One Million Followers: How I Built a Massive Social Following in 30 Days

There's really nothing new here, skip this one. This should have been a blog article, not a book. I was really looking forward to it too since it had a great build up, so I was quite let down. Mr. Kane's basic premise in this book & it's summary: pay for ads through a platform's advertising (his favorite is Facebook) and seek the highest share rate when doing an A/B test. For Facebook, he demonstrates why Facebook shares are his metric to ad strength, since it has a logarithmic growth pattern for followers. He goes on to point out the obvious technique in marketing, which is the better your ad campaign is tested and managed, the better your ROI (using multi-variate testing, etc). With money = followers and attention. Growing exponentially requires a word-of-mouth component to the product or the content in the advertisement. This is in Marketing books from the 1800s and onward to the 1950s and 2000s, too - the only thing that's changed is that internet-based social mediums have changed the play-date chats between Moms of the 1950s and the lunch chats of steelworkers of the 1800s on what word-of-mouth now means. Quixotic to Facebook, this book skips Twitter entirely, mentioned in one simple sentence to : "I don't use it." The only other content is punditry on how Instagram is hard to share on, LinkedIn is expensive, and Snapchat is supposedly going away. There are a few good paragraphs (and finally, something a bit new) on why it's important to perhaps seek out emerging markets, and he makes a good case (if it's true) that certain emerging markets actually have higher involvement times on social media platforms than western markets do. Those few paragraphs are good food for thought, but the author provides scant research for that premise. It's a short read, and at least in the abstract, everything within it has been Marketing 101 for a couple of centuries now.

