the dangling carrot
cultivating your business vision
Website & Social Media
Oh Where Should I put my Blog?
Jun 12th
I gave a presentation on Online Marketing a couple of weeks ago and received a question about where a business should have its blog. I recommended that the business have the blog attached to their website as this would allow the website to have actively changing content and keywords – making it more attractive to the search engines as well as helping the site be found by people not specifically looking for the site (serendipitously). The gentleman responded that it was better to have the blog on Blogspot or Wordpress because it was not attached to the site and would be another link going to the site.
SO – to put this issue to rest, as a company we believe that a website should be like a city with many ways to get to the city (trains, planes, automobiles, boat, bicycle, etc). These “ways” on the web are links from strategic partners, Facebook, Youtube, Twitter, Blogs, etc. Now, if you are a big company (city) you may have a staff that can do your marketing for you – they can write blog postings on the company site, their own individual blogs, as well as on blogs that are relevant to the business’s industry. They can also participate in LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, etc. For small businesses (cities), we always recommend quality over quantity and that the blog be attached to the company website to help with traffic. – Remember, a lot of browsers will not take the time to go to another website (every click that you need a browser to make lessens the chances of the browser making it to your site – don’t make them work). Also, if you have a lot of traffic to your blog and it rests on Blogspot, you are driving traffic to and helping Blogspot, and not necessarily your business.
Now there is always an exception to every rule – I just met with a business where it makes more sense for the company owner to establish a separate blog from her company. But as a whole, for small to medium sized businesses who do not have dedicated staff for online marketing, we recommend that your Blog be where you business is.
How Much? How Much? How Much?
Apr 30th
We all ask – How much does it cost? And we don’t want to know about the bells and whistles – just the bottom line. This may be a good approach when purchasing toilet paper (though I recommend 7th generation – eco friendly), but it doesn’t hold true for all purchasing decisions.
Businesses should know what bells and whistles come with:
Setting up your website hosting :
- Is there 24 hour support & how many support staffers are there (we have a client whose website hosting was maintained by a company whose hours were only Mon-Fri 9:30-5:30, and when the domain “guy” went on vacation, there was no help & we did not receive a call back until he came back a week later)?
Hiring a Social Media Expert –
- Does this person/company really understand all aspects of Social Media or just Facebook? Can they write with my company’s voice? Are they providing me with topics that will help drive traffic to my website? (we have a client whose previous social media experts had not ever discussed the business’ target market or determined the company’s ”voice.”)
Hiring a website company –
- Will the web company be providing consulting advice as to what I, as the customer, need OR am I expected to be an internet expert in addition to running my business? Where are the programmers located? Will I have access to the graphics artists? Is the sales person still involved after they get a check?
We receive a lot of customers who are website “gun shy” after being so badly burned before coming to us. Most of the time, they are surprised by the “bells and whistles” that come with our services. We believe that if the job cannot be done right, we shouldn’t do it.
Social Media Hits the Mass Marketers!
Feb 25th
I recently saw an online ad that said, “Earn $x.xx with social media.” Like every other product – social media is going through its life cycle. Web companies, marketing agencies, and web savvy business owners have not only realized the value of social media tools, but have also educated themselves on how to have a strong (but not intrusive) presence on the web. Unfortunately, this very powerful tool has reached the hands of the salesmen of yester year – the “Get it NOW, NOW, NOW” in-your-face marketers.
Social media is fabulous when browsers want to find your information. It is offensive, when the messages/information is being shoved down the browsers’ throats. So, be wary of “Social Media Experts.” Just like in all business, a few buzz words do not a social media expert make. Use common sense – if someone suggests that you post personal stuff about your dogs and how many times they ate today, or your high scores on the latest games – think about if this information is valuable. If it is worthless to you, it will probably be worthless to others, too!
