The latest Google Sh*t Storm

Well, Google has done it again.  They’ve changed the way they assign page rank (which is a measure of a web site’s "validity") and web masters everywhere are throwing up their hands because overnight the rules have changed yet again!

Most of the blogosphere is reacting with outrage.  Andy Beard has a GREAT piece on the ensuing melee resulting from the latest shake up.  It’s funny and it’s educational.

However, it’s important for business owners to keep in mind that relying solely upon Google to deliver your customers is VERY dangerous, indeed.   See, Google defines their "customer" as those who search, not those who pay to be found by that search.  Because of this definition, you can’t TRUST Google to do what’s right for you, the one who wants to be found.  Google will always do what is in THEIR customer’s best interest…. damn those of us who actually pay to gain access to those eyeballs!

So while bloggers from A-Z may rail against the latest actions of the 900 lb Gorrilla that is Google, there isn’t much any of us can do to alter their actions.  

For the past DECADE I have encouraged my clients to design their web presence so that it can be indexed by the search engines, but to then to market their business like the search engines don’t exist.  

There are other ways to make your potential customers aware of your business OTHER than Google.  There’s an old saying that warns you against putting all of your eggs into one basket.  Many marketing professionals once extolled the "squeeze page"…. to which Google replied….SLAP! 

Now, Google is issuing another SLAP, this time to bloggers who feature paid links on their blogs.  Google isn’t going so far as to delist them, but Google is discounting them, and that hurts.

Then again, I am reminded of a story in the book "Striking it Rich.com" (copyright 1999) where one business owner (Long Island Hot Tubs)  had with the all powerful 9at the time) search engine, Alta Vista.  His submission of his site, which at the time featured 400 pages of product,  was deemed to be "search engine spam" and the site was delisted by the search engine.

What bothered Harrison most was that "as a judge, jury and executioner, they deleted all references to our site."

According to the book, Long Island Hot Tubs (now Pool and Spa.com)  turned to the web in the late 20th Century because other forms of advertising had failed them.   Alta Vista wielded the same harsh stick then that Google freely waves today.  The last laugh was on Alta Vista.  It’s no longer the 900lb gorilla.  Now Google sits on the throne.

As you build and promote your web business, keep in mind that Google views their "customer" as those who use them to search.  Getting access to just a small portion of those millions of eyeballs are why there is a now a "job function"  known as "Search Engine Optimization".    There are other ways to access those eyeballs… it is just that few of those options actually have a "deliver those eyeballs for free" option.

 

So you claim you’re an expert….

If you’re an independent service professional, you had BETTTER be an expert, especially if you want to charge $100 an hour or more for your services.  Whether it’s the web, the law or real estate, if you’re a solo entrepreneur chances are you’re selling your expertise in a subject matter as the basis of your business.

So you’re an expert.  Congratulations.  Now what?

Well, the next step is that you need to communicate this expertise.   After all, that will be the foundation of your marketing message. 

There are a lot of ways you can communicate your expertise.  You can:

1. Declare your expertise on your logo/business cards/business letter head, etc
2. Write a book on the subject area of your expertise
3. Launch a blog on the subject area of your expertise.  Post frequently on the topics in the subject area of your expertise.
4. Deliver speeches and talks on topics within your area of expertise.

If you’re smart, you’ll focus upon steps 2-4 and possibly skip step 1.

Step 1, declaring your expertise,  is probably the least effective way of communicating your expertise.  From your prospective client’s point of view, it’s "easy" for you to declare you’re an expert.  The next thought in your prospective client’s mind when they see or hear you declare that you’re an expert is usually, "Prove it!"  That’s what steps 2-4 are all about.

Steps 2-4 are all ways in which you’ll prove your expertise.  For example, when you write a book, you are instantly awarded a certain level of "expertise"…. a well written book that is well promoted and sells a lot of copies affords you even more "authority".  However, merely getting your book published no matter what the quality of the content is usually enough to get you points in the "expert" category.  Being able to say to a potential client, "Here, read my book" is a great tool to demonstrate your level of expertise.

Launching a blog where you post frequently on your subject matter area is another GREAT way to DEMONSTRATE your expertise.  Many authors actually pull their book content from their blog posts and vice versa.  Blogs are an expert’s best marketing tool.