Is the book great? No, but I’m not reading a book by a social media influencer for much more than insights about exactly that. Sprinkled throughout the book, Kane drops links for readers to go learn more at his website. A bit annoying, but ignorable. Some of the chapters can be outright skipped. If in a hurry, skip everything after chapter 5. The book is light on details on how exactly to do some of the things he describes like creating and testing ad sets, but Kane does cover generally how to do things fairly well. For exact, do this, go to an online analytics tool FAQ or something.<br /><br />4/5 for annoying references to his website. Otherwise relatively high quality.<br /><br />Kane generally emphasizes <br />* testing many things and iteration <br />* principle of failing hard and fast<br />* don’t pay for customers<br />* That Facebook is a great place to cheaply test content against broad, but targetable audiences<br /><br />## Ch1 How<br />* Hypothesize, Test, Measure<br /> * Hypothesize a format, story, or theme around a message<br /> * Produce a low cost proof of concept to be tested and learned from<br /> * Pivot if the measure does not do well<br />* Images and quotes are good for clicks<br />* Number one key: Get people to share<br />* Facebook is king of shares<br />* ROI is fundamental and inescapable: how much was invested should be a target. <br />* Never spend more than a fb suggested amount, and don’t re-up in the middle of a fb campaign. Examine CPLead / CPAquisition values, 50 cents per share is good<br />* Create ad sets for different interests to allow the creation of new variations among ad targets<br />* Test combinations of text, like quotes, and images<br />* term: dark post: based on population attributes to test content without bombarding audience<br />* Facebook is market research<br />* Target broadest age and country range possible so trends can guide you<br />* *launch at midnight*, or at least at consistent times to get consistent data<br /><br />## Ch2 Target<br />* Consumers are more than ever, specific in their interests<br />* Questions to ask in targeting:<br /> * What gender<br /> * age range<br /> * desired marketing goal?<br /> * what action? awareness, email list registration, post engagement, drive traffic to a website<br /> * Location<br /> * Interests<br /> * what sort of x do they like, music, stores, brands, routines, hobbies, tv, celebrities, etc.<br /> * Lifestyle<br /> * reln.status, occupation, income, needs, wants, etc.<br /> * Competitors - who are they, what can I learn?<br />* What tests can we assemble combining specific combinations of those?<br />* Test targeting people who are most likely to perform target action, AND share content<br />* *Sharable content is a function of quality and good targeting*<br />* Sometimes the target audience is not the most sharing audience, but the sharing audience can be targeted to get to the target audience<br />* Use tools like *Facebook Pixel and Google Analytics to analyze*<br />* Targeting the exact demographic is good for CTA<br />* Targeting sharable content is good for growth <br /><br />## Ch3 Choose a Message<br />* Find a *unique hook point* to grab attention<br />* Imagine a potential customer walking, what would stop them and get them to look at your product<br />* Several good case studies for headlines that are attention grabbers, and some not: target certain strong emotional responses<br />* Headline test variations on Facebook (A/B)<br />* *Content you share isn’t as important as context you wrap it in*<br /><br />* *Process Communication Model* - Use different styles of appeal in language<br /> * In PCM there are six personality types: *Thinkers, Persisters, Harmonizers, Imaginers, Rebels, and Promoters*.<br /> * Thinkers perceive the world through thoughts, and logic is their currency. <br /> * Persisters perceive the world through opinions, and value is their currency. <br /> * Harmonizers perceive the world through emotions, and compassion is their currency. <br /> * Imaginers perceive the world through inactions, and imagination is their currency. (that’s dumb)<br /> * Rebels perceive the world through reactions, and humor is their currency. <br /> * since they are often very powerful people, Promoters perceive the world through actions, and charm is their currency.<br /> * Think of a car. This car model gets fifty miles per gallon. The car’s miles per gallon are at the highest rate compared to other models in its class. We believe that this car provides more value to our customer in regard to what you’re going to pay for. Bottom line—it’s the best car on the market. It feels good, it looks nice, and you’re going to be so comfortable driving this car. All your friends are finally going to want to hang with you because this car’s awesome.<br /> * This sentence uses LOGIC and speaks to Thinkers: “Think of a car. This car model gets fifty miles per gallon. The car’s miles per gallon are at the highest rate compared to other models in its class.” <br /> * ​This sentence uses VALUE and speaks to Persisters: “We believe that this car provides more value to our customer in regard to what you’re going to pay for.” <br /> * This sentence uses CHARM and speaks to Promoters: “Bottom line—it’s the best car on the market.” <br /> * This sentence uses FEELINGS/COMPASSION and speaks to Harmonizers: “It feels good, it looks nice, and you’re going to be so comfortable driving this car.” <br /> * ​This sentence uses HUMOR and speaks to Rebels: “All your friends are finally going to want to hang with you because this car’s awesome.”<br /><br />* King shares that to reach the majority of people in the population, it’s *best to focus on feelings/compassion, which speaks to Harmonizers, who make up 30 percent of the North American population; logic, which speaks to Thinkers, who make up 25 percent; and humor, which speaks to Rebels, who make up 20 percent*. King recommends focusing on those three personality types to create content that reaches a very broad audience.<br />* Relevancy: You must find a way to take what you have to offer and make it accessible by linking it to what is already working. Popular content that gets shared often can be grouped into five categories: <br /> * 1.​Inspirational, motivational, and aspirational 2.​Political/news 3.​Entertainment 4.​Comedic 5.​Pets<br />* Although the message *doesn’t need to be about any of those things*, we can use them as *context to wrap our message in to drive attention*<br />* Does sharing the content make the sharer look good? Then it’s *social currency.*<br />* Even difficult messages can be wrapped to become more shareable: eg. tie drug and alcohol abuse (heavy) to celebrities (consumable); tie messages about death and life extention research (heavy) to a metaphorical story about a village whose elders are eaten by a dragon, and the kingdom researches to find a dragonbane<br /><br />## 4 Fine Tune through Social Testing<br />* Look at content the way engineers look at designing solutions: Build a prototype, then iterate.<br />* How many pieces to test? Pretty much as many as you can stand. <br />* Images and quotes are good places to start iterating. <br />* Test a dozen new things every day at midnight.<br />* Social is a psuh model, search is a pull model. Search tools give a good indication of how a message performs.<br />* Search gives insight into competitors: If competitors are buying certain words, a sign. If people search for you relatively more than competitors over time, that’s really good.<br />* Search shows how many people search for a specific term. Social networks are more difficult to disentangle.<br />* *Social listening* is the process of monitoring digital conversations for brand insights.<br />* Observe how people respond initially, and if response changes with time.<br />* Test fundamentally different messages—One may win out over the others.<br />* The brand should be community focused<br /><br />## 5 Create Shareable content on Facebook<br />Content light, this chapter was.<br />* Shareable content is about serving others.<br />* Headlines are high importance when evaluating shareability.<br />* Call to actions are to be used sparingly, and generally never directly telling others to share<br />* Content related to subject is not necessarily bad. Especially if it can be shared on others’ platforms bringing attention to your own.<br />* Posing a question to the audience is a good strategy.<br />* Creating a “five second trailer”, ie a quick introduction with an emotional or otherwise engaging hook, is good practice<br />* Think about shareability from the start.<br /><br />## 6 Strategic Alliances<br />The useful material from the book starts to dwindle after chapter 4.<br />* Alliances help go where the audience already is<br />* Start with people closer to one’s own level of influence<br />* Write featured articles<br />* Ask 2 questions: is anyone going to pay attention to the partnership, and Does the partnership elevate both brands<br />* Quality over quantity here<br /><br /># 7 Global<br />* Acquiring followers in developing countries is often cheaper<br />* Acquiring a following whether overseas or local may not matter for a lot of things—all give credibility<br /><br />Skipped the chapters on Instagram, Snapchat, Youtube.<br /><br />## 11 LinkedIn<br />Not using all of these tips, the chapter reads a bit like a hybrid of a lot of different ways to use LinkedIn.<br />* Specifically target selling a certain product or service, ideally expensive or B2B.<br />* Contacting in the right way is important, but the sample message he provides is super cringe<br />* Connections to a lot of people is pretty irrelevant<br />* Having a large audience with no likes or comments on content is bad everywhere<br />* LinkedIn is much more expensive than other platforms to market on<br />* Ideal parameters for linkedIn advertising: <br /> * big expensive products<br /> * Exact, professional market type<br /> * White collar products or recruiting<br /> * Higher education products or recruiting<br />* LinkedIn works as an initial contact; provide value before asking for anything<br />* Test to see how different segments respond (as always), job titles now possible, then adjust content<br />* change the images in ad content fairly often<br />

