SEO, Content Creation, Social Media and Courage: A Summary Of My First Year Of Blogging

A year ago I decided to start my own blog. I was missing writing so badly.  I wanted to practice my writing and to develop my marketing,  communications and social media skills. As you might know by now, my background is in marketing and in communications, however, during the last two years, I have been working mostly on sales.

Starting my own blog was something new and very personal. When you do marketing for a company, you focus more on the product, on the brand or on the corporation. In addition, you have to align your content with your company messages and you have to schedule your posts according to the company's plan. My blog is a perfect place to talk about the things that I am interested in. Here, I can focus on my own thoughts and I can arrange my own schedule.

The main goal of my blog is not to sell or to promote a company. It has been a personal experiment, a development plan. I have learned so much from my readers, and I am very thankful for that. In fact, there have been more readers than what I expected at the beginning of this journey. Some of my articles have been read around 1000 times. This is very encouraging and motivating.

I have experimented a lot and learned from each post. Here, the three most important things I have learned during this year of blogging:

1) Creating the right content for your blog

The process of creating content for my blog has been fascinating and challenging at the same time. It is good that you cannot see my drafts. At the moment, there are ca. 40 messy ideas. This blog has helped me to find a writing opportunity in almost everything in my life. Sometimes, I get topic ideas from things I see at my work place, other times, from my friend's conversations and experiences or from a book. I have accumulated a lot of ideas, however, some of those need to be very polished before I actually can publish those. Ideas are not very useful if I am not able to create something relevant from those.

Yes, content is the king, but I have learned that the way I present my content is also very important. It is not only about having fancy pictures but, more about having the right structure. SEO matters and you can see that very clearly when you have the chance to try these structures, titles, subtitles and wording, and measure the results by yourself. It is a great learning experience.

In a nutshell, a blog post should be:
- Relevant (information that matters)
- Easy to read
- With the right structures (titles, subtitles, etc.)
- With the right keywords to be found.

2) Mastering Social Media: 

To share your content on other channels is a must if you want to be found.  In my case, I use social media to promote my blog and my posts. Most of the visitors come to my blog from Twitter or from Google+. There is some organic search, too. I have used Facebook only a few times and I have gotten great results. However, I don't use Facebook so often because half of my contacts are not speaking English. It feels like I would be spamming them.

When I publish something on my social media channels, I can see the changes to the visitors' statistics. Following the Google and Blogger analytics have been very important part of the development of my blog. I have had the chance to play with many messages and content and see if those work or not.

There is something about the timing, too. I get more visitors to my blog if I promote at the right time for my audience. In my case, I write mostly in English so, half of the visitors are coming from the USA. When I tweet at the USA time I get more visitors than if I tweet at my local (Finnish) time. However, Finns are reading my blog, too. (Kiitos!)

Social media is all about interactions and getting to know people. I have noticed that if somebody "relevant" likes or share my tweet promoting my blog post, I get more visitors. If I am the one sharing other's people content, I also get more visibility. Sharing is caring.

3) Courage:
Jeff Bullas said once that "The biggest challenge for any blogger, social media marketer, content creator, and publisher is to -start- ". I could not agree more. It took a while for me to start this project, but, I am very glad I did.

Writing a blog is getting exposure. This can be very intimidating at some points. It took me a while to start my blog trying to find the perfect topic (or even the perfect language). The truth is that the perfect topic does not exist, so you just need to write and publish. I have done this experiment and I am glad about the results and the learning. Sometimes, I write and publish. Other times, I come back and edit. It is all about experimenting.  Hopefully, you have enjoyed this year on my planet as well. Thank you for be there.

Cuando Las Redes Sociales Son "Un Baúl De Recuerdos"

Muchos de nosotros hemos hablado ya por algún tiempo sobre las redes sociales. Sin embargo, todavía nos encontramos con empresas que están dando los primeros pasos en el desarrollo de las estrategias de mercadeo en estas redes. Si éste es tu caso, felicidades. Nunca es tarde para dar el primer paso.

Me imagino que ya debes tener en mente qué redes son las mejores para tu audiencia y a lo mejor ya has pensado qué tipo de contenido crear y publicar. Un buen contenido te ayudará a alcanzar tus metas.

