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Make Your Small Company Look Big

July 30th, 2007 by Chris

There is a factor in designing a site to generate sales leads I almost never talk about - mostly because it is deeply ingrained as something I aim for naturally so I basically make it happen passively. However, I work on all the little details required to make it happen very actively.

Make A Small Company Look Big with the Website

It is fairly intuitive but designing a site that makes your small company look big and established does generate more sales leads. It is great to read the contact forms generated by the site of a company whose site I designed. They sell some big ticket items so people often call to inquire about 10, 20, or 50 thousand dollar products and projects. People will say, “it looks like you are the main company doing this” or “jeez, I can’t believe I have never heard of you.”

Maybe I should add that some SEO and a well-managed PPC campaign help. SEO or bust, get visitors to whatever site you want but when the website makes them feel good about the company, they will make contact because nine out of ten websites are…hmmm, need improvement.

The company is very good at what it does. Oh, and another thing. They are small - especially for the breadth of projects they take on and the distances they ship. Exporting overseas is now very common for them. This only makes sense, though, because when people contact them from far away with only their site full of content, forms, charts, and information to judge them by they know they will be dealing with pros. And, they are dealing with pros who happen to also look like it online, too.
Which brings up another matter. Anne Field of the Herald Tribune says it best in Making a Little Company Look Big: “…no matter how adept their sleight-of-hand, it [making the small company look big] will not work unless they are delivering the goods.”

Please keep in mind that pretty websites don’t deliver the goods by themselves. That’s all. Just keep it in mind.

There are a million tips for how to make a small company look big but there is no “one size fits all” for this particular goal in site design. Different companies need different solutions. For instance, some companies should list their physical address while others will get more leads if they seem as if they are “everywhere.” The ability to get their products everywhere will only make the site infinitely more effective.
There are hundreds of articles out there about making a small company look big but they do not all focus on achieving that goal through web design. This SoloSEO article is really about making a small SEO business look big but the principles are good for most companies sites.

“How to Make Yourself Look Big” from Youngentrepreneur is a good article in the sea of same-as-the-others. I like this one because of the creativity of Evan’s ideas such as having friends dress up and look like they are working in the office when someone important (like media or a big client) is visiting. A few of the other ideas could save you some money and maybe improve your quality-of-work-life.

My list of required items for designing a website to make a small company look big

These are in no particular order. They all matter.

  1. Content - excellent clear content
  2. Downloads - pdfs, information sheets, specs, case studies, examples
  3. Fast responses to emails, faxes, phone calls, contact forms…
  4. Give contact opportunities on every page (multiple locations)
  5. Internal links - use them generously
  6. EXCELLENT quality images (I mean, EXCELLENT)
  7. Show your products often with (see #6)
  8. Add & update content often
  9. Make sure everything works - check links, images, files, downloads, flash…
  10. Professional copy writing with correct spelling and small, clear paragraphs
  11. Create pages for vendors, jobs, and maybe an “employee portal” page
  12. Double check everything
  13. Don’t ever EVER say, “that’s good enough” when you don’t like something
  14. See # 13 and apply it to many other things as well
  15. Be willing to try “new things” - video, fly-out boxes, flash, sketchcasting
  16. Be willing to pay more - big, nice, sites, cost more than others
  17. Focus on the goal of your site - to generate sales leads sell products

I could emphasize #17 a few more times because I think it is one of the most common mistakes in web design - loss of focus - but we will stop there.

If you need help re-designing your site to make your small company look big call me at (832) 628-0987 or email me at chris@leadoptimize.com. I am happy to help so don’t hesitate.

Posted in Lead Optimize, Using Your Site, Marketing, Selling | 5 Comments »

Using a Competitor’s Name in PPC Ads

July 26th, 2007 by Chris

Steven Bradley of TheVanBlog wrote “Stealing Customers Through Google Maps” which brought up something I have not looked into much before - whether or not using a competitor’s name to steal customers is legal.

Is Using a Competitor’s Name to Steal Customers Legal or Illegal?

There is no doubt it is not very nice. In fact, were you to meet your competitor on the street after he found out what you are doing he might prefer to sock you in the face as opposed to shake your hand for your great sportsman-like act of using his name to steal fair customers. Fairness aside; is it legal?

First, be clear that I am not a lawyer but off the top of my head (and from those undergrad and grad biz law classes), the legality should have more to do with how the competitor’s name is used and treated as opposed to the act of using the name alone. Let’s create three examples where you use a competitor’s name (Brand X) as paid a keyword in your PPC program. “Brand X” is searched and…

  1. the ad copy is something like “Excellent alternative to Brand X” then the honesty and intent is clear and the ad should be legal.
  2. the ad copy does not use the competitor’s name OR your name and only mentions products and contact information then the ad is in a gray area I won’t touch with a ten foot pole. Confusing.
  3. the ad copy includes the competitor’s name and is even presented as being placed BY the competitor then you might be taking part in fraud.

