Here’s a little video segment from my “New Media Marketing for Small Business” workshop…
Can’t see this video? Click this: Brody Dorland Video Presentation – Traditional Media is On Its Last Let
“Blogging” – A Buzzkill for Small Businesses
By Brody Dorland — November 22nd, 2009
I’ve been presenting on social media marketing quite a bit around Kansas City and it’s neat to see so many folks getting excited about the opportunities that these tools and technologies provide. But I’ve noticed something that’s consistently happening during my presentations. As soon as I throw out the word “blogging”, I see eyes roll and shoulders drop throughout the audience. Geez….You’d think I was a Yellow Pages advertising rep at a search engine optimization conference.
For non-web-savvy people and businesses, the negative connotations of blogs and blogging are still top of mind. Do any of these sound familiar?
- Aren’t blogs just personal online diaries?
- If I start one, what the heck would I write about?
- I’d rather not create more work for myself or my business…
What is a blog…really? Read the rest of this entry »
As Seen in KC Small Business Monthly…A Social Media Article by Brody Dorland
By Brody Dorland — June 17th, 2009Sorry, shameless plug time…
An article I wrote on social media for small business was recently published in the April 2009 issue of the Kansas City Small Business Monthly magazine. Click the image or link below to view/read the full article.
Need Help with Social Media?
If you would like assistant developing and/or implementing a social media strategy for your business, please call 913-440-9930 or complete our contact form.
2009 Online Marketing Trends for Small Business – Part 4: RSS Feeds Will Go Mainstream
By Brody Dorland — March 21st, 2009Quick Series Recap – 2009 Online Marketing Trends for Small Business:
- Part 1 – Series Introduction & Personalized Search
- Part 2 – Bounce Rates Will Affect Your Rankings
- Part 3 – Online Conversations (Social Networking) will Foster Offline Connections
Part 4: RSS Feeds Will Go Mainstream
When I give presentations on internet marketing, Web 2.0 and social media, very rarely do I have an audience that understands the concept of RSS (Real Simple Syndication). There might be a few that raise their hands when I ask the RSS question, but even then I notice the worried looks on their faces that say, “Please don’t ask me to explain it.”
According to an October 2008 report from Forrester, consumer adoption of RSS is only 11%, while roughly 50% of the interactive marketing community is using it. I guess it’s pretty safe to attribute this to the tech-savvy nature of internet marketers, but as mainstream marketers and consumers learn about RSS’ many benefits and get more comfortable with the initial set-up requirements, I believe adoption will really take off. So, I’m going to take on a little of the educational burden and try to explain the RSS concept with an analogy of a technology that has seen much more widespread adoption…
2009 Online Marketing Trends for Small Business – Part 3: Online Conversations Will Foster Offline Connections
By Brody Dorland — March 10th, 2009
According to a report from Pew Internet & American Life Project (1/14/09), 35% of adults now have a profile on at least one social networking website. The growth of such social platforms as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn are astounding and show no signs of slowing, especially in this economy where companies are cutting back on traditional mediums and looking online for cost-effective alternatives.
Here are a few major factors to think about. Social media websites (blogs, forums, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc.) are built specifically to enable users to interact. Instead of coffee-shop conversations, people are talking about everything online. From the mundane (what they ate for breakfast), to the more substantive (“I was just in a car accident! Can anyone recommend a good chiropractor?”); opportunities abound for those who are listening.
2009 Online Marketing Trends for Small Business – Part 2: Bounce Rates Will Affect Your SE Rankings
By Brody Dorland — March 1st, 2009Quick Series Recap…Part One was a discussion regarding personalized search and how search engines are factoring in your location and past search habits to return search results that will be more relevant to you personally. If you are keeping tabs on your website’s SERPs, you may be surprised how your positions will vary across multiple searchers.
Part 2: Bounce Rates Will Affect Your Search Engine Rankings
Another new ranking factor that Google is starting to integrate is bounce rates. A “bounce” is determined when a visitor lands on one page of your site and then leaves. Web analytics software programs track these occurrences and tally them up to establish your site’s “bounce rate”. If people are consistently landing on your site and then bailing, but they stick around and peruse your competitor’s site, what would we logically surmise from this situation? Their site must be more engaging. Google is going to give them credit for that and rank them higher. Can you blame them?
Google has done a spectacular job of flooding the web world with their free Google Analytics (GA) platform. On the website owner side of the coin, GA offers a plethora of analysis and reporting tools that provides an enormous amount of insight into how a website is performing. On the other side of the coin, Google is storing and mining all that data. And since GA has been so widely adopted, Google is keeping tabs on hundreds of thousands of sites.
I’m a GA user. They know my site’s bounce rate. I can only hope my bounce rate is helping my rankings.
