Maybe the rebel in you says “Who cares what Google has on me?” Maybe you really don’t care, but if that’s the case, let us consider reasons why you really should care. Maybe you just gave up trying to have a “clean” representation on Google. Too many people view it as a futile effort and throw in the towel, give up, and just live with it.

It may shock you how many websites collect information about you, and what they are presenting to anybody looking. What Google is telling people about you matters more than ever before. Just one ugly social media rant on a bad day – or worse, one politically incorrect slip on your part may cost you, big. Add in some faulty information or somebody with the same or similar name, and it can be a big problem – but avoidable.

It recently struck me, as I decided to re-publish this old blog after taking it down five years ago. I want my own words to be there when they Google Mark Murnahan.

Your name is your personal brand, and it deserves to be defended. Let’s consider why your public reputation matters.

What if They Google You? Imagine for a Moment

Even if you don’t care, somebody probably does care what the Internet says about you. It isn’t just about looking good among friends. It can cost you a future job – or even a current job. It could keep you (or your kid) from getting that college acceptance letter (true story). It could mean you don’t get a second date. It could even hurt somebody near you. As a father, you can bet I’m Googling the kids that my kids hang out with, along with their parents.

The reasons to be aware and manage what’s out there are numerous. An estimated seventy-five percent of companies will Google your name to make hiring decisions. I suspect that’s a low estimate. What if you are not looking for a job? Maybe the threat doesn’t feel as grave, but bosses eventually retire, quit, or move on. What if the new boss wants to know you a little better?
What will they find?

What about a date? It may seem all magical at first, but when they stop responding to your messages, it may be time to see what they found online, and freshen it up a bit.

There are many reasons to consider what’s out there in the wild, with your name on it. Information doesn’t even have to be true to cause damage. It’s really worth the minutes it takes to find out, and begin to address it.

Being proactive and building positive information in search results is the best answer. That makes it much harder for the ugly stuff to build up later. If it’s already a bit messy, it is time to give Google something positive to show people.

It’s Time to BrandYourself!

BrandYourself offers a free tool to help you discover things that may be holding you back or harming your good name, online. It will find things you may not realize are out there in the wild, including a thorough look at search and social media sites. The results may surprise you.

A free BrandYourself profile will give you another page that will climb the search rankings and help knock down another of the things you don’t want in the top listings. It will also help the good information that you list on your profile, such as your LinkedIn, Twitter, your blog, or other pages, to rank better and hold their position. This makes it a great tool, both proactively and reactively, to improve your online reputation.

The tools of BrandYourself are robust, well-researched, and include useful tips to help you do it yourself. You can also set up notifications to keep an eye on your progress. They have service upgrades available, and even a Concierge Service in case you need their professional help.

Rather than explain it all to you, here’s their “Shark Tank” pitch from 2015. Notice that they turned down millions of dollars from the Sharks, but went on to do far better elsewhere. Since that time, they have grown the tools on an impressive scale. The social media tools are very robust, and the search value is excellent.

Here is an example of a BrandYourself profile: Mark Murnahan

The post Who Googles Your Name? Here’s Why You Should Care appeared first on SEO and Social Media Marketing by Mark Murnahan.

In the five years since my most recent post here (in 2012), I have learned a lot, and I have a lot to share. I also see that I have a lot of sprucing up to do. This old blog is a mess. The code is ancient, the design is a throwback, and it is about as mobile friendly as a dunk in the toilet. I will get to it soon.

While I was away, I have owned and operated the most charming bakery I ever imagined. I was fortunate to find many of you, dear readers from all over the world, walking through the door for a fantastic cup of coffee, an amazing pastry, and a fun chat. I thank you kindly for that patronage.

While I enjoyed the endeavors of these past five years very much, I have freed my body from those 90 hours per week on my feet in the bakery in exchange for a leisurely 90 hours per week on my rump at a computer.

For everybody I have missed, I have some awesome tales to tell about how social media meets brick and mortar. I look forward to catching up.

If you’ll still have me, this could be like one of those sweet movie scenes where they reconnect and have a great moment.

How about it? I say we resume some fun, together.

Many Cheers from your old pal, Mark Murnahan.

The post Five Years Later – What Happened, and What’s Next? appeared first on SEO and Social Media Marketing by Mark Murnahan.

We’ve all surely heard that recruiters rely heavily on the use of social media for filling positions. It’s why we take down all of the party pics on Facebook, and stop beating our chest about politics or religion on Twitter. Those recruiters are watching. Right?

According to some people, recruiters and hiring managers are filling their quotas with the use of what they call “social recruiting”, but is it actually the way they’re telling it? Is social recruiting really the way jobs are being filled? I know what they’re saying, but I see something very different in what they’re actually doing.

As I see it, there are three very useful functions of social media for recruiters, as it applies to job candidates. I question how recruiters view each of these, and I have tried to identify which functions are considered important to them – if any. If you are a recruiter, please share your insight with other readers. In my estimation, the best social media assets for recruiters are as follows:

• Networking/discovery of candidates
• Candidate research
• Communications with candidates

Many people will claim that social media is highly important to recruiters, but I think we should test this theory in the real world. Actually, I already have done a bit of testing, and I have some good reasons to question the importance they place on each of these three facets I’ve listed. I will share what I have found.

First, for job seekers, I want to point out that the “old fashioned” job seeking methods are still very important. I will explain this by sharing my experience, and I really believe it should not go overlooked.

“Old Fashioned” Job Hunting is Still Important!

My search started out really exciting, but a little bit “old fashioned”. Even as a person who has written more than a million words about social media, including a book, my first efforts were the old fashioned way, combined with the use of social media.

It was a calculated effort. I carefully considered companies where I would love to work, and I did my research on them. I connected with employees, asked questions, learned about the company culture, and developed a good picture of the company and their needs.

I defined their expectations, and I formulated my approach. I wrote out a brilliant résumé and some amazing cover letters. I built my case by explaining all the great reasons I would be an asset, and also how much I would enjoy being a part of their organizations.

I sent my letters to the people in charge at the companies I had so greatly admired. I even sent them by FedEx to be sure the right people received them. That should work, right? It should at least help.

Recruiters and Social Media Candidate Research

Where I imagined the social media would be most important to these chosen companies was in the area of candidate research. If the human resources department and hiring managers were going to use social media as a hiring tool, they would find out a lot of great things about me.

In fact, if they gave social media much weight at all, I would surely stand out. My reputation is squeaky clean, people say nice things about me, and I’m even pretty popular by most standards. I have a ginormous blog readership (and no, I’m not calling you “husky”). Google search results for my name paint a picture of a successful executive – and not an ax murderer. I have over 25,000 followers on Twitter, a solid Klout score, and I look good by all of those other superficial measures that some people think matter. To top it off, about the most incriminating photo of me on Facebook is when I was caught wrapped in a pastel blanket and napping on the sofa snuggled up beside one of my children.

If social media was actually a significant factor to these recruiters, I should be a shoe-in.

Oh, but it is not so simple. I followed up on my efforts with telephone calls and letters. I refrained from belching, cursing, or any of the other big deal breakers. I subsequently discovered there are many reasons for not landing a particular job – or even getting an interview. There is a lot of competition.

Timing is also very important in a job hunt. Many companies will advertise that they are hiring for a given position, but that is often long before the position is actually to be filled. Some of them have already made their choice for a candidate and plan to hire from within, but they still go through the motions of seeing what else is out there. The list of challenges can get long.

There must be a good way to reach those recruiters at the right company and at the right time … right? After all, what about those amazing stories you hear about people getting jobs by way of social media?

I will share some example communications with recruiters by way of social media. This covers the rest of those three areas where I believe social media can be most valuable to recruiters – Networking/discovery of candidates, and communications with candidates.

Recruiters and Social Media Candidate Networking, Discovery, and Communications

I’ll offer just a couple of many examples I have seen. I intend for this to be constructive for the human resources/recruiting industry, and job seekers alike. I have heard things very similar to these examples from peers, and witnessed many other instances while watching companies closely. These are just two recent observations from my own personal search for the right company. I have every reason to believe that these are not just isolated incidents.

I will begin with an instance of a thriving company that approached me on Twitter. I want to note that they approached me publicly, and based on my research, nobody else before or since. Here is what they had to say:

It seems they may have been interested, so I responded on Twitter within minutes and followed up with my resume and cover letter the next morning – March 7th. I never heard anything back from them by way of Twitter or email, so I followed up by email and Twitter on March 16th – ten days after their initial communication. I still never heard anything – but is this an isolated incident? Absolutely not!

Here is another instance where I have made significant efforts at communication with a company that is in the business of recruiting. They are seeking a VP of Marketing for their own company, and I have applied. I reached out by email, LinkedIn, Twitter, and comments on their blog. I have followed up very thoughtfully, and given them reasons to recall my name. I am not offended in the least if they are not interested, but I have done my part to show my qualifications, and given good reasons and opportunities to communicate.

Beep beep! Here comes a convoy of irony for you.

In a recent article on their blog, they suggested ways for people to use social media in their career search. There is about three truckloads of irony in that blog. Their company has a relatively anti-social social media presence, and frequently fails to respond to their audience at all – I’ve been watching. In fact in that very blog article, they were the only user to tweet it in the first day it was published, and I was one of only two people to comment on it.

My comment has still never received a response, and if you only have two comments on a blog, responding to them is Social Media 101 – the most basic. The writer has accepted my connection request on LinkedIn, but she stopped short of actually responding to my friendly email greeting – so she is just another blank space … a name and a picture. When I went to the writer’s Google+ profile, there was nothing to see, because she had not shared a single item publicly – only to her own Google+ “circles” and “extended circles”. She had not even made the articles she had written on the company blog visible to the public. To me, this seems to indicate a need for some training.

Look, I don’t expect anybody to hang on every word I say, but I believe that if I shared all of my communication attempts with this company, you may think they are nuts to not follow up with me. It would seem they should at least to keep me impressed with their company, because who knows – I may know a person or two. I’m trying my best to be unbiased, and I can legitimately say that this company is missing the big picture.

Incidentally, I was fortunate to have a few words on Twitter with the CEO / hiring manager for that VP position. I would describe this individual as a “Grand Poobah” of the recruiting industry, but yet, I would not call this person, or the company, an earnest user of social media. Here’s how it went:

I followed up on this short communication with email on the following Monday. Then, after a ten day pause of complete silence from the Grand Poobah – and I mean the Poobah has not even sent a single tweet to anybody (publicly at least), I decided to check for a pulse and I sent this message on Twitter, and also another follow up email.

I Respect Recruiters

I respect recruiters – I really do, because I know it is a tough job to find the right people. I have been a CEO, so I know the challenges well. At the same time, I have my doubts about the weight recruiters place on the use of social media, and whether it is really as important as many people will say.

I recently read a study that claims recruiters only spend an average of six seconds per résumé as they scan through squillions of them. Unemployment is high, so there are a lot of people applying. It makes me wonder if recruiters ever really feel a need to look very carefully to fill a position. It also makes me wonder if they even have enough time to make a good assessment of an applicant’s qualifications – or disqualifications – based on social media.

That knocks a pretty big hole in the list of three things I estimated to be the most important uses of social media for recruiters.

With these examples in mind, and my assurance that I have a big stockpile of further examples, I want you to be the judge. If you are a recruiter, I want to hear your take on this. If you are a job seeker, I want to hear from you, too. Please add your comments and pass this along so others can share their insights.

Job seekers: Please feel free to give yourself a plug, and include a link to your résumé.

As a final note, I’m still looking, and I will relocate to anywhere in the USA for the right company. If you’re looking for me, too, please take a moment to get to know more about me and review my résumé.

The post Job Recruiting and Social Media: Is Social Recruiting Really as Advertised? appeared first on SEO and Social Media Marketing by Mark Murnahan.

Yes, that is a nice idea, but let’s face it – there is a lot of information online, and it cannot all be true. Let’s consider how false information is often deemed true, true information is deemed false, and how people decide for themselves what is “true” or “false”.

Like it or not, the things people believe are often based on what they want to believe – and what others around them believe. We are each influenced very uniquely, and whether marketing an agenda or defending ourselves, it is important to recognize those influences.

Facts are commonly disregarded, in favor of more subjective means of decision making such as societal perception and emotion. Allow me to give you examples.

I recently read an article produced by ABC News about “Pink Slime” being added to ground beef products. It has been in the news a lot, recently. What they call “Pink Slime” is made up of scraps of meat that would be otherwise wasted, but instead are finely ground and processed to be mixed with other ground beef. The beef industry calls it “Lean, Finely Textured Beef” or “LFTB”. It has been used for over 20 years in America’s food supply, but news agencies recently uncovered a great opportunity to make a sensational story.

Questioning Pink Slime and Industry Agendas

Maybe Pink Slime is horrible stuff, and maybe it is not. That’s not the point I am after. Regardless of whether it is good or bad, it brought up some thoughts about people’s system of beliefs and reactions to things they read. On either side of the topic, there are people who will strongly believe in their viewpoint, but the side that many people will believe is the one which creates the stronger emotional draw.

The article was produced by a large news agency, and pretended to be journalistic, but there was a strong slant against the use of beef additives. As I read through the comments, it was obvious how it influenced others. In fact, there were only a few who questioned the source reliability and bias. It emphasized how people react to fact or fiction based on emotion, and in this case the emotion was influenced by presentation.

When something affects people emotionally, and they can personally identify with the topic, they are far more likely to find something believable. If they have a connection of trust with the source, it becomes even more believable. For example, I could probably write a convincing story about green pixie dust, and it would seem a lot more “true” to long-time readers and friends than to people who do not know, like, or respect me. It would be even more believable if I created an emotional attachment and led people to believe there is something important at stake for them.

The topic of Pink Slime has a lot of people up in arms, demanding tighter government regulation of “Lean, Finely Textured Beef”. The comments on the ABC News article expressed anger toward the evil companies using it, and the evil government that had surely been paid off to allow its use. I was a bit surprised nobody claimed it had killed their pet unicorn or had spawned a new sub-species of humans that can only eat through a straw.

The readers responded very emotionally, but only a few pointed out unbiased and unemotional facts about pink slime. That ability to move people away from facts or toward the facts to support a particular viewpoint is how marketing works at its best – and its worst.

In another article on Discovery.com, the concerns of Pink Slime were addressed quite differently – based on the “Ick Factor”. Here is a quote from the article titled “PINK SLIME: PSYCHOLOGY OF THE ICK FACTOR“.

The article also considered Jell-O, but it seems far fewer people complain about gelatin products. I will give you another quote to consider.

The beef industry may point out that meat prices will skyrocket without pink slime. Maybe it is true. Maybe this USDA regulated meat product is safe and nutritious. Maybe it is not. What we can be certain of is that there are multiple agendas involved in its discussion, and the facts will “bend” based on who is presenting them, how they are presented, and to whom.

Once something of this emotionally-charged level of interest is presented, society and its inherent emotion-based process will prevail – one way or the other, and for better or worse.

Do You Ever Question Politics? Let’s Have Some Fun!

Another very easy way to explore this type of emotional “fact-checking” (gut checking) is to look at politics. It is a presidential election year in USA, so politics is on a lot of minds. Let’s consider how we make things feel more believable and “true” based on personal experience, influence from the people around us, and emotional attachments. Make no mistakes about this, because none of us are fully immune.

Many people identify with a given political party based on how they were raised, where they work, where they live, or other societal input. It is very unreliable, but most people have a hard time accepting that they may be getting the wrong story – or at least a story very tainted with emotion.

With regard to politics, once people choose their political party, they will often remain influenced by that group and will base their views on the group’s influence.

Let’s have some fun examining the two popular political parties in America, and how people of one political party may view the other. Let’s also consider how rigid people are in their beliefs and unlikely – or even incapable – to acknowledge varying viewpoints with flexibility and fairness.

I know you nodded your head or identified with something in those stereotypes. I hope you did not identify too perfectly either way, but I’m trying to make a point.