Here is a quick article on the legality of the topic of using competitors’ names as keywords in PPC marketing from the Business of Software.

“Trademark Infringement Issues for Pay-Per-Click (PPC) Advertisers” from Ezine Articles includes an overview of MSN, Yahoo, and Google’s policies on PPC trademark bidding, a case study on the subject, and suggestions for how to deal with it if you think a competitor is using your trademark.

Joe Agliozzo is the SEM Lawyer (he is actually a lawyer). In “Trademark Infringement in PPC Advertising”, he goes over some basics of PPC trademark infringement and says:

What you can’t do is pose AS American Blinds to steal their customer - but there is nothing wrong with putting your ad up there along with American Blinds’ ad so that the consumer can compare your offering with theirs.

This is a PPC trademark lawsuit case study from Eric Goldman of the Technology & Marketing Law Blog. The article is a detailed and very interesting discussion of the points of a case between the owner of the trademark and the actual PPC advertiser who used the keyword in its marketing. Usually the search engine is the defendant.

Using Competitors’ Names is Recommended?

Mistake #17 in “17 Most Common PPC Mistakes Web Marketers Make” is Avoiding Brand Name Keywords:

… anyone searching for your competitor could easily be your customer instead. Why not have your ad show up under that keywords? What if they are still shopping around? What if they are searching for your competitor’s name because they saw their TV or radio ad. Bottom line is, bid on your competitor’s brand names. Most of the time the ROI on those keywords is excellent. If you get a “legal letter” from the competitors and it holds water, I’d suggest comply with it.

I will look more into this but, for now, it seems the best idea, legally speaking, is to use the Golden Rule, which you should be doing anyway.

Posted in Interesting, Marketing | 2 Comments »

Businesses Using Blogs to Grow

July 25th, 2007 by Chris

About three weeks ago I wrote “Ready for a Business Blog?” and have been looking more and more into how companies are using blogs internally to communicate with and among employees and how they are using blogs publicly to increase knowledge about their products, increase visitor engagement, and generate sales leads.

Business Blog Examples

B.L. Ochman of whatsnextonline lists a handful of companies that use blogs in “Best Business Blog Examples and Why It’s Time to Think About a Business Blog for Your Company.” Companies listed in the article include IBM, American Airlines, and Daimler Chrysler. In addition to having one of the longest titles around, the article also gives a quick and clear idea of how various companies are using their sites to improve their businesses.

John of John’s Jottings introduced me to this case study about how Triple Point Technology uses internal blogs to improve internal information exchange. Essentially, employees use the blogs as compliments to email to share information and make that information easier to find.

Asheville Cabins uses it’s Asheville North Carolina Cabins Blog & News created by Blizzard Internet Marketing to update customers about regional events and general news in order to promote its customers. The inexpensive add-on to their site is a great way for Asheville Cabins to add content on continuous basis without having to get into the technical details of managing a website.

In “Your Daily Art: A great example of leveraging blogging” the great Dave Taylor covers how Martha Cleveland, the owner of Youngest Daughter Jewelry uses the Your Daily Art blog to promote her jewelry. I have subscribed to Your Daily Art for a while now and while Martha does still promote jewelry through the blog, it seems to have taken on a life of it’s own. Either way, it is a brilliant example of using a blog to gather a crowd so a product can be showcased.

Kevin O’Keefe of lexblog.com gives us this list of Fortune 500 companies that use blogs. It was written in 2005 but it is a heck of a good start. Does anyone know of a more updated list? It escaped my searches.

Roland Piquepaille wrote “How Boeing is Using Blogs” which is a great post in itself and includes links to other great articles as well.

Using Blogs to Generate Sales Leads

Believe it or not, it is hard to find companies (that are not online marketing companies) using blogs for the primary purpose of generating sales leads. I will be able to give a few more examples later and I am actually working on building two company blogs to generate sales leads right now but they will not be out for a few months at least.

“How to Write a Blog that Generates Leads” from RSS Pieces is a good article to start with. The post (and blog) is really aimed at generating real estate leads but the general idea of it is applicable to most businesses.

Chris Garret of chrisg.com discusses selling with blogs in Sales Lead Blogs - The Art of Selling with Your Blog and reminds us of how well it matches with AIDA. His summary:

Bottom line, use your blog to build desire effectively and you will find you are generating hot leads faster than ever before, without resorting to strong-arm pressure sales tactics. Better for you and your customers I am sure you will agree.

