Monthly Archives: April 2010

Dog eat dog. Survival of the fittest. That’s (theoretically) been the rule of the free market system…that competition improves the quality of everyone’s product, and only the strongest survive.

But the other night, I attended a networking gathering that was practically an online marketers’ convention – out of the 30 women there,  at least eight provided services related to web-based business promotion.

Sounds like a tense situation, doesn’t it, with all those competing businesses? Actually, no. It was pure magic. Instead of going into a competitive posture, we began seeking opportunities for connection…

• Where did our businesses not overlap?
• Where could we cross-refer, joint venture, collaborate?
• Where, in relation to each other, were our services or approach unique?
• How did our missions and markets align?

One woman’s service package might not include exactly the service that another woman offered. And even where we provided similar (or identical) services, we found we served different niche markets, and could create collaborative products for a crossover audience. Several of us discovered we were passionate about similar missions, and pursued complementary approaches. We came away energized, with a sense of connection, possibility, and mutual support, and plenty of appointments scheduled for discussing new opportunities.

How different this is from the traditional networking model, where similar businesses are assumed to provide basically the same limited products and services, in competition for the same undifferentiated audience.

But think for a moment – could the same marketing package and approach, for example, could serve every audience? Not by a long shot! And I would venture to say it’s the same for many other fields of business. By knowing your essential approach and your ideal audience, you can not only serve that audience better, but you can also create relationships with other businesses who might otherwise have been your competitors.

Yes, times are tough. And yes, budgets are thin, and prospects may be fewer. But that networking meeting proved to me that while the market may be more challenging, opportunities can actually multiply…if we honor our uniqueness, honor others’ uniqueness, and work together.

Oh, and about that Law of the Jungle? Actually, science has established that the natural law of the jungle  is one of interdependence and self-regulating balance…a living system in which each part has a role to play in relation to the others. Rather than competition for dominance, there’s a dance of complementarity.

There’s no reason why businesses can’t do the same.

When you’re just beginning to set up your business website, the screen can gape as blank as your mind. How can you communicate your vision and mission, your products and services? What words will have the greatest impact?

If you’ve never written for the web, it can seem like a relatively straightforward – if baffling – question. To web insiders, however, there’s a secret tactic that will clue you in to the best words to describe your field of business, and ensure that those words bring you the best search engine rankings.

It’s called “organic search engine optimization” (OSEO for short) and it’s one of the best ways to give your site credibility with the search engines and draw in targeted traffic.

In using OSEO, you have two goals:

• To prove to the search engines that your site provides high-quality, relevant content on its stated topic, thus moving it closer to the top of the listings
• To include in your content the keywords that people are most likely to use when they search for products or services like yours – thus ensuring that your site shows up in those search results

So, for example, let’s say your site is OrganicPetFoods.com, and you want it to show up when people search for pet food, organic pet food, organic foods, pet supplies, pet health, etc.  So logically, you need to include those words, and related words, in your content.

This is not to say that you should have a paragraph like this: When you shop for pet foods, you should only buy organic pet food because organic foods are among the highest-quality pet foods you can purchase for optimum pet health.

This is called “cramming” the keywords, a practice that will indeed catch the notice of rudimentary search engines, but will rapidly lose the interest of any intelligent person who clicks on that link. Google, like a savvy reader, picks up on this spamlike practice also, and rewards it with a low ranking.

Instead, you need to gather your keywords into logical groupings, and use one grouping per page in a natural flow:

Where your home page might start by discussing organic pet foods generally, you could have subsequent individual pages dealing with organic cat foods, organic dog foods, etc.  You could have a page addressing the question “why organic?” and one providing “organic resources” for those seeking more information. And so forth…

Sounds fairly simple, right? In principle it’s not difficult at all…until you start looking at the best keywords to include. If 99% of organic pet food suppliers are focusing their sites on the words “organic pet food” and there are 1,000,000 competing sites using those three keywords, how quickly do you think your site will rise to the top?

