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Shedding Light into the Darkest Corners of the Web

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If you tell lies about a product, you will be found out – either by the Government, which will prosecute you, or by the consumer, who will punish you by not buying your product a second time.

David M Ogilvy

If there’s one HUGE disadvantage to doing business on the web it’s that it is REALLY easy for people to be – well, let’s say “less than authentic”.

Unfortunately, it’s very, very easy for those who are NOT “web savvy” to be taken in by someone who “baffles them with BS!”

A few weeks ago, I was “virtually introduced” to a small business web marketing consultant and SEO “expert”   During the initial introduction, this small business web marketing consultant and SEO expert shared that she wanted to talk to me because she would like to enter into the dazzling and exciting world of blogging.

This statement is causing red flags are going up ALL OVER the place for me.

A small business web marketing consultant and SEO expert needs MY SERVICES to set up a blog?!?!?!?

No, no, no.  My clients are people who use Hotmail and AOL because they can’t figure out how to set up Outlook Express.    My clients want an easy to use and effective internet presence because if it’s not easy, they can’t use it.   A few of my clients don’t know the difference between an email address and a URL -yet they’re successfully blogging – blogs rock! My clients are the reason I wrote my 8 Week Power Blog Launch course… because once they “mastered” the mechanics of blogging, they didn’t know what to do next.

One thing is certain, my clients usually do not proclaim that they are small business web marketing experts  OR experts in SEO!

One of the things I share in the course are the “secret authenticity discovery tools” available for free  which allow you to see exactly HOW much someone who claims to know SEO really knows.   I mean, if you claim to be a nutrition expert, then I don’t expect you to have a six digit or less Alexa ranking, but if you’ve written books on SEO and claim to be an expert, I really expect to see better than a 4.6 Million Alexa rank.

Yet again, another reason I LOVE blogs!!! 

Blogs can act as a great “authenticity” meter.

Since the small business web marketing consultant and SEO expert doesn’t have a blog, all you can do when you get to her website is to read the three articles on her website or buy a copy of her book.  Did she write the articles?  Who knows – she doesn’t write regularly enough to see if she wrote that copy or if she stole it from someone else.

Did she even  write a book?   (There’s no link to purchase it on her website – but she references it frequently in her email to me.)   Again,  I have no idea, but one has to wonder how “authentic” her expertise on SEO is with an Alexa ranking of 4.6 Million.

There are plenty of people who hire others to write for them.  There’s nothing wrong with this practice – unless you’re hiring someone to demonstrate expertise that you in fact do not possess.

As I was publishing my book I discovered someone was doing just that with articles I had written and published on my old static website.   Turns out a web development firm in New Zealand that had copied every single word of my old HTML static website and published it as their own work.  After I got over the shock, I had to laugh.  The secret spy tools told the whole story.  Let’s just say it was obvious that GOOGLE was giving me credit as the original author of the content.

Here’s the deal – you can hire the “published author, small business web marketing consultant and SEO expert” I recently met who has an Alexa ranking of 4.6 Million to act as your virtual mentor.  You can go to her website, read a few articles and if you want, call her to set up an appointment.  (Oh, good luck with that – you have to schedule an appointment with her VA to talk to her – her time is VERY valuable!)

OR you can have Naomi Dunford of the blog IttyBiz with an Alexa Ranking in the  100K range give you advice on building your online business and SEO.  I’ve never tried to call Naomi but she responds very quickly to email – unlike the “expert” above!

The kicker – you can access Naomi’s “wisdom” by picking up a copy of her SEO Ninja course OR you can pay 10 times that price to book an hour of the SEO pretender’s time.

TRUST -TRUST-TRUST-TRUST-TRUST!

If you get the feeling I don’t “trust” this new contact – you’d be correct!   Oh, and if you get the feeling that I do trust Naomi – well, you’d be right on the money again.

I trust Naomi because of MONTHS of reading her regular blog posts – post I miss now that she’s gone “big time”.

I’ll bet there are people you trust because you’re a regular reader of their blog as well.

