10 ways to get famous on the internet

by Jon Ray on Feb 19 in Marketing, PR, Social Media

Well, given I was listed on a top ten list for PR people in Austin, I figured I’d take a stab at teaching you how to get famous on the internet. The next thing you know, you’ll be speaking your new catch phrase into homes across America.

10 Tips for Getting Famous Online:

• Create cool content all the time. Take pictures. Write blogs. Tweet, tweet, tweet. Make videos. Record your voice. Creating consistent content means that your message, opinion, etc. goes out in front of your audience all the time. The best way I know of to get people to help you is by showing them who you are and how they can be a part of it. If I have to choose between an artist that updates her website once a month vs. an artist that blogs, tweets, picture journals, etc. three times a day, I go with the later, because I feel like I know her better through the content she is consistently creating. People hire, promote and associate with people they like. Think of your content like a date. The more dates you go on, the more the person you’re dating begins to know you, feel comfortable with you and trust you. After enough dates, the two of you will just spend all of your time in bed with each other and isn’t that why you wanted to get famous anyway?
• Promote other people’s stuff. People love to be complimented and in the online world the best way for you to compliment them is by promoting or sharing their online efforts. Did you read something that you liked? Tweet about it. Digg it. Write a response blog post on your blog about it. Bookmark it or share it on Facebook. If you promote enough people’s stuff, they will promote your stuff too (if it is half-decent). Link loving each other makes for good clean fun.
• Listen. Encourage. Share. There are a lot of people out there saying things. What are they saying? Well, a myriad of things, really. Here’s a good plan that has worked well for me. Get yourself an RSS reader (I prefer Google Reader). Now, anytime someone adds you on Facebook or Twitter, add their blog to your RSS reader. Then, actually read a few posts. Make a comment, sharing your opinions on the post’s content. Now, throw this RSS feed into a folder titled Twitter, Facebook, Austin Friends, Porn Starlets, Etc. Every morning, “J” through these posts quickly and if anything jumps out at you, read it and comment on it. You don’t have to read every post, every day. No one has time for that. But, you can easily read fifty or a hundred and comment on the ones you feel you have the most to contribute to. People like to see that their content is being seen. Commenting is a great way to encourage people to continue creating the content they want to create. Love others and it will reciprocate back to you. Aren’t love triangles fun?
• Call yourself what you want to be. This goes back to the old saying, “Don’t dress for the job you have, dress for the job you want.” In the online world and well, in reality too, people know you by the way you introduce yourself. Now, obviously, you don’t want to go around pulling a George Costanza and claiming to be an architect if you are not an architect. But, it is very easy to start calling yourself a blogger or a writer or a filmmaker, etc. Just because you haven’t hit your peak or you are still learning doesn’t mean you can’t start calling yourself the thing you want to be. I’m not famous by any means, but I call myself famous all the time. There’s no harm in this, because eventually, I will be famous. Right? Right!? Validate me! So I jumped the gun a little; so what!? Start introducing yourself online and in the real world as the person you want to be. You’ll be amazed at how much faster you become that person once others believe it to be true.
• Do fun stuff. Just because you’re trying to run a business and appear professional doesn’t mean you can’t reveal a little of your personality. I used to struggle with this a lot. I thought I had to project a professional level of success all the time for people to take me seriously. Then, one day, I said, “Fuck it!” and I started saying whatever I wanted and guess what? I got a lot more clients and they are clients that I actually enjoying working with. Being professional and being dull are not the same thing. Let people know who you are. Be yourself. Talk some trash. Curse from time to time. People like to see that you’re real. Do you like going to Britney Spears concerts and getting trashed on Mojitos? Me too! Share those pictures with us. Don’t hide the person you really are. When you hide who you are, you end up with clients and friends that you have to pretend around. By being yourself all the time, you can be certain that when you do get clients, they are going to love you for you. And isn’t that what you’ve wanted since you were a kid?
• Be transparent. Be honest. Be yourself. Be cool, man. I can’t harp on this more, but being yourself is so important. People are instinctively drawn to honesty and things that are real. Just because you have flaws does not mean you are a flawed person or unworthy of stardom. It means that you are just like everyone else in the world and not perfect. People like knowing that you’re not perfect, it makes them feel good about themselves for not being perfect. You can be not perfect together and really make something happen. It is our imperfections that give us character. Embrace them.
• Your status message is the key that opens their hearts. What are you doing? Answer this question 25 times a day. Use a service like Ping.fm to broadcast it to all of the social networks you populate. And then once or twice a day, check in with each network and comment on the chatter around your status updates. Use your status updates to ask questions. Do you want to be hired for some position? Tell your online community about it through your status message. Do you love Whole Foods, Tito’s Vodka, Bud Light or book deals? Tell us about your love for these things in your status message. I have had more sponsorships and opportunities come out of me Tweeting and Status Updating more than I should, than I ever had Tweeting too little. Every status message allows someone to get to know you better. It puts your personal brand in front of their personal face. People can only help you if they know what you need help with. Let them know and then reciprocate the favor.
• Build those relationships. How much coffee are you drinking? Okay, double that. Building relationships online is easy. By spending an hour or two a day in front of your computer, being resourceful and having a positive attitude, you can make a lot of friends in the online world. But, when you move those online relationships into the real world, that’s when they become REALLY powerful. So, make a habit of having coffee, brunch, lunch, drinks, etc. with a few of the people you meet and trust online every week. Meeting people in real life is fun and can yield amazing results. You don’t always have to hide behind an avatar. Get out there, meet some people and make a few bad decisions (the fun kind of bad). I promise it will be the best decision you’ve made all year.
• Be helpful. What’s your specialty? Even if you’re like me and planning on becoming famous for being famous, you still have a specialty. I have lots of them. PR, Marketing, Video Production, Social Media, Blogging, Writing, Partying, Scoring Free Tickets, etc. Search yourself for a few things that you are good at. Even if it’s something stupid like being really good at shrinking chip bags in the microwave and making them into keychains, it’s still something. Your expertise does not have to be something that appeals to the mass public. It’s the weird niche fish which makes the biggest splash in the pond (why am I writing in haiku?).
• Listen and comment and listen again. Finally, I’ll talk about listening, again. Because listening online, like in the real world, is the most important thing. People aren’t jibber-jabbering all day on the internet because they like to hear their own voices. Don’t get me wrong, I am in love with my own voice and could listen to myself ramble for days, but ultimately, I’m hoping that one or two people out there are actually listening to what I have to say. When those people that are listening comment on my blog, or DM me, or write a blog post about me, or offer up sexual favors, cash or hard candies, it makes me feel all good and squishy inside. They like me. They really like me! When you comment, etc on other people’s blogs, they will have this same reaction and then you can move forward in becoming internet besties with them.

So, you see, by working with each other, we can all get famous together. Or, if nothing else, one of us will get famous and then sneak everyone else into all the cool parties. Now GO GET FAMOUS!

These are the things that are working for me. They are certainly not the only way. What is working for you? How are you getting famous? Can I come to your party?

Oh, and as a bonus, this video taught me more about becoming famous than anyone or anything else ever has.

Want to hire me for your next PR, marketing, social media, video production or writing gig? Let’s talk about it.

Jon Ray – whoisjonray AT gmail – 512.785.9160