Certainly, a large number of good incoming links and high-quality content  will help, but it’s also important to choose your keywords strategically.  Fortunately, Google comes to your aid with a package of free OSEO products:

• Google Analytics – when you install the snippet of code from this tool on your website, Google will analyze the number of visitors who come to your site, which site or search engine sent them to you, the keywords they used, and much, much more. This is the best tool you can add to your site to see how it is performing and how you can improve that performance.
• Google Trends – using this tool, you can evaluate the popularity of any keyword or keyphrase by year, country, city, and language.
• Google Adwords – while Google Adwords is  designed for Pay Per Click (PPC) campaigns, it also offers a standalone Keyword Generator which is perfect for suggesting keywords and gauging their level of searches and competition.

Another service, Market Samurai, is not free, but if you’re going to do any serious OSEO or plan to use Google’s PPC options, it’s priceless…a small one-shot payment for a lifetime’s return on investment. This multi-faceted tool analyzes each keyword and gives searches versus competition, search engine traffic, Adwords traffic, Adwords value, and much, much more (this is the tool I use before I begin to write any client’s website content…and for a limited time I can offer it at a greatly discounted rate).

Now that you have all these tools…now what do you do with them? If your site is going to rank high, you want to reduce the number of sites you’re competing against. So you look for keywords that apply to various aspects of your business (for example, “organic pet food,” “organic cat food,” “organic dog food” and so forth) that show up in more than 100 searches per day, but have fewer than 100,000 competing sites using them.

Once you have identified relevant keywords with plenty of searches but few competitors, you’ll want to add these to the appropriate pages on your site.  It’s important to do this for every page of your site, so Google can index every page, thus giving your visitors multiple points of entry.

Obviously, this is a very simple explanation of just one part of the OSEO process, but it will help you at least to get started. Of course, a professional copywriter can help you to find your best keywords and to place them effectively – and gracefully – in your site for the maximum impact.

When you choose an identifier for your business, you’re immediately faced with the question of defining it for your clients…and for yourself. What does XYZ mean, and who are you in relation to it?

For example, what is copywriting?

I’ve often been faced with this question at networking gatherings.  I introduce myself as a copywriter, and again and again the first question is something like:  “I’ve been thinking of a really great invention. Could you help me to trademark it?”

No, I tell them, I’m not a patent, trademark, or copyright expert…for that type of advice they’d need an attorney. I am a copy writer – that is, I help companies to present themselves in the best possible way by writing marketing copy, for example, web content, sales letters, brochures, etc., etc.

“Ahhhh,” they say, the light dawning…”Could you do that for me?” And the conversation begins…

The same thing happens when I introduce myself as a consultant for sustainable businesses. Again and again I receive a puzzled look and a comment like:  “My business recycles paper. Does that mean we’re sustainable enough for you?”

So over the past months, I’ve collaborated with eco-consultant Geoff Stack of Stack Coordination in joint presentations to not-yet-green business audiences. We talk with them about the  benefits of sustainability (a.k.a. “going green”) – saving energy, improving employee health and morale,  and saving money in multiple areas (this will be the topic of a Continuing Education course at CCBC in Fall 2010…watch Fresh Green Image for updates).

Geoff likes to respond to the question “What is sustainability?” with a slide of more than 100 tiny definitions, with Rocky Mountain Institute CEO Amory Lovins’ definition superimposed:  INDEFINABLE.  He follows up with Natural Capital Institute founder Paul Hawken’s definition:  “improving the quality of life for all living beings within the capacity of nature to provide that life.”

That’s a big definition, covering a lot of territory…it can potentially fit businesses ranging from alternative energy suppliers to zookeepers, depending on the values and policies that guide their operations. In practical terms, sustainability or “greenness” is a set of values that can be adopted by any business in any field.  It’s not an industry or a niche.

So we come to the question – how do you identify your business? How does it – and how do you – embody a role in your chosen field? And how do you define it for your clients?

In Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking Glass, Humpty Dumpty says:  “When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean – neither more nor less.” While I’m not advocating this psychotic use of language, the truth is that when you choose an identifier to describe your business, you become your clients’ experience of that word…the way it shows up in their reality. They may not explore its meaning beyond the meaning you demonstrate through your actions.

For example, how many mainstream consumers see Walmart or Clorox as defining green business – and thereby completely miss the larger social/environmental/ethical meanings of sustainability?

On the positive side of the fence, my husband was a master of this art of branding-by-being. As administrative director of the local center of a men’s international organization, he embodied a vision and set of values that went far beyond those of the actual organization.