Chris followed up the article with “Where Blogs Fit Into Your Online Marketing Strategy” which you should also read.

My bottom line is that blogs are only growing in reach and acceptance among everyday internet users. Companies can use them internally for product launches, internal promotions, information sharing, and even to drive direction and purpose. Publicly, companies can use blogs to quickly and regularly create additional content, update visitors and customers about products and services, engage those visitors, and to generate additional sales and sales leads.

To get more sales leads from your website, call me at (832) 628-0987 or email me at chris@leadoptimize.com.

Posted in Lead Optimize, Using Your Site, Marketing, Selling | 1 Comment »

Lead Optimize Feed CHANGED

July 22nd, 2007 by Chris

Please RE-SUBSCRIBE

I changed the Lead Optimize RSS Feed to another user name (from LeadOptimize to LeadOptimizecom) because of some WordPress problems I was having that have now been resolved. Sadly, changing my feed means the feed service will soon be disrupted to all of my subscribers.

Please re-subscribe to the new feed. The old feed will only work for another few weeks.

The new feed is here (and on the left sidebar):

RSS Any Reader

My bloglines feed has not changed but here it is as well in case you use bloglines:

Subscribe with Bloglines

Thank you for reading,

Chris Denny

Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »

End-to-End Online Marketing

July 19th, 2007 by Chris

Get your message where it will meet demand. This is one of the leading ideas behind marketing online today but many people are too focused on that component (SEO). It isn’t everything. It’s only the beginning.

Online marketing for complex products is an end-to-end process and a great deal of follow through is required throughout the site and then off line with lead management. Specialties have been developed for each part of the process and each has to be given it’s proper attention.

SEO is just the start and it must be followed up with attractive design, great content generation, a great lead generation plan, and an excellent lead management system.

I sometimes think of the commercial internet like a house where online marketers hang out waiting and hoping for customers to visit and knock on the door. It’s kind of backwards, I know, but in this scenario both parties are happy to meet.

When salespeople knock on your door, are you glad they are there or do you peek out your window and stand still for a moment thinking, “maybe he didn’t see me walk by the window”?

Knock Knock Knock

So, customers arrive and knock on the door (via Google) and anywhere from 1 to 1,239,827 sellers (usually about 18 including the ones who pay to be near the front of the line) run to the door and swing it open like Kramer flailing their arms and evangelizing their messages - which come across something like:

  1. Keyword here a lot and obviously what you want…
  2. Answer you want (keyword) kind of…
  3. I clearly you answer have maybe keyword…
  4. Sorry, #1 got picked (slumps shoulders)

Keep in mind there are thousands of other sellers in that house and some of them might work for excellent companies but most of them are really lazy and prefer to play video games, drink beer, and digg instead of preparing themselves to answer the door. It takes work, fellow online marketers.

#1 - Hollow Information

Now that #1 has been chosen (based largely on how great he told the folks at Google he is), he gets a chance to tell the customer about his products but can’t really show much valuable information. You see, he makes similar products and has information about what the customer wants but he does not really know much about them - and certainly doesn’t supply them. He has excellent literature and even has the label on his shirt and a nice card but he doesn’t know jack.

#2 - No Follow Through

#1 is quickly ushered back inside and #2 is jerked outside by his collar. “Ok, go!” says the customer. Luckily, #2 is very good at displaying information about his products clearly and knows everything you would ever want to know about them and spends a while exploring all the amazing stats and details of the product. The customer is all hyped up and ready to go!

But, alas, the customer’s excitement fades as he watches #2 fumble for a business card (”uhh, it was right here, err, uhh”). He has a piece of paper with an email address on it and a location address but the customer would like to see a nice form and maybe even call the sales office. They don’t seem to want phone calls - or something.

#3 - Best of the Most Important

#2 is sadly pushed back inside. Distraught, but even more knowledgeable about the product, the tired customer asks #3 to come outside and so he does - with a friendly smile and holding a clear and crisp brochure with every possible method of contact on every page. The product the customer wants is right there and nice ol’ #3 even gives him a little contact form (short but clear) which he happily submits.

Sales Lead Generated - Time to Follow Up

#3 generated a sales lead from the customer and should now contact a salesperson to follow up. There is more to be done but there is a very good chance the customer will not keep looking for more suppliers - especially if the sales team follows up on the sales lead exceptionally fast.

Conversion Rate is More Important Than SEO

Those of you who keep up with Lead Optimize have heard this message before. It is even on the sidebar (upper-right). A Lead Optimized site gets more sales per visitor at any level of traffic meaning each additional gain in traffic will be more effective.