The point is that people think in packs. It is generally true that people make decisions about what they accept as fact, based on the people around them, combined with their own experiences, and their own desire to believe it. The presentation is critical, both in how it is presented and to whom.

Know This About Marketing!

I hope you can see how the ideas here are very important factors in your marketing approach. If you do not reach the right audience and understand how people are influenced, it is easy to waste a lot of marketing resources.

Getting these principles right can create a lot of great business opportunities, but I must caution you to be very careful, too. The knife cuts in both directions. If you are falling prey to the emotional pull of the Internet’s popular notions of getting rich quick and easy with low efforts, it’s time to get a checkup from the neck up. That idea is popular and has a lot of emotional draw, but does it really settle right with you?

I guess you could say I am a bit of a whistle-blower about bad information online. I have explained the common SEO lies and publicly called out social media frauds. I try to encourage critical thinking, but perhaps understanding what leads people to believe something that is otherwise irrational or unbelievable is the best way to keep you safe from misinformation.

Now, please consider how believable something can become if you really want to believe it, and if others around you believe it, too. Then, perhaps the next time somebody tries to sell you their new variety of success in a box or easy-money green pixie dust, you will better understand how they make it so appealing.

Go ahead and tell me what you think about Pink Slime, democrats, republicans, marketing, or whatever this brings to mind for you.

The post Pink Slime, Politics, and Marketing: Should You Doubt What You Read? appeared first on SEO and Social Media Marketing by Mark Murnahan.

I often hear people say they just don’t have enough time. I want to inspire you to question how you are using your time, and how you could be doing it better.

You can scale this however you like – from an individual to the largest corporations – time is a very precious business resource. I want you to take this personally, so I’m scaling this down to just you. That’s because you are responsible to yourself, first. It’s easy to scale this up and see how it can affect any company of any size.

If you are wasting time doing the wrong things, you can stop complaining right now, because you are getting exactly what you asked for. You must defend your time, and treat it like the valuable asset it truly represents to your business.

Why Do Competitors Always Have More Time?

Lack of time is one of the most common excuses I hear from people about why their marketing is in shambles. It is an especially popular excuse that people will use for neglecting their online market. They will say “I don’t have time to understand and use social media” or “I don’t have time to write a blog.”

Others will sit and gaze into Twitter or Facebook for hours on end while deluding themselves that they are actually being productive. Worse yet, some will spend countless hours trying to get more people to click on their website links, without a productive marketing plan that addresses who is clicking or why they would want to.

People who are using the excuse of time will seldom like to accept that although they “don’t have the time”, their competition does have the time, and they are using it to win market share. Let me tell you, it’s not about the amount of available time – it’s how they prioritize the resource.

Time and Money Are Friends on Facebook

It’s tragic but expected that I hear the excuse of time-shortage from the same people who say they don’t have enough money. That’s more than just coincidence. Using time poorly will usually have a pretty devastating affect on finances, while using money badly creates a huge drain on time.

Just imagine how much more you could afford to delegate to others if you just started using your time better. Then you could surely get a lot more done. Yes, indeed, time and money are deeply connected.

The challenges of time and money cause an ugly and wasteful dilemma, and until priorities are sorted out, the cycle of waste will continue. Here’s the kicker though – you have exactly the same amount of time as everybody else.

Don’t Let Yourself Off the Hook!

I’m not going to criticize others about their poor use of time without accepting my own guilt. I shudder to look at how many useful or interesting things I see on the Internet, but only make minimal use of. I have a huge stockpile of links to articles I mean to finish reading – but I’ll have to get back to them after I follow up on some email. It all gets pretty messy without a solid routine – and a whole lot of discipline.

Discipline is especially important once you click open a web browser. There is always something shiny, blinky, and time-robbing just a click away. Controlling those urges to try and see and do everything is a big step toward productivity. You simply have to shut some of it off, and if you miss a few things, it is likely for the best. You cannot do and see it all, and you should stop trying. Focused and highly disciplined use of your time at a that computer can make a huge difference in the outcome of your goals.

I don’t have it perfect, and neither do you. What I can claim is that I’m trying, and I hope you are trying, too.

Stop Being Defensive and Delusional

People are often reluctant to accept that when they use the “not enough time” excuse it is largely because they are using their time poorly. Many people are quite defensive about their inefficient use of time. After all, who likes to accept the reality that they are messing things up, and it’s all their own fault? Denial is a wicked thing, so it’s best to just accept it – you can do a better job of time management.

If you don’t have time to do things you know you should be doing, it is time to take a closer look at what you are doing that wastes your time. Since we each have exactly the same number of hours in a day, days in a week, and weeks in a year, time is not the problem. Priorities … now there’s the real challenge!

How Was Your 168 Hours?

It’s another Friday, and I’m gazing back through my week at what I have done – and also what I have not done. This week was not any longer than last week, nor shorter than next week. As expected, 168 hours have passed since this time last Friday, and I have 168 hours until this time next Friday.

I didn’t complete my recent objective of finding the job of my dreams this week. I’m willing to accept that it is largely my own fault. I made a lot of progress, but I took my eyes off the prize at times. I can make plenty of excuses, but I know that each excuse really comes down to priorities.

So now I wonder, how was your week, and what have you done to prioritize the next one even better? If you have any ideas for the rest of us, please share your comments. If you have a helpful tip, or a link to a helpful tip, please share your comments with the rest of us guilty time-wasters.

The next time you catch yourself in a loss for time, consider how you are using it. Are you making a list of priorities? Are you following a defined plan? Are you doing what it takes to use your time efficiently, or are you just making flimsy excuses like most people?

You may think I should give you a bunch of resources to free up your time. There are many good ideas in my blog archive, but most importantly, you must first recognize that there is a flaw before you can fix it.

Photo Credit:
it’s being time by Gisela Giardino via Flickr

The post Stop Fighting With Time and Build a Better Marketing Plan appeared first on SEO and Social Media Marketing by Mark Murnahan.

It would be unwise to throw away your profit on SEO services just because you hope it may work out – someday. Don’t pretend to be shocked if I tell you that’s exactly what a lot of people are doing every day. I see it all the time that companies test the water and shakily hand over their credit card to the next SEO that gave them a good pitch. Other companies have all the skill they need for success, but they fail to use it.

I will give you some good pointers on how to select a good SEO, the basic components of their role, and even why you may (or may not) be able to handle much of it without their help.

SEO be damned, I’m going to tell you the truth you may not want to hear. It may sting, but it also may save you a lot of time, money, and frustration. I’m not just out to knock search engine optimizers, either. There are a lot of very talented SEO out there who just don’t want to talk to you because you’re trying to compare apples to airliners. As I tell you this, be mindful that it’s your business on the line, so if you’re getting this wrong, your company is the one that suffers.

SEO is a Double-Edged Sword

Don’t get me wrong about the value of good SEO. If you’ve got a good SEO, by all means, hang on to them. They are probably making you a lot of money. The problem is that statistically, most SEO are not very good at the job. Good ones are few and far between. It takes a lot of knowledge and experience to be really good at SEO. The best ones are also very well connected, and you don’t buy that for a few thousand bucks.

A truly qualified search engine optimizer can make an amazing difference in your business, but search engine optimization is a sword that cuts both ways.

Let’s make no mistakes about this: A legitimate attempt to reach your online audience can multiply your business, but an uncommitted and ill-considered effort can send it the other way … fast, and in more ways than you may realize. Rather than paying an inexperienced SEO who is still learning, you may do better to handle it yourself. It is true that a bad SEO can cost you a lot more than you pay them. Seriously – if you doubt me even a little bit, read about “Google Panda, Google Bowling, and How Bad SEO Can Kill Your Business“. If you’re trying to get by the cheap way, it’s like hunting for the cheapest root canal … it’s likely to hurt.

Do You Really Need Your SEO?

What makes you believe that you need a search engine optimizer? Think about that really hard. If you don’t have the right answer, based on the right strategy, it may be time to fire your SEO.

If your answer is that you have a legitimate business case for it, like most companies do, that’s great. Examine the business need carefully, choose your provider wisely, and make a strong commitment. Be sure that they understand your goals, and that they can provide a realistic forecast based on their work.

You should be prepared to pay them for that forecast, too. Otherwise, you are likely to make some huge strategic marketing errors. If you’ve chosen wisely, it will be worth every dollar you spend for their market research. If you get a good one, don’t expect to get their research for free. I’ll tell you why if you read that link I just gave you.

You should understand that even the best search engine optimizer will fail to bring you optimal results if you “kneecap” them with short budgets, “not enough time”, or other excuses. One of the worst things you can do is to make excuses because you are just too afraid to implement things they recommend based on their solid research. That frankly just pisses them off.

Understanding the math of SEO, and how it pertains to your specific business needs will matter more than you likely realize. I’m not kidding, and I’m not making this up. I’ll explain more about the math of SEO return on investment in a moment.

On the other hand, if your answer to why you need SEO services is that you’re trying it out because you are hopeful it will eventually have an impact, I have a suggestion: Fire your SEO immediately! Don’t pay them another dollar until you have a better answer. Hope alone does not create profit, and it can lead you down a really bad path. If you’re just “testing the water”, take your money and use it elsewhere in your business. There are sharks in that water!

Reaching a usefully measurable result with search engine optimization does not happen from “testing the water”. There is a bell curve (a gaussian function) at work, and it does not work in favor of minimized efforts.

In case you never heard of The Pareto Principle – a widely used economic principle – it is worth the effort to understand it and apply it to your marketing.

Why to Fire Your SEO: Three Things You Should Know

SEO creates a lot of mixed reactions. If you ask a room full of business people about their experiences with SEO, you are likely to hear everything from extreme delight to extreme dismay. These few points are important to know if you want to avoid the dismay.

SEO is Not High Tech! I know that search engine optimization may sound very tricky and technical – and it is in some ways – but the technology aspects of SEO are only a small part of the “magic” a search engine optimizer actually does. I suggest reading “Search Engine Optimization is Not a Technology Job!” If you wonder if it is just one person’s opinion, be sure to read the comments to see what other professionals had to say.

If your SEO has ever led you to believe that their work is largely a matter of technical things, or that you don’t have the time or intelligence to understand what you are paying them for – Fire Them! No, wait … don’t fire them … incinerate them, because they are like zombies, and you don’t want them coming back to try and eat more of your brains again later.

Good SEO Are Smart Cookies! You should understand that you don’t just pay an SEO for what they do – you pay them for what they know, and for what they research on your behalf. If you want the best SEO results, you will need to hire some very talented and creative people.

Here’s the kicker: If they are smart enough to help you, they are also smart enough to help themselves. You should read further to understand “Why Good SEO Don’t Seek Your Business“. If you get a good one who loves your company as much as you do, get up off your wallet and book them before the competition does.

Otherwise, if you ever question their industry brilliance for a moment – Fire Them! Of course, I can’t condone criminal behavior, but you may want to keep a wooden stake handy. They are “un-dead”, so if you see their blood-sucking fangs – stake ’em!

$5000 is Not Half of $10,000! Maybe you think I just made a mathematical error, but I did not. I want to make a point about the vast difference between measuring efforts versus measuring results.

I already discussed the importance of having the right people handling your SEO versus the wrong ones. So, let’s assume you have the right ones – you are confident of it, and you are confident about your business goals. Let’s climb that bell curve that’s killing your success.

You can scale this to any level you like, but if you think that half of the effort will yield half of the result, you’ll waste money. The bell curve I mentioned has a nasty way of killing company hopes for profit.

Look at the bell curve of your industry’s marketing, and notice where the numbers make a sharp increase. Many companies will go right up to the curve and quit as soon as it gets too scary, but then slide back down because it was not measurable enough. A wise SEO knows that a business should push far enough up the bell curve to get the best results, but short of the point of diminishing returns.

If your SEO tries to take you to the shallow end of the bell curve because they are afraid to tell you what it will really take to make an optimal impact, then they are not doing their job properly. Many SEO dread trying to explain the vast difference between doing something and doing something well. In fact, it’s largely why I made the announcement that I stopped taking clients (it’s worth a read, by the way).

If an SEO is unable to explain the value of your strong commitment to their work, and if you are unwilling to hear it, don’t bother. Whether they realize it, they are doing you a disservice and they are lying to you. Fire Them! You can probably achieve mediocre results all on your own, so you shouldn’t be paying somebody else. Fire the SEO, and consider spending the money on an exorcism and perhaps a lobotomy – for you and for the SEO!

It can take a lot of climbing to reach the profitable part of the bell curve, but there is always a point when it becomes relatively self-sustaining. If you keep struggling just to stay on the shallow end of the curve, fire your SEO!

How to Fire Your SEO

I mentioned the matter of firing your SEO. Beyond the incinerator, the wooden stakes, and shoving them off a high cliff, there are other practical considerations. This is a tricky matter, because they have your passwords! You should change them … all of them. Even if you are the one trying to handle your own SEO like the dentist who went to dental school to fix their kids’ teeth – don’t trust the SEO. Any person who does not grasp the importance of this information should not have access to your company website.

If you want to get a better understanding of SEO, there are some basic lessons you should know. It doesn’t come without effort, but if you’re serious enough to read this far, you’re probably serious enough to read these valuable SEO lessons and subscribe for more to come.

Remember, I’m not telling you this to sell you anything. I’m telling you this because I witness too many people with their heads up a dark place and I don’t want my readers to be among them.

You are not stupid. Don’t act like it with your search engine rankings.

Photo Credit:
Fire Breathing by Luc Viatour via Flickr

The post Fire Your SEO: Here is Why and How appeared first on SEO and Social Media Marketing by Mark Murnahan.

Branding can be described as the “feel” that develops around a company or a person. Once a brand is forged in a person’s mind, it can be a time-consuming challenge to change that feel. Just consider the correlative affects of branding to understand why it is important to get it right.

Pick a brand – any brand – and consider what it brings to mind. For me, if you mention K-Mart, I think of grade school in the 1970’s when saying “Your mom buys your clothes at K-Mart” was an insult of the highest degree. That was memorable for me.

If you mention Applebee’s restaurant, I get a knot in my stomach, along with an ugly flashback of the last time I ate at Applebee’s. On the other hand, if you mention McDonald’s, I may nod my head and think to myself “yeah, I really do deserve a break today.”

You can apply the same principle to many of the people you know. During your use of social media, you have probably developed a view of certain people. As an example, there’s probably a lady who loves her cats – a lot, and maybe a guy that brings to mind the smell of dirty socks. In my case, there is a sizable crowd of people who post funny bacon-related content on my personal Facebook profile. If they think of me when they see bacon, I’m calling that a huge win! Go ahead, show me your bacon.

The “feel” you get about a brand can often extend far beyond the basic facts you know about the person or company. The stronger the brand message becomes, the more it creates a subconscious overall picture in your mind. You’ve surely experienced this, right?

Preemptive Branding and Brand Defense

A brand will not always have a positive correlation affect on us. Creating a strong positive brand message early, and consistently working to build upon it can help minimize a need for defense. It can also minimize long term damage. Make no mistake – every brand is subject to damage.

Strong brands can overcome adversity. For example, when you think of Ford Motor Company, you probably don’t think of their disaster with the Ford Pinto that was known for blowing up if it was hit in the rear.

Additionally, you probably don’t give a lot of thought to cyanide when you take a Tylenol – but that was a different matter in 1982.

Time and continued brand-building has healed those brands. Their previously favorable brand-status was a huge asset to pull them through.

Of course, many companies don’t have time on their side. This is especially true of smaller or newer brands. NetFlix may or may not have enough time to recover from the huge 2011 media blows to their brand. Their stock dropped to less than half its previous value. It happened quickly and with a lot of attention. They have recently reported big gains, but you can bet those gains would come a lot slower if they didn’t already have a positive and widely recognized brand.

Brands Evolve, But Should Never Be Left to Luck

Many companies are apprehensive about carving their brand in stone. The stronger you build your brand, the slower it will change – for better or worse. This makes it important to get it right, but what should be even scarier than getting it wrong is to leave it up to the luck of the marketplace. Even if you only get it 90 percent right, it is better than neglecting it.