Which is why, if you’re selling your expertise and you don’t have a blog – you need one.  There’s no better way to demonstrate your expertise.

Steps to Starting a Small Business: #7 Your USP – Unique Selling Proposition

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No list which proclaims itself the key to “steps to starting your own business” can avoid addressing the topic of the USP – the Unique Selling Proposition.

While the definition of the USP is often draped in “mystery”,  quite simply your USP is the reason people choose to do business with you.

It sounds simple enough – doesn’t it?  Unfortunately, I’ve been seeing that this topic needs attention so I’ll begin with what a USP is NOT!

1.  A USP is not the price of your product or service.

“It’s cheap” is a poor imitation of a USP. That part you probably already knew.  After all EVERYONE knows that – except for the people I’ve been noticing lately who are trying to sell their e books by proclaiming that the reason to buy it is because it’s so cheap.  Free and cheap are both piss poor unique selling propositions.

2.  A USP is not the quality of your product or service.

Your USP is also not that you’re the best or most qualified.  Everyone’s the best – the fastest- the smartest – the cheapest – the finest.  People have a REALLY hard time judging the quality of a product or a service and they’re positively numb to exaggerated marketing declarations.

It’s virtually impossible to judge the quality of most products or services without experiencing the product or service in person.  That’s why ecommerce retailers are offering online reviews – to help buyers access the opinions of others who have previously purchased products or services.

Another reason it’s difficutl to just quality is that buyer’s PERCEPTION of quality often affects their judgment.    For example, researchers asked volunteers to judge the quality of different wines.  The volunteers were hooked up to monitors and the pleasure centers of the brain were measured as they drank the wine.  In the experiment, the participants were told that there were 5 different wines ranging in cost from $4 a bottle to $90 per bottle.  You probably won’t be surprised to learn that the participants enjoyed the more expensive wines much more than they did the cheaper ones.

The kicker – there were not 5 wines in the study but only three.  One wine was doing double duty – being served as both a sample of $4 a bottle and a $90 per bottle of wine.  The same wine actually tasted better when served as a more expensive impostor.

This should illustrate how important it is to properly brand and market your products or service – but don’t confuse applying the label of “the best” with a viable USP.

3.  A USP is DEFINITELY not the “uniqueness” of your product or service. Unless you’re offering sex change operations for chimpanzees – there is probably someone else who offers a reasonable facsimile of the good and services you have to offer.

If you are TRULY the only one offering a product or service in a free market – it means competitors don’t view your product or service as a viable business.  Initiation is the sincerest form of flattery and it’s validation you’re on the right track.

So what IS your USP?  What is your UNIQUE SELLING PROPOSITION?

Hang on to your hat because this may come as a surprise to you:

Your USP – like Soylent Green- is PEOPLE!

That’s right.  The REASON people choose to do business with you and your business is usually nothing more complicated than you (or your staff) are reasonably competent and cordial.  If a customer or clients feels BETTER when they hang up the phone or walk out the door than when they picked up the phone or walked in the door to your business, then that my friends is a USP that can’t be beat!

Yet many business owners are on a QUEST to REMOVE themselves and their people from contact with their customers.  As more and more businesses set up ways to automate communication, they unwittingly (maybe not so unwittingly) set up barriers that prevent customers and clients from connecting on a personal level.

I’ll never forget a situation several years ago that stays with me to this day.  I had a friend who purchased one of the earliest info products on marketing offered online. My friend visited the website several times and called to ask my advice a few more times.  As he moved closer to making the decision to purchase, he picked up the phone and called the author before he placed his order. All the info guru had to do was pick up the phone to close the sale.

Meanwhile, I was creating a website for a coaching client who asked me to remove her phone number from the website.  I replied by referring to the role having the phone number displayed had played for this info guru. I have to confess, I was stunned at the passion in her reaction to hearing this.  Seriously,  you would have thought I had asked her to include photos of her having sex with household appliances into the design by her response.   Apparently the thought of people calling her on the phone literally terrified her.