A really well prepared book if you have a lot of money and a goal to brand yourself largely on twitter and facebook. The linkedin section, which is my area of interest, is unfortunately anemic. However, it was worth reading about the steps that are taken by those who try to influence us, and who sometimes succeed.

Let's start with the bad news: 90% of what is in this book can be found in any number of other blog posts and YouTube videos. Also, Brendan Kane puts a lot of emphasis on the size of his following rather than what he is able to do with that audience.<br /><br />IMHO, it's better to have one loyal follower who buys your product or service and tells others about it than 100 million people who clicked "like" on your page and then forgot about you. Engaging an audience is key. Having an overall strategy for your social media presense is essential. Too many peoople get bogged down in how many followers they have rather than focusing on the things that drive one's business. This book feeds into that misconception rather than solves or addresses it.<br /><br />With all of that sad, there is still a lot of value in the remaining 10% of this book. In fact, I would go so far as to say that there is so much value in those remaining pages that I believe it's worth reading and sifting through everything else to find those golden nuggests amoungst the fluff.

The funniest part is when he says he hates books that don't tell you how to create content and instead they say vague things like "be authentic" or "be creative" and he promises he won't do that and then he does exactly that. <br /><br />Unless something like "get an interview with Taylor Swift" is supposed to be actionable advice, ayuno. There's some good fundamentals of digital marketing in here but, no, this book will not tell the average person how to get a thousand followers in a year, never mind a million followers in a month.

If you can get anything from this books is this: Make quality content. That's it. Work on your craft every waking hour. Give more than you want to receive. Put yourself in the shoes of your audience and think about what would please them. Not to derail from your ethos but to find balance in what you want to communicate and what the audience wants to see. It's a game of translating your thoughts and creativity into a language the most people can understand.

This is more for small businesses than influencers looking to grow. I learned a few interesting things but like I said a majority of this book did nothing for me nor pertain to my scenario.

Brendan Kane is a digital strategist and growth hacker who has worked with A-listers like Taylor Swift, Rihanna, and Katie Couric on their digital presence. Using that expertise, he was able to use his method to attract a following of over one million users on Facebook in 30 days.<br /><br />I was skeptical at first, but the method does have its merits and given enough capital, would work.<br /><br />Kane begins on a very basic level, discussing the psychology of why people interact the way they do in the online sphere. Many books in this genre would spend the first third of its content proving the author's credibility and humble-bragging their way to believability before they levy their sales pitch. I didn't get that feeling here. Rather, Kane opts to use examples from his previous experience to show exactly what he did for previous clients in a level of detail I could appreciate.<br /><br />The first three chapters introduce the general why and how of getting started. Chapters four through eleven get down into the weeds in a good way. From chapters on Facebook and Instagram to YouTube, Snapchat, and LinkedIn, most of the big social media bases are covered. Among the most helpful chapters in my view were those on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn. Most people know the power of Facebook and Instagram, but LinkedIn is often overlooked. I appreciate that there were clear stats on the typical LinkedIn auction bids and demographic info.<br /><br />Kane shows he knows his stuff rather than just telling you he's an authority. He's able to deftly describe the inner-workings of each major social media platform and the pros and cons of working with them.<br /><br />So, can you reach one million followers?<br /><br />The methods Kane used to achieve this feat were legitimate, although costly for the person without any budget. Based on the acquisition costs per follower/like he mentions and the geographic region that person came from, it would cost between $10,000 and $80,000 to get one million followers. The lower end of that range would indicate an entirely international audience outside of the United States and Western Europe.<br /><br />Don't have the money? Don't Worry.<br /><br />The tactics Brendan Kane describes can be useful for organic platform growth as well, albeit at a slower pace. Eventually, the way the social algorithms work, money will likely come into play through targeted ads and A/B testing on a large scale with hundreds or thousands of variations. What if you have no or low budget for social? I would recommend using the free aspects of his method for a while and measuring your growth.<br /><br />Regardless of whether you use just the free aspects or you dive in and test thousands of variations of your posts to discover the most shareable content and explode your social accounts, One Million Followers by Brendan Kane does a great job of preparing you for your task. Even if you're just starting out, this is a great book to read. It will familiarize you with all of the options that are currently out there. It's a good read for marketing specialists and executives alike. I would highly recommend!

