phone, chances are it’s a smart phone with internet capabilities.
This being the case, it’s not hard to believe that 48% of consumers start mobile research with a search engine, and the first position on Google search results on mobile has a 31.35% click-through rate. Since we have such a heavy use and reliance on our phones, it is vital to a business’s success. Not only must you have a website, but, you must ensure that it’s visible and functional from a mobile devices.
6. Chatbots
We live in a world of instant gratification and it’s no surprise that more than half of consumers expect a response within 10 minutes regarding any marketing, sales, or customer inquiry. Of course, it’s not possible for humans to cater to every need of every person, so now enters the bot. Bots are powered by computer programs that automate certain tasks, such as chatting with a user through a conversational interface. Artificial intelligence allows the bot to process complex requests and to transmit personalized responses.
Companies like Mastercard use chatbots when they know their customers need available support 24/7.
7. GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation)
Companies collect private and privileged information every day and so when data breaches happen, precious information is siphoned into the wrong hands. Privacy is the lifeline of all things marketing, sales, service, and more. Organizations must ensure that their data is collected legally and safely, and that those who collect and manage the data will protect and respect the consumer rights. Following these guidelines may seem like a burden, but being fined for non-compliance will feel much heavier in the end.
8. Virtual Reality
Virtual reality is the gateway into the future. It helps consumers visualize virtual furniture in their own real rooms, or new paint colors on their own real walls. It allows you to view a computer-generated lifelike scenario that makes the consumer feel as if they are immersed in the process and experiencing things first hand. The technology behind virtual reality improves customers’ experiences online and at events as well.
Tom’s took users to a remote village in Peru where they could experience a giving trip.
Finally, as we work our way through this year, we expect to see these trends continue to grow and to witness new ones emerge. The year 2018 brought a concentration on digital marketing through the internet. Digital marketing is now, and it will be more vital in the future. The consumer wants their content and they want it fast! (Maybe even in video form.)
Actor Donald Glover says it well, “If you’re on Twitter, what you’re saying is, ‘I’m important enough for you to care what I think.’ ”
True for a celebrity, perhaps, but just as true for an individual and for a business. Twitter’s slogan is, “It’s what’s happening.” There’s a subtle statement made by the fact of being on Twitter. It’s the suggestion that you’re in the moment, that you matter, that you have something to say that’s worth watching for.
With those thoughts in mind, we funnel this down to just business considerations of Twitter. With no further ado, here are seven steps to make your business’s Twitter account shine:
This is a tweet from our agency’s own Tweet feed. Twitter gives a business an opportunity to take the outside public inside its operations. You can share your values, your personality, your competitive advantages. These help break down possible resistance to your business’s appeal.
1. Set Goals
If you’re at, say, 200 followers on Twitter, set yourself a goal of getting to 1,000 followers. Give yourself a year or two. And remember that you don’t have to have huge followings to get some good out of your Twitter presence. Hashtags, for one thing, will flag and funnel prospects your way, and you can also run advertising on Twitter that will expose prospects to your offerings.
2. Employ Imagery
Don’t run text-only tweets exclusively. Add a photo below your tweet or, for a more professional look, create a graphic that has text embedded in it. This makes for a more shareable post. But even when you create an attractive, professional-looking graphic, think about placing a line of text with it. (That is, text that is not a part of the graphic itself.) Why do this? Because you’ll want your post to show up in people’s searches of Twitter, and unless there is freestanding text in your post, there will be no words to match up against those searchers’ search terms. Words that are embedded in (placed upon) an illustration or photo are not searchable by Twitter. If you want to share a link, then you’ll want the link to be click-able, and that only happens if the link is above the graphic, not displayed within the graphic as text. Also, you’ll want to include hashtags in some of your posts, and hashtags must be in the freestanding text that is not displayed in your graphic. See this example, below.
This tweet from our @JemullyMedia feed includes hashtags, a backlink, and a graphic.
In this example, the keywords Wix, Weebly, and Squarespace, as well as the hashtagged terms #free, #website, and #cost are all included in the hope of attracting searchers on Twitter who are interested in these topics.