From his interpretation of the organization’s mission, he created a reality that went far deeper than its official menu of services. Men were attracted because of his vision and values; they came, experienced healing through his role in those services, and helped to carry on a spiritual legacy.

When you promote your business, what are the vision and values you are projecting? How do you embody the gift that your business – and your industry – brings to the world? And how do you offer that gift to your clients?

That is the key to branding your business.

When you’re setting up your website, it’s the most natural thing in the world to think it’s about your business – your mission, products and services, history, success stories, etc., etc. After all, this is what your customers want to know, right?

Actually, no, it’s not. Unless your visitors entered your website address (URL) directly from your business card, or click a link from a public listing or review of your business, they aren’t coming to research your company. They’re coming with a problem in mind, looking for a solution.

And if your site doesn’t look like it’s likely to provide the solution those visitors want within seconds of their arrival, they will – repeat will – move on, no matter what your credentials are. If you can’t direct them to the product they need, and tell them how to use it, they simply aren’t interested in your 30-year history at the forefront of your industry.

In other words, while your website may superficially seem to be about your company, your products and your services, it’s really about your visitors, providing answers to their needs and solutions to their problems.

What are some indicators of a site that serves your visitors’ needs, versus one that simply promotes your business?

• That simple three-letter “y” word – you. How many times does your content use “you” instead of “we”, “I”, or your company name?
• Ease of use. Does your site put the information your visitors need on the landing page, or does it bury useful information below several sub-menus? Does it use a clean, easy-to-read style with black text on a white background, short paragraphs and plenty of open space, or does it cram as much information as possible onto high-tech pages designed in white-on-black reversed text?
• Helpful headlines. Do your site speak directly to the visitor’s needs with a home page headline like “The Right Gadget for Your Purpose…Every Time” or does it begin with a generic headline like “Welcome to Our Site” or “Leading the Gadget Industry Since 1979”?
• Understandable language. Does your website speak the same language your audience uses – or does it drown them in technical terminology and jargon?
• Features versus benefits. How much do you tell about the ways in which your products or services can solve your visitors’ problems, instead of describing the details or specs of whatever you do or sell?
• Educational content. Does your site offer additional information such as an FAQ, a blog, or an article library to help your visitors make good decisions, or does it assume they have all the background information they need?
• Continuing connection. Does your site offer an educational newsletter, a special report, or some other free information product for the visitor to download (which also puts a lasting reminder of your expertise in their hands and gives you an opportunity to get their contact information for your mailing list)? Or does it just tell visitors to call or write for more information?

Bottom line – treat your site visitors as you would treat individual prospects in a personal presentation. Let them know you care about their needs and want to solve their problems. They’ll reward you with their trust and business.

I can’t count the number of clients who’ve answered my question “Who is your audience?” with “Everyone! – Anyone who’s ever needed (fill in the product or service).”

That kind of confidence is great…but it doesn’t help from a marketing standpoint.

To sell effectively to your audience, you need to know them as individuals – what are their interests, their wants, their needs, their dreams, their struggles. Why they need your product. What about your service resonates for them. How their lives could be made easier by your offerings.

Everyone is not going to buy your product or service…but individuals might, if you communicate its value in terms that resonate for them.

“But I researched that when I developed my business plan,” you may be thinking. “Why do it again?” Well, just take a look at the ways in which a major corporation like, say, McDonald’s has reinvented itself: first a hamburger joint for teenagers…later a convenient dining place for busy families…more recently, a place to grab a (supposedly) healthy snack; now, a coffee bar of sorts.

The audience changed, and with them, the company.

Even if your target market was clear at the beginning, times change. Society changes. People’s level of awareness changes. Don’t assume that what was true when your business opened its doors is true now.

Sure, you can get a general sense of the trends by networking and keeping up on the news in your community and your industry. But unless you’re doing some significant research in those trade mags and local newspapers, or pumping your networking contacts for information, you’re going to need a more focused approach.

Yes, you can hire a marketing company to survey your audience for a hefty sum…and there are times when that can be critical to your company’s survival. But to gather general data to assess and tweak your company’s direction, you may be just as well served by using a DIY approach and a nifty free tool called SurveyMonkey.com (www.surveymonkey.com).