Might your bounce rate be negatively affecting your rankings? Are you monitoring your bounce rate? Need help?
2009 Online Marketing Trends for Small Business – Series Introduction & Part 1: Personalized Search
By Brody Dorland — February 21st, 2009A few words to introduce this series… I started writing this as a single article, but realized quickly that my explanation/commentary of each trend was almost an article in itself. So, I’ve turned it into a 10 part series covering the 2009 Online Marketing Trends that I feel small businesses should know about and consider as part of their future marketing strategies. Here goes…
2009 Online Marketing Trends for Small Business – Introduction
I came across a report the other day on Online Marketing Trends for 2009, developed by Strange Media, and the opening statement really hit home with me…
“2009 is likely to be a challenging year for many businesses as the global economic slowdown takes hold. Digital marketing, however, looks set to continue its rapid growth, as its many solutions and advantages become even more apparent when marketing budgets are subjected to even greater constraints.”
As industry giants feel the pinch and scramble to maintain market share and mass appeal, small businesses are uniquely positioned to move quickly and flourish within the emerging marketplace of online consumers.
Let’s face facts…Tough economic times means more people using the internet to research products and services, and more people searching online for the best deals. Small businesses that focus on continually building a strong online presence will be positioned well to chip away at the market share of their slower, larger competitors.
The Strange Media report mentioned above lists 16 online marketing trends for 2009, several of which I will touch on here. But many trends within their report may be “over the heads” of most small businesses who are still getting their online legs. Instead of throwing a bunch of advanced digital marketing topics at you, I’d like to focus on 10 internet and search marketing trends that I feel small businesses should understand and can take advantage of quickly.
Part 1: Personalized Search
Also referred to as behavior-based search, personalized search is a set of ranking factors that Google and other search engines have gradually implemented within their already-complex search algorithms. For years, Google has been keeping tabs on how we search, what we search for and the types websites we frequent. They also know where we live (think “Big Brother”). Therefore, in an effort to provide us with the most relevant search results, they’re factoring our search patterns and location into their algorithms and presenting us with web pages that are not only good matches contextually, but also good matches geographically.
For example, I type “underwater basket weaving training” in Google. Before personalized search, top web page results may have been dominated by top trainers in San Diego, Tampa or even Cancun. Well, I live in Kansas, and when I’ve done searches with the term “training” in the past, I’ve always clicked on Kansas City-based companies. With personalized search, an underwater basket weaving trainer based in Kansas City may find themselves on the first page of the Google results when I’m searching for them.
There’s an additional wrinkle to this that I should mention. For those companies who have been hanging your hats on top Google rankings, realize that personalized search may throw off your analysis. Searching from your computer may be returning top rankings for your key terms, but doing the same search at another location may return a very different result. Just remember that a certain ranking position doesn’t necessarily dictate success. Converting website traffic into customers dictates success. Focus your success metrics on conversion rates and know that personalized search may play a significant role in bringing higher quality traffic (fewer bounces) to your site.
Does this make sense? Did I miss anything? Feel free to comment…
Stay tuned for Part 2: Bounce Rates Will Affect Your Search Engine Rankings – Subscribe to the series via e-mail or my RSS feed.
Run A Referral-Based Business? 4 Reasons Why You Still Need a Solid Website
By Brody Dorland — June 1st, 2008
Recently I was approached by a friend to provide an estimate on a new website for his company. During our initial discussions, we talked about his company’s strategic goals, their audiences and the markets in which they serve. Also during our discussion, he mentioned the fact that his boss, the owner of the company, was not necessarily sold on the need to invest much money on the website since referrals are really their primary focus for generating new business.
As the owner of a referral-based small business myself, I certainly understand the notion that making a significant investment in something that may not bring a return might not be a smart move. But as a website developer, I have also seen first hand how a solid website can be the soft-selling opportunity that gives prospects the confidence to pick up the phone and call you.
Sales & Marketing Are a Lot Like Dating
I find it funny how sales and marketing can be a lot like dating. As a confident guy, you feel like you have a lot to offer a girl and most of the time, when in social situations, you can get her digits, which may or may not lead to something. But she hears good things about you from her friends, so she decides to take the next step and try out your goods (bare with me here people).
But what happens when a nice girl, who has just moved into the area and doesn’t know a lot of people, starts her search on the web? She’s busy with her new job and doesn’t really make it out to the social scene. Other than the web, she really has no way of knowing you exist and might just be her soul mate.
So she starts her search and finds a lot to choose from. There are big guys, little guys, and cute guys with lots of flash, but not much substance. She’s determined to find the right guy that “completes her”, but since you didn’t make a proper investment in your website, this match made in heaven may never happen.
