Many businesses in Hollywood are suffering due to the economic slowdown, and as usual it is small businesses that are suffering the brunt of the problem. While most of the press is focused on multi-billion dollar studios, it is the caterers, prop rental houses, equipment suppliers, post production facilities, independent contractors, and other small businesses that make it possible for studios to make huge profits every year. I was recently quoted extensively by the LA Business Journal on this issue, and give some tips on what these companies can do to combat the problem. Please read this article at: http://www.labusinessjournal.com/news/2010/aug/23/lot-left/
Stop burning your money like dead leaves!
While the country is currently faced with heat waves from coast to coast, in a few short weeks leaves will be changing colors, evenings will bring a pleasant cool, crisp breeze, and fall will be in full effect. In some parts of the country, people will be raking leaves into piles that they burn. Those leaves are a lot like the dollars business owners have spent on their websites- in a seemingly endless cycle, small businesses spend money on web design, copy, hosting, and with no return, they are burning their money just like those leaves.
Some persons, however, will take those falling leaves and turn them into mulch. They can use them to provide nutrients to the soil, and be able to have a great garden come spring. That’s exactly what a small business can do with the dollars they spend on the Internet- rather than just throw away their money on costs that bring no return, they can use that Internet budget to actually bring in new business in the future.
How do you go from burning your dollars to investing them in future sales? An effective Internet Marketing Plan is essential to getting the most from your efforts online.
To set up an effective Internet marketing plan, you need to take into account the following major areas:
- Keyword Selection/website copy
- Inbound links
- Landing Pages
- Blogging
- E-mail marketing
Keyword selection/website copy
It is critical that you understand the terms used by persons searching for your solution to their problem. To do this, you need to do some research through tools made available by search engines such as Google. This will help you identify the best keywords to target with your online efforts. What makes a good keyword? A large number of searches with low competition is ideal. A search professional can help you with this process, and should be able to identify the best chances you have at achieving success online.
Once you have identified these keywords, you need to use them on your website. Rewrite the copy on your pages to include your targeted keywords. This will make it so that your website is more relevant for those terms.
Inbound Links
One of the major factors Google and other search engines use to determine the importance of a website is the number of other websites that have links pointing to it. A search professional can help you find other sites that will link to your website. This may involve linking back to those websites, as well as finding directories for companies in your industry that will link to you.
Next week we’ll send information on landing pages and blogging, and the following week will be a message on effective e-mail marketing. For more details on any of these topics, reply to this message to say that you want to stop burning your money like dead leaves and we’ll send you our whitepapers on Internet Marketing Plans and E-mail Marketing. Have a great weekend!
Mark Deo
mark@markdeo.com
Stop burning your money like dead leaves!
While the country is currently faced with heat waves from coast to coast, in a few short weeks leaves will be changing colors, evenings will bring a pleasant cool, crisp breeze, and fall will be in full effect. In some parts of the country, people will be raking leaves into piles that they burn. Those leaves are a lot like the dollars business owners have spent on their websites- in a seemingly endless cycle, small businesses spend money on web design, copy, hosting, and with no return, they are burning their money just like those leaves.
Some persons, however, will take those falling leaves and turn them into mulch. They can use them to provide nutrients to the soil, and be able to have a great garden come spring. That’s exactly what a small business can do with the dollars they spend on the Internet- rather than just throw away their money on costs that bring no return, they can use that Internet budget to actually bring in new business in the future.
How do you go from burning your dollars to investing them in future sales? An effective Internet Marketing Plan is essential to getting the most from your efforts online.
Click here to read the full article and to get our FREE whitepaper on Internet Marketing.
Put your prospects in PAIN
The dance of marketer/prospect mostly involves the salesperson MOVING TOWARD the prospect looking for an opening to push their product or service. Unfortunately this creates repulsion rather than attraction. While there are exceptions where chemistry is strong, often times, the more we move toward the prospect, the more uncomfortable they get and MOVE AWAY from us.
Again the focus should NOT be to talk about our company, product or service but rather ask genuine, creative questions about the prospect’s experiences, feelings and vision of the future. The only way to incite change is by getting the prospect to realize, of their own volition, that their current solution or current collection of possible solutions are inadequate for their very specialized needs. When this occurs the prospect will begin to move toward us rather than away from us. This is what is meant by creating attraction. It is not an OVERT thing that we do but rather a COVERT realization in the mind of the customer.