Finally, speaking frequently on your topic is another way to demonstrate your expertise.  Do you speak better than you write?  Then video tape yourself and post those short videos to your blog! 

In any case, communication is key in demonstrating your expertise.  Potential clients must be ASSURED of your expertise before they’ll pick up the phone and call you.  That’s why blogs are GREAT marketing tools for indepdendent service professionals.  Your blog allows your potential clients to "test the waters" without taking a HUGE leap of faith and contacting you, whether by phone, mail or email.

That’s why I HIGHLY recommend blogs for clients who want to demonstrate their expertise. 

There is no such thing as a set it and forget it successful web site

I try to use Fridays as a day to manage my business.  Well, things have been REALLY hopping around here for the past few months, and I haven’t checked on some of my babies… my now ORPHANED web sites, in apparently a VERY long time. I’m truly embarassed as to the state of disrepair of these web sites.  What’s really, really sad is two of these sites used to pull in NICE traffic.  Now, they’re mere shadows of their former glory. 

I blame blogs. 

My blogs in particular… including this one!  It’s all their fault really.  They’re just so DARNED EASY to manage.  I can log in, write a bit and click "publish".  VIOLA!  I’m in and out in a fraction of the time it takes to upload a big file via FTP. 

But it’s not just the ease of posting the content that makes me blog over creating HTML pages.  For example, on one HTML site I had created to experiment with affiliate income generation… there were CJ banner ads scattered all over the place.  Managing those banner ads was ALWAYS a chore… just from the HTML side.   Keeping up on who was still USING CJ as their affiliate manager and who wasn’t was yet another dreaded task.  If someone I was signed up with dropped CJ, their links went dead and I got to go searching through the site to find all the instances of that advertiser’s links.  Admittedly, that’s just part of playing the affiliate game. 

Another part of playing the affiliate game is attracting traffic. Without traffic, you won’t be making any affiliate sales and you won’t get traffic until you get some inbound links.  You can do everything right, but if you don’t have some inbound links, well… you’ll be working very hard for a very puny return.  

In HTML land, creating those inbound links was virtually impossible!  I mean sure, I published articles which helped a little… but I’ve found that if you’re publishing a web site outside the traditional "web developer" network, getting people to hire their webmaster to add a link to your site is difficult for most of us.  So difficult that I recently received a $20 bribe if I would link one of my more popular sites to another site!

In blog land, those bribes are called "pay per post".  However, in blog land you can generate those inbound links easily (in comparison)  by using trackbacks.  PLUS you can exchange links with your fellow bloggers, confident in the fact that 7 times out of 10, they’re going to approve your trackback link to their blog.  (After all, they like that inbound link as much as you do!)

The moral to the story:

There is no such thing as a set it and forget it web site. 

Your Word Press blog based web site makes web maintenance SO much easier for the average business person.  You can see incoming links come in as you sign in to your dashboard.  You can visit the person’s blog and easily create a link from your next blog post to that nice blogger who linked to you.  Sometimes, it’s as easy as saying , "Hey, thanks for linking to my post!"

My experience has been that when I go to check my stats on my ACTIVE blog sites, I’m pleasantly surprised by what I see…. in stark contrast to the sinking feeling I got seeing the triple digit traffic figures for my "forgotten" web sites.  

Which is why, when people contact me about creating a web site for them, I let them know that I am PASSIONATE about blogging.  I am quick to regale them with my own personal experience and  after today, I’ll be able to clearly illustrate how pathetic the traffic numbers are for the "set it and forget it " web site!

 

Choosing the Messenger

So, now that I have my end user in mind, the next step is to choose the messenger, because my messenger is going to dictate my content.

In the film Ghostbusters, Gozer (a powerful being from another dimension) stands atop an apartment building on Central Park West in New York City, and informs the Ghostbusters that the next thing they think of will be the form that of the Destroyer, one whose mission is to destroy the world. While all the other members of the team clear their minds, Dan Akroyd’s character Ray allows his mind to wander to an innocuous memory of his youth: the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man.