The wrong brand message can be polarizing. The good news is that the right brand message can be polarizing, too. Just look at Facebook, Google, and Microsoft for examples of companies unafraid to polarize their audience.

I often harp on this fact, and I’ll say it again: “Everybody” is not your target market! If your marketing is focused properly, you must be willing to exclude some people. It doesn’t mean you should insult them, but you also don’t want to waste your resources trying to reach them.

Branding Identifies You, And That’s Okay!

We don’t all think alike, and we don’t all respond to the same things. In my brand instance, I’ve stated that my job is to help brands become more exciting … somewhere along the lines of sex, bacon, and fast cars. Thus, my personal brand is often identified with bacon, sex, and race cars. That works for me, and my audience can appreciate these things.

Sex, bacon, and fast cars may not work for you, but you have your own brand to work with. Your brand grows all around you, even when you’re not looking. It is best to have a good understanding of that brand picture you’re building – and embrace it. You should never be too passive about your brand, or it will tend to fade and lose value – and suffer the wrath of the market.

This may give you a nauseous feeling as you hear the sound of the whole world as you know it collapsing around you, but I’ve got to share a bit of truth. There is almost certainly a person sitting at their computer right this moment who does not like bacon, nor sex, nor fast cars. In fact, those bits of my brand message may completely turn them away. Some people will be less than enamored by your brand, too. But that’s OK!

On the other hand, if you just threw something heavy across the room and screamed about how crazy this ball of rock and water called Earth has become, you’re my kind of person – passionate, wise, and perhaps a just bit nuts. Bacon, sex, and fast cars are staples. Some things are just better than others, and we realize that fact.

Some people are better, too! That whole notion of people all being equal sounds fantastic in theory. Sure, I guess you can say that we’re all equal in some ways, but some will just never be a good singer. I’ll demonstrate if I really must, but you’ll want to turn down your speakers. Better yet, you may want to unplug them. I’m really terrible at singing, but like anything else, mastering a talent takes practice.

Some people will be great at making a brand stand out against the backdrop of a squillion others. That’s my gig. It’s what I studied while the rest of the world was apparently taking vocal lessons to embarrass me. Now, the next time you’re thinking about bacon, race cars, or sex, I want you to remember what I said about branding. Practice can help a lot. Embrace your brand – and practice it!

Oh heck, I just hijacked your favorite food, your transportation, and your sex life. You can hate me later, but at least you’ll have a leg up on the competition!

100 Pounds of Free Bacon!

Just to be sure we’re clear on this, I want to offer you 100 pounds of free bacon!

I’m currently in the hunt for a new job. I’m seeking a company that wants a stronger brand, and a better marketing return on investment. They can’t have my brand, but I will work hard to understand and create their best brand message.

If you introduce me to that company, I will reward you with 100 pounds of free bacon. In fact, I’ll even buy you a new freezer to keep it in. That way, every time you enjoy that amazing bacon smell filling your kitchen, you can think of me.

How’s that for a way to build a brand picture? I’m happy with it!

More Thoughts on Branding:

• Marketing and Brand Consistency: Check Your Gargoyles
• “Everybody” is Not Your Target Market!
• How To Sell Paper Clips: A Closer Look at Marketing
• Polarize Your Audience and Stop Making Everybody Happy
• Building Equity in Social Media vs. Interruption Marketing
• Influence Marketing: Reach Your Market Through Their Influencers

The post Correlative Affects of Branding and 100 Pounds of Free Bacon appeared first on SEO and Social Media Marketing by Mark Murnahan.

Consider something as complex as a space ship for a moment. Space ships don’t always launch as planned, but they have an overall good record, considering their challenges. That’s because of careful planning. It has to begin somewhere, and it begins with a vision.

It is more than a coincidence that most successful companies have a vision statement. Those visions can change, but there should always be a vision. Vision is what guides people and keeps them on the right path to achievements.

You have undoubtedly heard somebody express the importance of setting goals and envisioning the outcome you want. It can sometimes sound far-fetched, and even a bit hokey. If you reverse-engineer this notion of having vision, the reality may not be as you expected.

I want to explain why those people who talk about having vision are not just promoting a dream world filled with unicorns and cute kittens. It is not just about dreaming up a hallucination, either.

The reason it is important to have vision, whether as a huge corporation or as an individual, is that it becomes a basis for your goals and expectations. With vision, you will begin to do the things that bring you closer to the desired outcome. Your vision is what helps you to develop a subconscious reflex to do things to affect the results you want.

Vision Doesn’t Work for Skeptics

There are a lot of skeptics who may consider the value of vision as hogwash. We are each skeptical at some point, and to varying degrees. Being a bit apprehensive about a positive vision and creating goals is what preserves us from failure. If you don’t hope for much, you are less likely to be let down. That kind of apprehension also preserves us from success.

I believe that lack of vision is one of the greatest causes for failure in business and personal pursuits alike. The fear of creating a vision and doing what it takes to follow that vision is simply more than some people can overcome. I have witnessed this for decades as a marketing consultant.

To a skeptic, the people who talk about vision are often the ones who somehow “got lucky”. They hype the whole idea that everybody should have a dream for their life. It must sound totally crazy to a skeptic. For the skeptical type, the very notion of “vision” as it applies to getting what you want probably sounds like some kind of mystical new age idea complete with smoking the wrong stuff, waving a magic wand, and other hokus pokus that makes people want to go chase unicorns.

I’m talking about the real world. This is not about some fancy notion that if you can dream it that the obstacles will magically fade away and you’ll get everything you ask for. That’s usually not going to happen, but you can definitely get a lot closer.

A True Story of Vision

There was a time when I was not expected to make it very far in life. I was frustrated with school, and my grades showed it clearly. I was bored to tears, and I hated sitting in a classroom to be drilled with the same information, over and over again. I had previously been a top student, but my teenage vision obviously did not include my grade point average.

This was hard for my mother. Despite her previously high hopes and continued business mentoring, my future was falling apart. I was becoming an outcast, and a disappointment. She was giving up on me. All of the sudden, I was not just letting myself down, it was tearing my mother apart. I did not feel good about that.

When I was 15 years old, I left school to start a company. Throughout my earliest career years, I was a bit fixated on somehow making my mother proud. It became a very clear vision for me. I imagined how it would be for her to not look at me as her biggest failure. Of course, at 15 years old, I only really knew one way, and that was to prove my lack of formal education would not hold me back and I could be successful in business.

My vision took me far beyond expectations. I did very well in business by fixing under-marketed companies in exchange for ownership equity. Ten years after leaving school, I was comfortably retired and enjoying Mother’s pride … and a bit of my own. My vision was complete.

Caution: Completed Visions Are Like Poison

Once my earlier vision was completed, I became a 25 year old retired bachelor with no vision of my future. I dated the wrong ladies, I made the wrong investments, and I connected with the wrong business partners. Things pretty much fell apart, and I needed a new vision to get back on a good track.

I discovered that without a continued plan – without a vision – life simply would not take me where I intended. It became obvious that it would be impossible to get what I wanted if I couldn’t define it.

I eventually became inspired again. My new vision came in the form of another lady. Call me a ladies man. She wanted to quit her mid-level job in the banking industry to grow her sideline Internet services company. We merged companies and I went back to work with a vision. There was nothing easy about it. It took a lot of time and effort, but the vision came to life.

This vision worked, because there was a goal. We expanded the goal as needed, and our vision was flexible. It turned out that we took a website development company and spun it into one of the largest wholesale providers of Internet access and web hosting in the world. Yes, a high school dropout can have a successful vision, too!

Visions Should Be Flexible and Failure is Always an Option

Years later, I had a vision of sports car racing. I bought some brand new Corvettes, spent a quarter million dollars per year, and invested countless hours of hard work and training in that vision. It was very important to me. I got quite good at it, too.

When I consider all of the things in my life that require vision, auto racing has got to be on the extreme side. It would be nearly impossible to make it around a two and a half mile race course with 14 turns in under a minute and forty seconds without a vision.

Since the vision of our Internet company was as developed as we thought it would ever be, we created a new vision of selling the company and opening an upscale bed and breakfast and racing school. It was a mutual vision to pursue our culinary talents and my racing passion. Indeed, my business vision had led me to a full-time career in automotive racing. But there was a curve in the road!

The crash of the economy was not good to us, and it changed our vision. Change can be a good thing, when you have vision. Following my wife, Peggy’s culinary passion, we opened a wildly successful bakery, Mad Eliza’s Cakes and Confections.

Racing ran off the track for a while, but guess what? The vision is still there!

The Best Visions Bend, But Don’t Break

With a well-conceived and longer term vision comes flexibility. By its very nature, vision should be flexible and open to changes. It is not a formula for instant success, but rather a guideline. The best vision will create an overall look at what is to come, but it is not a predefined paint-by-numbers view of the future.

What got me thinking about the importance of vision today is because I’ve noticed my long-term vision coming clearer, almost without even consciously recognizing it. My earlier vision began to drive me to focus on what I really want.

In December, I announced that I would stop accepting new marketing consulting clients in January. That was because I decided to stop trying to be great at everything, as a CEO, in order to focus on my best talents and the things I am most passionate about.

I realized that my refined vision is to work for a company I will love. I started imagining how it would feel to settle into a new job with great coworkers and a new home in a new city. Then I imagined how amazing it would be if that company was one that fits into my larger vision. That means a company that is involved in racing, has a race team, or would have a good case to sponsor a race team if their marketing success – based on my hard work – could justify it.

The vision involves racing, and it involves marketing. I’m not shopping for my next race car just yet, but with vision on my side, it’s definitely in the works.

Almost without even realizing it, my efforts began to focus on companies that I could believe in and where I could improve their vision and feel proud to bring them success. I found myself researching companies based on their vision, and how it would fit with mine.

I’ve developed my vision, and I’ve noticed that I am making many renewed efforts, both consciously and subconsciously, to make that vision come true. It may sound pretty lofty to some people to find a job they love with a company where they can feel devoted. What I know for certain is that without a vision, I would fall short of my best outcome.

My vision may not come out exactly as planned. It is flexible – and negotiable. Then again, I was somehow able to make my mother proud. So I’m going with it.

Great Visions Are Shared

When you have a vision that others can share, it builds synergy. The vision becomes larger than its individual parts. Sometimes the hardest part is to share your vision with others, for fear of being shot down.

You should feel proud of your vision. Some people simply don’t have any. You may be amazed by the outcome of sharing your vision with others. If you don’t feel good enough about it to share it with others, it probably just needs more development. Even if this is the case, vision is always best when it is shared.

So now I ask you, what is your vision? Please share it.

Photo Credits:
Through the Glass by GoRun26 via Flickr
Seeing Truly by Joel Penner via Flickr

The post Vision: If You Don’t Have it, You Can’t See It! appeared first on SEO and Social Media Marketing by Mark Murnahan.

My grandmother will turn 95 years old in a few weeks. In honor of my dear Grandma and other real-world people like her, I’m here to deliver a valuable reminder about effective marketing communications.

Let’s consider Grandma for a moment, and imagine how she communicates. She talks like a real person. She thinks and communicates in logical phrases. Grandma uses plain and simple language to make herself clear to others. Most people are a lot like Grandma in this respect. Most of them will also find themselves indifferent and even insulted if you try to talk over their heads.

I want to give you some yummy food for thought. That’s because “yummy food for thought” is more appetizing than “palatable incentive for continued exercitation of intellect”. Got it? Great … let’s dine!

What really got me thinking about this is my long and tedious research in the hunt for my next employer. It seems popular for companies to drone on with wordy hyperbole in their job descriptions. I suppose many people do that in their résumé, too. It is just one of those awkward formalities that has not adapted to the modern world quite yet.

Wordiness is like a dance to see who can sound smarter. Just read an average job description to understand why unemployment is so high. According to most job descriptions I’ve seen, it seems that companies can barely write a paragraph without floating in an extra 30 words of fluff to throw people off the real meaning. Here is an actual example of a job posting bullet point that I just found without looking very hard.

It seems that all they said was “We want an organized person who can keep up with a lot of things at once. They need to think fast, work fast, and prove a history of it.” Does it actually say anything more than that? If so, please explain it to me. They said it in 62 words and 399 characters, but my “less intelligent” version trimmed it down to 29 words and 136 characters.

Are you ready for the irony? This particular job listing is for a Marketing Director at a marketing company. This kind of language reminds me how often I see similar diarrhea-like communication in marketing.

Stop Abusing Grandmas!

Grandma and all those many people like her do not like it when you try to baffle them with frivolous words and phrases to try and seem smarter. If you want Grandma to like you, it is better to make her feel smart because she clearly understands and can relate to your ideas.

If you cannot make it easy and comfortable, Grandma is not going to become your biggest fan and brand advocate. It is also very unlikely that she is going to speak up and let you know what you’re doing wrong. After all, you have already done your best to show that you know it all.

I think the reason bad marketing communication makes grandma want to turn ninja is that while you may sincerely believe you are “proficiently communicating in a manner that is consistent with sound business practices and expected protocols”, you are actually talking down to her. If you keep it up, you will grate on her last nerve and the outcome is bleak.

Bridle Your Verbose Hyperbole and Expedite Your Simplicity

Let me give it to you straight. If you are “excessively verbose and embellish your communications with gratuitous hyperbole”, you will ignore and alienate the majority of any market.

It is even true in the most intelligent circles that if you make it easier to read, more people will pay attention. If you communicate with people as if they are idiots and you are a brilliant word magician, you can save your breath. It often creates quite the opposite outcome and shows that you’re not smart enough to put things into terms people care about or respond to.

If you want to show off your intellect, try taking your complex concept and making it easy for people to understand. That is a much better measure to show off how smart you are.

The Solution: Make it Readable to 8th Graders

The best advice I can offer about marketing communications is to make it easy. I understand the temptation to use big words or complex phrases to make a point. Maybe you even talk like that when you are having beers with your buddies – but I doubt it. Let me make another example. I’ll let you tell me which one you think is better.

A.) What I wish to express is that when you use big words and complex phrases, you not only alienate people, but also stand to lose their attention.

B.) If you make it harder to read, you’ll lose people.

You can criticize me for my lengthy writing. I’m guilty of this “crime against Grandma” at times. There is a time and a place for it, though. Knowing when and where to use your wordiness is worth consideration.

If you are not already familiar, I encourage you to take a close look at popular readability formulas such as The Flesch formulas, Fry Readability Graph, or The Dale–Chall formula. It should not be shocking to find that they were each designed to be very easy to read and understand.

I’m back to my job search now. I’m hopeful there’s somebody out there who wants a real-world marketing executive that grandmas everywhere will understand – and love.

Related Rants:

• Director of Social Media Instrumental in Blunders
• Grammatical Reasons They’re Taking Their Business Over There

Photo Credits:
Ninja by Jeyhun Pashayev via Flickr
Visiting Portage by Jeremy Bronson via Flickr

The post Marketing Communication That Makes Grandma Want to Slap You appeared first on SEO and Social Media Marketing by Mark Murnahan.

I consider myself lucky to be looking for a new job in marketing. That may sound completely insane to millions of people looking for work these days, but I’m inspired by it. I’ll tell you why.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again – I’m not good at everything, and I don’t want to be. I am good at marketing, and that’s where I want to focus. It is best to have focus in any career, and perhaps this will get you thinking about a closer focus on your best assets and interests, too.

I’ve been the CEO of companies for a very long time. It is not because I am good at everything to do with a business. It is because I did an exceptional job of marketing communications – enough to build a successful corporation.

Some people have questioned why I would ever want to make a career change, but I have some excellent reasons. Being at the top of a corporation has its perks, but when it comes time for the tough decisions, they often land on the CEO’s desk. For example, in 2009, when suppliers began to falter and it was time to decide whether to pump my own money back into the company to preserve many people’s jobs a little longer, I did it. I made the decisions that a “better” CEO would never have done … and it cost me millions. I don’t want those decisions, because they hurt me, and they don’t focus on my best assets.

