Aligned Marketing Blog

The challenges, however, are twofold:

1. Very few of those potential customers realize they need SEO. I heard a speaker claim that 85% of the websites in existence get fewer than 5 visits a month. I don’t know if that’s true but the point is there’s a lot of wasted investment in the online world. Why would anyone invest in a website and then not invest in driving traffic to that site? “Build it and they will come” is a horrible strategy.
2. The reason people are reluctant to invest in SEO is because it’s an inexact science. Google and the other search engine tell you a little about their search algorithms and we learn a lot through trial and error but, in the end, SEO is part guesswork and there is no perfectly optimized site. There’s always more than can be done and there’s nothing you can do that your competitor can’t do as well. In theory it’s a level playing field (see below). SEO is a necessary investment but not a sure investment; more stock than bond.

To overcome these difficulties I use blogs, emails and social media to educate my target audience on both the importance of SEO and the basic tactics they can employ to improve their search ranking. For example,

1. When you perform a Google search you get a page with 10 results. Those 10 results drive approximately 42% of the search traffic. If, however, you’re on page two, search results 11-20, you can be expected to get 21% of traffic. That’s a big difference! You could double your traffic by moving up to page one.
2. The difference between page one and page two on Google is often something very minor, perhaps something as small as a Header. The lesson is small differences can result in big results and, depending on your business, huge increases in visits or even revenue.
3. Since no site can be perfectly optimized the goal is make sure your site is more optimized than your competitor’s site. For my SEO clients we pick one competitor to benchmark against and then, once we’ve overtaken them, pick another site to benchmark against, and so on. Picking one competitor at a time allows us to define our own playing field and create a competitive advantage. A rifle approach produces more targeted results, is easier to measure and, often, less expensive than the shotgun approach where you try to do everything perfect.

Lately I’ve tried a new marketing tactic and it seems to be working. I find a website that I know needs work and provide a free evaluation along with 3-5 specific recommendations for improving the site. Call me if you'd like to evaluate your site for free.

Done with tact, most people seem to appreciate the comments and, as a result, some new work is coming my way.

Steve

800-707-9150

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He was referring to me being a consultant and, indeed, there’s evidence to support his statement. The industrial market is heating up. The Industrial Supply Association’s (ISA) most recent Economic Indicator Report was up for the second month in a row. Their Manufacturer Index was 66.42% in February while the January index was 60.63%. The Distributor Index saw similar gains (61.1% and 65.72%, respectively). Anything above 50% indicates those surveyed expect economic expansion.

The subjective evidence is equally strong. I talk with frustrated marketing people every week. Their complaint is with management and goes like this: “They laid off half my staff so we’ve been struggling to keep up for over a year. Every month we fall further behind and are getting our butts chewed out. Now, because business is getting better, they want us to do a bunch of new stuff. We can’t complete our work now! I have no idea how we’re going to get any new projects completed.” Maybe you can help them?

If you’re an unemployed or underemployed marketing professional consider becoming a consultant. As my CEO friend said, the timing may be perfect.

The client benefits because they can rent the expertise they need (from you). You simply augment their staff as a variable cost solution. A competent resource they can eliminate quickly without a long HR process.

Do a great job and maybe you get hired full-time, if that’s what you want. Here are a few things you need to be prepared for before accepting your first consulting job.

• Be prepared to add value immediately. One good way is to do more than you’re asked. In other words, take tasks off your new employer’s task list. Most marketing managers have presentations to create, reports to format, blogs to write and other nuisance tasks that they’d love to delegate but are beyond the skill level of most support personnel. Don’t wait for them to ask you to help. Be proactive and add value.
• Understand that there will be politics and much of it will be invisible to you. You represent a variable cost option and, as such, threaten everyone in your area of expertise that is an employee, a fixed cost. The best way to combat this is to recognize the politics exist and find a few key alliances within the client’s organization that will help you navigate through the terrain.
• You must be taken seriously so don’t walk in meekly. State your positions and your recommendations clearly and directly. Not everyone will agree but if you focus on pleasing everyone, finding the maximum in common ground and playing politician, you’ll lose. Understand your pre-designed role is to get in, complete your assignment, and get out. You are not part of the long-term extended corporate family (not yet, anyway).
• There’s nothing unethical about selling more services while you’re completing your project. Be polite and professional but keep your eyes and ears open for pain points, new projects and things the company would like to have if they had the resources. There’s truth in the old saying: “The best source of new business is old customers.” In my experience the big firms spend up to 30% of their time onsite looking for a new project while they’re completing the current project. I find that objectionable (selling while I’m on the client’s clock) so I never charge by the hour and I only spend about 10% of my time prospecting for new projects. You’ll need to find your own balance.

If you have skills and are either unemployed or underemployed I encourage you to think about consulting. The market is getting stronger, it’s a great way to leverage your strengths, and may get you the inside track on a full-time job if that’s your ultimate goal.

Feel free to call me if you want to discuss further.

Steve

800-707-9150

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Does your company have specific business goals for your social media activities? If not, you should.