El contenido para mercadeo tradicional y el contenido para redes sociales

Muchas veces por falta de tiempo podrás sentirte tentado en utilizar el material viejo, ya usado en canales tradicionales, y simplemente publicarlo en tu Facebook o en tu Instagram. Para tu audiencia será aburrido ver los contenidos ya conocidos, ahora “almacenados” de manera “digital”. 

Sin duda alguna, las redes sociales son frescas y así deberá ser tú contenido también. Algo muy bueno del auge de estas redes es que nos desafían a diario a ver y trabajar nuestro contenido de una manera diferente, de una manera más rica. Las redes sociales se enriquecen de la interacción, del contenido interesante, de nuevas perspectivas visuales, de arriesgarse a ser diferente así como también de actuar rápido y con un poco de urgencia. Sé creativo, olvídate de las mentes cuadradas y cosas demasiados tradicionales y diviértete con tu contenido.

Enfrentando lo desconocido. El primer contacto con las redes sociales

Si aún no has aprendido a usar por ejemplo, el Twitter, no tengas miedo. Mira a tu alrededor. De seguro que encontraras uno de esas personas “digi-nativas”. También hoy en día es mucho más fácil conseguir ayuda en Internet para desarrollar tus habilidades. Olvídate de tu orgullo, busca ayuda y empieza a aprender y disfrutar de esta aventura. Usar los medios sociales no debería sentirse como una tortura. Te puedo prometer que si consigues una red social que sea “tu alma gemela”, la pasarás a gusto.

Crea un contenido nuevo y relevante

Yo soy una persona súper afortunada a nivel profesional. He tenido la suerte de pasearme por varias industrias -por el B2B y por el B2C. En estas industrias de verdad que el mercadeo se mueve de una manera diferente, pero a la final todos le mercadeamos a humanos. Los humanos como tal se dormirán y dejarán tu sitio web o tu red social, si el contenido es tipo “noticia de ayer”.

Entonces, ¿estás listo para escribir tu primer tuit?  Allá vamos, respira profundo y comparte algo que menee un poco tu negocio y tu marca. Llama la atención de tu audiencia. Recuerda, que como todo en la vida, hay que tener un poco de paciencia. Si lo que quieres es incrementar las ventas de tu negocio, hay que darle un poco de tiempo. No obtendrás la venta inmediatamente después de escribir tus dos primeras líneas. Seamos optimistas, pero realistas.

A Simple Marketing Tip: Your Signature Matters

Something so simple yet so important. 

Your email signature says more about your company and about yourself than you think. 

Doing business by email:

 
I receive hundreds of emails per week, perhaps thousands. You might be surprised by the amount of emails I receive from people working for respectable companies without a formal company signature.

Call me old fashion but, if you are contacting me for the first time by email, you need to make a great impression. I understand that we are quite busy and so on but, an email without contact information will take you nowhere. 

If you are trying to sell me something or if you are contacting me to start a business relation with the company that I represent, you should absolutely let me know who you are. Or if you need more information about the company where I work for or about its products, you need to know that I will not be able to give you a price without knowing you. I know there is Google but, your email signature is your business card. It will make our lives easier if you provides us with some basic information.

Use your signature to marketing yourself:


Your signature is not a wasted space on your email bottom. These characters can be used smartly to marketing yourself and marketing your company. Think quickly, how many emails did you sent today? Well, your information has been exposed to all your receivers. Don't lose this opportunity.

You don't need to use anything extraordinary. In fact, I would say that the best option is to use a clean, easy to read information that might help our communication in the future.

6 steps to a useful signature:

1. Add your first name and last name
2. Add your role in your organization
3. Add your contact info (office phone, mobile number, email, etc). Please, if you are in contact with people from different countries, kindly notice this when giving the phone and mobile phones number.
4. Do you want to direct your customers to your website or to your social media channels? If so, the signature is a good place to show the links/gadgets.
5. Make sure that your font style and the font size are good. Follow your brand book in case of using the corporate email signature.
6. Make sure that people in your company use similar signature style.

Does Your Customer Understand Your Product?

You have a fantastic product: the latest technology, a state-of-the-art, etc. 
Nobody is buying your product.

You have invested a lot of money in marketing, communications and sales material. 
Your team used a lot of hours preparing it. 
Nobody is reading it. 

You have gotten no inquiries.

It is perhaps time to ask yourself a very important question: are your customers understanding what you are trying to say?  