3. Be Engaging
Some businesses, in their Twitter embodiments, maintain a highly corporate look that is all graphics (and these generally with very refined, highly standardized design elements), with (usually) no text-only tweets. That’s fine for a major corporation, but then large corporations tend to be somewhat starched and they don’t generally present themselves as chatty, candid, or casual. If you examine the tweets by large corporations, you’ll see that they have relatively low levels of engagement. I’ve charted a statistic on some of them—retweets per 1,000 followers—and their numbers can be amazingly low. But major corporations are (mostly) not there to accomplish the same ends as small businesses, so if you’re a small business, don’t be afraid to inject text-only tweets, and @reply tweets, and shout-outs, and especially retweets of other accounts’ messages. These are all things that major corporations rarely do, if ever. But major corporations do not necessarily look upon Twitter as a customer-growth or demand-growth proposition. For them, it’s more about staying visible and looking branded across all channels. You, however, as a small or medium-sized business, want to attract potential customers. So get out there and mix it up!
4. Schedule Your Tweets
There’s an additional reason for scheduling your tweets, beyond just the idea of getting many of them done in advance. There’s the pure efficiency that comes with scheduling tweets, especially when you planning to tweet the same material multiple times. In Hootsuite, for instance, one can click the “save” button to preserve a freshly constructed tweet in “draft” mode. So once you have scheduled the tweet, you simply re-open the draft and schedule it for yet another date (and so on, repeatedly, as often as needed). If a Twitter account is going to display a particular tweet eight different times, for instance, then this draft function is a huge time saver. We sometimes like to make minor tweaks on the fly each time we schedule it—changing, say, the hashtags or the textual message or the graphic (don’t forget to use graphics with your tweets when you can).
For our own company Twitter account, we’ve created Tips that we trickle into our feed. We have built some 150 such tips so far. This one links readers to a blogpost, but many such tips don’t. They are a reader service for our followers.
5. Up Your Posting Game
Of all the most popular social media platforms, Twitter is most forgiving on the issue of repeating posts. Today, you’ll find many Twitter authorities urging marketers to be quite liberal in re-posting content. Twitter is a “noisy” platform and the half-life of a tweet is a mere 8 minutes, by at least one estimate. I’ve also heard sources say it’s 14 minutes—either way, it’s probably safe to say it’s less than 20 minutes. That’s not to say that someone should repeat a post in 20 minutes. By no means. But if you want a tweet to be seen by most of your followers, then multiple transmissions of it are necessary.
How many? Again, the estimates vary, but the figures do seem to cluster around 10 (times per tweet). We advise that you spread those out. If the message is evergreen enough, then the freshness-factor is not so critical, and in such a case, one ought to spread the repetitions out at least several days apart. We’re not averse to running repeated messages on consecutive days, but if you are only going to repeat a message, say, ten times altogether, then putting weeks between transmissions is even better. We also have some tweets that run once a month for, say, a year. If the content has value and isn’t time-sensitive, make the most of it.
Sources such as Hubspot recommend that online marketers apply a 40/60 rule to content creation. Forty percent of one’s time is to be spent creating the content, and 60 percent of one’s time is to be spent sharing the content, repurposing it, or promoting it.
Install your Twitter app on your phone and use it to snap pix on the fly to post immediately as live tweets. This one was shared during one of our team meetings. Twitter is all about immediacy.
6. Think “80/20”
Note: The “80/20” rule is not to be confused with the “40/60” rule from the previous tip.
Remember, with social media, you are replacing and bypassing traditional media. Eighty percent of your messaging should be informative or entertaining—not sales-y. In the old world of traditional media, the media outlet itself assembled and held the audience, and marketers simply pushed sales messages, nothing more. But in social media, the account itself has to do both jobs—gathering and retaining an audience, and selling. And so, 80% of your effort ought to be dedicated to obtaining and holding a following, without pushing a sales message. We often encounter clients who, in their early days with us, voice their insistence to be constantly selling. Some of them want to see a sales pitch in every post. They’re not always comfortable with spending time or money on efforts that are not directly tied to a sales pitch. But the practice of selling constantly is at odds with building a brand that retains a following. Who wants to be sold 100 percent of the time? Social media is reciprocal, not unilateral. It helps, then, to remind others that social media is media. To support ads, media must offer something of value to the audience. It has to function as media, as well as marketing. In some capacity, it needs to do the same work that traditional media did.
7. Consider Hiring A Social Media Manager
For brands that reach a certain size, or that desire a certain level of activity, it may become essential to hire a digital agency or solo professional to manage social media messaging and engagement. It might be the most cost-effective thing you can do. Some business owners cannot spend the necessary amount of time to nourish their social presence when they also have a company to run. We know from experience that we can grow clients’ accounts and make good things happen for them. Any business looking to get its feet wet on Twitter can do well for itself by following the first six steps guide, but at a certain point, when you’ve started to see that growth, bringing in a little outside help can be just the thing you need to scale up your social media efforts accordingly.