Here are some questions that can allow us to create PAIN in the mind of the prospect without making them feel we are trying to move in on their space:
1. What are some of the solutions that you have already tried?
2. How did they work?
3. What kept them from being the most effective solution?
4. What were they missing?
5. How will you avoid this from happening again in the future?
6. What is it that most of the vendors that you speak with just don’t get?
7. Why are your needs so “specialized?”
8. What would happen if you cannot get this project properly completed in time?
9. What happened last time?
10. What is the cost of staying with your current solutions?
11. What do you like most about your current vendors?
12. If there was one thing that you could change about them what would it be?
There are many other PAIN questions that we can create. Think of a few and share them with your colleagues. Ask these questions of your existing clients and prospects and see the PAIN you force them to face, and then help them resolve those issues. Let me know how it goes.
Be well and enjoy success this week.
-Mark Deo
We Fall For It Every Time
In this difficult economy everybody is looking for a bargain. That’s why we have to seriously entertain reducing our prices in order to compete effectively. Right?
WRONG! We fall for it every time.
If you are a finding that you clients are putting more and more pressure on your firm to reduce prices then it’s about time you change your clients! That’s right often times price erosion is not so much a problem with your pricing strategy or product selection or service but rather your customer profile.
Continually reducing our price is like prostitution. WE can never become cheap enough. In fact the cheaper we get, the less valuable we are perceived.
I encourage you to look at your customer pool and begin to segment them not so much by demography or psychographics but by “value perception.” Do you understand why those specific customers are “willing to pay more?” What is it that they value that the “price-oriented” customer do NOT value? Why? Then you can create a NEW customer profile and focus on those clients that find great value in your product or service. Perhaps you can even discover a way to create evangelists who trumpet this value claim.
I encourage you to check out this brief video of a seminar where I discuss price sensitivity and what you can do about it.
WOMMA
Can you beleive that there is now a Word of Mouth Marketing Association (WOMMA? If you go to this site, http://womma.org/main/ you will discover that there are all kinds of articles regarding how to get your message delivered to your target audience withOUT using the traditional marketing or advertising channels.
In one article it outlines how fast an ad campaign can become saturated in this time starved, relationship savvy culture that we live in. Why? “Because people tell other people about things they think they don’t know about. If you want to spark word-of-mouth virus, the first thing you need to do is realize it’s not about you. Word-of-mouth only works if your give people an amazing story to tell so that THEY are the introducer of something new, cool, different, interesting, or outrageous.
Beyond Traditional Marketing – half day seminar
Chasing customers doesn’t work anymore. In today’s culture we must leverage curiosity to “attract” clients and business partners.
This 2.5 hour class will help you to customize a strategy for your company.
– Reduce your advertising while at the same time increase demand for your product/service.
– Fully integrate the marketing campaign with a parallel selling strategy.
– Set your company, product or service apart from the competition like never before.
– Ensure that every participant establishes their own personal marketing plan.
When: Friday, June 5, 2010
Time: 10:00 AM – 12:30 PM
Where: Dale Carnegie Training 2525 Cherry Ave. Suite #380 Signal Hill, CA 90755
Who: Presented by Mark Deo, Bestselling Author of The Rules of Attraction
Tuition: $49 Investment
To sign-up call 562-427-1040 or email mark@markdeo.com
Recruitment Tip #253
Before investing your limited time interviewing candidates, carefully consider YOUR desired profile for each position:
1. The desired staff member tenure according to the current and future department needs
2. Cost and time required to train and retrain replacements
3. Loss of intellectual equity when someone leaves the department
4. Impact on customers with a constantly changing staff
5. Impact on fellow employees who are constantly training new people and possibly lose focus of their own responsibilities
Don’t modify the position to fit the person, find the person that fits the position.
Governed and Guarded by Buffoons
It seems to me that we are being governed and guarded by buffoons. I write this blog as I sit in the Delta Sky Pass Lounge at Chicago Ohare. My flight is delayed 5 hours and after speaking with some of my fellow travelers it looks like I’m the lucky one! All this is a result of the latest “terrorist scare” that dominates the news today. Some wing-nut (who couldn’t look MORE like a terrorist if he dressed-up as one for Halloween)decided to try to light an incendiary device while on final approach. He was apprehended by a few civilians, no thanks to our multi-billion dollar TSA system. Nothing against the TSA officers who are merely attempting to do the jobs they were hired to do. Yet I have to wonder who is in charge of hiring these folks. They don’t seem to have the intellect to count the number of fries in a Happy Meal. That coupled with our fearful leaders in Washington who seem more focused on protecting the rights of foreign born middle-eastern nationals than they do with protecting our safety. What will it take for the Americans who are paying their salaries to rise-up and demand that politicians fulfill their obligation to make decisions for the majority rather than out of fear of offending the many minorities in this country. My heart goes out to all of you who are traveling this holiday season. Please have a safe journey despite the stupidity which you are surely contending with.
Small businesses pay tab for health care
It looks like businesses with over 50 employees will be paying the tab for obama’s new health care plan. Join me on our radio show this Monday as we discuss the good and the bad of the new plan which Congress passed yesterday and how it affects your business.