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Eight Reasons Why Your Website is Crap

Thursday, May 27th, 2010

A few years ago I heard a quote, supposedly by Bill Gates:

Soon there will be two types of businesses, those online and those out of business.

While I’m not sure if the quote ever really came from him, the premise of the statement is definitely true.  And even years later, only a staggering 40% of small businesses in the US have websites.

Of that 40%, a good chunk of those websites are stale or dead.  They heard that they needed to be online, and rushed to get online, but had no strategy or planning about why they should be online.  They just knew they had to be there.  And after a few years of their website sitting there doing nothing, they’ve most likely abandoned what little hope they had about the Internet, when actually now is when they should be actively pursuing climbing the rankings and dominating the ever-growing online segment of their industry.
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Posted in SEO, blogging, small business, traffic | 1 Response »
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Microsites & Micropages

Thursday, May 13th, 2010

Earlier this week I met with a potential client who sold personalized gifts.  He’s got a really terrific product line, something that I’ve never seen anywhere else.  In fact, I’m probably going to get me a Tshirt next week, even if he doesn’t hire me.  It’s that cool.

During the meeting, he was telling me how he had control over each page footer, how he could build out each footer to be different, link to different pages, etc.  That’s cool, could help with his internal linking.

But then he started telling me how he could build different pages for slightly different terms, and them link them through the footer, thus creating an entire network of pages.  For instance: Mother’s Day
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Posted in SEO, niches, site ranking | 2 Responses »
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Kickin it Old School Ain’t Cool

Friday, January 22nd, 2010

I’m a big 80′s fan. Grew up in it, love the tunes and always look forward to the 80′s category at local trivia nights. When Kickin’ It Old School came out, I sat and laughed and laughed at the totally rad outfits and hip break dancing moves.

In the 80s I was warming up to a Vic 20, then Commodore 64 and Apple IIe. But now I use a badass Dell laptop, widescreen monitor and high speed Internet connection. The 80′s are fun to look at and reminisce about but I’ve moved on.

Unfortunately, many businesses haven’t.
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Posted in Marketing, trending | 2 Responses »
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Saint Louis Sees 16% Rise in Business Bankruptcies

Wednesday, December 9th, 2009

News came out today that business bankruptcies in Saint Louis have increased some 16% this quarter.  This is apparently below the national average, but still a huge chunk of revenue and jobs going out the window.

I’ve spent some time over the last few weeks talking to business owners about their overall financial and economic situation.  As expected, nearly every industry is down for the year.  Overall, I’d put the average drop at right around 30%.

A 30% downturn in revenue can really hurt a business. One business was down over 50%. Ouch.
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Posted in Saint Louis, St Louis, small business | 1 Response »
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You’re Doing it Wrong

Friday, April 24th, 2009

lolcats funny cat pictures

“Know your enemy” – Sun Tzu in The Art of War

If you use Twitter to promote your business (and you should), you are already ahead of most businesses in your industry.  Twitter is a great tool, if you can leverage it correctly.  Unfortunately, I see a lot of businesses using Twitter in ways that, while they think helps them, it’s actually hurting them.

Screwup#1: Missing Traffic Opportunities

If you’ve attended any of my seminars, you know that I’ve said blogging is by far one of the best ways to build your brand, promote your business, and increase your landing page count.  Providing quality information that people are ready to consume will automatically put you in an authoritative position in their mind.  You become the subject matter expert.

So when I see a business post a tweet that is informational about your industry, without a link back to your article, I hang my head in disgust.  Here you have a great piece of information, like a celebrity that uses your product, but you don’t link it anywhere.  You missed the target!

The real enemy here is simply missed traffic.  Twitter gets insane amounts of traffic. Ultimately, traffic back to your website means branding, which leads to sales; and that’s what we’re after.  Even if someone doesn’t need your product today, when they do need it, you want to have your logo/biz name pre-planted in their head.