Create messages which are easy to understand.  
Picture http://smilingtreetoys.com

Technical communication for non-technical customers: 

I have been involved in multiple technical or engineering-oriented projects. If I am honest, at the beginning it was not easy. I remember sitting in technical meetings listening to technical presentations. There the product managers used their field jargon and presented all the possible technical data. This was heavy data. It was hard to understand. For some engineers, the messages about their products were "so obvious" that they thought additional explanations were no needed. Unfortunately, the delivered messages to the customers were as complex and difficult as those used during the meetings. The messages were not reaching their audience.

Assuming that your (non- technical) target group understands very well your technical messages is a very common mistake. Another common practice is delivering very detailed data to "clarify" something forgetting that the target group has a very different level of understanding.  

The solution is simple. If your audience is not as technical as your team, you have to translate the technical information into messages which are easy to understand by your audience.



Communicate with your customers effectively:

If you are an expert on the topic, and especially if you are the "father of the product", you might try to impress your audience with your knowledge. That is a normal human tendency. However, there is a big difference between knowing something and being able to explain it to someone else. When preparing your marketing, sales or communications material remember the blog post, the brochure and the campaign are not for your or for your team.

The solution is not adding technical details to your content. You need to think a bit more like the customer. So, focus on finding out your customers' needs as well as getting to know your customers' understanding level. With this information you might know the right level of detail needed on your content. It is important to always keep in mind that if you are focusing only on the technical details or scoping your message too narrowly, there is a high risk of getting bogged.

Keep it simple. If your message is too hard to explain, it will be too hard to be understood by your audience.

Teamwork means better marketing and communications material:

Are you thinking that your product is so unique that nobody else than you is able to talk about it ? If your answer is YES, it is time to change your mentality. Such a product does not exist. 

You should work with different people to prepare your marketing, communication and sales material. It will help you developing your content. If more people understand your content, you will have more chances to get your customers and prospects interested in your product.

If you want to start with something simple, test if your actual material works. Ask feedback from people who are not directly involved in your project. 

Let your marketing and communication team work on your wording and on your content. If you are working with an outside agency, they might give you a sincere feedback on how you should try to create your content to increase your product's awareness and especially, to be understood by your audience. You don't need to accept all the suggestions but, it is all about working as a team. Be ready to interchange ideas, to ask and to answer questions as well as to share your thoughts.

Tus Empleados Se "Enredan" En las Redes Sociales ¿Está Tu Empresa Lista?

Siempre he creído que los empleados son los mejores embajadores de las empresas, de sus marcas y de sus productos. Las empresas necesitan ser bien representadas frente a los consumidores, competidores y hasta frente a los futuros empleados. Está de más decir que, sí los empleados están felices, ellos van a transmitir esa felicidad a la gente que les rodea, ya sea de forma online o cara a cara. Los amigos de tus empleados absorberán esta información (y hasta pueden sentirse celosos si los amigos trabajan en una súper empresa). En el mejor de los casos, estos amigos pueden pedirles trabajo a tus empleados lo que te ayudará a reducir los costos de reclutamiento de tu empresa. También vale la pena mencionar que los amigos de tus empleados poder ser tus consumidores y al escuchar las buenas historias y experiencias sobre tu empresa, comprarán aún más tus productos.

Con el alcance de las redes sociales, tus empleados ahora también pueden ser parte de las comunicaciones y mercadeo de tu empresa, te guste o no. En comparación con la comunicación tradicional, ahora tus empleados pueden comunicarse con tu audiencia de una manera más fácil e informal, pero a la vez más poderosa.

Las redes sociales han dado a los empleados un poder que puede ser bien intimidante para algunos gerentes y supervisores, especialmente si ellos no conocen bien los nuevos medios. Sí eres uno de esos gerentes, y te sientes un poco ansioso o estresado porque esta situación no la puedes controlar, relájate, y toma las acciones necesarias para que este proceso sea exitoso.

La verdad es que tú o la empresa no pueden evitar las redes sociales. De la misma manera, no se puede controlar la comunicación de tus empleados en las mencionadas redes. Lo que si puedes hacer es ayudar a tus empleados y hacerles entender la importancia que tiene sus comunicaciones y mensajes y especialmente, el papel que ellos juegan construyendo la presencia online de tu empresa.