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Technical support in respect of the Services is only provided to Jemully Charter Users. Questions about the Terms of Service should be sent to Jemully Charter Support.
You agree not to reproduce, duplicate, copy, sell, resell or exploit any portion of the Service, use of the Services, or access to the Services without the express written permission by Jemully Charter.
You agree not to work around, bypass, or circumvent any of the technical limitations of the Services, use any tool to enable features or functionalities that are otherwise disabled in the Services, or decompile, disassemble or otherwise reverse engineer the Services.
You agree not to access the Services or monitor any material or information from the Services using any robot, spider, scraper, or other automated means.
You understand that your Materials may be transferred unencrypted and involve (a) transmissions over various networks; and (b) changes to conform and adapt to technical requirements of connecting networks or devices. “Materials” means Your Trademarks, copyright content, any products or services you sell through the Services (including description and/or price), and any photos, images, videos, graphics, written content, audio files, code, information, or other data provided or made available by you or your affiliates to Jemully Charter or its affiliates.
2. Domain Names
Upon purchasing a domain name through Jemully Charter, domain registration will be preset to automatically renew each year so long as your Jemully Charter Account remains active. You acknowledge that it is your sole responsibility to notify Jemully Charter to deactivate the auto-renewal function should you choose to do so.
3. Jemully Charter Rights
The Services have a range of features and functionalities. Not all Services or features will be available to all Merchants at all times and we are under no obligation to make any Services or features available in any jurisdiction. Except where prohibited in these Terms of Service or by applicable law, we reserve the right to modify the Services or any part thereof for any reason, without notice and at any time.
Jemully Charter does not pre-screen Materials and it is in our sole discretion to refuse or remove any Materials from any part of the Services, including if we determine in our sole discretion that the goods or services that you offer through the Services, or the Materials uploaded or posted to the Services, violate these Terms of Service.
Verbal or written abuse of any kind (including threats of abuse or retribution) of any Jemully Charter employee, member, or officer will result in immediate Account termination.
We reserve the right to provide our Services to your competitors and make no promise of exclusivity. You further acknowledge and agree that Jemully Charter employees and contractors may also be Jemully Charter customers or merchants and that they may compete with you, although they may not use your Confidential Information (as defined in Section 6) in doing so.
In the event of a dispute regarding Account ownership, we reserve the right to request documentation to determine or confirm Account ownership. Documentation may include, but is not limited to, a scanned copy of your business license, government issued photo ID, the last four digits of the credit card on file, or confirmation of your status as an employee of an entity.
Jemully Charter reserves the right to determine, in our sole discretion, rightful Account ownership and transfer an Account to the rightful Store Owner. If we are unable to reasonably determine the rightful Store Owner, without prejudice to our other rights and remedies, Jemully Charter reserves the right to temporarily suspend or disable an Account until resolution has been determined between the disputing parties.
4. Your Responsibilities
You acknowledge and agree to provide public-facing contact information on your Jemully Charter site.
You acknowledge and agree that the Services are not a marketplace, and any contract of sale made through the Services is directly between you and the customer. You are responsible for the content of your Jemully Charter site, the goods and services that you may offer, and all aspects of the transactions between you and your customer(s) via your Jemully Charter site. You represent and warrant that your Jemully Charter site, your Materials and the goods and services you offer through will be true, accurate, and complete, and will not violate any applicable laws, regulations or rights of third parties.
You are solely responsible for the goods or services that you may sell through the Services (including description, price, fees, tax that you calculate, defects, required legal disclosures, regulatory compliance, offers or promotional content), including compliance with any applicable laws or regulations.
You may not use the Jemully Charter sites for any illegal or unauthorized purpose nor may you, in the use of the Service, violate any laws in your jurisdiction (including but not limited to copyright laws), the laws applicable to you in your customer’s jurisdiction, or the laws of Canada and the Province of Ontario. You will comply with all applicable laws, rules and regulations (including but not limited to obtaining and complying with the requirements of any license or permit that may be necessary to operate your store or that may be held by you) in your use of the Service and your performance of obligations under the Terms of Service.
5. Payment of Fees
The subscription with Jemully Charter requires a minimum of twelve (12) months. Business owners who terminate their subscription prior to 12 months will have the payment method on file automatically charged for the remaining months that equal to twelve full months of service. plus a 15% early termination fee.
