Provide Can-Do Customer Service

Turn customers into regulars by treating them like they already are.

By Sydney Barrows | July 29, 2009

Once a month, half a dozen New York- and New Jersey-based Glazer-Kennedy members get together for a Mastermind meeting. I always ask for an entire dish of lemon wedges for my iced tea, while another group member always has a piece of warmed-up chocolate cake as an appetizer. It’s always very amusing to watch a new waiter try to grasp this peccadillo.

Last week the cake appeared after an unusually lengthy wait, accompanied by profuse apologies. Faced with an unfamiliar request, our waiter had to ask the manager what the procedure was for warming up chocolate cake. The manager pursed his lips and announced, "We don't do that here."

Our waiter found himself facing a dilemma. He didn't want to be the person who couldn't manage to deliver a warm piece of cake (no doubt he wasn't anxious to compromise his tip), nor could he disregard the manager's direction. Luckily, the assistant manager handled things. He microwaved the cake, explaining to the waiter that we were monthly regulars and "we do do that here."

The savvy assistant manager, treating us with the respect due loyal customers, ensured that we would continue to do business there. Realistically, that level of respect is the way all customers ought to be treated if a business has any interest in seeing them again. His "can do" attitude also deserves recognition.

You can generate repeat customers by training your employees to be friendly, helpful and knowledgeable. Give them authority to problem-solve on the spot. These actions make your customers' satisfaction your priority. The success of your business comes down to the customer experience. In this economic climate, customers are much pickier about where they do business; you won't earn loyalty if the experience they have doesn't add to the value of the purchase.

Providing customers with a positive experience doesn't necessarily cost you any money--except for electrical output, it didn't cost a penny to microwave that chocolate cake--but not prioritizing the customer experience can cost you thousands in lost business. Hire, train and keep employees with a positive customer-service attitude. If interactions with your employees creates a sense of appreciation, customers are likely to return the favor with repeat business.

Sydney Biddle Barrows, known to millions as the Mayflower Madam, is a professional speaker, business consultant and is a recognized expert on the Customer Experience. She has had four books published; the first was a number one New York Times bestseller and was named one of the top business books of the year. Her most recent book, Uncensored Sales Strategies, co-authored with the legendary Dan Kennedy, was published in 2009. Sydney has also just released an information product called The Experience Formula: Your Step-by-Step Guide to Designing Your Own Customer EXXXperience, which guides entrepreneurs, solo-preneurs, small businesses and professional practices through the process of creating their own unique and compelling Customer Experience. Visitwww.sydneybarrows.com for more information on her products and services.

Playing to Win

Gamefly's Sean Spector gives us a peek inside his game-rental empire.

By Justin Petruccelli | June 25, 2009

Video games have come a long way since Pong and Pac-Man. But with high tech comes even higher price tags, a source of pain for plenty of passionate gamers. Enter Sean Spector, who, in 2002, co-founded Gamefly, an online company that is to gamers what Netflix is to movie lovers. The company was venture-backed from the start--even on the heels of the dot-com bubble burst--and is now profitable. Spector, who now serves as Gamefly's senior vice president of business development and content, shares some of his secrets to online success.

What inspired you to start Gamefly?
I had a voracious appetite for video games, and I couldn't afford to buy all the games I wanted to play. I think that's the conundrum for most gamers: They want way more than they can afford. I looked at the traditional rental model--which is the brick-and-mortar model--and realized that it was pretty good for movies, but it was broken for games. I figured there had to be a better way, and it really came down to my personal desire to play more games than I could afford to buy.

What were some of the hurdles you faced during startup?
When we started this company, it was post-bubble burst. Nobody was really looking at funding dot-coms. They had sort of gone out of fashion--especially dot-coms that held inventory. So it was definitely a contrarian play, for us as well as for the investors. It was a really good time to start a company, not that dissimilar from the way things are today. Really good companies are going to emerge from this shakeout, and I think the same thing happened back in 2002. Real business models need to be created to sustain growth and become profitable. I knew from Day One that we would have a real business model that generates real revenue, and not the reliance upon "If we build it, the profitable model will come." That's the critical thing: To have a business model from Day One is the better route to take rather than trying to say you'll figure it out a couple of years in.

How do you deal with the obvious comparisons to Netflix?
We embrace it because Netflix is a great company and they run their business extremely well. It's definitely a form of flattery because they've done an amazing job of making sure that they focus on their customers. I think all businesses can take a page out of Netflix's playbook and see how well they've done by focusing on their customers.

What's your advice for aspiring online entrepreneurs?
We had a pretty good idea, but ideas are a dime a dozen. You've got to be willing and able to execute the idea, even though people are going to tell you you're making a mistake or you're wrong or you're crazy. You've got to be willing to fail if you're going to succeed. It sounds cliché, but it's true. Even if people are going to tell you you're going to fail--and they may be right--you're going to come out of it learning a lot, so the next time you do it, you're going to do things differently. You wouldn't have had that experience or that knowledge if you hadn't tried.

Why Should Your Employees Like You?

Use these 5 tips to gain respect from your team and boost your bottom line.

By Nancy Mann Jackson | July 21, 2009

When a couple of employees were habitually late to work at Oceanside Photo & Telescope in Oceanside, Calif., owner Craig Weatherwax refrained from harsh words or disciplinary action. Instead, he opted for a heart-to-heart discussion, explaining the reasons behind their start time and how their tardiness was affecting other team members.

“I believe there’s a rough and tumble way to handle things,” Weatherwax says. “But I try to use kid gloves, and we all get along better that way.”

Managing employees isn’t a popularity contest, but if your workers like and respect you as a person, your company’s bottom line is likely to show it. Handling problems gently is one way Weatherwax has built positive relationships with his 23 employees, who in turn have helped his business grow to be one of the largest telescope dealers in the United States since he bought it in 1974.