El debate sobre prohibir el uso de las redes sociales en las horas laborales, o controlar lo que se escribe, ha estado en la mesa por largo tiempo. La verdad es que prohibirle a tus empleados la participación en las redes sociales es absurdo y será más un problema que una solución. Ignorar el papel que tus empleados juegan en tus comunicaciones, simplemente, porque ellos nos son ejecutivos de comunicaciones o porque no son unos gurúes de las redes sociales también fallará como estrategia. Lo mejor será organizar entrenamientos sobre las diferentes áreas de las redes sociales como por ejemplo: cómo usar las redes sociales, el tono de mensaje que es más apropiado para tu empresa, tips sobre temas para compartir, etc. Esos entrenamientos, organizados de acuerdo a tus necesidades, te ayudarán a canalizar los mensajes en la dirección apropiada y así podrás evitar "sorpresas". Lo más importante es usar estos entrenamientos para alentar y entusiasmar a tus empleados a usar las redes sociales.

 

Las redes sociales te brindarán muchos beneficios. Sin duda alguna son una opción de mercadeo más económica que el mercadeo tradicional y con alcance global. Las redes sociales son canales para interactuar, lo que te ayudará a alcanzar nuevos prospectos, fanáticos y seguidores. Tus empleados pueden usar las redes sociales para conocer más sobre tu producto o tu negocio y para evaluar los cambios en la industria. Ésta información será útil para reaccionar a tiempo e innovar.

Si tu empresa está en una de esas industrias en el que usar las redes sociales no es una práctica común, disfruta de este privilegio. No esperes que otras empresas tomen la iniciativa, al contrario, ahora tienes la oportunidad de ser el primero en usar éstos canales.

Recuerda, las redes sociales están aquí para quedarse. Tú no lo puedes evitar.

Are You Ready to Listen To Your Employees?

Every day employees find small problems and challenges at work. However, this is not a bad thing. In fact, each challenge can spark ideas for improvements. Even the simplest idea can have a positive impact on your company performance improving your revenue, your safety and also your employees' engagement rate. 

When you open "the employee's suggestion box" with an open heart and especially, with an open mind, you can make your employees feel valued, therefore, their performance can reach a completely new level. 

Your employees can help you to improve different processes and areas in your company

Are you currently receiving fresh and innovative ideas?

- You have asked your employees for opinion and you have gotten no answer
- You have a suggestion list on your internal system with no marks
- Nobody comments on ways to improve performance
- In team meetings, your employees are mostly silent and agreeing in everything you say. 

It is time to check why this is happening.

Corporate culture for innovation: 
 
In many companies, suggestions seem to disappear into a dark hole. In others, employees with new ideas might be seen as an unfit for the organization. Sometimes, the company's priorities list does not include managing employees' suggestions. Or perhaps they are just "too busy" to improve.  

If you want to properly use your employees' suggestion to improve your company's performance, you need a corporate culture that matches and supports it. It this is not the case at the moment, you must reboot your existing corporate culture. 

Be ready, this is not an easy task.
 
How to work on your employees suggestions: 
 
Evaluate your corporate culture: if you are not receiving fresh and innovative ideas and your employees remain silent when you ask for suggestion, it is time to evaluate your corporate values and rituals. Change those in a way that your new values supports the employees' suggestion experience. 

Create a safe environment for suggestions and input: make sure that your employees feel free to talk about their ideas and point of views. Your employees' collaboration will be better when they feel comfortable providing input without being demeaned.

Be welcome and open for ideas: as each employee is different, you might get ideas, proposals and points of view which are different than your own. If people want to do things in different ways than your way, it does not mean that they are wrong, that they don't know how to do things or that they want to go against you. When you add different approaches to your company actions and processes, you inject richness into your company.

Be empathy: let say that your employee is sharing a solution to a problem he is facing at work but, this problem does not resonate to you, remember to put yourself in this person's shoes and try to understand his situation.

Facilitating spaces for experience sharing:  I have learned so much from the professional experiences of my colleagues located in other units and regions, that I cannot recommend this experience sharing enough. The point is not to imitate the tactics that others are implementing but, to learn from them, take some inputs from the cases and perhaps, adapt and use those inputs in your own activities. Make experience sharing a regular part of your communication and processes. 

Give space to the anonymous: The truth is that not everyone feels comfortable to share the own ideas, however, this does not mean that they have no ideas at all, or that their ideas are invaluable. By giving the chance to share their points of view in an anonymous way, you are getting also another set of ideas and approaches.

Focus on things that add value: positive and constructive criticism is accepted, to be negative and nasty, is not.