You can do your own research – there is plenty of great information on the web about social media, there are true social media consultants, and take online or local classes on social media. Creative Carrot Studios is teaching a class on Social Media Basics & How to Use Social Media for Business on March 12 and April 9. For more info, contact Business Building Blocks 954.427.3880 or email info@creativecarrotstudios.com
Solid Business Plan a Necessity for Social Media
Feb 7th
New Management Solutions in Coral Springs, Florida (www.newmanagementsolutions.com) has requested that we provide a 2 class series on social media. The first class covers the Social Media Basics and the second, How to Turn Social Media into $. We have scheduled the classes with a 3 week break in-between them – allowing the student to apply what they learn at the primary class, and to do some research (yes – we give homework).
In developing our own business as well as the classes we understand how vital it is to really have a solid roadmap for the business to follow and a truly targeted market niche. People have all heard how important social media is to establishing credibility, engaging customers and prospects, and creating awareness and relationships. So when people learn how to use the Social Media tools – they want to use them right away. But unless – they have really identified their target audience, so they join the RIGHT groups, and hone their message, they may attract attention, but it may not be the right attention!
We strongly recommend that businesses either take a business plan writing course, have a professional review their business plans/ assist in writing the business plan, as the cost of making a bad first impression (a non-targeted one), is very expensive to overcome.
Is my Business Ready for a Website and Online Presence?
Jan 18th
As an online presence is vital to survival in today’s marketplace – it can also be lethal if your business it not ready! What does READY mean? It means that you have a detailed and defined business plan outlining who your target market is, who your competition is and how you are going to differentiate yourself, what your plan to market is, what your pricing structure is, what your customer service entails, and what your budgets are going to be. With any of the above being unknown, having anyone create a website that truly suits your needs, is unlikely.
As it takes a few months to have your SEO and social media efforts really take hold, we recommend that our prospective customers have an “Under Construction Page(UC)” created with some quality copy (start generating a buzz about your company). This UC page can begin to drive traffic while you define your business plan – which is your roadmap to success.
How do you learn to define your business? We recommend that you take some classes for entrepreneurs that walk you through the above topics. We attended the Business Building Blocks Series (for more info go to www.BBBseries.com). We also recommend that you hire a consultant who specializes in writing business plans (we hired www.ecouncilinc.com). We have learned that it is much less expensive to do things properly the first time with professional help, than to do it incorrectly ourselves!
So I have a Blog. What do I do now?
Jan 11th
We created a blog for a client last week. I trained him how to use the blog, how to post, how to edit, how to approve comments, etc – that was the easy part. The difficult part is encouraging the client to have enough confidence to actually write the blog posts. This client (the owner of Dolce Amore Cafe) is an incredible chef and an entertaining person. He knows more about fine cuisine and the vitamins, anti-oxidants, and minerals than anyone I know. I explained to him that a successful blog post is a gift.
Blogs should be:
- Information that customers want or need
- It should be provided freely – the customer should not have to sign up for anything to access your blog
- About what is in it for the customers if they attend if you are promoting an event
- Written like you are having a conversation
- Showing off your stuff – what you know and that you are an expert in your industry
- 2-3 paragraphs (a Tasty Tidbit). If it is a long topic, break the blog into sections
- Enjoyable to read (not necessarily entertaining – but a pleasant experience)
- About topics that will drive traffic to your site (but is not already included on your site)
Please do NOT give away the store – do not provide info in the blog for which you would normally charge customers – e.g. this post is about what we recommend for Blog posts, I did not tell you how to create a Blog because we charge customers to do that!
Happy Blogging!
Social Media 101
Jan 3rd
Social Media 101
More and more businesses are realizing that in order to be successful, they need to have a strong online presence. We spend time educating our clients. So … I am including a mini-social media class.
The purpose of social media is:
- Generate traffic to a website (& increase your search engine rankings)
- Engage with customers and prospects in a dialog
- Establish credibility
The Big Four:
- LinkedIn- http://www.linkedin.com – Engage businesses
- Facebook – http://www.facebook.com – Engage individuals with a Personal page or set up a Fan Page for your Business
- Twitter – http://www.twitter.com – Engage individuals by sending out announcements and providing people with useful information. And remember to subscribe to others’ tweets.