In a November 2009 survey MarketingSherpa discovered that approximately ninety-four percent (see chart below) of those surveyed use social media to increase their website traffic, which is not surprising.

What might surprise you is twenty-one percent don’t actually measure their results and five percent have no specific objectives for their social media activities. So I can only assume that they’re on LinkedIn and Tweeting, for example, because they think it’s the right thing to do.

Doing something for the sake of doing it doesn’t sound like real business to me, does it to you?

The other thing that surprised me was the relatively low number of respondents who use social media to reduce their customer acquisition and customer support costs. I mean, the tools are free!

The bottom line is social media is a free and easy to use platform for promoting your business and communicating directly with your customers and prospect, so use it.

If you’re not sure how, give us a call.

Steve Hartkopf

800-707-9150

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1. Project centric: The change that is required to make tomorrow better than today is often measured by the number of projects completed. Outsourcing is project-centric and delivers results with minimal impact on day-to-day operations or personnel.
2. Size doesn’t matter: Small projects such as web design, training and video production are ideal for outsourcing for all but the largest corporations, those with virtually unlimited internal capabilities. Large projects that require an outside perspective, such as institutionalizing Six Sigma or Strategic Pricing, are excellent projects to outsource since true change rarely happens from the inside out.
   
3. Skills: Outsourcing lets you acquire specialized skills to accomplish goals, complete projects and augment your existing resources. Projects that are popular to outsource are social media tasks, such as blogging, search engine optimization, and specialized training or coaching like improving presentation skills.
4. Cost effective: Outsourcing is a variable cost option and preferred by many over adding full-time employees, which is a fixed cost solution. In this economy variable cost projects are approved easier than new headcount. Since outsourcing is a global industry adding world-class talent to your team is not as expensive as hiring talent.
5. Velocity: Speed can make the difference between good and excellent. Outside providers can deliver resources, even in large quantities, quickly while hiring fill-time expertise can take weeks or even months.
6. Technology: Few companies can afford the money to purchase or the time it takes to learn the latest technologies available in every function – sales, marketing, IT, logistics, etc. Outsourcing allows you to rent the best technology available from the best providers.
7. Accountability: Outsourced resources do not suffer from goal diffusion or the day-to-day fire-drills that impact full-time staff and extend project deadlines. An outside provider of resources has one responsibility and one priority, which is to complete the project. Their focus delivers better results and greater accountability.

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I should have seen that one coming James. Here’s my recommendation: Ask them.

I’d start by finding sites you are willing to link to and then create a link on your site. Then add sites that you think your site compliments, adds value to. In total you’ll probably want 50-100 targets. Finally, send emails requesting a link. It's best to send the emails to an individual and not to a “Contact Us” email address.

That’s a lot of emailing so I recommend that you create a template and avoid all that unnecessary re-writing and typing. Writing your link requests in a friendly and personalized style will increase your chances of success.

Here is an example of a link request for a fictitious company:

Subject: Social media resources on your website

Good morning, [insert name],

I found the resources on your site helpful and well organized, especially the articles and whitepapers on social media. My company, Get2NoMeZ.com is dedicated to helping others master social media. As far as I can tell we do not compete with one another.

Since November 2007 we’ve posted a new blog three times a week. It’s a big commitment on our part but, like you, we’re serious about helping others and understand that being found on the web takes hard work and constant effort, which is why I’m emailing you.

The purpose of this email is to ask you if would post a link to our site on your site’s Resource Section - www.socialmediamatters/resources.htm?

You can link to us by downloading our logo and code from www. Get2NoMeZ.com/linktous.htm or just create your own link.

We have already added a link to your site (www. Get2NoMeZ.com/resources.htm) on our website and trust you are already getting additional traffic.

I can check your site in a couple weeks to see if you’ve granted my request but an email response would really be appreciated.

Keep up the good work and thanks in advance for your time and consideration.

Regards,

Steve Hartkopf

800-659-3638 (Linda or Ben)

Feel free to borrow this template. Obviously it will have to be modified if you’re writing to a site you don’t want to link to from your site.

If you decide to write your own email request template you’ll want to remember to include the following:

It’s a good idea to write a few variations of your request template to (1) see what works best and (2) speak in the style and tone of your target audience. Requests to large corporations, for example, need to be formal while requests to small companies can be less formal.

Finally, remember to keep a record of all the link requests you send out, track your results and don’t be a spammer.

Steve

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But before we get into tactics, let's begin with a definition. According to Wikipedia: An inbound link is a hyperlink transiting (Is that a word?) domains. Links are inbound from the perspective of the link target, and conversely, outbound from the perspective of the originator. Inbound links were originally important (prior to the emergence of search engines) as a primary means of web navigation; today their significance lies in search engine optimization (SEO).

In addition to rankings by content, many search engines rank pages based on inbound links. Google's description of their PageRank system, for instance, notes that Google interprets a link from page A to page B as a vote, by page A, for page B.[1] Knowledge of this form of search engine rankings has fueled a portion of the SEO industry commonly termed linkspam, where a company attempts to place as many inbound links as possible to their site regardless of the context of the originating site...

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