Grow From Here

To Twitter or not to Twitter?

I have been hearing all the arguments for Twitter for a while.  Even though I run a software / website development company, I tend to be slow to adopt new technologies.  I don’t want the latest version or the latest fad and I’m too busy to try the latest great toy out unless I see value from the getgo.  If it’s not going to grow our business or our customers’ businesses, then I probably don’t want to know.  Fortunately our Creative Director, Jeff, just loves all the new stuff and raves to me about all the possibilities for this and that as it comes out!

We had a great conversation yesterday about Twitter – pros (mostly Jeff) and cons (mostly me).  Jeff says it’s important to be part of the online conversation and a great way to come in contact with people you would never have come across otherwise.  I was trying to figure out how to find anything useful (there’s so much information out there – I find information filtering more of a need than how to get more information) and whether it would take a lot of time or whether it would actually bring value.

The Experiment

Being experiential and empirical, I decided to try it out and see what happens.  Is all the Twitter buzz true, or are the people I know who say that it’s just a big time consumer right?  Will it actually add value to our company to have a Twitter account?

I already had a twitter account created, but had never done anything with it.  So yesterday I went in, found a couple of people I know & a couple of people I don’t know but who are in our industry (franchise and franchise services) and set it up to follow them.

For those like me who have trouble finding anything useful in the default twitter search, Jeff sent me a link to a good search tool; search.twitter.com, which allowed me to find some conversations that I found interesting.  I also uploaded a picture, set up my basic profile, and changed the background image.

Day Two

This morning I was surprised to find that I had acquired some followers – some of them the people I had chosen, but also a couple of others.  Note that at that point, all I had was a profile – no tweets, nothing.  I did do a couple of tweets today, and found some very interesting links to a variety of websites and articles that are useful and/or interesting. 

Time spent so far:  probably 2 hours (some of that figuring out how it all works, some of that browsing the tweets & profiles).

Questions so far:  with so many tweets coming out, do most people just browse the most recent ones from the people they follow, or do they really go through them all from when they last checked in (even skimming)?

ROI: aside from the interest factor, nothing so far, but I have learned about some interesting people out there & seen some good websites….

Communication, Technology, Twitter Experiment

Here’s my little link to amusement for today – check out Brainz.com’s Completely Unscientific (Yet Accurate) Look at Social Sites – a lighthearted breakdown of what types of people are (or aren’t) using the different social networking sites…

Fun

Why Analyze Keywords

One of the first steps in Search Engine Optimization is determining what keywords people will be searching for to find your product.  Two weeks ago I wrote a post about using the Google Keyword Selector to get the right people finding your website – people who are actually looking for your products and services.   They’re the best ones to have coming to your site because they’re the most likely to actually buy from you.

The first step in helping these customers find you is determining what the right keywords are – what are your best customers actually searching for?  The second step is writing content that:

1. Provides value
2. Uses those keywords
3. Is unique

Writing Content that Provides Value

I am going to assume that you can write content that provides value.  If writing is not your strong point, I know a number of companies that have succesfully found either professional writers or students who are passionate about language or other types of communicators who can write up the information.  One company I know hired a great communicator/online networker and has established a place as an industry leader in their field in less than a year – huge ROI.  But that’s a topic for a different post…

Check Keyword Usage

Once you have the content that provides value, the next step is to see how it stacks up in terms of keyword usage & attracting the right traffic via search engines.  Always remember that you need to write the content for users, not search engines (and in fact, too high density can get penalized or be very hard to read).  But real language keyword density that makes sense and provides value is the lodestone you are aiming for.

A great tool for determine your keyword density (=how much you use your selected keywords) is E3 KWD Check - it’s a nifty little tool that you install on your computer.  You can then load into it web pages or local documents & it will tell you the keywords used in those web pages/documents, along with how many times each is found & what the keyword density and prominence of each keyword is.  Once you have a draft of the content, run it through E3 KWD Check & see whether the keywords you selected in step one are actually reflected in your content so they bring the right customers to your site.

Is Content Unique?

The unique factor is mainly a list of Do Not’s

• Do Not use content that has been posted elsewhere on the internet
• Do Not  post the same article/blog posting to multiple different blogs
• Do Not  copy someone else’s content
• Do Not post the same content multiple times throughout your site (you won’t actually get penalized for this, but the duplicate content will be ignored).

Or, to put it another way, do post original valuable content that was developed only for/by you.  The closer your site gets to being considered an ‘expert’ by Google, the more valuable the search engines perceive your content to be.

Helping The Right People Find You

As I said in my post on Tuesday, don’t make people think! 

Make it easy for them to find you when they are looking for what you offer.