It’s not enough to put posts on Twitter about interesting things.  Take all those interesting things that you find out and write a blog post about them.  Expand on them, add some great information about why this info is great, and provide it all in a way that is purely educational and not sales-y.

People aren’t stupid. If you’re talking about how blue widgets can kill mosquitos, and they happen to have a mosquito problem, they’re smart enough to click over to your blue widget page and buy.

As I hear all the time when my kids are playing Call of Duty 5, The Enemy has Taken Your Flag!  Don’t let twitter take your flag (traffic) and keep it.  You’re posting the information to help people, right? So make sure the traffic that your Twitter feed is seeing gets to your website.  Don’t drop the ball.

Screwup #2 – Posting Half of a Good Deal

Many business people understand that there’s an advantage to Twitter.  They’ve got the understanding that most people are following you because they’re interested in what you have to say/sell.  You’ve got your target audience in your hands, and they patiently await to be persuaded to buy.

So when you want to offer a deal to people because you’re nice, or because they are raving about your product, don’t post a message telling them that “for a good deal”, they need to contact you.

Why? Well, let’s go back to your audience. Many of these people are interested in what you have to say/sell, right? But they are probably passively interested.  Meaning, they aren’t interested in putting a lot of time into you (along with the thousands of other businesses clammoring for their attention).  So posting a message saying that in order to save they have to contact you, you may have just lost a sale.

Why not just post the coupon online for all to see?  The more your of your audience that sees it, the more sales you’ll get, right?

Screwup #3 – Dumping Your Followers to Competitors

While this one isn’t as big of a no-no as the others, it’s still one that makes me scratch my head when I see it.

You find a great article on something in your industry.  It’s written by a well known competitor, and (unfortunatly) you agree with what they’ve posted.  Or maybe you don’t. Either way, don’t go twitter-crazy and immediately post a link to the guy’s article, especially if you disagree.

If you agree with what was said, consider rewriting the article as your own content (careful here… you don’t want to be accused of plagiarizing or called a Johnny-come-lately) or post something on your site about how your business agrees with what was said on such and such’s site.

If you disagree, you’ve got all kinds of firepower to write up a great blog post.  Inform your readers by (politely) showing how your competitor is wrong, and how your company would do the project right.

In Saint Louis MO? Learn more about Internet Marketing at the Look at Me Seminar in June.

Posted in Marketing, traffic, twitter | 1 Response »
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Mobile Twitter Coupons

Thursday, March 5th, 2009

I think the power of social media has yet to begin to peak.  The potential out there is just incredible.

Today I met with a potential client who owns several Italian restaurants here in the St. Louis area.  They are (just like every other restaurant) wondering how they can tap into the search engine and social media fields to gain new clients.  With the down economy, people are being more and more select about where they spend their money for dining.  Here’s where Twitter can come to the rescue.

I don’t want to go into the whole explain-twitter-to-me thing, but here’s something cool that many people may not know – twitter can link up to your cell phone, and you can receive updates about whatever it is you choose to see updates about.  You can see what friends are saying, or you can get notified anytime someone uses a certain phrase, etc.

So let’s say I’m looking for a good Italian restaurant in St. Louis and I post a quick note to Twitter via my cell. (Just a note here – if you don’t use your cell phone to do that, don’t think others don’t.  A *lot* of people are using their phones for this and a lot more.)

Using their API and search tools, Mr. Restaurant Owner can watch for phrases like “italian food” and “st louis”, “saint louis”, etc.  Anytime one of those phrases come across twitter, Mr Restaurant Owner immediately (or through automation) sends out a coupon for a free drink at his restaurant.  Or a free appetizer.  Whatever.

Using social media, getting clients that may have otherwise never known about you will get easier and easier.  But if you don’t know how to use the social media platforms to do these things, you’re going to be stuck standing on the front porch hoping customers see your sign.

Posted in local marketing, site ranking, twitter | 5 Responses »
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Arnold MO Chamber of Commerce Meeting – What I Maybe Would Have Said

Thursday, February 19th, 2009

Earlier this week I attended the Arnold Chamber of Commerce meeting for February.  Arnold is a small town of about 20,000 residents, south of Saint Louis in Missouri.