I guess I could call this writing my occupational therapy. It’s helping me to further define where I’ve been, and where I’m going. It’s forcing some of those tough questions that I never really put my finger on before. I believe it will even help me with better direction when I go to interview those lucky folks who seek to hire me. If I do this right, it may get you thinking about what you love about your work, and what you would rather leave behind.

Here is my list of seven things I love about my next job in marketing. I will begin with the three things I will be the most joyful to dismiss from my current role in marketing. This is not intended to be negative about my current work, but rather a forward look at what I will love about my next job role. It adds emphasis to why I made the decision to seek a new career adventure.

Number One Love About My Next Marketing Job: No More Apathetic Clients

As I make my move away from providing marketing services as a consultant, leaving apathetic clients in the past is my biggest relief. I will never – and I mean never – subject myself to explaining the benefits of marketing to another person who is any of the following:

• indifferent about their business objectives, or refuses to define their business objectives.
• too paralyzed by fear to make good business decisions.
• convinced that marketing is an expense rather than an investment.
• a big talker who is actually flat broke and trying to impress or mislead me. Only real data is allowed here.
• wasting my time. I am entirely done with that. My time is worth a lot of money, but its value is greatly diminished when I waste it with people just because I’m nicer and more considerate than they are.

Number Two Love About My Next Marketing Job: Ignorant Clients Be Gone!

I think I may whistle and skip my way into the office an hour early every day for this one.

I will never be asked to speak to somebody who has not already been vetted and prepared for the valuable information I will share with them. I will never have to entertain the bottom of the barrel. That’s because my new employer will realize I’m far more valuable to the company when I’m not trying to slit my wrists with paper cuts from the 45 page proposal that I spent three weeks researching, or thrusting forks into my eyeballs when I look across the table at the zombies who just didn’t get it.

If dealing with apathetic clients is like setting me on fire, then ignorance is like throwing tequila at my flaming corpse and calling it a party.

I have often said that when it comes to marketing, there are no innocent victims … just ignorant ones. Nearly anything a person could ever hope to know about our world is on the Internet. Yet, I find that many people will still try to hide behind their ignorance as a shelter. Who are they fooling, anyway?

What’s worse is that in order to be ignorant in this great era of information, a person has to be apathetic, too. If they actually care to know enough to save their own skin, they can pick up a mouse and know it in an instant. The trouble here is that so many want-to-be clients don’t comprehend the value in paying somebody who knows the right questions to ask … so they hide under their ignorance blanket.

Here are some of my most polite answers for those ignorant people:

• No! You cannot increase your return on investment without an investment. Please slap yourself for me.
• No! It is not a good idea to spend more on telephone book advertising than on the Internet.
• No! You should not use a personal Facebook profile for your business. It is foolish and will eventually get your account deleted.
• No! Becoming popular on Twitter, alone, is not a marketing strategy. Twitter is not a magic wand.
• No! Marketing online is not a technology job!
• No! I will not choke you until you turn blue for being ignorant, but mostly because I don’t want that on my résumé.
• No! You may not have another free consultation. Do you swipe the whole tray of free samples at the grocery store, too, deadbeat?

Number Three Love About My Next Marketing Job: Dishonest Clients Turn to Dust

I will never be ripped off for the value of a new luxury car again! Oh yes, that actually happened in my former professional life.

I guess I can sum this one up pretty quick with the words “Suture Express“. That’s the name of a company where the CFO (now CEO), Bryan Forsythe, claimed the check was in the mail (for weeks) and ripped me off, but then tried to pay me off later to take down what I wrote about them because my marketing was too good. Marketing Lesson Learned: Don’t hire the best marketing guy you can find, but then rip him off when it’s time to pay the bill. Even the best reputation management cannot make up for decisions that bad.

This one is a case study in what not to do if you ever want to market a business online. Just see how many nice things show up in the first page of Google when searching their company name. When I say this one is a case study, it really is, and it’s been referenced in keynotes at industry conferences. It is a case study that I will never need to address in my next marketing job – not a chance!

Number Four Love About My Next Marketing Job: A Great Team

I feel fortunate for my knack at finding the right people for the job. Knowing how to recognize and delegate to the best people for the task at hand has served me exceptionally well in my career. They don’t always need an MBA or a perfect résumé. They have to be right for the responsibilities they are given.

The think tanks are built in! A skill that I very often embrace is putting together think tanks of bright and talented people who can imagine the right questions and think their way through to solutions as a group. Ideas are fun to produce and shape into works of art. Thinking and being with thinkers creates great passion for me.

I look forward to working with a team where I can make magic happen and we can be glad to see each other every morning. That’s worth more than money alone, and that spins my turbines!

My new office will come complete with thinkers to put into the tank, and will also enjoy the benefits of my existing network of great thinkers.

Number Five Love About My Next Marketing Job: They Will Love Me, Too!

I am a highly dedicated person, and I take a lot of pride in doing things the right way. When I consider my new adventure, it is important that my new employer recognizes my dedication to their success. Likewise, they will be dedicated to my success.

I don’t just skip around to the next great thing in my career. I have three more kids and many more years of experience than I did the last time I changed jobs. I am not wishy-washy about my work, and I don’t plan to leave anytime soon.

My next employer will appreciate my dedication, and they will notice very early that “This Murnahan guy doesn’t think like those other applicants. He has something special in mind.” They’ll be right, too. I have some very special ideas in store for my next employer – and they will love it!

Number Six Love About My Next Marketing Job: The Location is Amazing

As I discussed this with my wife, we realized that the location of my next marketing job will be incredible. We will enjoy a great city that is mostly new to us, and we will discover many amazing things to do as a husband and wife with three brilliant kids. We will see our new adventure with amazement, and we’re each very excited to know where it will be!

Number Seven Love About My Next Marketing Job: I Get Paid for This!

With all the great things that come with my next marketing job, I’ve got to say that getting paid for doing what I love is fantastic! I’ll probably be paid a whole lot. It will not match my previous seven digit earnings, but it’s going to be a nice income for doing the job I would choose if all jobs paid exactly the same thing.

There you have it. That’s the list of seven things I love about my next marketing job. Do you have a list burning to get out? I know I could sure go on with a Top 100 list. For now, this one feels like a great start. I hope it will help you to think about your own list.

I have just one more thing to add. If you have a good lead for where I may find my next marketing job, please introduce me or pass this along to others. Perhaps it will eventually land on the right desk of that one special person at that one special company for me. Thank you kindly!

Photo Credits:
LOVE Park sign by Brandon Weight via Flickr
punks in love by Patrick via Flickr

The post 7 Things I Love About My Next Marketing Job appeared first on SEO and Social Media Marketing by Mark Murnahan.

People really are friendly. At least that’s my view. They may not always have a great day, and they may be disappointing at times, but I still love people. It feels great to express it, too. Most people really do have a kind side. As long as that’s the side you’re appealing to, the result is like magic.

Even when you doubt them, sometimes you’ve just got to take the plunge, and believe in people.

I want to share something I find fascinating about the nature of people. I also hope that since my blog is about marketing and business, you will relate to how this applies to your business. I’m even going to point out what I believe is the most popular thing on the whole Internet – even more popular than sex and bacon – and I think you’ll agree with me.

Stop and Smell the People … Err – Roses

None of us would be very good without the others around us. I imagine that same need for people is a strong reason social media is so popular. We get to connect, share, brainstorm, encourage, and gain a connection with more people – awesome people. So, I’ll repeat it – I love people – even the disappointing ones who are having a bad day.

People may not always realize exactly why they do it at the time, but being good to others makes them feel good. I believe it is a baseline reflex that is built into each of us, and those who neglect that reflex do so at their own peril.

Even when there is not a large perceived personal benefit, and sometimes especially because there is not a large perceived personal benefit, people move together for a common action. I’ve witnessed it my whole life, and it still amazes me every day.

Making others feel good spreads far and wide. In fact, I’d like to challenge you to find anything more “viral” on the Internet than a smile. If you doubt it, just consider how many times you’ve seen this:

Job-Seeking Taught Me a Lesson

What brought this to mind for me today is the friendliness of people when I recently asked them to assist me in a very meaningful career endeavor. I reached out to a small handful of people for friendly advice and assistance to reach Steve Phelps, Senior Vice President and CMO at NASCAR. I humbly asked a circle of friends for introductions to others who could provide me with even more friendly advice and introductions. I didn’t ask for a large sacrifice, or a huge piece of their time, but I was amazed to find them giving their time freely, and without seeking a return.

You see, I’m a marketing guy with a passion for racing. It makes sense that Steve Phelps received the very first résumé and cover letter I sent in what seems like a squillion years. People knew it means a lot to me, so they gave freely.

It was as if I had simply asked them for a glass of water, and they were delighted to help.

For those people, the greatest return is perhaps just my sincere thanks, and a smile they can spread to others. They made me feel good, and knowing how it feels when I do something similar, I know it made them feel good. I’m not selling anything here, but I even wrote a book that focused on the great benefits of being good to others … and imagine what happened … it made me feel very good!

The Pursuit of Meaningful Work

I’ll back up just a bit. In December, I decided that I would stop taking new marketing clients in 2012. I announced it, but I said I would have another announcement to come. On January 2nd, I solidified it, and officially bid sayonara to mediocrity. Today’s announcement is where I’m going next.

I’ve heard it surprised some people when I stopped taking clients. Those who know me probably did not imagine where I decided I wanted to go with this career. That’s because it sounds like a step down … and it is, in some ways. I’ve run a successful corporation for over a decade, and before that, I was retired for a while and resting on the good fortune of a previous endeavor. Some people would ask what in the heck a guy like that wants with a job working for somebody else. I’ll tell you just that.

I’ve been a CEO and business owner my entire adult life. I’ve participated in board meetings and advised corporations since I was a teenager. I’ve seen a lot, done a lot, and enjoyed a lot. I’ve also been the guy who is handed many of the hardest decisions. I’m good at decisions, for the most part, but one I battled with for a while is to change my career and stop being the guy who is supposed to be good at everything. I want to focus on the things I am the best at, and that’s marketing. I feel it is a healthy and productive change for me, and I’m prepared to go “both feet in”.

Maybe this will encourage you, too. I hope it will.

Going “Both Feet In”

I’ve witnessed many people who want a lot in life, but are afraid to ask for it. I think that kind of fear affects each of us on some level, at some time. Asking for something simple from a few of my inner circle of friends has reminded me that it is important to ask for what you want, and recognize that many people will go out of their way to be helpful. I teach this principle, and I do it for clients every day, but it is easy to neglect even my own good advice.

I don’t often ask a lot from people around me, so this was a really great reminder to practice what I preach. I hope you will take this good advice from me. Ask for it! Have a call to action! If you don’t, you’re missing out on most of the best results.

You will not always get it just right, but if you never take a risk, you may never know what you’ve missed. I don’t want to live with those doubts, so I believe there are times to go “both feet in”.

Here’s a little Racing 101 course that you can apply to your marketing.

The term “both feet in” is a term used in racing when you’ve tried to recover from a slide and the car is not in agreement. You let go of the steering wheel (before its rapid spinning breaks your hand) and put both feet to the floor – one on the brake, and one on the clutch. It’s a thrill ride, but not in the way we drivers prefer it. It slows us down, and hopefully keeps us off the wall. It quickly resets our objectives.

This happens when you know that steering and throttle alone will not correct the car’s angle, and it’s time to save what you can of the car and your safety. All the while, time moves slowly, and you just want to get back in the race.

For experienced drivers, this only happens once in a long while, and preferably only in practice. As out of control as it may sound, it’s often well-calculated and happens when we’ve decided to lay on the gas a bit harder and earlier as we come out of a turn. Sometimes you have to push the limits to know the limits, and sometimes you have to take a risk. That’s how you get big speed on the straights, and that’s how you win races.

I love racing. I even love analogies about racing, so I’ll give you one. I believe today is a great day to push the throttle hard and risk a “both-feet-in” ride. I’m pushing the throttle on a new career directive, and I hope you can offer me a friendly hand to exit the turn with more speed than ever.

I’ll describe the race course, and I hope you’ll find it as easy as a glass of water. I also hope you will find inspiration in seeking a glass of water for yourself.

How About That Glass of Water?

My “both feet in” moment is when I ask you to help me reach the right person with my message. Here’s the simple “glass of water” I’m seeking:

• If you have a friend, colleague, or know a company that you believe can benefit from my skills of 25 years in marketing, please introduce me.
• If you have a connection with anybody at NASCAR, BMW, Porsche, Mazda, Ford, Audi, or any other automotive, racing-oriented, engineering, or high-technology companies – or recruiters for such things – please introduce me. I’m not married to automotive, either. Like I said, I love people, and the people and culture of the company will matter more than the industry … or even the pay scale. Most importantly, they must appreciate the difference between just doing something, and doing it well.
• Take a look at my résumé to find out what I know about my area of expertise, and get to know a little more about me. I have extensive experience in marketing and business consulting. I want to share that experience for the benefit of my next employer.
• Let’s brainstorm. I’m an analytic guy with a lot of imagination. I may have some good ideas for you, too. I’m not selfish with the thoughts that race through my mind, and I’m usually happy to share some inspiring ideas.
• Please spread this message and help me with my goal of finding the right match in an employer. That would mean a lot to me, and you have nothing to lose. Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook are some great places to start. Anything is appreciated.

It will not cost you any more than a glass of water to help me, and it will most certainly make somebody smile … and probably more than only me.

Does that sound self-serving? I guess maybe it does, but if you know me at all, you know I would do the same for you and I would smile the rest of the day just for feeling helpful.

Photo Credit:
Glass of Water by Michael Hamann via Flickr

The post Marketing Professional Asks: May I Have a Glass of Water? appeared first on SEO and Social Media Marketing by Mark Murnahan.

Your gargoyles say more about your brand than you may think. They are your front line. If your marketing doesn’t match, you’re asking for trouble.

I recently responded to a blog article written by Kay Ross, who wrote about the faces we put forward in a marketing message. Kay’s article is titled “In Your Marketing, To Thine Own Self Be True“, and it reminded me of many observations I have made about the overall feel of companies during my career, and personal encounters.

That “feel” of a company is what makes up a brand, and when it’s done well it involves every aspect of the company, and extends far beyond the marketing department. I want to share some thoughts about your brand, and I believe you will be able to relate to this from both a consumer and business viewpoint.

The topic which was addressed in Kay’s blog came from one of her subscribers who asked the question as follows: “Which is more important when communicating with your audience: say things you really want to say, or say things that people want to hear?”

Should there really be such a disparity between the two? If the marketing is reaching the appropriate audience, it should not have to be one or the other. The way I interpreted this question, it led me to imagine the question as whether it is acceptable to fake it in your marketing. If you know my brand at all, you can place your bets now about where I stand.

Let Them Love You, But Realize You Cannot Force Them

As I read that question, I immediately thought of something I once wrote titled “Polarize Your Audience and Stop Making Everybody Happy“. In that piece, I used examples of companies like Apple and Google, who understand their brand enough to stand behind it.

You will never make everybody love you – so don’t even try. Trying to be everything to everybody will only serve to dilute your brand integrity and create a “wishy-washy” brand message. People don’t like that in politics, and they don’t like it elsewhere, either. That doesn’t mean ignoring anyone or treating them badly … but you should realize there is always a good, better, and best customer for any company.

Instead of creating a false brand loyalty, I suggest looking closer for the ones who will find a connection with your brand, before you assume you should re-brand. You’ve got one brand to work with, so you should understand it well, and embrace it. Kay and I agree that it is important to know what you are about, and stick with it. I think most people would agree with that point, once they give it a little consideration.

Don’t Make it “Us Versus Them” … Make it “Us With Them”

Many companies struggle to strike a perfect balance between what others want from them, and what they are willing and capable of delivering. This means there is a gap between the two parties – the company and the consumer. In most cases, there is a huge gap, and it’s why you would be wasting your time to try and sell me knitting needles. This is exactly why it is extremely important for any company offering anything to anybody to realize the message I shared in an article titled ““Everybody” is Not Your Target Market!” Please feel free to read that thought provoking piece. This one will still be here when you get back.