Prioritize: you might receive many suggestions and it might feel a bit overwhelming. Talk to your people a select those topics and actions which are more urgent. Make a priority list and go trough the cases according to the list.

Engage people in solving the problems: you don't need to be in charge of solving all people's problem. In fact, you should delegate and engage your employees in solving their issues. Making them responsible of some improvements, will make them more committed.

Follow-up tasks: work together with your employees and create clear plans and deadlines for these improvements. You can, for example, manage those as projects. In this way you can follow up and evaluate the results.




Receiving feedback and suggestion from your employees will help you to develop as a manager and especially, to develop the way your company is doing things. Remember to be open minded and make your employees part of the process. Your employees will feel that their opinions are valued and they can have an impact on changing things to better. If at the moment you are facing difficulties receiving feedback, you might need to transform your corporate culture into one that is open for employees' suggestions and feedback. For that, you need organizational commitment, clarity and ongoing communication

Marketing For Non-Sexy Industries

Heavy machinery, engineering jargon, niche markets, kind of unknown products...

It is not an easy task for a marketer or a communication person to get the attention of the media or of the public when the product or the industry is everything but sexy. Right?! If you feel represented, trust me, you are not the only one struggling with it. But, what are you doing to make your content more interesting?

It does not help just giving up and falling into the trap of thinking that your brand is too boring or too traditional. 

Remember even in the weirdest industries, 

there is an audience waiting for information 

and getting ready to make a purchase. 

 Make it happen. 

Be brave, take risks.

 

8 Marketing tips for challenging industries: 

1. Share useful content: Remember the content main goal is to inform, educate and entertain. You should give your customers what they actually need (not just what you want to share or -better to say, to sell).
2. Make the content appealing: the content should be interesting and relevant but, please, do not forget using the right font, good layout, and the visuals. There are so many channels and tools out there, that you can try new things even at low cost. No excuses.
3. Focus on one topic at the time: The more common mistake when writing about a product that is not that "sexy", is that you try to say too much. Just visualize for a second a brochure with too much text and too many pictures, well you know the feeling...Forget to try to speak about everything. That will not increase your blog readership, either. Instead, focus on main points.
4. Write for a wider audience: rather than writing from engineers to engineers, (sorry for my honest example), try to make your topic more interesting for other people. Forget that technical jargon. It is not making you look as an expert or smarter. This is very relevant if you want your content to be shared on different channels. If more people understand your content, you will have more readers and therefore, more chances to get shares, likes, and comments. This approach will help you when working with the media, too. A journalist will not write about something that is too difficult to understand or that needs many hours to get deciphered. Keep it simple.
5. Stop measuring a number of readers (or likes); focus instead on quality leads: I know you think I am contradicting myself but, my point here is that you need to get more readers, but a number of readers does not guarantee the sell. You need to create content that will attract the buyers, too. A funny picture can get thousands of likes, however, they are not buying your product. 
6. Stop selling or advertising: Nobody wants to read a blog post that is only an advertising in plain text. What about talking about cases or examples in which those benefits are shown? Don't push your products. Make your customers discover the benefits between the lines of your stories.
7. Make your employees your ambassadors: If you are running out of ideas why not to talk to your own people. They can help you finding great ideas, new perspectives, new topics and why not, they can help you creating the content. What about getting a great picture from your factory, or the story behind the guy who creates your latest hit... Your company is not only about selling products, there is much more happening inside the organization. Share it! 
8. Track the results: You have the chance to try many things, but the only way to know if those have an effect on your results is by measuring. You can measure the changes to the sell, the reach of your stories, the media coverage, changes to the brand awareness, etc. Decide the measurement tools according to your goal.  

The Corporate Strategy: A Company Secret?

Defining your company strategy is the key to your company success. However, keeping this information to yourself or sharing this to an exclusive circle does not help your organization much. If you believe that your company strategy is a Board of Directors' secret, think twice. Sharing your strategy among your employees is vital for its implementation.
 

Strategy in changing organizations

Companies face multiple situations during their life-cycle. Companies go up and down, celebrate good times and confront adversity. Whatever the situation your company is facing right now, make sure that your employees know well the direction they need to go next. 

Having a solid knowledge of the company strategy will make the employee’s journey easier than without knowing about it. This is even more important when your company is facing changing situations such as grows or expansion as well as reorganizations. If your employees know well where they are going to and what do they stand for they do not need to speculate. They will be able to make decisions by themselves, prioritize and focus on the things that really matter.