Increasing the Bottom Line
Taking careful steps to build trust, respect and goodwill among employees doesn’t just make it more fun to go to work, it can also boost your bottom line. Research by Leadership IQ shows that “the overwhelming majority of employees are not giving 100 percent at work; 72 percent admit that they’re not giving their all,” says Mark Murphy, CEO of Atlanta-based research firm Leadership IQ and author of Hundred Percenters: Stop Making Your Employees Happy, Start Making Them Great, to be released in November by McGraw-Hill. “One big reason is because their boss is not leading them in a way that encourages them to give 100 percent.”

Employees of large corporations often view themselves as working for an impersonal entity, while those at small businesses conflate the organization and its owner. Quite simply, if employees like and respect you, they’re more invested in your company and interested in its success. They’re willing to work harder and give more. But if they don’t care about you, they don’t care about your company.

“Dislike and disrespect can turn into resentment,” says James Harwood, CEO of Ravens Fire Group, a rental service consulting firm in Asheville, N.C. “Negative attitudes can turn into mediocre work and even theft. Those with negative attitudes can pull down other workers with them.”

For many small companies, employees are the primary asset, says Stephone Darby, president and CEO of Advanced Information Technologies, Inc., in Florence, Ala. “For companies like us, if employees perform their work with expertise and timeliness and provide good customer service, the employer will retain their customers, grow their business with them and get referrals based on their relationship with them,” Darby says. When the employer provides an environment that is conducive to earning respect, employees will perform their work to these levels of expectation. But if there is not a mutual respect between an employer and employees, there is a great likelihood that one or more of these requirements will not be met. In turn, the employer will lose customers and sacrifice the growth of the company.

Employee Relationships in a Recession
While it sounds good to build and maintain positive relationships with employees, priorities often get shifted during an economic downturn--and relationships with employees may suffer. “For the majority of leaders, their leadership performance is suffering right now,” Murphy says.

Some business owners are slacking simply because they can get away with it, as employees are just happy to have a job at the moment, Murphy says. Some others are dealing with such high personal stress levels that they are neglecting to give feedback or provide coaching and training. “They’re so stressed and frazzled that they’re forgetting some of the basics of leading a company,” Murphy says.

But the recession won’t last forever and those companies that survive recessions are the ones that continue to focus on developing high performers and keeping people engaged, Murphy says. “The best way to win in a recession is to keep employees’ chins up.”

Murphy’s research shows about 70 percent of companies that make positive progress during a recession will continue those gains after the recession is over. The organizations that suffer during a recession “often maintain that suffering for a great deal of time after the recession is over,” he says, frequently due to increased turnover rates when the job market improves. “A recession shakes things up in the marketplace and offers an opportunity to take market share. What if you’re the one company that’s able to motivate employees and keep them going while your competitors’ employees are frozen in fear? This is your chance to win.”

Bridge the Boss-Employee Gap
Keep your company afloat through the recession--and ensure that employees will stick around when times get better--with some of the following strategies:

1. Nix double standards. Don’t expect employees to follow your instructions if you don’t follow the same instructions yourself. “You can’t just sit back and not have the same standard for yourself as you have for your employees,” Weatherwax says.

2. Share the work. Nothing widens the gap between employer and employee like doling out the “dirty work,” such as asking employees to do something unethical or simply to work an unreasonable number of hours. To earn employees’ respect, business owners, “should never ask an employee to do something that they would not be willing to do themselves,” Darby says.

3. Make them laugh. Humor is proven to reduce stress and take the edge off of a tense conversation. “As the boss, you can set the tempo or the mood for the business day,” Weatherwax says. “If you can have fun with your employees and joke with them, they’ll have more fun and they’ll joke with the customers too.”

4. Enforce consequences. Whether it’s rewarding good work or holding employees accountable for mistakes, enforcing consistent consequences helps workers know what to expect. “Sometimes in tough times we overlook bad behavior and don’t recognize the good work being done by high performers,” Murphy says.

5. Share your thought process. Especially during tough times when employees are worried about keeping their jobs, you can earn goodwill by being open about the choices you make, whether it’s to cut costs or cut personnel. “The more transparent a leader becomes with his decision making process, the more likely employees are to trust those decisions,” Murphy says. “Share the data, explain where you got that data, and why you decided what you did. What scares employees is the unknown, and if you’re not transparent, they’ll expect the worst.”

Nancy Mann Jackson is a freelance writer who writes frequently about small business issues. Reach her at www.nancyjackson.com.

Build a Billion-Dollar Business

Here's an inside look at how two successful businesses went from zero to $1 billion.

By Sara Wilson | Entrepreneur Magazine - March 2009

As an entrepreneur, you've probably set your sights high. You dream of a reality that others would brush off as, well, simply a dream. You envision creating a brand that crosses oceans and continents in its importance and recognition. You don't think in multiples of one, but instead in hundreds, perhaps thousands. And you might even be calculating not if but when your business will officially cross the threshold from the millions to $1 billion. And even in the throes of a recession, you hold on to that vision, knowing that if you can build the foundation and survive now, you will thrive later.

We recently caught up with two individuals who have survived turbulent waters, skillfully navigating their companies through the dotcom bust and building billion-dollar companies before age 40. Here's how they made a billion happen--in their own ways and on their own terms.

The Entrepreneurs
Michael Chasen, 37, travels extensively every month and values meeting people and sharing ideas. He has been doing that since 1997, when he co-founded Blackboard Inc., a Washington, DC-based provider of enterprise software that enables colleges, schools and other educational institutions to bring their processes online. (To interview him, I had to trail him down to Mexico, where he was attending a networking event with 60 other successful entrepreneurs.)

Tony Hsieh, 35, is a smart investor who placed his bets on a small startup called Zappos.com in August 1999 but then became so convinced of the potential in the marketplace for an online shoe retailer that he joined full time, ultimately outlasting even the founder. Over the past decade, he has taken the Las Vegas-based company well beyond shoes into apparel, bags, housewares, electronics and cookware.

