Many businesses slow down during the summer and it becomes the perfect time and opportunity to create a new marketing plan or revise your current one!

Starting June 7th, we will be holding “Summer School” every Monday.  We’ll be offering invaluable information about web, outbout and social media marketing as well as some pretty cool specially priced offers to help you along the way.

Click HERE to get your blank ACTSmart Summer School calendar so you can plan your summer projects along with us.

Week 6 – Permission Marketing

David Meerman Scott’s book “The New Rules of Marketing and PR” makes a great point early on that we have to move from “interruption marketing.” When TV or radio that stops us in the middle of something that we are doing to tell us something that we probably don’t want to hear or see, that’s “interuption marketing.”

Today, more and more people are going to the Internet to find what they are looking for.   They may not be buying everything there but they’re more often searching the web for information to make an educated choice. 
 
When someone visits your website or reads your Constant Contact message, they are doing it on their own terms – THEY decided when rather than the commercial interruption of their favorite TV or radio show.  You are answering their questions rather than offering unsolicited information.  It’s a whole different mindset.
 
David has several free reports on his website including “The New Rules of Viral Marketing” which is a FREE e-book written in a landscape format rather than portrait because our computer monitors are horizontal rather than vertical – one of many novel ideas!  It’s subtitled “How word-of-mouse speads your ideas for free.”  It has lots of great information!
 
For the record, we advertise on the radio very successfully.  In the case of our radio ads, they are usually conversational and like a human interest story or they are amusing – never “hard sell.”  They are used for name recognition more than to get an actual sale.

Week 5 – Keeping In Touch
 Communication is a critical part of any relationship. Take a lesson from small businesses that long ago grasped the dynamics and importance of building customer relationships through communication.  And they keep in touch with customers on a regular basis ensuring their organization remains “top of mind.”
It takes six to seven contacts before you can turn a prospect into a customer. Robin Robins, our marketing consultant in Nashville, says that every business should have contact with their clients every 30 days. Their remembering of you and your business declines progressively after until after 120 days you have to re-introduce yourself and your business; they’ve forgotten all about you.
Constant Contact makes this contact quick, easy and inexpensive!  Don’t feel that you have to write pages of articles or provide reams of statistics; the most sucessful newsletters that we have seen are ones that are short and sweet!  If your reader knows that it will only take a few minutes of their very valuable time, they are more apt to open your email.
 
Anyone promoting a sale or class schedule finds that Constant Contact is a great way to go.  It’s quick, easy and gets the information to the target audience for very little investment.

Because it is “permission based” marketing, these newsletters are generally sent to current clients.  Be sure that your subject line is compelling or the message my never be opened.
 
Click on the Constant Contact image to sign up with us. There is no difference in fees and we are able to help you with all Constant Contact marketing.

Week 4 – Your MVAs

Your website should be one of your Most Valuable Assets.  If it’s not, your Most Valuable Activity needs to be bringing it up to that level.  Invest your time and possibly add some features.  Here are the questions to ask:

1.  If my website went down, would I know it quickly due to customer inquiries or employee’s alarm? If not, what would make it that important to your business; what could you add to make your website invaluable?
2. Is there information on my website that increases my business by directing and guiding visitors to make purchases online or at our “brick and mortar” location. If you don’t currently have a way to make a sale or book a service on your website, now is the time to add that feature.  It has gotten less expensive and easier to add online payment over the last year or so.
3. Is your business strictly local or could you expand into new markets using your website?  What product or service is uniquely yours?  Could you sell “information?”
4. Do you have a way of capturing your visitor’s email address?  We all hate spam – they came to your website for a reason; can you provide follow up information and possibly get an additional sale?

Do you gather feedback about your products or services on your website?  Who knows what your customers want better than your customers? Give them an opportunity to advise you on your business.  Sure, they’ll gripe more than compliment but honest constructive criticism is really valuable! Listen carefully and decide if it’s worth considering a change.  Use the compliments as testimonials – they are valuable, too! 

In the newspaper business, any article on the top half of the newspaper; any article “above the fold” is the most important article in the paper.  It’s the one that would get you to buy the paper if you saw it on the news stand.  On your website, it’s the information seen on the screen before you have to scroll – don’t bury your most important information below the scroll line.