Make it easy for them to buy from you.

Make it easy for them to keep coming back.

Then keep adding value and repeat.

Communication, Search Engine Optimization, Technology, Time Savers, Tips

Don’t Make Me Think

One of the best books on website design and usability (making websites easy and pleasant for people to use) is called Don’t Make Me Think.  It’s a classic, and everyone I know who is serious about web design is familiar with it.  I even recommend it to customers who are interested – it’s an easy, practical book with common sense explanations and lots of examples.

The best websites will make it obvious to people browsing the web where to click, how to navigate and what they offer.  These are the sites that are a pleasure to visit and that allow you to go deeper and deeper, but without overwhelming you at the beginning.  They don’t make the user stop and think about what the site is trying to do, how to accomplish the user’s purpose, or what the choices are.  They don’t make the user stop and read, but make good use of headings, bullets, clear buttons and visual distinctions.

Don’t Make Your Customers Think

Good design and making it easy doesn’t just apply to your website.

Does your sales pitch make it obvious to people what they’re getting and, even more important, why they care?  Or do they have to wade through your sales pitch/marketing materials trying to figure out what the product/service does for them?  The easier you make it for people to understand why it matters to them, the more likely you are to close the sale.

Does your customer support make it easy for people to figure out how to solve their problems?

Do your your production processes make it easy for customers to know what is happening when, and why?

SQL or MySQL or XML?

At Open Box, we do a lot of work with companies that are looking to increase efficiences, build their online presence, improve their reporting knowledge or build productivity systems.  Our customers for the most part don’t want to know the technical details.  Who cares if the database is SQL or MySql or Access or XML?  Does it accomplish the business purpose it is meant to achieve?  And does it do so in a cost-effective and easy-to-use way?  If so, then pick whichever database is best for our purposes!

Do you talk with customers in internal jargon for your industry?  Do they have to figure out what you mean, or are you making it easy for them?

The Pleasure Aspect

We all lots to think about & lots to figure out day to day.  The more you can make doing business with you seamless & enjoyable & easy for your customers, the happier they will be.  I suggest looking at all aspects of your business – maybe bring in someone who knows nothing about it & ask them to go through the buying process, and watch every place that they get stuck, aren’t sure what to do next, hesitate.  ‘Don’t Make Me Think’ is not just great advice for web design – it’s great advice for business & process development.

Best Practices, Business Growth, Communication, Tips

Recession – Where is the Opportunity?

There are many blogs and articles online these days about a recession providing both danger and opportunity.   This has almost become a bit of a cliche.  For business owners in the midst of it, the danger is clear.  But the question many people are asking is where is the opportunity. 

Is the opportunity in the future when many competitors may have gone out of business and my company will still be around?  Is it in the fact that I have to focus on my company’s core values RIGHT NOW if I want it to survive this period?  Is it the fact that I need to get my staff to pull together & need to focus on customer satisfaction to continue to grow during these times?

All of these are possible opportunities, but somehow none of them are terribly exciting.  They’re making the best of bad times, but they don’t get many of the business owners I talk with excited. 

Exciting Opportunities

Three things have come up that do get business and franchise owners excited:

1. The chance to see very cleary where the leaks are in a business – and plug them
2. The opportunity to get new business with bigger customers
3. The opportunity to build exciting new partnerships and strategic alliances

Where are the Leaks?

Recently I got a nail in the tire of my car.  When I went to the mechanic, he pulled out the nail and plugged the hole, then covered the tire in soap to see whether air was still leaking or the patch had been succesful (apparently soap shows up the air coming out of the hole if the leak is not completely plugged).

In the same way, right now, businesses need to be operating at maximum efficiency, and any leaks can easily be seen – the recession is acting as soap on the tire (inelegant image!).  When money was flowing easily, it was not always obvious which expenditures were resulting in increased cash, which jobs were profitable, which customers were happy – there was so much to do and business was growing.

Now, as the outside world may be slowing down (depending on your sector of the economy), it is worthwhile to take the time to look for leaks.

• Are your systems efficient?
• Where is time getting lost?  How could productivity be improved?
• Is your pipeline moving smoothly?
• What are barriers to customer satisfaction/referrals?

Multiple Leaks

One of our clients recently asked us to review their processes.  They had field staff who were writing reports while on site.  Then those reports came in to the office and were typed into an invoicing system.  The invoices were printed off and filed by due date so they could be checked for payment.  If follow up work needed to be done, that was typed into another system and printed off for re-scheduling when the follow up date came around.  Then once payment was received, the information was typed into the actual accounting system (as opposed to the invoicing system).  Each order was typed in at least 3 times, and manually retrieved to verify payment and follow-up scheduling.  Each step in the process had a ‘leak’ in terms of time, efficiency, cost and frustration for the staff who knew that this was a ‘crazy way to be doing things’.   Integrating all those systems (so that the information was typed in once and flowed through to the other systems and automatic reminders were set up so nothing got missed) had a cost, but the payback period was extremely short (less than 6 months) because of the enormous cost savings in staff time – never mind the boost to morale!