Building the Foundation
There's no better way to build a billion-dollar company than by starting off with an idea that has billion-dollar potential. Even at a time when the internet hadn't yet become such a prominent shopping destination, Hsieh knew Zappos.com was a business concept with potential. "At that time, footwear in the U.S. was a $40-billion-a-year industry, and paper and mail-order catalogs were 5 percent of that, or $2 billion a year," he explains. "In our minds, it seemed the web was going to at least surpass paper catalogs." For Hsieh, the equation spelled success, and he didn't hesitate to move forward, confident that the numbers would work in his favor.

Zappos.com weathered the dotcom bust by focusing less on attracting new customers and concentrating more on retaining old ones. Word about the service-friendly business spread quickly, and the number of repeat customers increased. It introduced free shipping long before it was a common business practice, and the company continues to go above and beyond for customers. It has a 365-day return policy and even relocated the entire warehouse from California to Kentucky to be near UPS's hub and ensure faster delivery of its merchandise. Customer service got the company through hard times and has become an identifying characteristic of the business. Hsieh says it's the No. 1 driver behind Zappos.com reaching $1 billion in gross merchandise sales.

For Chasen, competitors already existed when he entered the space, so it was a matter of creating a better product, building a better business model and meeting the right people. He chose to build Blackboard using a subscription model in which the school would pay annually to continue using the software. This simple decision would later become the company's lifeline. When the tech bubble burst and financing dried up, Blackboard stayed afloat thanks to $40 million coming in from annual subscriptions.

But before any of that could happen, Chasen had to get the word out. He attended networking events, signed up for business plan competitions and met with as many investors as possible. As a result, Chasen not only raised about half a million dollars in his first round of angel financing, but also met a group of Cornell University students who had developed tools for bringing teaching and learning online. He persuaded them to come on board after graduation. "Talk to as many people as you can and get as much feedback as possible," Chasen says. "It's only by tapping that greater collective of knowledge that you can really succeed."

Growing the Business
Reaching $1 billion requires scaling a business effectively. Chasen has kept one step ahead by making sure the right management team is in place every step of the way. He says, "We've continued to hire and expand and improve our management team along the way, always looking not at where the company is today, but where the company is going to be five years from now and making sure we have the right team in place to get us there."

He has also mastered the art of M&A, which has contributed largely to the company's growth. He saved money and time by acquiring businesses or technologies that fit with the company's product offerings. Through acquisitions, Blackboard added Blackboard Transact, a student ID card that doubles as a debit card, as well as Blackboard Connect, an emergency notification and alert system. "With M&A, it's not an either/or vs. organic growth," Chasen says. "It's really something that's additive, and when we reach a certain size, it's often one of the better ways to deploy capital."

Hsieh has been able to stay ahead of the curve by creating an environment where his employees feel empowered to contribute ideas and take charge. He invests time in teaching his employees, knowing it will pay off in the long run. In fact, the company just rolled out management and leadership training classes to equip employees with the know-how to grow within the company.

Hsieh also advocates creating a strong company culture. Ten core values make up the culture at Zappos.com--"Embrace and drive change" and "Create fun and a little weirdness" top the list. Culture is so important that it's integrated into the interview pro-cess: Applicants are asked to rank their weirdness on a scale of one to 10, for example--and qualified people have been rejected because they didn't fit the company culture. Says Hsieh, "The most important thing is that there's a culture you believe in and are willing to hire and fire based upon."

Moving Forward
Today, Zappos.com stocks millions of shoes and more than 1,000 brands, and requires the work of approximately 1,600 employees. Blackboard serves more than 3,000 colleges worldwide and more than 400 K-12 districts. The company went public in 2004 and employs 1,100 people.

These businesses' successes didn't happen overnight, nor are they immune to hard times. At the end of 2008, Blackboard's stock price was down by 30 percent due to the economic downturn. But Hsieh and Chasen aren't anywhere close to slowing down. "Less than 200 schools in China and 30 schools in the Middle East are using Blackboard technology, and there are hundreds of millions of learners in those areas that are not yet using technology in the education process," Chasen says. "In places like those, we are in the very beginning. So if you look at it as a global opportunity, which we do, we still have a very long distance to go."

For Hsieh, selling shoes online was just the launching point. Now he's working toward making people forget that Zappos.com ever sold only shoes by expanding into different product lines. Hsieh has even fielded customer requests to start an airline. He doesn't make any promises, but he considers it a real possibility in the future. Anything is possible. Such is the attitude of a billionaire entrepreneur.

What They Read

Tony Hsieh:Tribal Leadership: Leveraging Natural Groups to Build a Thriving Organization, by Dave Logan, John King and Halee Fischer-Wright

Michael Chasen:Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking, by Malcolm Gladwell; Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, by Michael Lewis; Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything, by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner

840 Million Reasons to Celebrate

Fresh off his mammoth deal with Amazon, Zappos.com CEO Tony Hsieh shares the secrets of his online empire.

July 23, 2009

On the heels of Amazon's $840 million acquisition of Zappos.com, Zappos.com CEO Tony Hsieh spoke with Collective-E, a worldwide collective of women entrepreneurs, and some of its members.

If you had to explain why you believe Zappos.com has been so successful, what key reasons would you attribute it to?
I think it's because of our focus on customer service and company culture. Our whole belief is that if we get the culture right, then most of the other stuff, like delivering great customer service or building a long term enduring brand, will happen naturally on its own.

We've grown from almost no sales in 1999 to over $1 billion in gross merchandise sales in 2008. The No. 1 driver of that growth has been through repeat customers and word of mouth. On any given day, about 75 percent of our orders are from repeat customers. Our philosophy is to take most of the money we would have spent on paid advertising and marketing, and put that into the customer experience instead, including things like free shipping both ways, our 365-day return policy, and staffing our call center 24/7.

How do you feel businesses of all sizes should respond to the recession in order to thrive?
I think the true test of a company's character (or even a person's character) is how they behave when times are tough. For us, we've continued to focus on providing the very best customer service and developing our company culture. My advice to businesses of all sizes is to figure out what you want to stand for (i.e., what your core values are) and continue to make decisions based on that.