There are a few key points within this analogy that I’d like to drive home…
- You Can’t Be Everywhere at Once – While your personal networking efforts may always be your number one new business generator, you can’t be everywhere at once. Business growth really starts ramping up when you can duplicate your presence (your brand and your message) in many different, targeted mediums.
- Search Engine Optimization/Internet Marketing – The internet is the first place people go to source products and services. And search engines are the driver. Period. In order to capitalize on these buying opportunities, search engine optimization and internet marketing strategies should play an ever-increasing role in your marketing efforts.
- Perceived Value – First impressions are everything. If your site’s design and organization are subpar, your company will be perceived as the same, subpar. A proper investment in your website design and website architecture will go along way in raising the perceived value of your company.
- Content Expectations – Every time a new visitor stumbles onto your website, they are looking for something, and they expect to find it. If they don’t, they move on. A solid website is one that has been carefully engineered to quickly provide the content that your target customers will need to make a buying decision. And the most effective content is professionally written and delivered as if you were providing it in person.
All Alone on a Saturday Night
Bottom line, it doesn’t necessarily take a big investment to build a solid website that can be found on search engines. The key here is to make an appropriate investment to build a site that can help you reach your goals for business growth. Not investing enough may leave you sitting at home alone on a Saturday night waiting for the phone to ring.
What If Your Website Was a Real-Life Salesperson?
By Brody Dorland — March 1st, 2008
In today’s business environment, every company needs a website. And if you’re a small business with a limited budget, a low-cost solution may be tempting. But what if your website was a real-life salesperson? Would your lack of investment in them set them up for failure?
I’m forced to use this analogy more than I would like these days. While I can’t do anything about the people/companies that offer so-called high-quality website development services for dirt cheap, I can try to help small businesses understand why you need to make an appropriate investment in your 24/7 sales workhorse.
You Get What You Pay For
Developing a high-quality website from scratch takes most, if not all, of the items listed below. Completing these items is time consuming and takes a lot of creative and technical talent. So how do the cheap service providers charge so little? Simple. They don’t offer many of these services…
Website Strategy – Included in the Low-Cost Solution? No.
Like any successful marketing initiative, proper research and planning need to be the first step. Getting website marketing experts involved early on will give you an outside perspective and help you profile your audiences, define their needs and adapt your corporate growth strategies to the web.
Content Strategy – Included in the Low-Cost Solution? No.
Once you have a good handle on what your customers need, your content needs to feed those needs and keep them coming back for more. A content strategy helps to keep your content fresh and establish internal or external processes for ongoing content development and website promotions.
Information Architecture – Included in the Low-Cost Solution? No.
Website users can quickly feel lost if placed within a space that is not well organized. Information architecture focuses on usability and designing an effective site organization, navigation and nomenclature, all of which are best handled by professionals.
Custom Design – Included in the Low-Cost Solution? Kind of.
Do you consider customizing a pre-designed template as “custom design”? I almost can’t wait to be contacted by a company that was told their site was “custom”, only to come across another site that looks suspiciously similar.
Website Production Standards & Compliance – Included in Low Budget Solution? Probably.
I’d bet that a large majority of the cheap service providers out there are actually programmers (not marketers), so your website will probably meet compliance and compatibility standards.
Professional Content Development – Included in the Low-Cost Solution? No.
You can dress up an attractive salesperson in a custom tailored suit, but if his sales pitch stinks, he’s not going to convert prospects into buyers. Heck, he probably won’t even make it past the receptionist. Writing engaging copy for websites is an art and a science and getting a professional website copywriter involved is a very wise investment.
Content Management Tools – Included in the Low-Cost Solution? No.
Many low-cost providers don’t provide content management options because they are banking on the recurring revenue your website will provide.
Search Engine Optimization – Included in the Low-Cost Solution? Kind of.
Ask any professional search engine marketer about submitting your site to search engines and optimizing your site’s Title and Meta tags and they’ll tell you that those techniques are important. But if you ask them, “Will this get me to #1 on Google?” They’ll probably laugh at you. These few techniques are all you’re going to get out of cheap website service providers.
Website Analytics Integration – Included in the Low-Cost Solution? No.
Since many low-cost providers are also programmers who are probably running their own servers, they will probably include some basic traffic statistics for your site. But this is only the tip of the iceberg when you integrate free tools like Google Analytics into your site that will provide so much more user behavioral analysis and conversion tracking.
Internet Marketing – Included in the Low-Cost Solution? No.
With so many internet marketing tools at our fingertips, developing and launching your website is only the beginning. Now it’s time to go fishing.
Conclusion
A small business need to think of their website as a salesperson. A salesperson with vast potential. When you provide that salesperson with proper training (website and content strategy), a sharp business suit (great design), an engaging sales pitch (great content) and great connections to a huge network of potential customers (SEO and internet marketing), you may be surprised at how quickly your investment is returned, and then some.