Gaps Between Companies and Consumers

Shrinking that gap between the company and consumers is extremely important, but try to imagine it like another kind of relationship for a moment. When I was a single guy, I tried to make myself more attractive to ladies – but not just any ladies. I wanted a certain type who would want what I offered and understand my vision. I could have let it change me completely, but wouldn’t that eventually fail?

I fixed my hair just right, I shaved extra close, and I adapted to things like closing the bathroom door. That’s right – when I met my wife, Peggy, I would close the bathroom door if I needed to stink the place up. That doesn’t mean I’d go out of my way to hide the fact that I stink the place up sometimes … I just kept it a bit more courteous. I didn’t fart at the dinner table, either … I waited until we made it out the restaurant door.

Now imagine if I just held it until she left. Can you imagine how much gas and poo I would have held back? Then imagine if she had married me for all my amazing (but fake) charm. I mean, can you imagine finding a non-pooing, non-gaseous guy? She would have surely loved me even more, but what if I had sealed the deal based on that fakeness?

Wouldn’t she be disappointed later, when she found out that I can curl the bathroom paint? Wouldn’t she have really hated it once she realized that each of our three babies poo, too?

Now put that in terms of a company brand message. Even pooing companies with gas are charming and “perfect” to somebody. In the case of marketing, that usually means a lot of people. By reaching that perfect segment, you can encounter something I’ve said many times, and that is as follows:

Perception Shaping Versus Waiting to Poo

Shaping the perception of consumers is important, but letting your integrity slip just to tell them what they want to hear is not the right answer. I believe that each and every company can do a better job of closing the gap between the company and their ideal consumer. It requires research and paying close attention, and when companies can get out of their own way, that market research and paying attention serves them very well. What I refuse to advocate in is glazing over the things that make the company what it is, and creating a false perception that can later be discovered as such.

In the article by Kay Ross, she cited something I said in a piece titled “Great Marketing is Not About You … Hogwash!” In that article, I explained ways that is really is about you, and that the people of an organization are what makes it special.

About Those Gargoyles …

I want to share what I wrote in my response to Kay’s article. I’ll paraphrase, but I invite you to see her original article and the comments there, as well.

My take-off, based on the article, was to address how company cultures spread throughout the company, and how valuable or destructive that can be. I based it on things I have seen over a long period of time, as a marketing consultant, a corporate officer, and a consumer. I suspect you can find instances where something similar has created an impression with you, about a company.

In my experience, if a company has a mean gargoyle as their gatekeeper, it is easy to expect it throughout the company. On the other hand, if that gargoyle is helpful and friendly, it is often a sign of the company’s culture – their brand. If it is faked in the marketing, it becomes obvious very quickly.

You can experience this right now, by simply considering how you feel about any given restaurant, retail store, doctor’s office, cellular provider, or any other brand experience you’ve had. Somebody set the brand feel in motion from the very start. Whether that came directly from the marketing department or elsewhere, it begins to forge your view of the company. If that brand message is inconsistent with your experience, it is easy to become very critical of the company. It can also become very enticing to share that feeling with others. Thus, it is wise to know your brand and not waiver from it.

Here is my longer answer, based on Kay’s blog:

In summary, please consider this: If you stray from the things which make up your brand just to make your marketing appealing, it is best to revisit those gargoyles and get them in shape, first.

The value of “human collateral” should not be neglected. The people within your organization make up a huge portion of the brand, and it is nearly impossible to convincingly change it without changing the people, themselves.

If you project a brand message that is not consistent with the consumer’s experience, they will see through it. When they do, the outcome is not favorable, it is best to get it right from the beginning.

Photo Credit:
Gargoyle by Jeff Egnaczyk via Flickr
Friendly Gargoyle by Michael Napoleon via Flickr
Scary Gargoyle by Andrew Barden via Flickr

The post Marketing and Brand Consistency: Check Your Gargoyles appeared first on SEO and Social Media Marketing by Mark Murnahan.

I turned forty today. I’m happy about it, too. It doesn’t really feel like forty quite yet, but I’ve done it! I have lived long enough to have some well-earned gray hair, and a good amount of wisdom that comes with it. For such a young guy, of course.

My forty years have come with a lot of lessons. Having spent well over half of those years as a marketing professional and business owner, I’ve learned a lot about marketing. I’ve shared large volumes of my experiences here on the Internet, and I feel great to say that I’ve helped a lot of people with that experience.

One of the things I learned about marketing is the value of brevity. Keep it short. Keep it easy. Don’t get too confusing with all of your wordiness. I learned it, and then I threw it out the window for the purpose of this blog. Brevity matters when you are selling something, but I am not. If you can embrace some blatant verbosity today, I’ll reward you with some valuable real life marketing lessons.

Did you get that? It’s my birthday, but I’m trying to give you a gift. I guess that’s lesson one. When you give more, you receive more, and it’s an important principle of marketing. It’s a principle that is far beyond most people’s patience threshold, but to the ones who get it, it is invaluable.

I’ve shared a lot of helpful principles and practices of marketing on this blog. Much of it comes directly from things I learned through decades in the marketing profession. I feel good about that, and I know I’ve made an impact. I’ve helped a lot of people reach their goals, both business and personal. I plan to continue that work, but in a different way.

The Announcement That Changed My Life: Sayonara Mediocrity

At forty years old, I decided it is time to change things up. I intended to be fully retired by now, and a few years ago, I was actually well-prepared for it. I had plans to race cars full time, and my work was going to focus only on things I love. My bank is not as big as it used to be after somebody screwed up the world’s economy, so I’m still working. That should not keep me from pursuing the work I love, so I’m doing it … I’m making one of those scary changes I’ve encouraged so many others to make.

As I announced a few weeks ago, I stopped taking new clients (of course, that is unless somebody with really big goals and a ginormous budget comes calling). It’s very liberating. Now I feel even more free than ever if I need to call somebody out for being an apathetic bonehead. I’m also inspired to believe that if I tell you something, you’ll feel confident there is not an underhanded agenda just to sucker you out of your hard-earned money.

A challenging fact of marketing is that the best marketing consultants will never receive as much benefit as the client. It’s why many independent marketing consultants have their own products or services to market, outside of the marketing industry. The best marketers know that marketing is an investment rather than wasted money, and that if they build their own business, they will always be paid far more than by boosting a client’s return on investment.

Sometimes clients will find themselves skeptical about who receives the greatest benefits, but it is the client and not the marketing consultant. I explained this in an article titled “Find Good SEO: Why Good SEO Don’t Seek Your Business“. Being regularly at odds with that inherent negativity and skepticism in the market is why I’m changing things up and creating some significant career moves. No, it’s not because I’m not good at it … I’m just ready to move on to something more positive and inspiring.

Today, more than ever, I hope you will listen up and take some good direction. Give this gritty old marketing guy a chance to help shape your perceptions and understanding of marketing. I serve some pretty good food for thought about marketing, and many easily actionable tasks that you can put to use in minutes. In fact, here are six ways to improve search engine ranking in under one hour. There’s one caveat: they are only useful if you use them.

I have no reason nor desire to lie to you or mislead you, and I cannot recall a time when I intentionally misled anybody about marketing. So slow down and stop worrying about the next thing to click.

Velocity is Great in a Market, But Sometimes You Must Slow Down

Rushing around the Internet looking for the next bit of marketing enlightenment is not where you really want to find yourself in another 15 minutes or half hour … or three months … or next year. That’s what everybody else is doing, and if you think searching the web and looking for the next bottle to rub and hoping a genie will pop out is a better option, you’re likely to get pretty average results.

Settle down and look for the greater benefits. A mathematical fact of the online marketing space is that an average result is abysmal. It’s true! Most companies really stink at reaching an online market, and never get much out of it. I find that it is very often because they don’t slow down – breathe – get some oxygen in their brains and pay attention. They don’t pay attention to their market, and they don’t pay attention to things that can help them to reach their market more effectively. They are often all mouth and no ears, and rushing too hard to get things right that they get it all wrong. That’s them, and I hope you will make the choice to not be one of them.

Honesty in Marketing: It’s Not All Evil!

Marketing is often viewed with a sizable dose of skepticism. If somebody will gain from it, there is a frequent perception that somebody also loses. It’s not true, but this skeptical belief often hurts people in their own marketing, based on how they view marketing as a whole. If I am introduced to something as a result of marketing, and I trade my money because I wanted it, did somebody automatically lose? I got the thing I wanted, and the company marketing to me got what they wanted.

Yes, there are a lot of dirty scoundrels who will lie to you about marketing, but in the big picture, dishonest companies just don’t make it very long. It reminds me of a principle I implemented to create one of my most successful business endeavors, and it was a single word. It came to me when I asked my wife and business partner to summarize what made us stand out from the crowd, and what made us better than the competition. She said “It’s easy, Mark. It all comes down to a single word … Integrity.” That moment will never leave me, and it has provided me a great amount of success.

Marketing Wisdom: It Only Appears Simple

Even today it feels strange and almost surreal to say that I’ve been in marketing for 25 years … but I have. I was raised into marketing, and I was sitting in boardrooms offering my opinions from the time I was a teenager. I started my first company when I was so young that my mother had to sign the legal papers … for years.

It took a long time to make good sense of it all, in business. In fact, I still utterly stink at some points in business, but the part I do understand is marketing. I know from many years of running successful (and some not so successful) businesses that marketing will make or break a company. They don’t make it easy to understand, either. Even in the best universities, they often talk about a lot of theories and concepts, but where the fork meets the food, it takes some stomach-churning hard work to see real success. I know, because I’ve done that, and if you ask me, or any of my peers who have earned anything more than six-digits per year, you will find very few of them who came by it with simplicity.

Stop buying into people’s notions that it is simple. If it was really so simple, it probably wouldn’t be very profitable.

TAM, SAM, SOM, ROI, SEO, SMM, and PECKERs

There are enough acronyms and industry buzz phrases to bring my lunch back to the top of my throat. Some of those acronyms really matter, such as TAM (Total Available Market), SAM (Served Available Market), SOM (Serviceable Obtainable Market), ROI (Return On Investment), and many others. These matter in huge ways, but they are very frequently misunderstood or overlooked because of shortsightedness, which often comes from a frightened accountant who knows little about marketing or how the company actually gets the money to pay their salary.

In small businesses, it is often because, although the person in charge was good enough in their field to start a company, they were not good enough at business to understand that being good at a trade does not mean being good in business. Being good in business means knowing where your weaknesses are, and knowing how to fill those gaps with people who are as good or better at their field of knowledge than you. That’s right, the best business leaders learn to effectively delegate what is out of their league. It’s why I don’t handle my own bookkeeping, and why people in other trades are usually let down when they try their hand at marketing.

Other marketing acronyms are beaten to death, like SEO (search engine optimization) and SMM (social media marketing). These buzz phrases are so popular these days that dishonest people use them to fool companies. In online marketing, they talk about building more website links, but they throw out good ideas of why somebody would actually want to link to their website … and they often hold the absurd notion that more links is always a good thing. The really misinformed marketers will lead you to believe that social media marketing is all about networking and socializing.

This kind of shortsighted and misinformed thinking is why I created my very own acronym for 2012, and I welcome you to read why I’m very proud to call myself a “PECKER” (Profit Engineer and Competition Killer with Extraordinary Resources).

Advertising is Only a Very Small Part of Marketing

I find that a lot of people imagine marketing to mean advertising what they offer for sale. This is only a small part of what makes up marketing. Marketing addresses many other things, including a whole lot of math, creativity, strategy, and so much more. An easy example is to look at anything you have for sale, and answer the question of why you priced it at the level you have. Is it because of its cost to produce? Did you leave it up to the competition to decide your price? Did you ever actually do the research to know what it’s worth – and not just that – to the right audience? Did you get that research just right, or is it really so impossible that you made some costly mistakes by using guesswork instead of basing it on the right factors?

The ways that marketing influences a business are far too numerous to list in a single blog. I hope you’ll think about some of those things you may have overlooked. I welcome you to my blog archive to help get the wheels turning. There are hundreds of articles there, and I think you’ll find them very useful if you slow down.

Throw Out Your Sandwich and Make a New One

I hear a lot of people regurgitating the last thing they heard or read about marketing, and how fresh the latest idea is. I guess maybe it was fresh sometime before it hit a squillion blogs, but now it’s like a day-old tuna sandwich sitting out in the sun.

Great marketing is seldom a matter of seeking the latest and greatest thing. Following trends is important, but following them too closely that you follow the mistakes is often a train wreck in the making. The things that work are not just following what everybody else fervently exclaims will work. Great marketing requires research, testing, and discovering what works – really works – for your company, and being the one all of those trend-talkers are talking about. It is not about tweeting, Facebooking, Flabunctuating … or whatever the next big trend is.

I’ve written volumes about social media, including hundreds of thousands of words, and even a book. I marvel at how many people think it is something new. Did you think social media is new? It’s how I met my wife, well over a decade ago … and many close friends years before that. Social media helped me to grow several of my companies quite abundantly, too, but social media is not a unicorn net or a leprechaun trap.

One of its greatest uses is to listen and learn about what makes your market tick … and then use that information. Many people are too short-sighted to take things to a new level of analysis, and understand what to do with a good analysis. Most are unwilling or unable to dig deep into their creativity and find ways to make their brand stick out like a sexy model passing out free bacon sandwiches and all expense paid trips to “Available-Sexy-Model-and-Free-Bacon-Sandwichville”.

I witness many scared companies making scared decisions, but I’ve watched a lot more scared companies fail than I care to count … and that’s because they don’t count. The ones that count are the ones willing and fearless enough to do what it takes to be more like you want your company to be. Not like the bottle-rubbing, instant-enlightenment-seeking, one shot wonder at the competitor down the street – like you – or at least your vision of you. So stop being scared! Go out on a limb. That’s how people succeed in the real world of business.

Fear of Failure Destroys Marketing Efforts

I know the extreme power of fear. I have witnessed it throughout my career, and I’ve even allowed myself to be a casualty of fear at times. There is nothing easy about making the kind of commitment it requires to be successful. This goes for anything you really want in your life, whether it’s a spouse, a family, a new home, a new car, or an improved bottom line in your business. It takes a leap, but it doesn’t have to be simply on faith.

If you think about your marketing as a foundation of your company, which it really is, you will find yourself on a much stronger path. I know, it’s easy to try and argue the point. The accountants think accounting is the foundation, the attorneys think the legal structure makes the foundation, and the people who created the company think it’s all about the product or service … but that’s really not true.

Businesses simply do not work without being marketed. Even in the most obscure and complex examples you can throw out there, the biggest factor between success and failure of two equal companies really does come down to how well they are marketed.

I Believe You Could Do Better With Your Marketing

How could I put this any more clearly? You can do better! Failure to control your fear impulses and continuing to worry about what will not work is a fast track to failure. Try thinking more along the lines of what you stand to gain, instead of cowering to the fear of what you stand to lose. Then consider what you continue to lose effortlessly because you’re waiting. There is a steep cost of missed business opportunities. In fact, it is often the worst scenario of all. Getting out of your easy chair to face your fears is a huge factor in success, and I know it from experience.

I turned ideas into millions of dollars within only a short time after completing my 8th grade education. It didn’t take an MBA, or however you spell those fancy degrees hanging on the “smart guy’s” wall. It took research, creativity, and a good supplier of balls. I said balls, and you can call me a bad marketer for that … but if you want to know about selling balls – or selling anything else – read this article to get your thinking up and bouncing: “SEO, Social Media, and Marketing Balls”

Stop worrying about the cost of marketing done right, and start focusing on the positive outcome if you do. There are plenty of chickens out there, and I hope you aren’t one of them … and if you are, I hope you’ll make a commitment to change it.

Some Personal Lessons I Learned About Marketing

When I consider why I advocate for people to take their marketing more seriously and stop waiting for “something” to change, I look inward at how it has changed my life. I imagine the things that would never have happened without marketing, and I’ll give you a glimpse.