When it comes to a title like this one, the danger is it suggests that gaining one million followers is straightforward, and that there’s a step-by-step process for achieving such a goal. In reality, doing so is pretty challenging; it requires lots of cash and tinkering and depends on so many factors specific to one’s business / situation.<br /><br />Conceptually, I feel like that idea sums up the shortcomings of this book better than any other way I can think of. That is, it’s very hard to create a one-size-fits-all playbook on a subject that probably requires an expert or consultant level of knowledge about the business or brand at hand.<br /><br />In other words, though running Facebook ads and experimenting with different options may be the way to the top, it’s the business-specific implementation of that process that will actually get you there — and that’s really hard, if not impossible, to convey in a mass-market work.<br /><br />That’s not to say this book is bad — far from it — it’s just that it doesn’t do its title justice.<br /><br />What I did like about this book, however, was that Kane is an expert in this domain, with real-life experiences to back it up. Having run campaigns for some larger-than-life figures, it’s clear we, as readers, can trust him on the subjects upon which he elaborates.<br /><br />I also liked Kane's insights on Instagram as a platform, as I hadn’t heard many of those tidbits before. Specifically, I didn’t know that Instagram ranks your profile into specific categories, and that which category you’re in influences how often your profile and content are displayed across the platform. Those sorts of insights were valuable for me.<br /><br />So, if I had to conclude things, I’d probably say this: Kane seems like someone I’d love to hire as a consultant, but that fact alone doesn’t magically make this a great book. In addition, the book is longer than it needs to be, given the surface-level nature of its content. I wouldn’t necessarily recommend this book, but I would definitely check out what other, shorter-form content Kane has online.<br /><br />-Brian Sachetta<br />Author of “Get Out of Your Head”

О ЧЕМ КНИГА: <br />Книга маркетолога, который продвигает в соцсетях и занимается цифровым маркетингом для крупных брендов и звезд шоу-бизнеса. Brendan Kane доказал делом, что если всё делать правильно, то можно набрать в фейсбуке 1 млн подписчиков за месяц, даже не будучи знаменитым. И конечно, как настоящий американский маркетолог, решил написать на эту тему целое произведение, где делится с нами приемами как набирать аудиторию и продавать в соцсетях. Книга свежая, без воды и булшита. Можно сразу брать и применять прочитанное для раскрутки аккаунта компании или личного бренда.<br /><br />КАКАЯ БЫЛА ЦЕЛЬ ЧТЕНИЯ:<br />- Получить новые методы продвижения своих бизнесов и своего аккаунта в соцсетях.<br /><br />ГЛАВНЫЕ ВЫВОДЫ: <br />- Главное свойство поста в том, что он должен быть расшариваемым. «The more people sharing, the quicker you grow.» Надо проверять каждый пост на виральность по чек-листу прежде чем его публиковать.<br /><br />- «I don’t believe in a one-size-fits-all model for digital strategy and growth.» Каждому нужно найти собственный уникальный стиль и контент, который его выделяет среди остальных. Это важно, потому что почти все делают одно и то же.<br /><br />- Неочевидный подход, но можно использовать поисковики, чтобы понимать, что сейчас в тренде и популярно, для того чтобы потом делать посты на эту тему в соцсетях. <br /><br />- Все дело в тестах. Надо не лениться и проводить сотни экспериментов, чтобы найти работающую тему.<br /><br />- Главное быть настоящим и постепенно строить личный бренд, опираясь на свои сильные стороны и уникальность. Платформы приходят и уходят, а бренд и его поклонники остаются.<br /><br />ЧТО Я БУДУ ПРИМЕНЯТЬ В ЖИЗНИ И БИЗНЕСЕ:<br />- Сделаю чек-лист с характеристиками поста для Instagram, Facebook и письма имейл-рассылки.<br /><br />- Попробую в ленте фейсбука подход с короткими видео-презентациями.<br /><br />ЕЩЕ НА ЭТУ ТЕМУ:<br />Майкл Хайятт "Платформа: как стать заметным в интернете"<br />