I had a dream conversation with a new client today. I often don’t hear the results of my client’s success or lack thereof. To be honest I didn’t expect this one. The business owner lives out of the country. When we announced programming classes he held in the US. I knew that he didn’t get a lot of response.
I wrote a press release and even though no one came to the classes, people found him.
Here’s a bit from the conversation:
Client: We’ve developed a second class following the success of the first one so I want to announce it.
Me: Was the first class successful?
Client: YES!
Me: tell me about it…what made it so good?
Client: 70K worth of business
Me: and how did they find out about the class?
Client: They found out via OUR press release!
Branding, Business, Link Building, social marketing
I had a great conversation a few days ago with a programmer friend of mine who works for a major company (but wants to be working for himself). We were chatting about business, Internet business, making money and particularly about how to find products to sell online. My friend made an interesting comment that struck me me so much that I wanted to write a post about it. I am doing my best to remember his exact words, but more or less, here is what he said:
I am just having a hard time figuring our what kind of a business to start that has not already been started. I mean, do you think I could really create a product that would sell online?
Business
Business, Internet business, reinvent the wheel, starting an online business
Too Many Cooks
As marketing professionals we always seem to find ourselves in positions where we are being “pitched” on some big idea, that someone had, and that someone wants our feedback and possibly help on. It seems we have a never ending business opportunity at our front door. As an SEO, owner of an Internet marketing firm, with several established online businesses, I have a problem with this sometimes.
Here is the scenario:
You are meeting with a person who has a great idea, and is looking for someone who can provide the SEO/online marketing services they are looking for. You get to talking about what it will take to accomplish their goals, tell them they have a great idea, and before getting into what it will cost they turn the conversation (really quick) to you partnering with them because you think it’s “such a great idea”.
Business
Business, partnerships, start ups
I am ready for the onslaught of examples that I am sure people are going to be throwing in my face; I’m ready for it and I still won’t agree! I do say this with all sincerity though; if you are an offline business-owner and don’t have a website, you are not only missing the boat, but could be sinking it! In today’s economy every customer counts. You want to make sure and do everything to keep current customers and find new ones.
I got to thinking about this yesterday when I was going off on how much I loved the Chandler West Auto Care company for taking care of me. I was also reminded of it when Chris Hooley left a comment about sending them some link love in the post. Here’s the deal, I would love to have sent their business some link love, but guess what? They didn’t have a website for their business! As much as I love their customer service, and know they will continue to get an amazing amount of referrals, they absolutely need a website for all those people looking for information/reviews/maps etc. about them online!
Business
Business, local seo, website
This post was inspired while eating lunch with a few of my new Arizona Internet marketing friends last week. I thank them for opening up and sharing things, and really making it an enjoyable lunch. I decided to do a post specifically because of comments made by Chris Hooley and David Wallace about referrals. We were all talking about how powerful referrals are, and how most of our business comes from referrals because of our ability to come through for people and provide them the results they want. It was a great conversation that lasted for hours, but it got me thinking.
My referral story:
Business
chandler auto repair, chris hooley, david wallace, honesty, referral, referrals
The Biggest Catch of the Day
This most recent weekend I had the chance to go ice fishing with a group of friends. We went to Fish Lake in Central Utah and it was great experience, considering it was my first time out on the ice. I have been fishing on many occasions in the past, as it has been a hobby of mine since I was young, but have never been ice fishing. While reeling in the biggest catch of the day (as you can see from the picture the fishing this round wasn’t great), I started thinking that often times business owners are looking to catch the big one, but in the process forget the many existing clients that have kept them going back to the lakes, and often times kept “food on the table”. I thought about this on several occasions throughout the morning, and on the drive home, and it has inspired me to post today on what SEOs need to do to provide good customer service to their clients, thus keeping them as clients.
Business, Entrepreneur, SEO
customer service, SEO
I had an unfortunate experience yesterday when I had to take my 2 year old to the Urgent care to get his head 
stitched up from splitting it open because of a desk. He is ok now, but he didn’t appreciate us all poking and prodding at him. He’s a boy and things like this happen I guess. (It’s the reason I have Aflac accident – its not a matter of if, but when it happens).
The reason I bring this up is because the Doctor who was working had a broken arm and could not do the stitching. He had to call up the owner of the Urgent care and have him come in to do the proceedure. They took amazing care of us, (which I want to thank them for) but we got to chatting during everything and they found out what I did for a living. He was telling me he does ok with rankings on MSN, but has never been able to get rankings on Yahoo or even crack anything on Google.
Business
Internet marketers, Internet Marketing, off line business, offline businesses
5 Ways To Keep Your Business Poor
I have had this post written for a while now, but was waiting for the best opportunity to share it. It seems with all that has gone on the last several months with the economy, I have not felt right about posting. With that said, I don’t think there is ever a right time. However; Now that the New Year is here, and we have new resolutions, I thought I would be more appropriate to share. I see so many businesses, and people around me (including family and friends) making poor choices when it comes to money, and they never seem to be able to dig our of the bad spot they are in – so maybe they will give an ear to this advice? Either way, this has been on my mind for several months now, and I wanted to post about this topic – so here goes:
Business
Business, financial freedom, money