I have no intention of explaining all that I have learned about marketing in a single blog article. That would be impossible. I hope that you will be willing to take a good look and accept some useful tips from a guy who has been around the block. I hope you will bookmark my blog archive and keep coming back to feed your brain with some useful marketing advice. I also hope you will subscribe for more to come soon. Don’t miss the point that it will make a lot more difference to your business than it will mine.

I also welcome you to get to know me. I’m a very approachable guy who loves the field of marketing, and I’m always delighted to be helpful.

The post What 40 Years Have Taught Me About Marketing appeared first on SEO and Social Media Marketing by Mark Murnahan.

If you’re in the field of marketing, get over yourself. You’re a commodity. At least that is the way a lot of people will see it, even if you actually are as awesome as you say you are.

Looking at marketing as a commodity is something people can understand. That’s because if they see it as all the same, it just comes down to the dollar amount, and that is what feels the safest for most people.

As it applies to the majority of people buying marketing services, the dollars which are easiest to concentrate on are the dollars going out, but without adequate forethought or examination of the incoming dollars the marketing produces.

It seems that a lot of people think of it like throwing those dollars to the wind and hoping some of them will float back.

That’s not the way it works when marketing is done well, but it is the easier way to digest. In the real world of business, marketing should be based on qualified mathematics, demographics, psychographics, and other principles of qualified market research and forecasting, but that is enough to make most people’s head explode. That kind of marketing comes with an investment and a commitment beyond commodity-style thinking about marketing. Many people confuse that as a risk, while the real risk is when marketing is based on guesswork and crossing fingers.

I’ll describe how the trend of “commoditized marketing” goes completely wrong. I hope you’ll take some qualified advice from somebody who has been around the block, and no longer wants to accept your money. In fact, this is my formal announcement that I Quit.

I have made my 2012 New Year’s resolution, and that is to stop offering marketing services for hire. I’ll give you some good advice and try to help you, though. The only things I would like to ask from you are your friendly wishes on my new career path away from providing marketing services for hire, and maybe a little discussion.

What Do You Want to Do With Your Life?

I believe that everybody should periodically ask themselves the question: “What do you want to do with your life?” That’s a tricky one, isn’t it? At least it is for me.

I’ve been asking myself this question a lot recently, and I’m seeing some things with much greater clarity. It’s still a bit blurry to me, but one thing is clear … I absolutely do not want to sell marketing services.

I finally reached the conclusion that selling marketing services for hire is a twisted soul-sucking racket filled with liars, and it has led me to ask this very important question of what I want to do with my life … and why I keep letting people suck me back into building their success while neglecting my own.

Knowing the answer to what you want to do with your life is vital to professional and personal growth, and it’s why my career is about to take a sharp turn, which I’ll announce one day soon.

The big life question I’ve addressed here was perhaps most famously asked in the 1984 music video “I Wanna Rock” by Twisted Sister. For your amusement, I’ll share that piece with you as you contemplate your answer.

I guess you could call it my mid-life crisis that brought me to this point. After all, I am about to turn 40 years old, my beard is going gray, my belly is getting bigger, and my job is sucking the life out of me. I’ve done most of the things I ever wanted to do. I’ve raced cars, authored books, been a CEO, earned squillions, retired, un-retired, and even created a family complete with three kids and a wife, but now I largely hate this job. As much as I love the work I do, dealing with a public who really want to believe that marketing is a commodity sucks a little more soul out of me every day.

I’m simply not willing to participate in the “marketing as a commodity” mentality, and I honestly hate to even watch it from a distance. I’ve got better things to do than demean myself by taking peanuts for my skills and dealing with clients who don’t have a clue how much I am worth to them if they get out of their own way. Nosiree, Bob, that’s not my bailiwick … not in the least!

I previously promised myself to quit the addiction of accepting marketing clients by mid-2011, but as the end of 2011 draws near, I plan to stick to my guns. I’m not going to play along with the absurdity of “commoditized marketing” any longer, but I’ll tell you some good reasons for my decision, and leave you with some keys to help make more people flock to you like a free bacon sandwich covered in sex appeal.

While I take this turn away from selling the services of marketing, I’ll give you some indications of where this mentality is taking companies.

“Flat Broke” is Popular in Business!

Many companies are flat broke these days. Being broke is very a popular trend in business, but in most cases, they have a competitor that is raking in the profits. Decades ago, I made it a career objective to help people understand some of the reasons this is the case.

Helping companies to create success has always been very inspiring to me, but it also comes with a lot of challenges. Now, more than ever, I see a lot of companies making bad decisions about their marketing, and I see a lot of fear.

Why did it get this way? I have my ideas on the matter, and I’ll start with this: Marketers got lazy, and while they did, people’s confusion of marketing being a commodity was booming right along with the Internet. Fueled by that confusion, the barrier of entry to a marketing career was lowered to the level that any intern can pretend to be the equivalent to a Chief Marketing Officer or Marketing Director without being called out as an obvious fraud by the general public.

That’s for the fakes and liars, but as the frauds became more believable, the true marketing professionals with an ounce of integrity still faced the same old challenges.

The Challenges of Marketing Professionals

It has always been a challenge of marketing professionals to help people understand marketing concepts like customer modeling, targeting a market, and many other components to effective marketing.

Most people really don’t need or want to fully understand these things, and trying to explain it can often bore them to tears. So it is fitting that the client often just assumes these are things the marketer is using to confuse more money out of them.

A much tougher concept to explain is that marketing is not a cost, but rather an investment. This one stumps many good marketers, because companies either “get it” or they don’t. In my experience, most companies only understand their market very fractionally, and doing what it takes to achieve their potential scares them.

Other companies are complacent, and they are certainly beyond help. You can give some people case study after case study of successful marketing campaigns, and you can explain that it is the difference between growing a company or shrinking it, but if they refuse to help themselves, you cannot force it on them.

These things have never changed, but one thing that has become clearer is that marketing is increasingly viewed as a commodity.

I’ve provided marketing services to clients for a very long time. I’ve watched marketing change dramatically since my start in the 1980’s. I watched it change from small companies trying to chase unicorns with $1,000,000 catalog mailers and newspaper ads, to chasing unicorns with $300 ecommerce websites and marginal blogging efforts. More recently, I watched it change into the popular notion that hiring an intern to send tweets and update the company Facebook status is what marketing is all about.

It seems that an astonishing number of companies have been falsely convinced that social media marketing is just about socializing, and that search engine rankings are a function of technology. They’ve also been convinced that it is easy to be successful online and that if they keep doing what they’re doing, success will just magically come to them one lucky day.

Great Marketing Professionals Don’t Need to Lie!

I often find that marketers lean in one of two different directions: There are marketers who are great at selling marketing services but stink at actually performing them, and then there are marketers who are just great at performing marketing services, but stink at selling it. I am the latter of the two.

Something you should know is that good marketers don’t need to lie, and don’t like to sell.

An analogy I think is kind of funny is that I rank quite nicely if you search for “how to sell SEO” (search engine optimization), but I am absolutely terrible at selling SEO. In fact, if you google “SEO hell“, that’s where you’ll find me.

From my experience, I’d suggest seeking the the ones with the highest prices and finding out why their rates are so high. That’s what I do when I’m looking for marketing help, because I understand that this is not a commodity … I accept it, and I embrace it.

I look for the ones who are doing it for the right reasons, and who made success for themselves and others. Then I make them prove it, and if they can, they’re in!

There are more than enough “Johnny Come Lately” marketers out there, so you have to be diligent. Watch this video to see my take on them, or read “Bashing SEO and Social Media Experts: Humor or Hazard?” to see real life examples of it. Without their proof, you’re just guessing, and good marketing is not about guesswork!

$300 Unicorn Ride to Planet Success

I can show you a metric squillion instances of people seeking unrealistic profit from minimal commitment. It has become so convincing that some people will try almost anything, as long as it’s cheap.

What went completely wrong for me is that I am one of those marketing marketers, and not one of the selling ones I mentioned. I’ve had sales reps to handle sales for me, but most of them have been just as confused and in the dark about the value of good marketing as the general public. Besides, you just can’t train somebody to overcome apathy … people either want more, or they don’t.

I am entirely unwilling to let people pay me to deliver them mediocre results. That is my curse, and my Achilles heel. I just cannot see letting people believe something is going to help them unless it is actually going to help them.

I’m not willing to start offering $300 unicorn rides to planet success, and as long as people see marketing as a commodity, somebody else always will. I thought about stooping to the cheap side of marketing, but my integrity always gets in the way.

I hope that you can believe my words more than ever by knowing that I’m out of the consulting business, and I’ll turn you down when you come waving a wad of money in my face. Well … I guess it depends on the wad, but it let’s just say that it would take a signed letter of commitment and a lot of money before we sit down for lunch to talk about changing my mind. Plus, I’d have to really like your brand.

Farewell to the Mediocrity of Commoditized Marketing

If you are one of my many readers who makes it to the very end of my articles, I hope you will at least give me a good send-off with a “hello” or something to let me know you’ve been reading. I hope you will know that I really feel the words I write, and that this is not an easy step. I also hope that you will look forward to hearing more from me, because I have many working drafts for articles to come.

To those knuckleheads who were just lurking around, waiting and thinking about contacting me to help them grow their business: You waited too long. I would have worked a lot harder and could have achieved a lot more for your business than you gave me credit. On a positive note, there’s probably a 15 year old kid in Pakistan who will do the same thing for fourteen bucks. Yeah, it’s probably the same.

I hope that my work (including my books) has, and will continue to help you move forward in your business and personal desires. I sincerely believe that my integrity is fully intact and I have never been misleading in this blog. I know there is a lot of benefit for those who continue to read my archives … and my tales of what’s to come.

Now I’d really appreciate hearing from you. Please take a moment to add your comments and help me create a discussion of what you’ve just read. It means a lot to me.

Photo Credit:
I’m A Human Being NOT A Commodity by Kenny Sun via Flickr

The post Face it Marketing Professional, You’re a Commodity! appeared first on SEO and Social Media Marketing by Mark Murnahan.

Every blogger and every user of any other social media platform has a goal. There is always something … an outcome that they hope for and work toward. Whether that outcome is making a friend, or making a sale, there is a goal.

Those goals are each different, and they are often not entirely clear to the individual, but one common thread is that we all want people to read what we have to say.

With any luck, they will subscribe, come back, read more, add their replies, and click “Like”, “Tweet”, and all those other buttons to share it with their friends.

Luck isn’t enough! They will need reasons, and everybody has their own … reasons. It is your task to find those reasons, and I have some ideas that I truly believe can help you.

Define Your Social Media Objectives

If you don’t know what you want, it will be pretty hard to achieve it, and even harder to match it with what others want. Why are you doing this? If you don’t know, how will anybody else know, and how will you measure it when it happens? I don’t think I have to remind you that it is not a perfect world, but let’s imagine for a moment.

In a perfect world, everybody will follow our website links to all the right things we really want them to read, and maybe even get to know us. Even if it doesn’t make us money, it makes us feel good to be useful, entertaining, or whatever kind of validation which makes up those goals I mentioned. Sometimes the most useful of all is that it lets us know if we’re on the right track … or not.

If it is a business endeavor, we generally hold hopes they will become a customer.

That’s a perfect world, but in the real world, it’s going to take more than just hope. It will often require some pretty extensive effort, and maybe even a little magic … such as building trust, fostering ongoing communication, and a good dose of creativity.

First of all, you must define your objectives if you ever hope to match them with their objectives. You know … them … those people whose objectives you hope to trigger.

Define Their Objectives … That’s What Really Matters

This could go into a huge topic of audience modeling, but that’s another article … and it’s in my archive with the rest of them. What I want to suggest here is that being likable, human, and considerate is like Shark Repellent.

One of the strongest most profound objectives most people have is to avoid people they don’t like or trust. Heck, I’ll avoid whole cities because there are people there I don’t like or trust. I’m certainly not going to read their marketing material or do business with them. I’d rather throw a hungry shark at them!

A flaw that I often see in business use of social media is the tone people use, and whether that tone is really just about them, or about the person reading. If you ever want to sell something … anything … the message should be about the ways it will benefit them … and not just you. Focusing on why you want them to buy something rather than why they want to buy it is not likable. It turns people off like a light switch. If you want their attention, you need to address their objectives.

The best way to solve your tone issues is often with proper intentions. That is usually something people either have, or they don’t … but it can be developed and improved.

The tone we set with our words can tell a lot about us, but those words are often based on our intentions. Your words can help somebody feel like they would enjoy having beers with you, or your words can make them want to throw a hungry shark at you. Your intent will nearly always show through with your words, and so it holds true that your intent is often what makes you either likable or shark bait.

Get on Their Beer Side

The best way I’ve found to be on the beer side of their decisions rather than the shark side is to keep my intentions in check. When I know that is in check, the next thing is be a real person, and write to people just as I would speak to them in person, or how I would write if I was sending them a letter.

You may be writing to a lot of people at once, but as they each read what you have to say, they identify with it individually. Yes, I’m writing to you. Will you write me back?

I’m not going to claim that I have this just perfect. If you’ve read my blog for any time at all, you may consider me just a bit “crusty”. I tell things how I see them, even when it is not comfortable to everybody. That’s because I’m not trying to reach “everybody”, but hopefully the ones I do reach will keep their sharks for somebody else.

If you are likable and you avoid the flying sharks, all of those hopes and goals are a lot easier. For example, I am not ashamed or afraid to tell people the outcome I hope for. Of course, there must be a good balance between being useful to others and sustaining usefulness to yourself. I try my best to strike that balance, and from my experience, that balance is a lot easier when we’re feeling like having beers together, and nobody is throwing sharks.

Be Genuinely Human … Always!

I’m not out to make everybody happy … plain and simple. I have claimed it many times that “I am not out to please everybody, and that pleases some people very much.” What I do have on my side, and something I think matters a lot is that I am here to talk to you, directly, and to tell you just the way I see it. Even if you don’t like it, you will at least know where I stand. Being a genuine human makes that more palatable.

Yes, I’m human. I have my good moods, and I have my bad moods. I have my good ideas, and I have some that are flawed. Well, not actually flawed, but I just threw that in because some people like it better when I seem more humble.

I am pretty sure that if you have a blog, use Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube or any other communications tool, you can probably relate to this in some way. You’ve seen the fake people. So, my thought today is to reflect on just how human you are, and how human those people reading what you say are, too.

Are you being conversational in the things you say? Are you writing for people, or are you writing at them? Are you inviting them for a beer, or are you making them want to whip out a shark and wing it at you?

I consider this often, and I hope you know that I am not just writing to write … I am writing to communicate. So, here it is … my letter to you. I didn’t write it in calligraphy and seal it in a sweet smelling envelope, but I did write it for you. Keep your sharks handy, if you must.

Dear Reader:

I appreciate your interest in improving your market share with better social media marketing. I hope you find my work useful.

I am pretty sure you didn’t wake up this morning jazzed to read about marketing, but I’ve got some reading material for you. I can’t make you read it, but I sincerely believe you will find real value in the information I am sharing with you.

One of the first things to note about social media is that much of what you will encounter sounds too good to be true. That’s because it is. The world has largely been enamored by the “new” trend of social media, and so there are a lot of people still in awe by the packaging, and still playing with the bubble wrap.

I think you will find that I tend to direct people back to some common sense and rationality. I believe in things which are objective and measurable, and I like to dispel the popular hyperbole. It is my job to make companies more visible and more profitable, not to waste clients’ money.

Social media is not new to me. I met my wife and mother of our three children by way of social media, a dozen years ago. We merged our respective companies and created one of the top wholesalers of Internet access and wholesale website hosting services in USA. Our growth was largely due to the same type of marketing services I provide for hire.

I would like to share some of the things I believe every company should know before jumping into social media marketing. The link I am about to share is to a series of articles that can provide a lot of understanding about what works and does not work, and how to make good decisions for your business (even if you don’t hire me to help you).

If you dare to accept some truthful and logical advice, based on extensive experience, please see this collection of social media marketing articles.

I hope that you will read it and put it to good use. If you don’t have the time right now, I hope that you will bookmark it and come back. If you subscribe for my updates, I’ll help to remind you.