How important are social media outlets such as Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube to Zappos.com?
Our primary focus has been on Twitter. We have over 400 employees on Twitter, and you can view their tweets at: http://twitter.zappos.com/employee_tweets

As you can see, most of the tweets are not about business or marketing, but it's a great way for us to connect on a more personal level with both employees and customers. It gives people a glimpse into our company culture, which is ultimately what our brand is all about.

What is your favorite thing about entrepreneurship?
I enjoy that there are always new challenges and that you have to be creative in figuring out how to attack those challenges.

What is the biggest challenge you face as an entrepreneur?
I think the biggest challenge is that there are so many great ideas but not enough time or resources to do all of them. The hardest part about being an entrepreneur is figuring out what not to do.

How have you created such a powerful and positive customer service force in Zappos? Even scheduling this interview, the level of positive and quick feedback was notable enough to talk about after we hung up the phone. How do you keep that spirit alive and thriving?
It's a combination of making sure that everyone understands our vision of having the Zappos brand be synonymous with the very best customer service as well as making sure that we hire people that are a fit for our company culture. Our culture is defined by our 10 core values:

1. Deliver WOW through service.
2. Embrace and drive change.
3. Create fun and a little weirdness.
4. Be adventurous, creative, and open-minded.
5. Pursue growth and learning.
6. Build open and honest relationships with communication.
7. Build a positive team and family spirit.
8. Do more with less.
9. Be passionate and determined.
10. Be humble.

Entrepreneurs seem to be very good at starting and developing projects. I've found one of the most challenging things for me is to figure out and then decide what to stop doing, whether it's because the market is changing, it's not profitable, or I'm just not good at something. Can you give an example of something you stopped doing and include how you made the decision, how long it took you to make, and the outcome?
We are always open to experimenting with ideas we get from customers and employees. For example, we had some customers that suggested that we try selling dog collars, and others that suggested that we try selling sunglasses. Neither of those categories have very much to do with shoes, but we decided to experiment with both.

As it turns out, the dog collars did not sell very well, but the sunglasses did. So we decided to stop selling dog collars and invest more heavily in sunglasses. Today, we have one of the best selections of sunglasses available anywhere, online or offline, and they continue to sell well for us.

How often do your Tweets turn into actual sales? Do you measure that in some way?
We don't measure that because we don't think of Twitter as a direct marketing channel. Twitter allows us to be more personal with our customers and build relationships with them over time.

What was the most effective thing you did to maximize web awareness?
Most of our awareness online or offline has been generated by word of mouth. We really just focus on WOWing our customers, and let our customers do the marketing for us.

Make Search Engines Your Friends

Learn how to boost web traffic with this introduction to SEO copywriting basics.

Today, more people than ever flock to the internet to locate information on just about everything. They start their quests for knowledge, services or products by using search engines. When creating content for your website, search engine optimization is an important tool to increase traffic to the site with modest effort and little to no extra cost, as your own time is needed.

SEO is a process in which specific keywords are added to content. These keywords are those that are found most often in search engine results.

Proper page organization and inclusion of keywords help drive your website higher in search engine rankings and helps customers find your company online. The process of creating effective SEO copy is quite simple and can be accomplished by using a few basic techniques.

Keyword research is one of the most important steps when creating SEO copy. Try Google's free keyword tool to see which keywords (and search volumes for them) are being used in your business's industry or niche.

This practice locates exact keywords and phrases that people search for the most when trying to locate specific information. Keyword research should be combined with "pre-click" research. Differences exist in user search intent, from more commerce-driven, to navigational and information based. By conducting pre-click research combined with keyword research before writing copy, you'll be able to ensure your content contains only the best possible keywords with user relevancy as well as the appropriate density for each word. Density is how often the keyword should appear throughout the document. Don't worry or analyze too much--just write naturally.

Keyword research should not be taken lightly or rushed. Words should be selected based on validity, volume, uniqueness, competition and how easily back links can have terms included. These words are the very core of web content, and they'll make or break optimization. Strongly typed back links from other relevant sites are very important, but they, too, must appear naturally.

You can hire an SEO specialist to help determine a proper keyword list and page breakdown (themes). However, research can be done quite easily on your own using free online tools like Goggle's, noted above. Try conducting a simple search for your type of business and see what pops up. For example, if you're in the flower business and you offer a specialized service such as custom centerpieces, make sure to include the specific keyword (centerpieces or custom centerpieces), not just common terms like "roses." This will narrow the results a great deal and allow for a more focused search that is better targeted for sales or leads. Make sure during your keyword research that the users are using those words.

Once the keyword research has been completed, the next step is to decide how to properly insert the terms into your web content. One page of content should be dedicated to each keyword and variations of them--including plurals--by designing the text around that specific word. The writing should sound natural and set an appropriate tone using correct grammar. Search engines tend to like this model: Make sure that the keyword/phrase appears once at the beginning of your content, once at the end and two to three times throughout the body of the text. When looking at your competition, you'll probably see that more competitive terms (heads) are used for the homepage, while others (long tails) are used for inner pages. It's very important to avoid saturating the copy with one particular word; doing this could be considered spamming and may have a negative effect. To further optimize the web page, place the keywords in the title of the page as well as in a heading (H1 tags).

I like to write for users first, and then search engines, so effective SEO copy must consider clickability. It's what entices people to engage and click on your headline when scrolling through the masses of search results. That also means a friendly URL and domain name.

The first way to increase clickabilty is to have an intriguing title. The title should be somewhat personal, address potential readers and pull them in; you can even include a phone number. The web is full of bland content, so yours must be different. Be forceful; use direct words, terms and type. Offer the promise of something like a reward or promotion. Consider making your copy into a list. A title such as "5 Simple Tricks Anyone Can Use To Design a Killer Website" grabs a person's attention and entices them to click. There have been several studies that suggest people are more apt to click on information that's presented in list form because they believe it's quick and easy to understand. Remember, most people don't read on the web--they scan content.