I was surprised to find so many businesses taking part in the Chamber meeting. Several people who had taken my classes were there, so it was nice to see some familiar faces from the get-go.

The meeting included a lunch served by the people at Ponderosa Restaurant and a drink (water for me).  There were a few announcements along with the opportunity to introduce the guests (me and many others).  I met some nice people and had a good time.

Apparently normally the Chamber has a guest speaker at most of their meetings, however this one backed out, so they decided to do a ‘topic’ instead, and this months topic was Marketing Your Business.  Right up my alley, or so I thought.

The first speaker was from DDI Media, a local billboard company.  She promoted her billboards and told of her pricing schedule.  No mention of  ‘marketing’ tips.

Second and third were salesmen from local newspapers.  They talked about their great subscription base and blurted out their inflated circulation numbers, all in an attempt to get more advertisers.  No mention of marketing tips.

Can you see where this is going?

Next up was supposed to be the ‘Welcome Wagon’, a company that puts (imagine this) ads in a little packet that they give out to all the people who apply for residency permits.  No mention of marketing tips.

Last was the good ‘ole Yellow Book.  This lady was even worse than the others.  She simply read from a flyer that she had handed out and told the business owners about all the great things that YB does.  She mentioned (incorrectly) Pay to Click, and Search Ads, although I guarantee I could talk circles around her about her own product.  It was funny to watch her read what she was selling when it was obvious that she didn’t know jack squat about it.

So, since there was no mention of actual marketing tips (the “topic” of the day), I’m going to simply pretend like I was asked to also speak.

“Thank you for this opportunity.  I’d like to share with you seven tips that you can go back to the office and do today that will help increase your business revenue.

  1. Add your business to Google Maps.  Take the time to put in as much information as you can, including your products, services, hours and what kind of payments you take.  Add information on what you do, how well you do it, and verify your address through Google’s verification system.
  2. Start asking customers to write reviews about your business on Yelp!, Mixx, and other local-based websites.  Don’t fake the reviews yourself, or ask your relatives to do it – those are too obvious.
  3. Set up a blog on your website, and publish something each week (at a minimum).  Listen to your customers, and use their questions as fodder for your upcoming posts.  Blogging for business can lead to very nice ROI.
  4. Get a Twitter account, and start posting daily messages about your business.  Don’t be boring, post things that people will find interesting. Link your account to your website, and set up an account through twitterfeed that automatically posts your new blogs.
  5. Start tracking your website visitors.  Add Google’s analytics program to your site and learn where people are finding you.  Do you know how many people call you because of your website? …which brings me to number six…
  6. Consider getting a call tracking service.  Call tracking lets you get separate phone numbers for each of your marketing campaigns.  You can then track that campaign and literally tell how well or poor it did.  Doing a direct-mail campaign? Get a phone number that only shows up on your mailer. When people call, you’ll know just how that campaign did.  And it’s not expensive.
  7. And lastly, consider attending a seminar on Search Engine Marketing (SEM).  You’ll be blown away by the amount of things you can do online that can increase your bottom line beyond what you ever thought possible.  There are competitors of yours out there who haven’t heard about SEM yet, but when they do, you’ll be sorry you didn’t get to it first.

Ok sure, some of this may be self-serving in a roundabout way, but hey at least I’m giving real marketing tips.

I look forward to future Chamber meetings, and the topics they’ll cover in the future.  I could definitely use some education on things like accounting and such, so I’m sure it will benefit me in the long run.

Posted in Marketing, Saint Louis, content, local marketing, networking, site ranking, small business, twitter | 2 Responses »
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The Big Idea

Wednesday, May 7th, 2008

Donny Deutsch’s show The Big Idea is one of my absolute favorites to watch.  He’s very inspiring and just keeps on truckin’ day after day with his “you can do it” attitude.