There is also a link to my bio, on that page, as well as my blog archive with hundreds of articles dealing with online marketing, including a lot of useful information about search engine optimization. It will certainly not all interest you, but it can help you with good direction for your marketing.

If you will take the time to read some of this material, I am confident that it will benefit you. If you know somebody else who can benefit from it, please share it with them, and note that I pay quite generously for referrals.

Feel welcome to contact me any time. If you decide that you want to have a beer with me, let’s put that in our calendars!

Best Regards,

Mark Aaron Murnahan

P.S.

I just want to add one more thing. Thursday is Thanksgiving in USA. Since I am writing and publishing this in between Thanksgiving-related cooking tasks, I thought I’d share this with you. Yes, it is three pounds of bacon shaped like a turkey with a Thanksgiving wish from The Murnahan Family. Cheers!

Photo Credit:
writing santa by timlewisnm via Flickr

The post A Letter to Friends and Readers: Please Don’t Throw Sharks! appeared first on SEO and Social Media Marketing by Mark Murnahan.

I think this should be obvious, but then, obvious is not so obvious, and common sense is not so common. That is the main emphasis of this article, so if you decide to stop here without further consideration, you’ve got the bulk of the benefit.

This is not just about content curation, or any one specific tactic that somebody told you may be a good practice for your marketing goals … this is about all of them. If there is something you are doing in your business pursuits, but you would never in a million years see the value in hiring somebody to do it for you, stop doing it, and get back to doing things that actually build your business.

I may sound like I just picked on “Content Curators”, meaning those people who expend their energy to bring you the latest and greatest news and information, but that is just an easy example to make this point. It is also a very common way to avoid the realities of business, and the limitations of time.

Who doesn’t love that person who generously takes time from their day to find interesting things to share with us? We all love that, and I, for one, am grateful for them. As a group, they have cumulatively helped to make my words, my industry knowledge, and my unique mind-spin very popular. I am sincerely very grateful and humbled by that. At the same time, I think it is important to note that many of those people who do it exceptionally well, and provide that extended filter of what is worthwhile, interesting, or useful, are generally doing it out of generosity. They are not getting paid for it. In most cases, not even a little bit. In fact, it can cost them (or you) a whole lot of time.

If you are curating content with the idea of it being a useful business tactic, I want to share reasons to reconsider your strategy about social media sharing and why you do it. Where it applies to your own marketing strategy, it is at least worth a momentary “think-over”.

I understand the thought that if you tweet, facebook, and share enough great ideas and information, it will make your name more prominent in people’s social media information backlog, but is it useful to you or not? Have you considered whether it may cause people to tune you out for the excessive noise it produces? Would you hire somebody else to do that for you, and would you consider it a valuable asset to your business? Would somebody ever, in a squillion years, pay you to receive the updates you curate? Unless you are a major news agency, the answer is “probably not” … and even if you are, the answer is “probably not”. How much would you be willing to pay to receive the content curation you provide?

Look, I really do have a good understanding of the mindset that if you share something, others will be more likely to share what you have to say. I wrote about it, and if you really want to curate something popular, have a look at what I said about “Social Media and The Absurdity of Implied Reciprocity“. To put it mildly, I’d suggest you don’t hang your hat on that strategy.

I also offer some really good insights about “Social Media Popularity Addiction and Why I Quit“. The truth is that although many people find it very alluring to share a whole bunch of industry information with the notion that if they are sharing enough outside information, it will be easier to sneak their call-to-action in there so they don’t feel too “self-promoting”. I get this. If all you are doing is promoting your own thoughts or ideas, people may see you as “The D Word“, but there is an even worse option … being a headless chicken without a strategy.

Another popular notion is that by sharing good information and ideas, it may help somebody else to view you as more informed or knowledgeable about a given topic. That’s fine, and it can be very useful to share ideas to express your approval (or disapproval) but what about content creation? Wouldn’t creating an idea provide an even better yardstick of what you know, or what you think?

What I want to caution here is the downside of performing tasks without using forethought and common sense. If you think it will be a huge business asset to keep doing things which you would never pay somebody else to do, take a deep breath, sit down, think clearly, and question whether you are really spending your time productively.

I’m not saying that you shouldn’t share what others have to say. Not at all, and there are some great ideas out there which should be shared. I am just suggesting to think it over before you do, and consider how much time you expend with such things. I’m also not saying you shouldn’t be doing each and every thing you are doing in your marketing, public relations, or networking. I am mostly just suggesting that you rethink it to better define where your assets and liabilities each lie. You may be right, or you may be wrong, but in either case, you should be cognizant.

Here is are two acid tests to consider:

A.) Would you pay somebody else to do the things you are doing to promote your business?
B.) Would somebody else pay you to do the things you are doing to promote your business?

If you are unsure, or these questions hit a nerve, it is probably time to readjust things.

Photo Credit:
Chicken by Leif K-Brooks via Flickr

The post Content Curator Wanted: Salary Commensurate With Zero appeared first on SEO and Social Media Marketing by Mark Murnahan.

A thought came to mind today about the frequently very low attention span of Internet users. When they come to your website, you would probably like to fix that. I will share some thoughts and handy tips to help you do just that. First, let’s consider why it is this way, by looking at how we use the Internet, ourselves.

We often must scan through a lot of dis-interesting information in order to find what we seek, so we each do a lot of scanning when we use the Internet. Just considering all the advertisements we dodge on a daily basis, it is amazing that we ever find our way. Then, adding in the huge volume of obviously false, overtly misleading, and downright dishonest drivel, it really has our information filters working overtime.

It makes a lot of sense how we can become excessively dependent on a quick scan-and-click defense of our time. Let’s face it, most of what is on the Internet is worthless, offensive, or irrelevant to any given individual. The majority is just plain boring. Otherwise, we would want to read and fully absorb every link we can get our mouse on. Of course, this is all subject to the perspective of the reader. Even toupee maintenance and Acetaldehyde dehydrogenase will be interesting to somebody. Here comes my first tip: know who that interested “somebody” is. I’ll get back to that.

Once we find what we are looking for, we make a quick jab on the brakes and we slow down enough to try and learn something. What seems obvious, but is easy for many people to overlook, is that this scanning and filtering is not just something we do … our potential customers do it, too. That’s right, they are not so different in this respect, and it is entirely possible that you are not as immediately interesting to them as you could be.

Be More Interesting, to More People, More Often

This is a prominent goal of many marketing efforts, but being more interesting, to more people, more often is easier said than done. It comes with some challenges. If not, more people would drive down the street tossing hundred dollar bills out the window because their marketing made them so filthy stinking happy.

In the Internet marketing field, when somebody just pops in and takes off without reading, we call that scan-and-click ratio a “bounce rate“. I like to call it, a “Yawn Rate” … or the rate at which people encounter a big yawn and dismiss it as useless and boring. It usually happens within only a few seconds.

The “yawn rate” creates a great challenge for online content producers. Whether it is a product description for an ecommerce website, an “about us” page, or a blog article, it is a challenge that must be recognized in order to overcome it. I have some tips that may help, but there is still no perfect answer. If you intend to be astonishingly interesting every time, it will take practice … plus a good amount of magic.

Today, as I often do, I want to offer you some marketing ideas you can put to work immediately.

Sometimes It’s The Timing

Sometimes it is just the timing of your message that fails. Not that you created or released it at the wrong time, but that a reader has discovered it at the wrong time … for them. Maybe it just wasn’t what they needed right then, but maybe they will need it later. Be sure to make it easy and desirable for them to come back later.

If they don’t take action, at least you have tried to help them. It is pretty unlikely for them to go away horribly offended by your effort at continued communications. If so, their neurotic episodes probably extend to other areas of their life, too.

Sometimes It’s The Delivery

This is a tough matter for a lot of people. Most people are only a fraction as good at creating interesting or useful information as they think they are. Before you start feeling defensive about your website, consider asking for advice from others.

Have you ever watched a talent show like American Idol, X Factor, or So You Think You Can Dance? Much like the many humorous failed auditions that make these television shows so interesting, many people with a couple dozen visitors to their website think they have amazing marketing talent, and refuse to accept good advice.

Don’t take it personally if somebody offers you a suggestion. Ian Benardo thought he could sing and dance, so he refused to listen to criticism. Don’t be an Ian Benardo!

If you are willing to face the truth, ask somebody else for their unbiased opinion. Maybe you need to hire it out to a professional (usually the best option), or maybe you don’t. In either case, you should be willing to listen and accept good advice.

Fix Your Yawn Rate With Audio Feedback

This is a favorite, for me, and it is a staple of providing read-worthy information. Knowing the way somebody will read what you have to say can be invaluable. When people read your website, it is like a little voice in their head, silently speaking those words you produced. Shouldn’t you know how that quiet little voice sounds to them?

Reading comprehension is not the same for everybody. There is often a language barrier to overcome, even among readers of the same native language. Something I find helps me a lot is to hear my words in audio. If I don’t have my editor handy to read it aloud, I record it and listen to how it comes across. Many times, I find errors in the flow of material just by reading it aloud, but they come through even clearer when I record and then listen. Try reading your website aloud and pretend you are speaking to the person reading it. Does it sound awkward? Would you still express it the same way verbally, or would it be better to rephrase it?

I have found the value of using a conversational tone to be useful for decades, but it became even more obvious when I started providing all of my blog articles in both text and audio versions. If you try this tip and listen to your words, I think you will agree that it can be very beneficial. I believe it is much better to have somebody else read it to you, and I thank my lucky stars to have an awesome editor, but even if you are self-editing, it is worth the time to hear what you are saying before publishing it.

Don’t Pre-Judge or Dismiss Visual Appeal

I am a word guy, so I sometimes resent the fact that a picture can say things I cannot say. Well, I guess I could say those things, but if a picture is worth a thousand words, as they say, my blogs would be even longer … and that may seem impossible, but it is true.

Visuals count, and as much as I stomp my feet and pout about it, they still have a strong value in making the information you share more interesting. I often consider this one of the hardest parts of producing website content. I guess that is because the words come a lot easier than hunting down a cool graphic to represent those words. It is worth it, and I think of it like setting the tone of that voice I explained. Be creative with this and see what happens. I think you may be surprised how much it can help grab and keep a reader’s attention.

Do You Feel More Interesting Yet?

Far beyond the suggestions I made here, it is critical to understand that everybody is not your best audience. In fact, I highly recommend reading the article titled “Everybody is Not Your Target Market!” to emphasize the point. They will not all love what you are promoting, and some people may even dislike it very much. That’s a good thing, because the ones who do like it will probably like it even more.

You will never get it perfect, and there is always room for improvement. It can take a lot of effort and adjustment to make it optimally effective, but isn’t it worth it? When you get it all just right, you will find that more people will read to the very end … and that’s when they take action on your words. Don’t we all want that?

What do you have to say about this? Do you have suggestions, or did you like my ideas? Please take a moment to express it.

Photo Credits:
Yawn. by Michael Lemmon via Flickr
A Big Yawn by Mark Robinson via Flickr
Yawn by Linda via Flickr

The post Ideas to Increase Reader Attention Span and Reduce Your “Yawn Rate” appeared first on SEO and Social Media Marketing by Mark Murnahan.

I must have heard nearly every conceivable absurd notion a person can come up with when it comes to marketing. There are a lot, and I have heard some really bad ideas about marketing practices. One silly thing I encounter a lot is when people say “It’s not about you.” A few people may really know what others mean when they say this, but I think the majority of people are just giving you hogwash.

It seems to me that this message has been mutated in so many ways that it has actually become a scare tactic against marketing, rather than good advice.

If you hear people say “It’s not about you”, you should never accept that as a reason to hide who you are, what you stand for, and what you are seeking, only to sneak it in once in a while. Tragically, I believe that is the way many people have taken this message, and it is often completely contrary to effective marketing.

Stop Letting Knuckleheads Control Your Marketing Assets

When you think of your social media marketing, and especially blogging, let’s consider some things. It is a whole lot easier to spread a message if it is useful and interesting to others, rather than just a sales pitch. That should be obvious. If you are just telling people how awesome you are without relating it to how it benefits them, your ship is sunk. Nobody wants to hear about that, and nobody wants to talk about that.

It is comparatively easy to spread a genuinely useful message far, and spread it wide. When it is done just right, it can get a lot of people talking about it, and you may even benefit from many other websites linking to it. This is also a primary factor to being listed better in search engines. It works in perfect synergy, and it grows like a downhill snowball. It all looks shiny and grand, right?

Here’s the kicker: When something is implicitly “not about you”, it comes with a big risk of people never knowing you, your brand message, or your call-to-action (what you want for them to do next). Until you show them who you are, and what your call to action includes, it is just guesswork for them, and missed opportunities for business.

If you think that being useful and interesting means you should carefully hide your call-to-action … the thing that actually provides benefit to your business … then why are you doing it at all? Who ever suggested that you should be playing Mother Teresa and Gandhi with your marketing assets? If somebody suggested that, perhaps you should give them a big hearty slap.

Finding Your Marketing Balance

There must be a good balance to your efforts, and in that balance is where much of your success is locked up like Fort Knox.

You can take the approach that those useful things you do on your blog or social networks will make up an overall better presence for your brand, and this is very true. It is a very important principle in online marketing. At the same time, you cannot expect people to go hunting through pages of information just to discover how to pay your company a profit. They won’t do it! No, they really won’t … and the numbers show the truth! This means you must create a good balance, and that balance should include letting them know what it is that keeps you in business so you will be there when they come back for more.

Sure, it is fine to give the whole world a nice pat on the bottom and a kiss on the brow, but if you are doing something valuable for others, you deserve the benefit of growing your business for it.

Where is The Voice of Your Brand?

When it comes to market research and learning who will give your brand a second glance, it is not about your company or yourself. It is about them … your market … the people who will become your loyal customers and brand advocates. With this information, it becomes about you and them, and where the two parties meet in the middle and do business.

Beyond the research, when it comes to building a brand, you would be foolish to invest in the marketing hogwash that “it’s not about you”. Yes, it is about you, but with some checks and balances. The balance comes somewhere between the value you provide, and the value you ask for, so you need to get that part right.

If the people you are reaching are the right audience, they want to hear from you, and they want to know what you’re all about … whether you represent a company or an individual. That sense of “You” is what they connect with, and what gives them the confidence in who they are considering doing business with.

I’ll explain this in real and vivid terms, and I stand behind this. First, I’ll give you a bit of background, and then I’ll explain the direct benefits to you. I hope you can apply this to your business.

I’ve been in marketing my entire adult life. I have provided marketing consulting and training to successful companies when I was as young as 15 years old. I was raised into it by some brilliant parents, and they taught me a lot. They mentored me.

I was actually raised for my job, much like the six year old girl playing piano in the video above was raised to be a concert pianist. I was fed all of the best books about marketing, success, and motivation. I was taken to conferences of all types and sizes. I was hidden behind phone lines and fax machines to work with clients who simply wouldn’t understand it if they knew their new marketing campaign was largely being constructed by a kid.

I was on a stage talking to people about marketing before I was old enough for a driver’s license. Back then, I could barely wait to be 40, so people could take me more seriously. Today, as I approach 40 a couple months away, I question whether that was my best goal. In any case, I suppose that turning 40 with 25 years of marketing experience and business ownership has its upsides.

I grew up a lot faster than I would ever wish for my children, but I had good mentoring for this career. My parent-mentors trained me to understand how to make something marketable, and how to see markets as systems. That means seeing more than just “the dots”, but rather being able to connect the dots between companies and their consumers. I don’t know why I was raised that way, but my parents had their reasons, and must have seen something in me.

Ten years after I left school at 15, I was able to retire early, as a 25 year old “know-it-all”. Some years later, I went back to work and merged two companies and grew them to the pinnacle of the wholesale Internet services industry. I have also created similar success for clients who had the fortitude and desire to grow their companies, and called me to build and manage their marketing strategies.