In addition to using keywords, you can further optimize the pages on your website by categorizing the content, also known as tagging. Blogs are great for that--all the more reason to set one up. Many search engines and directories use topic categories to group results more concisely. You can increase your rank and likelihood of being put into the right category by tagging your own copy. To tag your copy, simply add a categorical header before the content headline or title. For example, if the title of your page is "How To Succeed in Business," the tag for the page might look like this: "Business and Entrepreneurship: How To Succeed in Business." Just as with keywords, research should be conducted to determine the most searched-for categories to help ensure your tag is the best possible fit. If you want to get ideas, visit dmoz.org, dir.yahoo.com and social media bookmarking behemoth delicious.com.

Another very effective SEO practice is called linking. Linking can and must be applied on your website, as well as externally. Because the voting system of Google is a core signal to their algorithm, you must make sure your website is linked to other websites and vice versa. With strong content and optimized written materials, you should anticipate getting links back, but don't be afraid to ask. The more easily users and search engines can navigate your pages, and the more links to your site other people have on their pages, the higher your search engine ranking will be--and the more traffic your site will generate. Links can be purchased, however, there are many free options available. Add your website address to e-mail signatures, blogs, forums and social networking sites. The more your links appear, the more curious people will become, leading to more visits. If you consistently update your site with interesting and useful information, more people will click over to you, recommend your site to others and keep coming back for more.

While creating effective SEO content may take some getting used to, it doesn't have to be difficult. It's important to remember that the style might be a little different than your normal writing style and will not be the same as creating general copy. You may not get exactly what you want on the first try, but once you begin to publish your content you'll be able to measure the results and learn which areas need improvement. Your web analytics will tell you how it's working--or not working. Make sure you know your audience and with practice, SEO writing will become much faster, more focused and second nature to you.

By keeping these general principles in mind and devoting some time, you'll begin creating highly effective, traffic-generating pages with ease.

Jon Rognerud is Entrepreneur.com's SEO columnist, an SEO consultant and the author of The Ultimate Guide to Search Engine Optimization, available from Entrepreneur Press. He has more than 20 years experience building marketing and web projects, including creating content and application solutions at Yahoo!/Overture.

SEO: Essential to Survival

Companies that rely on the web for sales have two choices. Embrace SEO or don't embrace SEO. And one's not really a viable option.

In the realm of e-commerce, one of the top marketing tools a company has is a Google ranking. The difference between a page 1 or page 2 search engine ranking can be the difference of tens of thousands of dollars of revenue for a company.

Because of this, companies are allocating more budget space than ever toward search engine optimization (SEO), the strategy and process of improving the volume of traffic to a website by improving the search rankings of various search engines like Google, Yahoo!, AOL, Ask and MSN.

For many online companies like My1Stop.com, an online printing company, using SEO techniques to achieve a high search engine ranking is essential for survival.

"Our website is our complete livelihood, since 99 percent of every penny that comes into our pockets is from our website," says Michael Del Chiaro, president of My1Stop.com. "If we're not getting a good [search engine] ranking, we're starting to atrophy as a company."

But SEO isn't as easy as it may seem. It requires a host of strategies to help climb the search engine ladder to page 1, including content revision, link building, coding, and even social networking. Some companies elect to do in-house SEO. Yet if they lack proper knowledge of the way search engines work and are evolving, they might be limited.

For Del Chiaro, it took two unsuccessful attempts with SEO companies (see sidebar) before he found MoreVisibility, a search engine marketing, optimization and design firm. MoreVisibility has helped My1Stop.com gain invaluable ranking exposure, increasing the company's visitors through "organic" search results--search-engine-directed visits--from 30 percent to 90 percent.

Search engine results used to measure progress and modify strategy for My1Stop.com are provided by MoreVisibility and Google analytics, which are essential to any organization engaging in SEO practices, Del Chiaro says.

"If you engage with an SEO firm or hire programmers or experts yourself, if you don't have analytics, it's like driving blind," Del Chiaro says.

Using analytics, Del Chiaro is able to track where visitors to My1Stop.com arrived from, what keywords were entered, what customers ordered, how long they stayed, how many pages were viewed, how many quotes were requested and other useful information. Knowing what keywords customers entered to find a website is important because search engines primarily search for content when ranking websites.

"The SEO factors that matter today, over and above the coding piece of a website, include the content on a website," says Andrew Wetzler, president of MoreVisibility. "If you want to show up under the phrase 'working capital loans,' you need to build out a website that speaks with a significant depth to that keyword. The more content a website is able to publish on a particular keyword, industry or phrase, the greater likelihood the site's rankings will increase."

The Nevada Commission on Tourism found that revamping its website with more content oriented toward specific searches yielded dramatic results. With the help of MoreVisibility, the NCOT went from having 224 indexed web pages with 2,796 keywords, to more than 1,000 pages and 14,000 keywords. In December 2008, the website had 29,000 organic visits, compared to just 9,000 the year before.

The return on the NCOT's investment has been significant. In the past, the organization relied on sponsored links through pay-per-click advertising, which cost an estimated 65 cents every time somebody linked to its site. With the drastic increase in traffic to its new website, NCOT estimates a savings of nearly $19,000 based on what PPC would have cost.

The NCOT also used social media outlets to increase search engine rankings. Search engines are now recognizing social media websites such as LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube and Twitter as important content, Wetzler says. The NCOT created its own YouTube channel, posted travel videos on Viddler.com, created a mobile ski site and has an online press room on Twitter.

"If you Google 'ski travel Nevada,' the entire first page of results is us, with the exception of one," NCOT spokesperson Bethany Drysdale says. "If we didn't use social media, those results wouldn't be there; they'd be replaced by something else."

With the internet changing at a rapid clip, it's important for companies to understand how search engines work and modify their websites as new advances occur. The introduction of social media is a more recent example how quickly search engines can change their protocol.

In terms of SEO, "If you don't view social network sites as something you have to put daily resources into for your business, you're failing," Del Chiaro says. "The internet is always changing. When Google hiccups, everything changes."