You will pay the Fees applicable to your subscription to Online Service (“Subscription Fees”) and any other applicable fees, including but not limited to applicable one-time fees, setup fees, or site customization fees.
You must keep a valid payment method on file with us to pay for all incurred and recurring Fees. Jemully Charter will charge applicable Fees to any valid payment method that you authorize (“Authorized Payment Method”), and Jemully Charter will continue to charge the Authorized Payment Method for applicable Fees until the Services are terminated, and any and all outstanding Fees have been paid in full. Unless otherwise indicated, all Fees and other charges are in U.S. dollars, and all payments will be in U.S. currency.
Subscription Fees are paid in advance and will be billed in 30 day intervals (each such date, a “Billing Date”). You will be charged on each Billing Date for all outstanding Fees that have not previously been charged. Fees will appear on an invoice, which will be sent to the Business Owner via the Primary Email Address provided. Users have approximately two weeks to bring up and settle any issues with the billing of Subscription Fees.
If we are not able to process payment of Fees using an Authorized Payment Method, we may make subsequent attempts to process payment using any Authorized Payment Method. If we are unable to successfully process payment of Fees using an Authorized Payment Method within 28 days of our initial attempt, we may suspend and revoke access to your Account and the Services. Your Account will be reactivated upon your payment of any outstanding Fees, plus the Fees applicable to your next billing cycle. You may not be able to access your website during any period of suspension. If the outstanding Fees remain unpaid for 60 days following the date of suspension, Jemully Charter reserves the right to terminate your Account in accordance with Section 14.
All Fees are exclusive of applicable federal, provincial, state, local or other governmental sales, goods and services (including Goods and Sales Tax under the Goods and Services Tax Act, Chapter 117A of Singapore), harmonized or other taxes, fees or charges now in force or enacted in the future (“Taxes”).
For the avoidance of doubt, all sums payable by you to Jemully Charter under these Terms of Service will be paid free and clear of any deductions or withholdings whatsoever. Jemully Charter will be entitled to charge the full amount of Fees stipulated under these Terms of Service to your Authorized Payment Method ignoring any such deduction or withholding that may be required.
Jemully Charter does not provide refunds.
6. Confidentiality
“Confidential Information” will include, but will not be limited to, any and all information associated with a party’s business and not publicly known, including specific business information, technical processes and formulas, software, customer lists, prospective customer lists, names, addresses and other information regarding customers and prospective customers, product designs, sales, costs (including any relevant processing fees), price lists, and other unpublished financial information, business plans and marketing data, and any other confidential and proprietary information, whether or not marked as confidential or proprietary. Jemully Charter’s Confidential Information includes all information that you receive relating to us, or to the Services, that is not known to the general public including information related to our security program and practices.
Each party agrees to use the other party’s Confidential Information solely as necessary for performing its obligations under these Terms of Service and in accordance with any other obligations in these Terms of Service.
7. Limitation of Liability and Indemnification
You expressly understand and agree that, to the extent permitted by applicable laws, Jemully Charter and its suppliers will not be liable for any direct, indirect, incidental, special, consequential or exemplary damages, including but not limited to, damages for loss of profits, goodwill, use, data or other intangible losses arising out of or relating to the use of or inability to use the Service or these Terms of Service (however arising, including negligence).
You agree to indemnify and hold us and (as applicable) our parent, subsidiaries, affiliates, Jemully Charter partners, officers, directors, agents, employees, and suppliers harmless from any claim or demand, including reasonable attorneys’ fees, made by any third party due to or arising out of (a) your breach of these Terms of Service or the documents it incorporates by reference (including the AUP); (b) or your violation of any law or the rights of a third party; or (c) any aspect of the transaction between you and your Customer, including but not limited to refunds, fraudulent transactions, alleged or actual violation of applicable laws (including but not limited to Federal and State consumer protection laws), or your breach of the Terms of Service.
You will be responsible for any breach of the Terms of Service by your affiliates, agents or subcontractors and will be liable as if it were your own breach.
Your use of the Services is at your sole risk. The Services are provided on an “as is” and “as available” basis without any warranty or condition, express, implied or statutory.
Jemully Charter does not warrant that the Services will be uninterrupted, timely, secure, or error-free.
Jemully Charter does not warrant that the results that may be obtained from the use of the Services will be accurate or reliable.
Jemully Charter is not responsible for any of your tax obligations or liabilities related to the use of Jemully Charter’s Services.
Jemully Charter does not warrant that the quality of any products, services, information, or other materials purchased or obtained by you through the Services will meet your expectations, or that any errors in the Services will be corrected.