  

One of the main goals of communicating your strategy is making your employees part of it. In this way, they will care more about the company and the job they do. 

Communicating your strategy 

 

If you have not communicated yet, go for it, plan a meeting with all your employees to talk about it. Articulate a clear and compelling message about the future of the organization. You can start talking about your company’s current status and continue with the future possibilities. Remember to respect the hard work they have done in the past and appreciate their old achievements. Invite them to move forward. Remember, there will be people who are not ready for changes, so be patient and constant. 

When planning your message, create an inspiring message that is easy to relate to and to understand by your audience. Identify the most appropriate channels to share the message across the organization and to reinforce the message often. Emphasize your company values. Remember that one meeting is not enough. You need to communicate your strategy often.

The way you communicate your strategy has a real impact on you employees’ behavior and commitment. Use the right message to inspire, motivate, and engage. In addition to letting your employees know where the company is going to, make sure that you have clear plans on how to go there.

Employer Branding Has No Holidays

Each company, from startups to corporations, should invest in creating the right perception of their organization. It is not only about creating catching recruitment ads or paying the highest salaries in the market; it is more about taking care of the diverse processes which involve the company and the employee even before this person is hired.  

Summer employees, an investment. 

At least in Finland, summer employees are common figures in many organizations. They come to substitutes some people and to help when the regular employees are taking their annual leaves.

We know that a summer job is a great opportunity for any employee to gain experience and develops his/her skills. For the company, this is a fantastic chance to create the "right employee for the future" and to show them all the opportunities they might have in the organization. But, what happens when the summer employees are abandoned on the new role? Or when the induction is poor because “they will be working for us only couple of months”?

Well, the truth is that employer branding has no summer holidays. Keep in mind that if you decide to take an employee to help you during the summer, you need to be committed to take care of this person. If things work well, the employee might want to stay in your organization, might get very motivated to continue developing his/her skills and even recommend this place to his/her school classmate and friends. However, if things are handled poorly during this period, the employee's results might be unsuccessful and he/she might not be willing to come back to the company. You all are losing your time (and your money).

Taking care of your employees: 

If you are having summer employees this year, remember these basic things to consider when the person comes to the company: 

- Prepare the initial paper work. Make sure that your employee has the contract, work permissions and all the documents that are needed to start the job.

- Arrange the tools which are needed for the role e.g. a working place or desk, computer with proper software, office keys, ID cards, uniforms, safety equipment, appropriate clothes, cellphone, etc.

- Arrange the appropriate orientation for the hires. In addition to the proper training related to the job, you should have some training on the company and the industry. Remember to show the place where this person is going to work and introduce him/her to the team and other units. If you are counting on somebody to take care of the training, you need to make sure that this person is available during the summer or at least during a reasonable amount of time. List the things the new employee needs to learn and schedule the training. Remember to let some "extra air" just in case the training takes longer than expected. Based on my own experience, I recommend you to plan some "training review" few weeks after the initial training in case the employee has some questions or doubts. You cannot digest all the information at once.  

- Describe the role clearly and agree together on the tasks and goals. Especially if you are having young employees who are working for first time, you might want to offer some structure to the job. It will be useful to clearly share what does this person need to do, when does he/she need to get it ready, as well as how the results are going to be measured. If needed, define the processes and tools that employees should use to get the job done. 

- Make sure that you deliver the information to the other units, too. This might be very useful if for example, you need to get email accounts open by another team and salary payed on time. 

- Offer the right challenges to the right people and if your summer employee develops quickly, remember to offer tasks in which he/she can develop even more. For many students, the point of getting a summer job is to find out their real interests and passions, to learn more, and to develop their skills. If the job is not challenge enough, they might move forward to another role just after the summer. 

- If you find the diamond, try to keep it. If you have the resources and the need to hire somebody after the summer period, make sure you are retaining the top talent on time. Do not wait until the last minute to inform him/her that you want him/her to continue. You just invested your time and your money, so make the most of it.

-  If you need to let go your summer employees, prepare suitable exit programs which will give the best impression of your company. It is recommended to have exit interviews with your employees. You can get constructive feedback to develop your processes in the future. Make sure that you deliver all the documentation needed for the exit such as payments receipts and certifications. 

- Remember to communicate often. Make sure that things a clear and this person receives support during this working period.