Unless you have almost zero traffic, increase your conversion rate first, then improve SEO. Improving search engine optimization and PPC campaign effectiveness is always important but a site that effectively converts traffic into leads will typically do so at any level of targeted traffic. As a starting point, lead optimization is more cost-effective than SEO.

It is nice to have people visit but you have to be a good host for them to buy what you’re selling.

Posted in Lead Optimize, Marketing | 9 Comments »

PayPal versus Google Checkout

July 18th, 2007 by Chris

Lead Optimize is mostly written for small businesses that generate sales leads online to sell offline.

I was looking around for the easiest online payment solutions for small businesses. Aside from custom (expensive) solutions, PayPal is the payment solution I have experience with but I thought I would look into Google Checkout. I have bought through both but have only created selling websites using PayPal.

Google vs. PayPal (long story short)

Basically, they are both great solutions. A year ago the winning factor in my mind was that Google did not calculate shipping and taxes while Google did but that seems to have changed. It looks like PayPal still makes it easier, though. Honestly, though, now I don’t see a whole lot of difference. Google has the most valuable brand but PayPal has the most valuable brand attached to online payments.

However, Google Checkout is cheaper per transaction and also has a few additional excellent incentives. Google Adwords customers get a $10 credit towards Checkout transactions for every $1 spent on Google Adwords and up to a 21% discount on FedEx shipping costs.

Comparisons and Reviews

This review from Cnet is an excellent comparison of the two services. They also provide an excellent comparison chart.

To save you some time, here is the Google Checkout demo and here is the Ebay demo.

Simple Thoughts wrote an excellent Google Checkout review this article from TechCrunch about Google Checkout’s impact on Paypal brings up some good ideas about the future of the two services and offers some excellent links for additional learning.

Posted in Using Your Site, Selling | No Comments »

Lead Optimize! July 15, 2007 Carnival

July 15th, 2007 by Chris
Welcome to the July 15, 2007 edition of lead optimize!

Thank you to EVERYONE who submitted an article for this blog carnival. To those of you who submitted but are not included in this carnival, please submit next time. I welcome your submissions, enjoy reading them, and consider all of them. I will include all articles that add value to the current carnival.

ATTENTION - Like I said last month, this month’s Lead Optimize Blog Carnival posts will be considered for bonus chapters in the Lead Optimize book, which is scheduled to come out later this year.

Contributors whose work is included in the book (with your permission) will not be financially compensated but will, of course, get full credit for the content of the respective chapter and a complimentary copy of the book.

On with the carnival…

General Business

Here’s a topic you don’t see often - factoring. Factoring is selling your accounts receivables at a discount in order to “correct” cash flow problems or just get rid of a headache. Thomas Humes of Wealth Building World writes about factoring in “Cash Flow - Life Blood for Every Business.”

J. Mark Walker of Keyboard Culture asks, “What do your best people do that you wish everyone would do?” in Building Relationships as You Are Selling.

Jason at Good Customer Service Blog discusses a J.D. Power & Associates study about customer service. “According to the study, customers who are approached within 30 seconds of entering the store provide a satisfaction score 86 points higher (on a 1,000-point scale) than customers not greeted within 30 seconds.”

Lead Generation & Nurturing

Aaron Pollock of vduglued (web design for the business mind) has an excellent article about Why You Must Publish Prices on Your Website and how doing so will help pre-qualify leads. This article will spur more articles on the topic.

10 Ways You Can Improve Your Conversion Rate on vFlyer. This is a good list on the vFlyer blog.

Marketing

Jason at Strategic Site Marketing posted this analysis of organic versus paid heatmap and clickthrough stats summarizing it with “There seems to be a “F” shaped scan pattern, where the eye tends to travel vertically along the far left side of the results looking for visual cues (relevant words, brands, etc) and then scanning to the right if something caught the participant’s attention.” This is a very good study.

Matt Hanson wrote “Is Traditional Publishing Dead?” a short discussion of the complexity of today’s marketing and ads some simple suggestions to clarify your marketing message.

Cade at Write to Right suggests outsourcing your email lists to save yourself time while offering better service and quality to your readers.

That concludes this edition. Submit your blog article to the next edition of lead optimize! using our carnival submission form.Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page.

Technorati tags: , , , , , .

Posted in Blog Carnivals | No Comments »

Follow Up On Sales Leads!

July 12th, 2007 by Chris

The importance of following up on leads can never be emphasized enough. Effective and consistent lead management and follow through often makes the difference between good sales organizations and bad ones or in good salespeople and bad salespeople.