• Does your website have a headline that grabs their attention?  One that makes them want to read more?   On average, 8 out of 10 people will read headline copy, but only 2 out of 10 will read the rest. This is the secret to the power of your title, and why it so highly determines the effectiveness of the entire piece. The better your headline, the better your odds of beating the averages and getting what you’ve written read by a larger percentage of people. So, get rid of “Welcome to our website” and use your TOP keyword phrase to write your headline.
• If you have a form, put it above the scroll – so many people don’t even bother to scroll so they could miss it.  This is where you can gather those “golden” email addresses.
• If you have an audio or video that you want them to access, put that up where they immediately see it.  Video “breaks the wall” between you and your visitors.  Visitors will stay longer when they have something to watch rather than read (More about this subject in coming weeks)
• If you are selling a product or running a special, be sure it’s front and center.  Don’t make them work to buy your products or services.

I know what you are thinking – “How do I get all that at the top of my website?”  What’s up there that you don’t need?  Is your header too tall (The area that houses your logo.)  Is space wasted with non-essential or self-gratifying information?  Give this area a critical once over to see where you can acquire more space. 

Week 2 – Improving Your Home Page
Your homework for last week was to list 12 keyword phrases that pertain to your website.  Now we are going to take that list and use it to improve your website.

Remember that we are looking for keyword phrases since single keywords will most likely get you nothing in search results- they are too vague and unspecific.

Now, take your keyword phrases list and go to your website.  How many of your keyword phrases can you find on your home page and on any and all inner pages?  Not many?  None?  That’s because websites are often designed for the use of the people that have already found them and not the strangers that are looking for them.

So, to attract search engines, where do you want to be sure to use these super-valuable keyword phrases?

• Page Title – the line at the very top odf your computer screen(look at Staples.com their page title is Office Supplies, Printer Ink, Toner, Electronics, Computers, Printers & Office Furniture taken directly from their .html  
• Headings- one <”H1″> tag per page = The headline that is most important to the page
• SubHeadings - use <”H2″> or <”H3″> tags to break up the page copy throughout the page Use them to support the heading keyword phrases.  I know that you have immeadiate control over your tags, unless you are using WordPress technology and are easily choosing your header tags yourself (The tags are surrounded by quote marks because this text format is trying to actually use them)
• General text – use your keyword phrases throughout the text on each page (best to use one phrase per page so you aren’t watering down the effectiveness)  Search engines often consider the text in the fist few paragraphs to be the most important so be sure that they are there.
• Meta Description – this is the generally description that generally is displayed when you are found in the search engines.  Be sure it has some of your relavant keyword phrases.
• Navigation – if at all possible, don’t just say “About Us” say “About our computer repair company”  This is very hard to do due to space limitations!
• Inbound Link Text
  This is hard for you to control since you most likely have no control over the link going to your webiste from someone else’s.  If you know of a link or are purchasing links, don’t allow them to just link your name or your logo.  Ask them to use one of your keyword phrases to link to you like “affordable gifts”
• Outbound Links – if you are linking to another website, do them a favor and use a keyword phrase that will help them in their ranking

Week 1

Every visitor asks themselves these 3 questions as they decide whether or not they are staying on your website:

1.     Am I on the right site?  If you are selling car parts, your site needs to look automotive; if you are offering advice on babysitting, your site MUST look the part – if you were to substitute the automotive look on the babysitting site and visa versa, your visitors wouldn’t even last 7 seconds – they would be gone in a flash! 

Look at your site and be sure that you are sending the right message.  If you have a logo, if you use certain colors through out your business, be sure to echo them on your site. Visitors will immediately feel for your website the way that they feel about your “brick & mortar” business.

2.     Can I trust you?  Are you a reputable business?  Have previous customers been happy with your services or products?  If so, post those testimonials on your website’s home page and through out the site. If you are a member of the Better Business Bureau, Chamber of Commerce and/or organizations specific to your business – be sure to post those logos as well. Any visitor who does not know you will be wary of your validity – put them at ease.

3.     How can I get in touch with you?  I see this mistake so often!  Contact information, including telephone number must be on every page.  We generally post this information at the bottom. I bothers me no end when I have to search for contact information – don’t they want me to call???

These 3 quick questions give you a great start to updating your website and making the most of your marketing efforts!

Today, more and more people are going to the Internet to find what they are looking for.   They may not be buying everything there but they’re more often searching the web for information to make an educated choice. 

David has several free reports on his website including “The New Rules of Viral Marketing” which is a FREE e-book written in a landscape format rather than portrait because our computer monitors are horizontal rather than vertical – one of many novel ideas!  It’s subtitled “How word-of-mouse speads your ideas for free.”  It has lots of great information!