10 Minute Exercise:

Sit down for a moment and think about your company.  Where do you do things in a ‘crazy’ way?  What do your staff complain about?  Where are the areas that errors crop in?  (this is a great indicator of a ‘leak’ waiting to happen).  Where does stuff slip repeatedly?  Where are you spending money that doesn’t seem to be paying off in revenue.  Pick one area and start ‘looking for leaks’.  Then let us all know what you found.

Business Growth, Franchise

Search Engine Optimization (”SEO”) has become a dangerous phrase.  It can be over-used, abused and extremely deceiving.  Everyone with a business wants to drive traffic and increase sales.  Everyone knows that some people are very successful at this.  It would be lovely if there were simple steps to follow to improve search engine optimization on websites – and in fact, there are, but there are also a lot of people out there promising results that may not be what you’re looking for (even if they deliver on their promise).

The SEO Dance

Search Engine Optimization is a little like a dance.  You need to know the steps (what to do, how to do it), and then you need to add your own personal flair (value, personality, content).  But there are a lot of people out there promising a magic bullet, and it’s important to know what you’re looking for.  As I said in my posting about the most important question to ask about your website, the most important thing to think about relating to search engine optimization is what you’re trying to achieve (this question is becoming my mantra).  Are you trying to

• Grow your business & increase sales?
• Make money?
• Build a reputation and a brand?
• Get the most traffic possible? 

Once you know what you’re trying to achieve, then you can go out & find a company that does a good job optimizing websites for your purpose.  If you get the purpose wrong, the results are unlikely to make you happy. 

Traffic Cowboys Story

Chris at XModus Ecommerce solution, has some great posts about what can go wrong with SEO, and what to watch out for.  His recent post about traffic cowboys is a great introduction to what can go wrong.  He tells the stories of the behind the scenes ways that some companies can drive traffic to a website – but it may not be traffic that will lead to sales.  Read his post to learn about the difference between driving traffic and driving shoppers – it’s a salutary warning to anyone talking with companies that offer search engine optimization.  He also has a great post about the potential conflict of interest for some SEO consultants.

A Simple Strategy

I recently designed a simple strategy for getting eyeballs for someone who has a new product, knows all the marketing tips & tricks, but wasn’t sure what to start.  The steps were almost too simple.

1. Know what you are selling and why people will care (that last part is critical – what’s the emotional hook & what matters to them)
2. Do a channel audit (were can you easily get the word out?  what resources do you already have?)
3. Know what your potential clients will be search for (what words do they use, where do they look, where do they hang out?)
4. Test your assumptions in 1,2 & 3
5. Set up your website/blog/twitter for the people and marketing you have identified in 1-4
6. Develop great content (value, value, value and unique)
7. Create standard blurbs that express your value proposition (clearly expressing the benefits and using the keywords people are searching on)
8. Make sure you can track your results (visitors, traffic, conversions)
9. Use your channels & post your marketing copy
10. Watch the results and adjust as needed

Of course there is lots that can be done beyond this, but remember that you either need to know the answers to 1, 2 and 3 before you talk with an SEO consultant, or you need to find a consultant who will help you determine the answers to those.  All the techniques in the world aren’t very useful if you don’t know why people will care about your offering, or if you can’t express it in a way that resonates for them, or if you’re marketing it in places where your prospects don’t spend time.

Best Practices, Communication, Search Engine Optimization

Why Keywords?

The purpose of Search Engine Optimization is to have the right people find your website – people who are looking for your services or product.  Keywords are the words that people are likely to search on.  If you are have a Chinese restaurant in Vancouver, then maybe they will search on ‘Chinese Food Vancouver’ or ‘Chinese Restaurant Vancouver’.  If you sell franchises especially to new immigrants, then maybe they are searching on ‘Canadian Business Opportunities’ or ‘Franchise for Immigrants to Canada’.

Step One – Know Your Keywords

The first step in getting your site optimized is learning what your best prospects are actually searching on (as opposed to what you might think they are searching on).  How do you find this out?