The only thing about his show that irks me is that he never has people on there that simply provide services. All of his guests for the ‘Minute to Millions’ segments (and others) are people with real physical products to sell.  Sure, it makes better television when people can see what they’re buying, but he’s missing an entire part of the business world – services!

Funny thing is, he’s an ex-marketing exec.  Marketing is a service industry!

C’mon Donny, have me on your show.  Let’s show SMBs that there’s more than just having the product.  You’ve gotta market that thing through conventional and online media.  You’re alienating a ton of SMB owners who sell services!

Just a few examples:

  • Plumbers
  • Grass cutters
  • Web Designers
  • Taxis
  • Printers

These businesses are important too!

Posted in Marketing, small business, television shows | 1 Response »
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Buying a House: Most Realtors Missing Big Opportunities

Friday, April 4th, 2008

My wife and I are in the process of purchasing a new home. This will be our first ever, and we are very excited. We’ve settled on a beautiful two-story – one we would not be able to buy had it not been for Internet marketing (but that’s another post for another day).

For several years now I’ve been teaching free Internet Marketing classes at our local library. Up until this past year, there were two other guys teaching there as well. One was a local PC-fix-it guy, teaching classes on memory upgrades, anti-virus software, etc. The other guy was a local realtor. Oddly enough, he was teaching Excel classes. Nonetheless, we all became friends with a common thread, helping out the community.

So when it came time for my wife and I to get a house, we already had someone that we wanted to use. But had we not, most likely we would have gone online to find someone. I’d probably type in something like ‘real estate agents in arnold mo’

real estate agents in arnold mo - Google Search

Besides Google’s ‘Local 10′ listings, this page really only shows me one ‘actual’ real estate agent – Gwen Reynolds (result #5). Looking through Gwen’s website, its obvious that the page is not at all search-optimized, but rather she was just lucky enough to have a title tag that worked for her. This is very typical.

As local search continues to grow, realtors that haven’t optimized their websites are missing one of the biggest opportunities to get new clients. At an average 3% commission per house sold, they are passing by a huge amount of money every day that their website goes on unoptimized.

I think it’s fair to say that 90% or more of local real estate agents use some sort of proprietary website that their company gives them. Every page on their site is just like every page on their co-worker’s website, minus the very few personal things they’ve changed. These pages are usually cheap (or free from their company) and the real estate agents use them as just another way to show their houses. There is little or no personalization, no mention of local events or pictures of local landmarks.

Interestingly, a search for ‘arnold mo realtor’ produces similar results. There’s Gwen at the top (once again, I’m betting this is because of her title tag and not because the page is optimized). Why aren’t any realtors optimizing their websites for local terms?

arnold mo realtor - Google Search

LocalOnliner recently mentioned the real estate agent v search conundrum as well. The most interesting thing to me there is that the process of selling a house with use of online tools isn’t all that great either. My wife and I used our real estate agent’s MLS program, but ironically enough the house that we found wasn’t even listed in his system.

A while back my real estate buddy mentioned to me that he was considering purchasing domain names for each of his listings – ie 456MainStreet.com. I thought this was a phenomenal idea. Some agents are doing this, because I remember seeing signs with URLs at the bottom of them in some yards. This isn’t a very widespread idea yet, but could be a great way for agents to rank for tons of local terms including small towns, community nicknames and even street names. Load up a nice virtual tour and some unique content and your chances of selling (and ranking) go up dramatically. Take some pointers from sites like Trulia and you’ve got a home run.

Online search for homes is only going to grow. Newspaper ads, untargeted direct mailing and real estate magazines are going to dwindle as Gen-X house buyers grow. Throw in mobile search and real estate agents have a very untapped market at their hands.

Note: Interestingly enough, shortly after posting this, I found a great conference for real estate agents: Kelsey’s Drilling Down on Local ’08. Looks to be a great conference, particularly for REA’s.

Posted in Marketing, SEO, local marketing | 2 Responses »
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