That’s a small portion of my career history. I am not ashamed to tell you, nor afraid that it offends you. That does not make me dis-interesting to the right people, and it does not make this all about me, either. If somebody is dis-interested in my career history and qualifications in marketing, they may be the type who will listen to the first slick-talker to tell them what they want to hear. I’m not that guy, and I have a robust brand message that confirms it. I am a guy who strongly understands that it takes willingness to make sacrifices in order to build a successful company … and my clients do, too.

Here’s How You Benefit Knowing This

I offer a lot of reliable information on this blog, the majority of which is based on things I have witnessed in my career. The benefit to you of knowing about my history, who I am, and what I’m about is that you may have more confidence in the things I write. If you have good reasons to trust my integrity, you can see that my efforts are intended to be helpful, and not based on hype.

You can learn a whole lot about my industry, and gain a lot of useful information on this blog … and I provide it for free! If you want the other 99.7 percent, and you want it implemented exceptionally well, I welcome you to contact me to see if we’re a good match. That’s what I’m paid for, and I’m not a bit apprehensive to ask for your business.

Are you ready? If so, click here!

Oh, but there is another point I want to make about one of those early lessons I learned in marketing … just to drive the point home.

The Lessons of Two Ears and One Mouth

Early in my marketing career, I received constant reminders of why I was born with two ears but only one mouth. That is a really tough lesson for most kids to master … and some never do. They explained that it was because I should be listening twice as much as I talk. Of course, a critical part of marketing is to listen to the customers. That’s how you come to understand them, and their desires. It is critical, and it is what market research is for.

I think this is the part where the notion that “it’s not about you” totally confounds a lot of people.

Another lesson I learned that was equally valuable is that when people are considering a purchase, they also appreciate a story of how well the product or service worked for others … or how it could work for them. In order for them to become a customer, they must envision having whatever it is you are offering for sale, and they must envision it with a favorable outcome.

This means, you must be more than just a listener. You also need to know how to tell a story. Sometimes it is a story of a customer, your product, your brand, or your experience, but that’s what people connect with and understand. If you have a story from your experience in business, tell it. Yes, it is about you, and that is a good thing! That is a whole lot better than letting people guess, and it is a lot more genuine than just telling somebody how great your product or service is. That piece of “you” is what becomes valuable … so in this sense, I’d say yes … it is about you!

A question that sticks with me is this: “Would you rather be an interested introvert or an interesting extrovert?” I think we all want to be a little of both, but if you put this in terms of a customer and a seller, I would have to say that I want them to be interested and I want to be interesting. That doesn’t mean turning off the listening, but it does mean you’ve got to do some talking.

People don’t want to hear your hyperbole, but they do want to hear what makes you who you are. If you hide that because somebody told you “it’s not about you”, then you are covering up your best asset. When it comes down to actually doing business, those things about you are what makes up a large portion of their decision.

Just as there are more followers than there are leaders, I believe there are a lot more introverts in the world than there are extroverts. This may be partially because in order to be an extrovert, you put yourself out there on a limb. You are taking a risk to be the one doing the talking. Don’t worry though, because even if you try really hard, you will never make everybody like you … and it is counterproductive to even try.

I say go for it … talk about yourself enough so we can know who you are and what you stand for. If you don’t, all that your would-be customers have to base their buying decisions on is facts and figures. Unless you are the best and the cheapest, all at once, somebody else can nearly always beat you out on at least one of those measures.

That’s my piece. It’s your turn, and it’s all about you, now. Go ahead and add your comments to tell me I’m wrong.

Photo Credit:
Pig by dullhunk via Flickr

The post Great Marketing is Not About You … Hogwash! appeared first on SEO and Social Media Marketing by Mark Murnahan.

I believe the popularity addiction that many people suffer from in social media is downright pathetic. I’m going to tell you, in plain business terms, why I quit putting that drug in my bloodstream and stopped caring about appearances of popularity, having a squillion followers, or stressing about having the highest Klout score. In short, it is because those things aren’t what pays the bills, and they can even be quite destructive pursuits.

If you will look at it rationally, for just a moment, I’ll show you why the fashionable illusion of popularity fails the test of real business value. If you are ready to breathe a sigh of relief, you may want to pay attention and join me on the road to recovery.

For the most part, you probably don’t follow people on Twitter or “Like” them on Facebook because you’re planning to do business with them. Sometimes, perhaps, but how often? Really, how often do you use that long list of people you are connected to as a reminder for your shopping list?

When you need to pick up something on your next shopping venture, you don’t go and see who you’re following to decide what to buy or who to buy from. No you don’t! OK, maybe you do … but if that’s the case, you are in a very small minority. If you buy from them, it is likely because they built a positive brand image, and became more memorable.

Then why is it that so many people out to sell something have it in their head that other people are using social media for formulating their shopping list? They aren’t thinking in rational human terms … that’s why! They are thinking in terms of appearances and what may make them look more important or popular, rather than building a sustainable brand recognition. I guess that must make sense to some people, but not the successful ones … not for the ones with two brain cells to rub together.

Let me explain it like this: If you saw only 426 people following Subway Restaurants on Twitter, it probably wouldn’t alter your thoughts about buying a Subway sandwich. You buy from them because they make an awesome sandwich, and you’ve heard of them because they built their brand based on those awesome sandwiches. That is also why they don’t have 426 Twitter followers … they have 184,847. They produced something people want, and they made it memorable.

Conversely, if you see that a small real estate firm has 184,847 Facebook fans, it doesn’t mean they’ve got a house you want … or that they will be any better at selling your house. In fact, it may mean they are playing the popularity game, and prioritizing poorly.

You can lie to me, but don’t lie to yourself. If you try lying to me, I’ll break out the real numbers. Try this on for size: Here is a recent snapshot of a random hundred people who followed me on Twitter, along with the results I put together from over 1,000 tweets of my previous ten blog articles. See “Twitter in Numbers: Marginal, Not Magical“. Click it and read up if you really want the truth.

Perhaps too many people latched onto the fallacy of “more is better”, or the crazy idea that social media marketing is just about the networking … but it’s not!

The Psychology of Social Media Popularity

Nobody is fully immune to the notion that a perception of popularity will somehow serve them. I’ve even heard it from people who have absolutely no business case to have a big audience. When I have asked people about it, they are often confused by why I think it is unimportant. A small number of them are honest enough to admit that they want the popularity because it makes them feel good … and it makes them feel more productive, or more important.

In itself, a Twitter follower or a Facebook fan or friend is a terribly weak way to measure your brand’s love, but I see it all the time. I have heard many instances of companies wanting to know how much it will cost to acquire “X” number of friends, fans, followers, and other useless measures. A much smaller number is asking how to breathe awesomeness into their brand and earn faithful brand advocates and customers.

Something those who participate in the popularity contest are reluctant to admit is that more social media connections alone does not actually equal true popularity, or value. What it can do, however, is make them feel like they are making progress, even when there is no true progress at all. It often just means those connections had the same psychological need for validation, and they are participating in the absurdity of implied reciprocity. These people are completely confusing cause and affect, and they are wasting precious resources, like time and money.

The hope is often to have hundreds of people tweeting and facebooking something about them. That is a different kind of popularity, and it means your message is spreading. I don’t begrudge anybody for that, and I won’t call them a fool. In fact, it is just great! That may actually have value, and it may land the right person to become a customer. It is a sign of doing something well. That kind of popularity is often due to legitimate reasons.

Look at how you use social media, and then consider why you think everybody else is so different. Unless you are doing something totally different, and awesome, it really seems arrogant to believe that they are paying more attention to you than you are them.

You may find a number of people or companies that you find interesting, but don’t tell me for a second that you found thousands of people you really intend to keep up with and give attention to what they have to say. It simply doesn’t work that way. Have you ever heard of Dunbar’s Number? It works both ways, and unless those people are really interested in you, it is worthless. For the truth, just picture yourself as one of those random names or faces you see as you look at who you are “following” or “liking”. Do you really pay attention to them? Do you really think they are paying attention to you?

The Little Company That Couldn’t

I want you to imagine the little company who couldn’t. They set out to find popularity, and they paid a “social media expert” to help them amass an audience, but they wanted it done quickly and at a low cost. The social media expert could be blamed (and should rightfully be hung by the short hairs) for delivering them a group of totally disinterested people to follow them on Twitter and “Like” their Facebook page. The thing is, it is exactly what the company asked for, and they refused to see it any other way. It was what they were sure would work, and it was all they were striving for. They dictated exactly what they wanted, and now they’ve got an untargeted audience.

Months later, they wonder why they are still not seeing a return on their social media investment. They have a huge audience, but those people just aren’t rushing the gates to buy their stuff. It is often because they were too concerned by the cost of time, money, and hard work that they never questioned the return. As the company resentfully struggles with “What in the heck is wrong with those people?!”, the competition is doing great.

The competition saw the value of a strategy, and they stopped trying to be like everybody else. The competition realized that having a disinterested group of people to follow them, “Like” them, and pad their egotistical desires for appearance without substance will not be worth a box of frog toenails if they are the wrong audience.

Here’s My Theory on The Value of Popularity

I guess should know a little about this … I have a metric squillion readers of my blog, and a reasonably sizable following across my social networks. I don’t need, nor want everybody to like me, love me, or follow me. I don’t concern myself with a bigger audience, because I would rather focus on the right people, and give them something they want … something useful. That’s why the audience is there in the first place!

Without a focus on people’s interests, and doing something worthwhile, it has very little business value. I guess you could say that I am reasonably popular, but I am still working on the awesome factor, every day. That matters a whole lot more to my business and personal pursuits than just looking popular.

Even with a great audience, it still requires a lot of effort. The most valuable audience is often the smallest target of all.

That’s my take on the subject. What do you have to say about it?

Photo Credits:
Heroin and Syringe by Michael Velardo via Flickr
“Red Face” sells? by Daniel Axelson via Flickr
Héroïne by Alexandre Duret-Lutz via Flickr

The post Social Media Popularity Addiction and Why I Quit appeared first on SEO and Social Media Marketing by Mark Murnahan.

I am reminded of a story of two friends, John and Mike. I introduced them many years ago. John was the number one real estate agent in town, and Mike was seeking to sell his house, and buy another. One day, Mike called John and asked him to evaluate his house for market, and make suggestions for improvements to increase the sale price.

John was glad for the call, and he offered his professional time and efforts to help Mike. A few days passed, and John discovered that Mike had listed the home for sale … but chose a different listing agent. As the top agent in town during a good time in real estate, John certainly did not need the commission, but was disappointed because he had wanted to assist our friend Mike in the sale, and subsequent purchase. Plus, he had been somewhat crudely taken advantage of professionally, by his friend.

John was a bit confused as to why his friend chose a different agent. He feared he had somehow offended Mike with the suggested listing price. No, Mike took his advice on the price. Was it the suggested improvements, the commission, the way he combed his hair? No, no, and no … the agent Mike listed with was a young sexy lady. Mike hoped he may have a chance with her, so he took all of John’s suggestions and listed the house elsewhere.

Once the house was sold and Mike was ready to buy his next house, he still overlooked John. He went with a different agent, again.

I really don’t think John ever felt the same about Mike after that. Whether it is right or wrong, I can understand how John could feel insulted. After all, he would have done the sale transaction and the purchase transaction for his friend, without a commission at all. Ironically, Mike had done a similar thing to me, years earlier, and he was on his way to building a reputation for it.

I am certainly not a fan of implied reciprocity (as you can see if you read that link), but you can probably imagine (or remember) how it feels when a friend overlooks you and buys from your competitor, right? It actually kind of stinks, and it is easy to take it as an insult. It also feels even worse when the friend is hurt by a competitor, when you know you could have saved them the trouble. No, it does not feel satisfying … is stinks!

Have you ever witnessed a friend go somewhere else when they needed something? I have heard speculation about the mindset, but I refuse to understand it or adopt it for my own use. I know that some people think you shouldn’t do business with friends, but I think that is largely a horrible attitude.

I will always try my best to give my business to a friend or acquaintance above a stranger. They may really appreciate that you thought of them, and they may really appreciate the business.

Now I’ll tell you what got me to thinking about this.

What Reminded Me of This?

I recently had a friend ask me if I knew a good option for web hosting. Now, when I say “friend”, I don’t mean just a random acquaintance on Twitter. She has sat at my bar for drinks, she co-chaired a school fundraiser with me, and we have celebrated kids birthdays together. She has sat in my office, and she has even seen and touched the corporate YourNew.com, Inc. Race Team Corvettes. She has also been my friend on Facebook for years. So, I know she knows I do something “Internetty”, and she knows I do it very well. She knows I know a lot about this Internet, so she asked me about web hosting.

The sad thing is that she didn’t really know much about what I actually do, or just how much I am able to help her. It bothered me, but mostly because of how I could benefit her, rather than that her business would pay me a dollar or two per month. That’s why I decided that I am going to start letting more people know.

I know that a lot of people who know me don’t really know or understand my work. I do more than a couple things here on this Internet, but I don’t really promote them very much. It’s mostly kind of an “obvious secret”, in a way, because the majority of my work is operating as “the geek behind the geeks”. I generally don’t promote my services to a retail market, or to friends.

You see, aside from my work as a marketing guy, I founded a company sometime over a decade ago, as a merger of two other companies. That company sells Internet services to wholesale clients … who often sell those same services to resellers, who sell them to the public. We’ve been very successful at that market segment, and retail sales are a minimal part of what we do.

We sell web hosting to web hosting companies. You knew it had to come from somewhere, right? In fact, if you have used the Internet very long, there is a very high probability that you have used services I have created or brokered. The company is still my full-time employer after all these years, and I work there as the CEO.

So, why don’t I promote that to my blog readers? It is mostly because I have enough search engine traffic and recognition in that specific area of the industry that it is just a distraction to what I do here at aWebGuy.com. In any case, if you are in need of any of the many Internet-related services we provide, I’m always happy to help … I am just not out to push those on you. In fact, you may even see Google ads for my competitors right here on my blog. It’s ironic, right?

Let Me Show You Why I Have a Reputation

I want to show you why I have a good reputation in my industry. I’m going to start with this: If you have been a reader for a while, you probably have some sense of who I am. You may even know a good amount about my principles and my ethics. You can probably tell that this is not some big scam waiting to suck you in.

Today, I have decided to offer web hosting to my readers and friends at a rate of $10 per month, or $5 per month for ten or more websites. I was going to say free, but come on … having a guy to call who really knows his stuff has got to be worth something, right? I’m not just offering basic web hosting, either. I will include the same web hosting system that is used here at aWebGuy.com … which clearly exceeds an average demand when it comes to web hosting. I’ll even include all the bells and whistles like website builders, ecommerce tools, plenty of email, and support for about any technology you can dream up … just ask me.

Better yet, I will provide your web hosting technical support, myself. Sure, I will have my tech support folks waiting in the wings in case you encounter something really pressing and I am in the shower or otherwise cannot take your call … but I will be the live voice at the other end of the line if you need web hosting help. How many CEOs do you know who will do that? I’ll bet that “Daddy” guy won’t take your call on his way to pick the kids up at school.

In fact, to take me up on this offer, I want you to contact me directly, and I will personally help you to set up your account and walk you through the basics. Now that doesn’t sound like such a scary offer, does it?

The one caveat is that you subscribe to my blog and keep reading to learn more about how to use that web hosting to build your business. If you are a subscriber, just ring me up and introduce yourself. I’ll be delighted to help you.

If you need web hosting, or you need better web hosting, contact me. I’ve provided web hosting for over a decade, including many websites you know and trust. Maybe even your bank, your city, your hospital, or your university. It’s better to trust somebody you are familiar with than trusting a total stranger.

I also want to add that if you know somebody else in the industry … by all means, call them! I really do believe it is valuable to do business with people you know and trust. I think it is always important to know who your friends are, know what they do, and remember them when they can help.

Oh, and one more thing … this is just for new web hosting accounts. I can’t just give away the whole farm. If you are already paying me more, I’m confident there’s a good reason for it.

The post Remember Who Your Friends Are … And What They Do, Too! appeared first on SEO and Social Media Marketing by Mark Murnahan.