1. Ask your current customers how they found you
2. Make a list of all the words that you think people might search on to find you
3. Put yourself in the headspace of a prospective customer and brainstorm what you would look for
4. Test & verify with Google’s Keywords Selector

Google Keyword Selector

You can find Google’s keyword selector at https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal.  Once you have your list of words that you think are likely the ones people are searching on, go here and type in the words that you think are the most likely.  The tool will show you how many people search on those keywords and suggest alternatives. 

Business Growth, Communication, Technology, Time Savers, Tips

Insider Language

I had an interesting conversation yesterday with a friend whose organization has spent a lot of money on a fancy interactive website & an outreach marketing campaign.  I had a quick look at the homepage of the website from the point of view of someone who is coming to it fresh.  The language on the homepage made sense to me because I know the organization, but if I didn’t, it wouldn’t have grabbed me – or maybe even made sense.

This is a challenge that I have frequently seen working with clients, and even in marketing Open Box’s services.   When we spend time with a group of people who share our purpose & language, we very quickly develop our own jargon or ‘insider language’.  In our company, we tend to talk internally in technical terms because we know what they mean & they are precise and clear to us.  But when I talk to people outside our company, I have to adapt my language for people who may not know or care about the technical details. 

Insider Language Excludes Those We Want to Reach

For many of our clients, this is a real challenge.  When we spend time with people who share our terminology and our understanding of it, we can lose the sense of how exclusive that language can be.  If marketing copy is developed using that internal language, it may be as clear as day to those in the know, but very murky to people outside.   In which case, it won’t do its job.

If I come to you and say that I can help you develop your systems, does that appeal to you?  Or if I ask what database you’re using to record your sales, do you care?  Or does it make you feel maybe a little overwhelmed or ignorant if you don’t know what the database is?  If that’s the case, then I have closed down the communication.  Whereas if I ask if you’re getting the information you need to make informed business decisions, then we can start to talk in a way that matters.

Marketing in Words that Communicate

When developing a website or marketing materials, it’s very important to do four things:

1. If you work with a professional company, make sure the people you are working with are ready and able to challenge you on the use of insider language
2. Always have the copy reviewed by someone who knows nothing about your industry and is not part of your organization, then find out if any of your words confused them or shut down the communication
3. Learn what resonates with your target market – don’t assume that what gets you excited will also excite them – ask, test and try different phrases and look for the resonance that opens up the communication vs what shuts them out.
4. Always remember that your audience is reading your material with the key question “Why Should I Care?” – make it easy for them to immediately find the answer to this question, and you will have bought the right to invite them into a relationship.

Best Practices, Business Growth, Communication

When you have been working too hard, and spending too long at the computer, go and and check out http://www.joshcole.net/.  It’s the end of the internet and a great invitation to go outside and enjoy the sunshine. 

It’s nice to know that everything has an end – even the internet!

Sunshine at the end of the Internet

Fun

The Franchise E-Factor by Greg Nathan, 2007

The Franchise E-Factor is well known within the franchise industry and was recommended to me by one of the franchisors we work with when I asked him about good resources on the franchisor-franchisee relationship.  It is a small book with 8 chapters that almost serves as a workbook.  Each chapter covers one key concept and then has concrete Action Tips to help you actually implement (and keep implementing!) the concepts.  Greg Nathan is an internationally respected corporate psychologist with a specialization in franchise relationships.  In 2007 he was named one of the top leaders in Franchising by the Franchise Times.

The core of the book is the stages in the relationship between Franchisor and Franchisee.  Greg Nathan breaks these up into 6 key stages; Glee, Fee, Me, Free, See and We, and talks about key elements of each stage in the relationship as well as how to best manage each stage.  I won’t tell you more about each stage – this is where you really want to read the book.

The core of The Franchise E-Factor’s concept is that in any relationship, we go through three stages.  He calls these dependence, independence and interdependence.  I have heard them described in other contexts as heaven, hell and then reality.  We’re all familiar with the experience; when we start a new relationship (personal, business or communal), the first phase is exciting and everything seems wonderful – it’s the honeymoon phase.  Then cracks start to appear and everything seems awful – disappointment reigns.  Then if the relationship continues, it get to a more realistic phase where the good and the bad are both recognized and accepted and there is a possibility to build for the future in partnership.  Nathan uses his expertise in psychology to examine what’s happening underneath each stage for both the franchisor and the franchisee.

The Franchise E-Factor is concrete, easy to read – and funny.  It is full of real life experiences with franchisors and franchisees.  This is definitely a must read for anyone involved in building a franchise.  The only disappointment for me was that I could not find it in a local bookstore or on Amazon.  You can order a copy through the website and have it delivered in one – two weeks (to Canada).

One great take away from this book is the line “When Perception meets reality, reality always comes out second best.”

Best Practices, Book Review, Franchise