For many who spend their days on the internet, and in my case in particular, it would appear this would be an easy decision…. pick up a domain name and either set up a blog or a web site. VIOLA! However, for my campaign, choosing the internet as my SOLE delivery device would be an equally poor choice.

There are just times when your target audience just isn’t looking for your product or service on the internet.

This may be shocking for some of you. It’s okay. Breathe.

This revelation doesn’t mean that a web presence can’t act as a powerful marketing tool. What it does mean is that when your audience isn’t searching on the internet for your solution to their problem, you have to find another way to BRING them to your internet presence.

And that is where I find myself as I plan the marketing campaign for my own product.

I can CLEARLY see how my product can benefit my intended audience, but if I try to reach them solely via the internet, then I won’t be reaching a significant number of them to even justify the time/expense of putting up a specific web site for the campaign.

See, my target audience doesn’t KNOW that someone has created a solution to their problem!

Now, I can sit back and wait for them to stumble to the internet and type in the words I think they’ll use when they head to the internet seeking a solution to their problem. That would be the “easy” way for me at least. However, from my analysis of keyword searches, it doesn’t appear that my target market is heading to the internet for answers.

The lack of search on the keywords doesn’t mean my target audience isn’t EXPERIENCING this problem, it just means they aren’t searching for a solution on the internet.

Because I know my target audience so well, I know that the lack of keyword searches doesn’t mean I shouldn’t launch the product or even set up a web site. It simply means I can’t count on the web site to attract heavy traffic from my target audience.

I have to find another way to drive my potential customers to my web site!

Fortunately, I have one clear advantage in choosing the form of my messenger: I have a very tightly targeted audience in mind.

Because I have such a TIGHTLY targeted audience, I can reach them cost effectively via Direct Mail.

Because I’m going to have a web site to direct them to, I can rely on a relatively inexpensive method of Direct Mail called Postcard Marketing.

By using Postcard Marketing ,

• I can tightly target my message
• I can choose an eye catching graphic
• I don’t have to play games trying to get my prospects to open the envelope.
• AND I can provide a web site for them to learn more or even place an order.

If you’ve got a product/service and you’ve been disappointed in your web site traffic and sales, it may be that your prospective customers either:

• Don’t know they have a problem.
• Don’t know YOU have a solution.
• Aren’t searching the internet FOR the solutions you offer.

In either case, you may have to reach out and touch them and bring them TO your internet web site.

In my case, I can purchase a mailing list that goes ONLY to my targeted audience. SWEET! I then plan on creating a piece that brings my target audience to my shiny new web site where they will find a tightly targeted message created JUST for them.

The role of your product or service in your marketing campaign

Since this is a record of the process of marketing a product or service, I should probably start at the beginning with product development.

In my case, my product is my book Beyond the Niche: Essential Tools You Need to Create Marketing Messages that Deliver Results . 

LESSON ONE: Develop your product with the distribution channel in mind

I wrote the book with an end audience in mind and even with a potential distribution channel in mind. 

Never in my most sleep deprived state did I EVER expect my book to become a best seller merely by it’s appearance on Amazon.  That meant I was faced with deciding BEFORE I WROTE A SINGLE WORD on how I would get my book into the hands of my intended audience.

One way of reaching prospective buyers was to launch my Beyond Niche Marketing blog. 

At this point, I’ll go on the record as stating mistakes were made in the NAMING of my product.  I am horribly jealous of Jefferey Fox’s book’s name HOW TO BECOME A MARKETING SUPERSTAR: UNEXPECTED RULES THAT RING THE CASH REGISTER.  This is, in my opinion, the BEST title I’ve EVER seen PERIOD!  Also, for the record, Rosemary Davies-Janes wanted to change the name of my book when I hired her to create the book’s cover, but by then the chapters had been named and the book had been through three rounds of editing with two different editors and it was really too late to fix my naming mistake.

LESSON TWO:   Sometimes you have to FIDO: Forget It and Drive On

The poor naming of my book damned my chances of selling it "virally" via traditional channels, (bookstores both on and offline).

However, I had in mind from the beginning a plan for selling books in quantities larger than 1-2 at a time and THAT is the basis of this "project".

IMPORTANT TAKE AWAY INFORMATION:

Don’t kid yourself!  Marketing begins during product development.

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