After you set up your SurveyMonkey account, you can create basic surveys and send them out to your client base by email or through the SurveyMonkey servers. You can generate a link and place it on your website, your Facebook page, or your blog, or email it to your list. All of this free of charge. Even if you elect to upgrade to the paid service while you’re running your survey (and there are distinct benefits, like being able to download the results), the charge is small, paid month to month with no long-term contract.

As marketing master Seth Godin wrote, “Selling to people who actually want to hear from you is more effective than interrupting strangers who don’t.” If you have the data to address the current needs and interests of your audience, they will be that much more receptive to your message…and your products or services.

You held out as long as you could. “I don’t want to be a blogger,” you said. “I don’t see the value to my business, and besides, what would I say?” But one way or another your objections were overcome…fired up with enthusiasm,  you set up your blog, sat down to write your first post, and…..

Now what? Somehow you locked yourself in to create not just one standalone piece of riveting, enlightening marketing collateral to add value to your site and bring clients to your door, but an ongoing series of posts, stretching into the distant future!

Before you begin to wonder what on earth you were thinking of – take heart. In fact, if you’ve ever had casual conversations with clients or prospects, you have all you need to write a blog (except possibly the time, but that’s another matter).

For example…

• Do you talk with clients about news in your industry or your company, and how that news affects them (for example, describing how reforms to the Toxic Substances Control Act will affect the ingredients in household cleansers) ?
• Do you repeatedly field the same basic questions from clients (for example, “what is the difference between “organic” and “natural” on the label of a processed food product?”)
• Do you need to educate clients before they can choose the product or service they need (for example, demonstrating how to find the VOC content of paints, caulks or adhesives)?
• Do you advise DIY-minded clients who want to call on your services after they’ve dealt with basic problems (for example, walking them through installing a new sink aerator to fix a dripping faucet)?

These are just a few of the topics you can explore in a blog post. Just picture yourself talking with visitors to your store or office…what do they ask, what do you tell them? Those conversations hold an important clue: you’re sharing the information they want, need, and request.

Now think of the articles you read: probably they address issues that interest you personally or affect your business, family, or lifestyle.  If you read about new products or services, you’re probably looking for the ways in which they would benefit you, or the ways in which you could use them to make your life or work easier.

Your readers are looking for the same information.

Remember – your business blog isn’t a vehicle for self-expression. If you need that sort of outlet, set up a personal blog or buy a journal. A business blog is a service for your clients, adding value to your business and building their trust by providing them with clear information and perspectives to make their lives easier.

Whether you’re running a brick-and-mortar shop, a sleek office in an industrial park, or a website, you have one goal in running your business:

GET TRAFFIC!!

It doesn’t matter whether “Traffic” means literal feet passing through your doorway, telephones ringing, email alerts pinging, or visitors following links or entering keywords to access your site. Traffic is the goal, the key to the treasure chest, the rainbow that leads to the pot of gold: sales!

When you get foot, phone, or email traffic, the next step is no secret: you respond! A salesperson welcomes the visitor, a friendly voice answers the call, a representative replies to the email. Simple, basic, Business 101, right?

But what do you do when you get a visitor to your website?

Let’s face it – website traffic isn’t easy to come by. Even when you’ve identified your niche and you have a solid search engine optimization strategy, even when you’re using pay per click advertising effectively, it can be a challenge to get visitors to zip past uncountable other sites to land at yours.

So – lacking a friendly salesperson or receptionist, what do you do with those visitors when they arrive?

That’s the biggest difference between real-time and online business tactics. When you have real live customers in your store or on the phone, you’d ordinarily go for the sales, right? Afterward, you’d seal the relationship by inviting them to opt in to your mailing list for news, discounts, coupons, etc.

It’s just the reverse online. Most visitors aren’t looking to buy when they first land on your site: they may be browsing, comparing prices, gathering information, and so on. In fact, unless you have very good web content,  most of them will stay less than 7 seconds – then they’re off to the next site, gone, and you’re forgotten!

Stop Them In Their Tracks…With Answers

Your job, before you try to win a single sale, is to capture those visitors. To win some way of staying in touch, staying in front of them, reminding them of your existence long after they’ve left your site. In short – to get them to opt in to your list!