By Chandler Harris | February 04, 2009

Website Marketing Turnoffs

13 things not to do when adapting your product to an online model.

Here's a compilation of 13 silly and even stupid ways some companies are hindering adoption of their products and services. So if you are doing any of them, don't.

1. Forcing immediate registration: Requiring a new user to register is a reasonable request—after you've sucked him in. The sites that require registration as the first step are putting a barrier in front of adoption.
   
2. The long URL: Say a site generates a URL that's 70 characters long or more. When you copy, paste and e-mail this URL, a line break is added. Then, people can't click on the link or it only links to the first part of the URL.
   
3. Windows that don't generate URLs: Have you ever wanted to point people to a page, but the page has no URL? Did the company decide it didn't want referrals, links and additional traffic?
   
4. The unsearchable website: Some sites don't offer a search option. If your site goes deeper than one level, it needs a search box.
   
5. Sites without Delicious, Digg and Fark bookmarks: There's no reason why a company wouldn't want its fans to bookmark its pages. When my blog hits the front page of Digg, page views typically increase six or seven times.
   
6. Limiting contact to e-mail: Don't get me wrong; I live and die by e-mail. But sometimes I want to call or even snail-mail a company. Many companies only let you send an e-mail via their "Contact Us" page. Why can't companies be honest and just call it "Don't Contact Us"?
   
7. Lack of feeds and e-mail lists: Make getting information about your products and services easy by providing e-mail and RSS feeds for content and PR newsletters.
   
8. Making users retype e-mail addresses: How about the patent-pending, curve-jumping Web 2.0 company that wants you to share content but requires you to retype your friends' e-mail addresses? I have 7,703 e-mail addresses in Microsoft Entourage. I'm not going to retype them into some done-as-an-afterthought address book.
   
9. No e-mail addresses as usernames: I'm a member of hundreds of sites. I can't remember my usernames, but I can remember my e-mail address. So why not let me use that?
   
10. Case-sensitive usernames and passwords: I know; these are more secure. But then I'm more likely to type in my user name and password incorrectly.
    
11. Friction-full commenting: "Moderated comments" is an oxymoron. If your company is trying to be a hip, myth-busting, hypocrisy-outing joint, it should let anyone comment. Also, many times I've started to leave a comment on a blog but stopped when I realized I'd have to register.
    
12. Unreadable confirmation codes: A visual confirmation graphic system is a good thing, but many are too difficult to read. All you have to prove is that you're not a robot. So if the code is "ghj1lK," entering "ghj11K" should be good enough.
    
13. E-mails without signatures: Communication would be so much easier if everyone included a complete e-mail signature with their name, company, address, phone and e-mail address.
    

Guy Kawasaki's mantra is "Empower people." He is co-founder of Alltop.com, a managing director of Garage Technology Ventures, former chief evangelist for Apple Inc. and author of nine books--most recently, Reality Check. Visit smallbusiness.alltop.com.

Create Your Own Online Network

As an entrepreneur, you want to be on the lookout for the newest trends that help keep you lean and profitable. One thing you may want to consider is implementing an online network as an integral part of your business.

As a person with strong entrepreneurial spirit, you may already be running one or more businesses. You may be running each by yourself or you may have employees of varying numbers. Starting an online network within your existing businesses can be a great way to increase the profits of those businesses.

A great number of larger corporations have already discovered that opening up the gateways of communication through an internal social network has allowed them to learn more about employees, particularly their hidden talents, talents that may be tapped into as the company grows.

Interestingly, the idea of creating a proprietary social network is not just for large organizations. Today, an increasing number of small businesses are embracing online networks, particularly as the workforce becomes more and more filled with employees who have spent their entire lives online.

If you own a small business, or businesses, one of the main reasons you should consider adding an online networking component is that the best time to make an online network part of your company culture is when the company is small. It can then stay in place and grow along with your company. As a small-business owner, you likely wear multiple hats and, even with your handy PDA, you may have a difficult time getting easy access to all the information you need about your employees in a single place. By using an online network you can keep track of--and have immediate access to--information about what each employee is currently working on, and what experience they have from previous positions.

Your company may have employees operating from remote locations. Setting up an internal online network will allow those employees to interact with one another--and with you--without leaving their desks, allowing for more personalization, and less isolation.

Finally, if you more than one small business, implementing an online network gives you the power to gather information across your businesses, search for the best employees for particular tasks, and establish greater collaboration between you and your employees.

Internal online networks are dynamic and allow employees to use virtually all the features they would find on Facebook, or even LinkedIn, including social networking, tagging and profiles. There are many hosted applications that cater to this market segment. Because of this, even the smallest companies have access to robust technologies at affordable prices.

Larger businesses have already jumped on the bandwagon, particularly in the last couple of years, but the time is right--and the software is here--for smaller businesses to profit from an internal online networking component as well.

Julien Sharp is the author of Design and Launch an Online Networking Business in a Week, and a contributing author to Masters of Sales: Secrets From Top Sales Professionals That Will Transform You Into A World Class Salesperson by Ivan Misner, PhD and Don Morgan, MA, both available from Entrepreneur Press.

Integrate Your Online Advertising

In the "old days" of the internet, most people paid for traditional banner ads or headline ads, or they paid for advertising under what was called a cost-per-click or CPC advertising. CPC advertising used to be the most popular method of advertising out there. But getting statistics on what worked and what didn't wasn't easy.

Many people today also market with Google's AdWords. While this is great for Google, it isn't always great if you buy words and you don't see your hit rate go up.

What's becoming interesting in today's market are the alternative ways of advertising. E-mail marketing is alive and kicking--mostly through giving away a newsletter with insightful information and hoping readers will click through to your web site. Collecting e-mail addresses and sending valid offers, special events and discounts to those who sign up (and only those who sign up) can be a good way to drive visitors to your site. The monthly newsletters you send out need to showcase you as the go-to expert, but don't forget to feature some of your loyal customers and fans, too. People like to see their name in lights, and they often forward the newsletter to many others in the process. Make it easy to subscribe--and unsubscribe. This will help you comply with laws and also keep your visitors happy.