8. Intellectual Property and Your Materials
8.1 Your Materials
We do not claim ownership of the Materials you provide to Jemully Charter. You grant Jemully Charter a non-exclusive, transferable, sub-licensable, royalty-free, worldwide right and license to host, use, distribute, expose, modify, run, copy, store, publicly perform, communicate to the public (including by telecommunication), broadcast, reproduce, make available, display, and translate, and create derivative works of any Materials provided by you in connection with the Services. We may use our rights under this license to operate, provide, and promote the Services and to perform our obligations and exercise our rights under the Terms of Service. You represent, warrant, and agree that you have all necessary rights in the Materials to grant this license. You irrevocably waive any and all moral rights you may have in the Materials in favour of Jemully Charter and agree that this waiver may be invoked by anyone who obtains rights in the materials through Jemully Charter, including anyone to whom Jemully Charter may transfer or grant (including by way of license or sublicense) any rights in the Materials.
If you owned the Materials before providing them to Jemully Charter then, despite uploading them to your Jemully Charter site they remain yours, subject to any rights or licenses granted in the Terms of Service or elsewhere. You can export the content of your Jemully Charter site, however you will be required to fulfill the 12 month subscription requirement plus any outstanding fees and the early termination fee, if applicable. You may notify Jemully Charter of your desire.
You agree that Jemully Charter can, at any time, review and delete any or all of the Materials submitted to the Services, although Jemully Charter is not obligated to do so.
You grant Jemully Charter a non-exclusive, transferable, sub-licensable, royalty-free, worldwide right and license to use the names, trademarks, service marks and logos associated with your site (“Your Trademarks”) to operate, provide, and promote the Services and to perform our obligations and exercise our rights under the Terms of Service. This license will survive any termination of the Terms of Service solely to the extent that Jemully Chartery requires the license to exercise any rights or perform any obligations that arose during the Term.
8.2 Jemully Charter Intellectual Property
You agree that you may not use any trademarks, logos, or service marks of Jemully Charter, whether registered or unregistered.
You agree not to purchase, register, or use search engine or other pay-per-click keywords (such as Google Ads), trademarks, email addresses, social media names, or domain names (including without limitation top-level domains, sub-domains, and page URLs) that use or include Jemully Media or Jemully Charter or that use or include any terms that may be confusing with the Jemully Media.
9. Jemully Charter Theme Sites
You may establish the appearance of your Jemully Charter site with a design template from Jemully Charter’s Theme options.
Technical support for a Theme is the responsibility of the Jemully Charter, and the Business Owner may not modify the Theme.
10. Termination
The term of these Terms of Service will begin on the date of your completed registration for use of a Service and continue for a minimum of 12 months or until terminated by us or by you, as provided below (the “Term”).
You may cancel your Account and terminate the Terms of Service at any time by contacting chartersites@jemully.com and then following the specific instructions indicated to you in Jemully Charter’s response.
Without limiting any other remedies, we may suspend or terminate your Account or the Terms of Service for any reason, without notice and at any time (unless otherwise required by law), including if we suspect that you (by conviction, settlement, insurance or escrow investigation, or otherwise) have engaged in fraudulent activity in connection with the use of the Services. Termination of the Terms of Service will be without prejudice to any rights or obligations which arose prior to the date of termination.
Upon termination of the Services by either party for any reason:
Jemully Charter will cease providing you with the Services and you will no longer be able to access your Account;
unless otherwise provided in the Terms of Service, you will not be entitled to any refunds of any Fees, pro rata or otherwise;
any outstanding balance owed to Jemully Charter for your use of the Services through the effective date and including the completion of the 12-month required subscription and early termination fee, if applicable, of such termination will immediately become due and payable in full; and
your Jemully Charter site will be taken offline.
If you purchased a domain name through Jemully Charter, upon cancellation your domain will no longer be automatically renewed. Following termination, it will be your sole responsibility to handle all matters related to your domain with the domain provider.
If there are any outstanding Fees owed by you at the date of termination of the Service, you will receive one final invoice via email. Once that invoice has been paid in full, you will not be charged again.
While in prison, Sinclair was allowed to work as both pharmacist and physician’s assistant, and it was while working within these capacities that he was allowed to be taken by car to attend to the prisoners assigned to work details at the city wharfs. Public attention and perceived favoritism prompted George S. Wilson, District Director of Public Welfare, to order an end to these rides, but rumors of Sinclair’s preferential treatment continued.
