Small Businesses - Big Marketing

ROWE – Workplace 2.0

As I plan for the current & future growth of my company, I am taking a step back to consider not only how I want my business to grow, but what kind of business I want to grow.

Recently I have been introduced to ROWE – Results Oriented Work Environment. You can learn more about it here. In a nutshell? Results are the only thing that matter. Work whatever hours you want, wherever you want. Meetings and conference calls only happen when the topic cannot be taken care of via email or a quick phone call.

No, it’s not a “work from home” set-up, but instead one that focuses strictly on what each person produces. Paper shufflers and office chatters? They can’t hide behind showing up 8-5 with ROWE.

Running an office isn’t the only application of ROWE. While working with my clients, I take a strict ROWE approach. Discussions on branding and strategy are important, but the bottom line is what matters at the end of the day. We make things happen instead of talking about making things happen. My current client communications aren’t ROWE perfect, but we’re getting there.

Overall, I think ROWE is the next wave of how businesses will be operated. Besides the sustained 41% productivity increase, knowledge workers will be harder to find and more difficult to retain as Gen Y penetrates the skilled workforce. As a proud member of Gen Y, I realize "we" are more interested in results than 4-hour meetings that accomplish nothing.

For SearchMarketMe, ROWE is the way to go. I'm excited to get started and I’ll let you know how it goes, both as an internal employee policy & client communications.

Why your Customers Don't Remember your Name in the Morning

Note – this is Rule #4 for “Top 5 Rules for Diving into the Email Marketing World.”

The dreaded question. “Who are you again?” is the last thing you want your prospective customers asking themselves when they open your email. Your customers shouldn’t have to “guess” who you are – it should be obvious.

I work with my clients to develop ongoing relationships with their customers regularly. One of our first steps? Create an email templates that help build your brand. First - Define your brand. If you haven’t already, have a logo created for you by a professional graphic designer. The $300-$500 you spend here will be the best investment you make towards building a online personality.

Next, select which colors will support your brand and represent your company’s online presence. Obviously, they should match your logo, but if your logo is only 2 colors, don't think you have to stop there. Feel free to pick 2 more to complement the existing colors.

Once you have nailed down your “online color personality” – make sure your website reflects the design. Finally, pull that image over to your email marketing. Your website and email marketing design should feel seamless.

Here’s a very important tip – beware of image usage in your email template! Many email programs, such as Outlook or online email options such as Gmail or AOL automatically disable images when they are received. Build a beautiful, graphic laden email template? Many of your customers may never see it.

So, morale of the story – use color & design to bring your brand through with email marketing. HOWEVER – test, test, test! Create a free account in Gmail, AOL, Hotmail, Yahoo, and set up an email through Outlook and test every email before you send. Check out how the email looks when images are turned off. A good designer can develop a template that looks just as gorgeous with images on as when they are off.

The result? Recipients that “know” you by recognizing your brand. The result? More sales.

Online Dating - Changing the Marketing Playing Field

After I posted “Online Marketing isn’t Dating – It’s Marriage”, I received quite a few emails from readers that were proud to say they ALSO met their husband or wife online. Apparently, meeting someone online is getting closer and closer to being a “normal” part of dating! Woo hoo!

So why does this matter to small business owners? The adoption of online dating is a clear indicator of a psychographic shift in the mentality of internet consumers. It has effects reaching far further than online dating.

Finding a spouse is one of the most intimate activities of our lives. The general increase of acceptance of online dating shows consumers are getting super comfy with “The Internet”. If finding a spouse is no longer off-limits, using the Internet for much smaller transactions such as car shopping, job hopping, or buying the newest iPhone (super, super cool by the way!) becomes almost second nature.

It’s a great thing for small businesses – “The Internet” is the only place that the playing field is level between the big boy retailers and “mom & pop” shops. If you’re not taking full advantage of today’s playing field – you’re missing out on tons of potential growth for your business.

If you’re not quite sure where to start, request a free consultation from us. We’ll take a look at your site & provide some guidance on things you can start doing today to get more bang for your marketing buck.

Yummy, Yummy Email Spam

Note – this is Rule #3 for “Top 5 Rules for Diving into the Email Marketing World.”

OK small business owners. Are you ready for the #1 secret for successful email marketing? Drum roll please!!!!!! Build your list with people that ask to hear from you.

Stop groaning – I know it’s not a very sexy tactic, but it is the #1 factor that will determine your long-term success via email marketing.

Here’s why. Marketing guru Seth Godin wrote an entire book on the topic – “Permission Marketing.” In it he explains that gaining permission from people to market to them increases the changes exponentially that they will respond to your marketing message.

I was cynical. Why spend the time, money, and effort to build a permission-based list when I can go buy a list of prospective customers through a list broker today? But four years ago, I decided to give the tactic a try. After 3 months of convincing my current client that it was a good decision (he wasn’t exactly excited about the idea of slashing his list by 2/3 and building it back up from scratch), we completely overhauled their email marketing practices, switching from a non-permission list to a double opt-in level. It was painful, long, and frustrating. And our response rates jumped from 2-3% per email to 10-15% nearly overnight. Good old Seth was right!

Today, the list performs at a consistently high response rate and email marketing is their number one relationship building tactic. Plus, since we’re mailing only to people who ask us to we have zero deliverability issues and haven’t had to deal with a blacklisting in years.

So small business owners, when you dive into email marketing do it right and use permission-based tactics. If you’re unsure how to do this correctly, shoot me a message and I provide some guidance.

After all, you don’t want to be known as a spammer, do you?

Attending Industry Conferences – Value Add or Time Drain?

Tuesday and Wednesday this week I attended the SMX Advanced Search Marketing Expo in Seattle. Overall the session was great. Great sessions, great networking, & great assemblage of industry thought-leaders.
But was it “worth” taking 2 days out of running my business and working with clients? Absolutely.

As business owners, it’s sometimes hard to justify taking “me” time. We’re so busy running the “nuts & bolts” of our business that we can get lost in the day-to-day details. The greatest benefit I found by attending events like SMX has nothing to do with the event itself, but in having 2 full (non-weekend!) days to think about the “big picture.”

As a result, I came away with a clear focus on SearchMarketMe’s future – and I can’t wait to see all of the goals come to fruition.

Stay tuned!!!

P.S. – I’m looking to hire my first employee to help achieve our new (redefined) goals. If you know anyone in the Seattle area that is looking for a position in the internet marketing space send me an email at careers@searchmarketme.com