Using a blog and an RSS feed may seem overtly obvious or too simple in this market, but they matter. Your community needs to feel engaged. If you don’t yet have a fully integrated social media website with a community and people to upload avatars, bios, link to Facebook and so on, a blog is a good way for you to keep information and write columns that others can comment on. Ideally, you want to be moving toward a true Web 2.0 model and keep the blog going, too. WordPress and Blogger are two very easy ways to create blogs and integrate them into your website. Be sure you follow up on comments, too. The more engaged your audience is the more they will develop into a loyal group of customers.

You'll also want to write articles--and a lot of them. You can become a columnist for online organizations and magazines that need writers. Don't expect to be paid (though some do offer a small stipend) but it is acceptable to ask to have a link to your website in the biography section of the article.

I also always recommend posting in appropriate forums in your area of expertise. One word of caution here: Don't directly sell things to people reading these forums. That's a sure-fire way to be banned and to upset the people there. Instead, put your website in your signature and offer sound, solid advice.

Use new social media tools like Twitter (and of course the "old" staples like LinkedIn and Facebook). These networks are still valuable; keep information updated and don't forget to get personal once in a while. People like to know that the person behind the website is a real human being. Be informative but don't be afraid to let people see who you are.

Danielle Babb is the founder of The Babb Group, an online entrepreneur, a professor, an author, public speaker and consultant. She has a Ph.D. in Organization and Management with a Technology emphasis, as well as an MBA with a technology emphasis. She is featured regularly on top networks such as CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, Fox Business and the Today show. She is also the author of The Online Professor’s Practical Guide to Starting an Internet Business, available from Entrepreneur Press.

Harness the Power of Surprise

I am always amazed when mediocre salespeople engage in their miserable excuse for selling. It's like they've slipped their prospects a pill and believe they can close by putting them to sleep.

Think about it: The Willy Lomans of the world walk in to see a prospect, turn down the lights, flip on the slideshow and everyone in attendance knows they are about to be sold.

The problem is that no one wants to be sold. As soon as their sales pitch detectors start to vibrate, they begin to turn off and put up the anti-sales shield. And the Willy Loman clone is a goner--shoeshine, smile and all.

So what to do? Never appear to be selling anything. Refrain from bringing any classic sales crutches with you. No catalogues. No portfolios. No price lists. No memos. These components of the traditional sales process are damaging for several reasons. They reinforce the expectation that you are just another salesperson and activate the sales guard detector. They deflect attention from you--and from the spell you must create to turn the sales visit into an experience. Most important, they deprive you of the element of surprise. And in the vast majority of cases, that's a deal killer. Here's how you can introduce and maintain the element--the power--of surprise.

Don't start by asking prospects what their needs are. That drivel is right out of the standard-issue sales coach playbook, and it's the polar opposite of what you should do.

What you should do is to control the agenda. Once you ask a question at the outset, you actually hand the stage over to the other party. You have lost it. Instead, start by providing a brief but highly compelling overview of what makes you, your product or company different and powerful. Instead of asking questions, do all of the talking right from the outset, telling a story that is engaging enough to captivate the prospect.

Case in point: I run a marketing firm that I believe is dramatically different from the standard aesthetics-focused firm. Instead, we're driven to grow businesses and to generate return on marketing investments.

I use the first 15 minutes of every prospect meeting to clearly and forcefully make this point. I don't "sell" in the classic sense. I educate. I do it with passion and conviction. I don't ask prospects what they need or want at this point. And they like what they hear because they have been frustrated by the standard-issue marketing firm that has failed to grow their businesses.

It's the element of surprise at work.

Once you begin to engage in a two-way conversation, don't automatically agree to meet your prospects' perceived needs. Why? In many cases, what they think they need isn't in their best interests. As the expert in what it is you're offering, you have experience and expertise that you need to share with your prospects.

Although it may seem counterintuitive, prospects respect you more when you say "no" to their requests--and provide them with more creative solutions--than if you simply provide what they ask for at the outset.

Every time you demonstrate that you're a solutions provider--an expert with the strength of your convictions as opposed to being an order taker--you rise in stature. And you reinforce the element of surprise.

Mark Stevens is the CEO of MSCO, a results-driven management and marketing firm, and the bestselling author of Your Marketing Sucks and God Is a Salesman. He is also a popular media commentator on a host of business matters including marketing, branding, management and sales. His latest book is Rich Is a Religion.

What is your goal in life?

In your last Radical Marketing Strategy email we spoke about
Peter Drucker's advice for business. He said that the business
enterprise has two, and only two, basic functions, innovation and
marketing.

Today I want to discuss the very first question I ask my
consulting clients. Whenever a client approaches me for
consulting work I first send him or her a list of questions about
them and their business.

The very first question I ask is "What is your goal in life?"
Most often this question really surprises them, and they have a
hard time answering it.

You as a business owner, should have goals. Business goals,
personal goals, family goals and health goals. Only once you
know your life goals can you develop your business goals.

A life without goals is like driving in a car without a map.
You're just driving round and round without a destination to
drive to.

This point reminds me of the scene in Lewis Carroll's classic
book Alice in Wonderland. One day Alice came to a fork in the
road and saw a Cheshire cat in a tree, the conversation went
something like this:

Alice: "Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from
here?"
"That depends a good deal on where you want to get to," said the
Cat.
"I don't much care where -" said Alice.
"Then it doesn't matter which way you go," said the Cat.

As a consultant I can't help someone who doesn't know where he or
she wants to go. In fact I sometimes refuse to take on clients
who are not sure about what they want out of life. I'd rather
deal with success oriented people.

Different people have different needs depending on their
circumstances. For example, a young man in his early twenties
might have ambitions of growing the business and opening new
locations and eventually franchising regionally, and then
globally. Whereas a mother of three in her forties might just
want to have a business part-time which she can go to in the
mornings when the kids are in school.