This isn’t like asking a customer to sign up for your newsletter after s/he’s bought a product, as you would in a physical store. You haven’t earned any of those warm fuzzies – and unless you act fast, you’ll never get the chance to earn them!  These passing visitors came with a specific problem or need in mind. They aren’t going to want to load up their in-boxes with yet another newsletter unless they know that it fills that need.

So you need to get inside their heads and anticipate their reason for coming to your site. What was the need or problem they were looking to resolve, and how can you answer it? Then, provide at least a part of that answer as an incentive to opt in to your list. You want to put some practical, usable tools in their hands, along with the awareness that you have much more to offer them.

How can you do this? With free information products – articles, e-courses, special reports, teleseminars, etc. – based on the knowledge that you offer to your real-time customers on a daily basis. For example:

• for a camera store: The Five Biggest Mistakes New Digital SLR Users Make, And How to Avoid Them
• for a dog breeder: The Seven Signs That Identify Your New Best Friend
• for a plumber: Leaky Pipes? Save Your Money and Don’t Call Us Till You’ve Tried These Easy DIY Fixes

Offer a  Sample Taste of Information

You get the idea – you’re not offloading all your expertise, but answering a specific question that customers ask again and again, establishing the value of your services by offering a free information product that answers their immediate need, rather like the sample trays of products you find in the grocery store.

What else can they do? They need that question answered. And so they opt in to your list and become true prospects, with whom you can build a real relationship that leads to sales.

My 22-year-old son is graduating from college as a Mechanical Engineering major this May, into one of the wickedest job markets in the history of the country. He looked over at me this morning as he was skimming through yet more online listings, and said, “Mom, I just saw a news story that said even highly qualified professionals are having  problems finding jobs. How am I supposed to compete?”

I listened to him, thinking of all he has to offer, and I realized – Darlin’, this isn’t a job-hunting issue. Down at the root, this is a marketing issue – branding, packaging, and promoting!

Now, I know that there are people who see everything in terms of their profession, and marketers are certainly no exception. But most people will agree with me that a resume, at its core, is a marketing document designed to sell a job-seeker’s skills, education, and experience to the most compatible employer.

But these days, it goes much deeper than that: whether you’re a job-hunter seeking career openings or an entrepreneur seeking clients, it’s foolish to simply send out marketing documents – whether they’re resumes or sales brochures – and wait for the offers to come flooding in. It takes one-on-one networking, expo-attending, cold-calling, and in the last few years,  social media marketing.

And in the end, whether you’re a job-seeker or entrepreneur, whether you’re on the hunt for a career or a client, the deciding factor isn’t your skills, experience, products or services. These are all important, no question – but in the end you’re selling a product called you: that indefinable combination of mission, vision, character, values, attention, confidence, and way of relating to others.

So the next question is – how do you package the product called you?

Simply, by showing up. Not as a characterless assortment of skills, accomplishments, etc., but as a complete person…not just aiming for any job or client that will have you, but for the right job(s) or client(s) – the ones that fit your mission and goals in life. Sure, there may be plenty of people with X educational level and Y skill set and Z experience – but there is no one who has your unique approach and viewpoint. Those are the factors that make competition a non-issue.

Thanks to today’s social media marketing technology,  you have more tools for showing up than ever before. So far beyond physically attending events, you can set up a Facebook business page, a LinkedIn account, you can interact with prospective clients and/or employers in forums and online groups, and you can blog and tweet commentary on your reading, your projects, or thoughts on news in your chosen industry.

But what’s the goal in all this? Simple: to give prospective employers and/or clients an idea of who you are – knowledgeable and self-motivated, a continual learner and/or expert in your field,  with particular areas of strength and informed opinions. You create a brand of you: what do you value, what do you believe, what world issues move you? How do you want to make a difference?

In a tight job market, it’s tempting to portray yourself as a one-size-fits-all generic anonymous cog to (supposedly) fit into the maximum number of settings. And sure, if you want to be treated as an anonymous cog by an employer/client that values anonymous cogs, sure, you can present yourself that way. But when you present yourself as a uniquely caring, skilled, and knowledgeable individual – an extra-ordinary person – you will draw the attention of companies who are searching for extraordinary employees.

The choice is yours – what sort of product are you?