Give random salespeople a good lead and propose this question one week later: “Did you follow up on that lead?”

Good salespeople will say some version of the following:

  • “Yes. I left a message Monday, talked to her on Tuesday, and sent an email this morning.”
  • “We talked Monday and have been exchanging emails since.”
  • “We are shipping the product today.”

Bad salespeople will tell you some version of:

  • “I am waiting for him to call back.”
  • “I sent an email.”
  • “I didn’t get a chance to.”

The second set of responses makes me cringe in sales meetings. Read how I really feel about bad salespeople in companies. Yes, I understand people can be trained or motivated or whatever but until that is done, they are B-A-D, bad.

Leaving leads on, or in (see below), the table is something of a worldwide epidemic among the populations of salespeople and the types of leads generated. Michael Hatch at ExhbitorOnline writes about the importance of following up on leads from trade shows and other marketing events. He discusses three main points for better lead management of trade show leads:

  1. Have a plan for leads before you go to the show
  2. Assign responsibility for the leads to one person
  3. Pick up the phone and call them

I especially like this part of this article:

Recently, the Freeman Decorating Co. tracked its rental properties for over a year and found that more than half of its rented exhibits were shipped back with the leads left inside the rented reception counters - completely forgotten.

VladS proposes automation of the follow up process as a valuable driver for sales success in his post Automating Lead Qualification and Follow Up. His list in the article is mostly about lead qualification but he says this about lead follow up:

The first step in automating lead qualification is to hold sales accountable for every lead, and this means tracking it through the pipeline and the forecast. Sales automation tools should guide, or sometimes even force the sales person to follow a particular methodology when the lead fits certain criteria. Examples include sending an automated e-mail, or creating a “to-do” task for the salesperson to contact the lead within 24 hours.

Leads are assets. Require your salespeople to follow up with sales leads. You paid for your sales leads through marketing and other lead generation efforts so follow up to make them pay off.

Posted in Lead Optimize, Selling | 1 Comment »

SEO & Page Rank Articles

July 9th, 2007 by Chris

I was reading SEO Services Blog today and discovered a few particular gems I wanted to bring to you. I have already added both of them to the Lead Optimize SEO & Traffic Builders page, a growing list of articles about search engine optimization, increasing conversion rates, increasing traffic, and improving sales lead optimization.

The one I liked most is The Top 5 Factor for Successful Web Sites in 2007. You will have to read the entire article for the details (and you should) but here is the list:

  • Success factor #1: Accessibility
  • Success factor #2: Site and information architecture
  • Success factor #3: The right keywords
  • Success factor #4: Content
  • Success factor #5: Inbound links

The other article that caught my eye is Tips for Increasing Google Page Rank, which is really just a list of good articles. One of the links is broken so I am only listing the functioning ones.

“As a general rule of thumb. A one-way, high Pagerank link will give your site a Page Rank two points below that of the linking page. So a link from a PR9 site should get your site a PR7. However, at the lower end of the scale, I have seen 1 PR-5 turn a new PR-0 site into a PR-4.”

If you want a link from Lead Optimize.com, you can wait until I find you or write a review about the Lead Optimize blog.

Related Articles

3 factors to increase sales leads from your website

Lead Optimize SEO & Traffic Builders

Posted in Lead Optimize, Marketing | 1 Comment »

Free Promotion for Your Business

July 5th, 2007 by Chris

Here is a way you can promote your home or internet based business, get a little more traffic, and maybe even generate a few leads.

Joe of Working at Home on the Internet has a page dedicated to helping businesses promote themselves on the internet.

His rules are simple and fair:

1. Write and submit an article to me using the Contact Form.

2. The article/business information must be original, not just a link to your site or promotion.

3. You may include any links to your site (excluding affiliate links) and various pages. ie. about, contact, articles, posts.

4. No Spam, Splogs or Spages. Anything that can be considered Spam will not be considered and ignored.

All submissions will be reviewed by me for content and relativity to Working at Home and Home Business.  Any Company from a Well Established Business looking to expand to a Start-up wanting Free Exposure will be considered. All Honest business people are Welcome.

Promote Your Home Business at Working on the Internet.

Joe is a good guy who helped me out a while back (he might not even remember it). Even if you don’t take part in his business promotion program, you should read some of his articles because he has some good ones.

I will be submitting a promo for Gluhwein . net to Joe soon but I am working on a re-design while waiting for a shipment of gluhwein syrup from South Africa. If you like gluhwein, go to gluhwein.net.

Posted in Lead Optimize, Using Your Site, Marketing | 1 Comment »

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