- Blogging – your blog can be set up as part of your own site or as part of a number of free or paid blogging sites. Post (write about) 2-4 paragraphs about how you have helped other people, or provide them with free useful information. Also, solicit and respond to feedback from your customers.
Help! My Web Designer Says He Owns My Domain and Website!
Dec 27th
It happens way more often than you think. We have customer after customer come to us asking for changes to be made to their existing website. They either want updates on their existing pages, pages or a shopping cart or a blog added, or to have the site search engine optimized. As most of our customers are experts in their field, and not experts in web design or hosting, they are unaware if they:
- are locked into a hosting agreement
- own their website
- own their domain name
Regardless of who your web designer is, make sure you find out the answers to the following questions:
- How long is the hosting agreement and can I have the username and password for the hosting company?
- Will I own the website and the images upon making the final payment to the design company?
- Will the domain name be registered in my name or in the website design company’s name?
The answers to the above information can be verified at www.whois.domaintools.com (go to the Registration Tab). For example, if a website is hosted at www.oneandone.com, a customer should see that the domain has been either set up in his/her name, or was set up in the designer’s name – but is transferrable, and that the “customer agreement” with the designer includes the transfer of the domain name.
We recently spoke with someone who had no idea that her domain name was owned by the original web designer, and that her domain and hosting were not transferrable. So, she either has to pay the web designer as long as she wants the site maintained, or leave and lose the domain name and have the site recreated.
At Creative Carrot Studios, our customers all own their domain names, and websites and images upon receipt of final payment.
How Do I Know which Shopping Cart to Use?
Dec 21st
There are many, many shopping cart products today. The first step to determining which product to use is to determine your needs. The below are a few questions to explore:
- Will I be selling products and/or services?
- Will I need the shopping cart to assist in the fulfillment part of the sale?
- Will I have digital products that need to be delivered directly after the purchase or can I email the file within 24 hours?
- What payments can I handle?
- How will I handle returns and what will I want the shopping cart to do?
- Do I want an auto-responder letter to be sent directly after the purchase confirming their order? Do I want a reoccurring auto-responder to be sent to my customer to keep my business on their mind?
- What kind of customer support will I be providing for questions?
- Do I want to have an affiliate program for people who have links to my website?
- What is my budget?
After defining what function your shopping cart will fill, we recommend that you vet the shopping cart provided by your website hosting company – as they are usually cost efficient as you are already a customer. Next, research other shopping carts online. Determine what their customer service support hours are (24/7 if you need it). Then, look for comments on their products – what are people saying about these products – use the social media resources out there – pose a question on LinkedIn as to what shopping carts people find useful.
Shopping carts are essential in today’s marketplace as businesses need to be able to sell their products when their prospects are shopping – which can be at 1am.
To Link or Not to Link, That is the Question?
Dec 14th
Most of our clients ask us about having links to other sites (and having the client’s website link on others’ sites) and what affect it will have. Links to other sites provide the following functions: increase your search engine rankings, advertise your association with the “linked” websites, and possibly have a financial return if there is an agreement between the linked companies (affiliate link). At CCS we recommend the following.
- Always consider you brand first. Does the company you are linking “to” or “from” represent the same quality message, product/service, and are they targeting a similar market niche. If they are of equal or better quality, but not the same market – it may still be worthwhile because you could receive unexpected interest from another market niche. If less than the same quality level, we recommend that you do not link as this could reflect poorly on your brand.
- There are new liability issues if you directly link to a site that is doing something illegal. For example – if you directly link to a site where they are fraudulently using credit card numbers, your company might be implicated (though this may legally be difficult to prove). Like in all business situations, know with whom you are doing business.
- If you have an affiliate agreement, determine what audits are in place to make sure that your company receives accurate payment for any sales received from traffic that originated at your site.