A man in his fifties or sixties might have worked hard all his
life and is now ready to sell his business. He may want to spend
more time with his grandchildren and pursue his hobbies. Each
case needs to be treated differently. It is vital therefore to
know what you want out of your life, and consequently out of your
business.

Researchers in the US conducted a very interesting long term
study on the effect of goal setting. If memory serves me
correctly the study was done between the 1950's and 70's at
Harvard. In the early 70's the researchers interviewed a group
of graduates they had interviewed 20 years earlier while they
were still in university.

The study found that only 5% of the students had set goals for
themselves, and that that 5% was more successful than the rest of
their colleagues combined!

That's the power of goal setting.

So here's today's lesson. Develop goals for yourself. Business
and personal goals. Then write them down and re-visit them
regularly. Once you've established your goals you can develop a
strategy to obtain them.

Personally I have my goals planned out 20 years in advance. Goal
setting is such an important part of success that I dare say you
will probably never succeed without them.

I hope this was useful . In your next Radical
Marketing Strategy email I'll talk about the Three Secrets to
Making Money.

Dedicated to your success,

Suhail G. Algosaibi, MBA, MCMI, AP
http://www.RadicalMarketing.com

Marketing and innovation

Today I want to discuss a very powerful statement made
by management guru Peter Drucker.

It is very rare for me to quote management theories and thinkers.
I find that too many management thinkers and academics are too
removed from the realities of day to day business. And of course
when it comes to entrepreneurial businesses they are even less
clued in.

But I want to make an exception today. I want to discuss a quote
by Peter Drucker. Peter Drucker is considered by many to be a
guru's guru and the father of modern management theory. His
works in the 1950's 60's and 70's still influence the way
management is practised today. Here's his quote:

"Because the purpose of business is to create a customer, the
business enterprise has two -and only two- basic functions:
marketing and innovation. Marketing and innovation produce
results; all the rest are costs. Marketing is the distinguishing,
unique function of the business."

I think he hit the nail on the head. Most business owners (and
especially large corporations) get their priorities wrong. They
focus on everything but creating customers. They often get
customers despite their poor marketing, not because of it.

As for innovation, I think that this is an extremely overlooked
(specially in the Middle East), yet immensely powerful, aspect of
business. One definition of innovation is "the introduction of
new ideas, goods, services, and practices which are intended to
be useful."

You as a business owner must constantly innovate. Come up with
new or improved ways of doing everything in your business. Not
only should you innovate with your products and services, but
also internally with your business processes.

Say you own a sandwich shop. One way to innovate would be to
come up with ways to reduce waste without compromising the
freshness of your ingeredients.

When it comes to sandwich deliveries, one way to innovate would
be to have a new computer system linked to your phone lines which
shows the customer's details on the screen when they call.
Another innovation would be to set up a system of automatic
delivery based on your customers' past patterns of purchase.

Another innovation would be to have your delivery person include
special offers for your customers' friends so they can refer
people to you. A further innovation would be to reward current
customers for bringing you new customers.

The next innovative step would be to have an online ordering and
processing system. Followed perhaps by an SMS ordering system.
The list goes on and on.

Focussing on marketing and innovation will really bring your
business to a new level. You will be setting new standards and
your business will be head and shoulders above the competitors.
They will be using ancient methods of doing business whereas you
will be on the forefront of innovation, enjoying a great
lifestyle and counting the large amounts of cash coming in every
month.

One more thing before I finish today. Being innovative does not
necessarily mean using new sophisticated technology. It just
means trying out new ideas and concepts, and measuring their
results. An innovation might be to reorganise your customer
order taking process and improving your filing system.

So to summarise , be a great marketer and a
great innovator.

Next week we'll talk about The Very First Question I Ask My
Clients.

Dedicated to your success,

Suhail G. Algosaibi, MBA, MCMI, AP
http://www.RadicalMarketing.com

E-Commerce - Middle East: Basics

E-Commerce - Dubai & Middle East: Basics

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Don't Fear Failure

One of the reasons so many people don't become entrepreneurs is because they're afraid of failing. They're afraid of making mistakes. They're afraid of losing money. But if people can't overcome these psychological fears, they'd be better off keeping their day jobs.

In the early 1980s, when my first major business failed, I thought I was the stupidest person in the world. Being flat broke and getting calls from creditors made me wish I had never wanted to be an entrepreneur. I even wanted my old job back.

But instead of condemning me for failing, my rich dad gave me one of life's most important lessons: "You're fortunate to have failed. You now have the opportunity to learn how to turn bad luck into good luck. If you can do that, you'll have a life of more and more good luck."

Here are three key points for turning bad luck into good luck:

1. Don't blame. When my rich dad asked me what went wrong, the first thing I did was blame my partners and the economy. He immediately said, "Never blame anyone for your failures."

   "But it was their fault," I replied.

   Shaking his head, my rich dad said, "If you blame someone else, you'll never learn from your mistake. If you blame, you give your power away." Remember, there are no victims--only volunteers. And you volunteered to become an entrepreneur.

2. Meet new partners. My rich dad said, "In every bad deal, I have always met good people. Some became new partners." Still hating two of my partners, it was hard for me to understand this statement, yet I took my rich dad's advice and began sifting through the wreckage.
   
   Today, one of my best friends came from that business fiasco. In the ruins of other business failures, I met my current partner in real estate and another partner in my franchise business. If not for the failures, I wouldn't have met those fellow entrepreneurs and gone on to make millions of dollars with them.

3. Study your mistakes. "Mistakes are priceless," my rich dad told me. "Study them, learn and profit from them."
   
   Again, this lesson was hard to hear. Being angry and broke, I wanted to run from my mistakes. But rather than run from my failure, I went back to my factory, studied my mistakes and resurrected the business.
   
   This is how I turn bad luck into good luck. Remember, making mistakes and becoming smarter is the job of an entrepreneur; not making mistakes is the job of an employee.

Robert Kiyosaki (richdad.com), author of the Rich Dad series of books, is an investor, entrepreneur and educator whose perspectives have changed the way people think about money and investing.