I’m not a coach nor a therapist, so it wasn’t my job to figure out why connecting with people who might want to hire her frightened her so.  I removed her phone number from the website design.

Which brings me to my favorite subject, which is why blogs are the cat’s meow when it comes to a web presence for service professionals.

Your blog is a great way to allow people to “get to know you” before they pick up the phone and call – or send you an email.  They can “sample” what it’s like to do business with you by reading your blog.  They can guage whether you know what you say you know.    They can get a glimpse of what it’s like without taking the scary leap of faith and actually contacting you directly.

If you think your Unique Selling Proposition is anything OTHER than the people who are part of your organization  – then you have a rude wake up call in your future.  Social media is all about people making connections and those connections form the most important part of any business USP.

Why would you think it’s easier to win [insert name of sporting championship here] than to build a successful blog?

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The subtitle of this post should read: “Everyone wants to be a winner -but not everyone is willing do to what it takes to BE a winner.”

The Indianapolis Colts have over the past three weeks restored hope for a chance at the playoffs thanks to three back to back wins including yesterday’s defeat of Houston.  (GO COLTS!) I’d love nothing better than to taunt my neighbors (most of whom hail from the land of the Giants, the Jets and the Patriots) this February with a garish display of Hoosier Pride.  I’ve still got everything perfectly preserved from the Colt’s 2006 Super Bowl win, hoping for the chance to bring it all out again.  ( I also had to endure the drunken near rioting of some of my other neighbors when UF won national titles in both football AND basketball!)

Not too long ago, the Phillies won the World Series.  In order to achieve that accomplishment, they had to play 162 games in the regular season just to make it to the post season.  They had to WIN more often than they lost just to make it to the playoffs.  In order to achieve that feat, every member of the team had to work hard – physically AND mentally – to even have the opportunity to play in the World Series.

This is the way the goal setting works.  First you define or set a goal and then you work towards ACHIEVING that goal.  However, if you don’t DEFINE the goal first, it’s almost impossible to put into action a plan to achieve the goal!

I’m not a baseball fan, but my son is.  Twelve years ago, my six year old baby boy would be so excited about playing coaches pitch baseball that he would bounce up and down in left field through the entire game.  Fortunately, no one could hit the ball that far because it’s my observation that bouncing up and down is NOT the preferred stance for outstanding performance in the outfield.

Years passed and my son’s love of baseball continued and fortunately, his skill as well as his concentration improved.   When he was 11, his All-Star team finished 1 game shy of competing in the Little League World Series regional play.   Watching that game was one of the most painful experiences of my life.  You could LITERALLY watch the wheels fall off that wagon as the final game progressed – and the saddest part of all was it seemed to be the COACHES who were determined to make sure their team didn’t advance to regional play!

Tom Volkar writes in Clarity Empowers Progress

The clarity of exactness and preciseness increases the probability of intentional manifestation. Maybe that’s what keeps many from choosing. A couple of participants on a recent group coaching call, supporting our community leveraging experiment, admitted as much.

When we definitely state what we want, in stark specificity, we have chosen, haven’t we? Perhaps that’s why folks choose to remain confused and general because you can’t really commit to a generality, can you?

Try dedicating yourself to excellence in vagueness. Yes you can develop the inspired confidence to move mountains but you’ve got to identify the damn mountains! If you don’t commit then you can’t fail but you can’t succeed either. Without clarity and inspired commitment your only choice is to remain safely frozen in whatever waiting hell you’ve created.

As I read Tom’s entire post (check it out, this is just one golden nugget of many in the post!), I can now see – almost a decade later – what was going on back then.  (Hindsight really is 20/20!)   It hit me like a ton of bricks: those coaches had achieved their goal when they reached the state finals.  Once they achieved that goal, they ran out of gas.  There was no new goal – new vision.  They had already achieved all they thought was possible – and we wereall  forced to remain frozen in the hell of what MIGHT have been that year!

However, this recognition extends beyond ancient history and fading memories of a Little League team that couldn’t – it’s also shined a bright light onto a dark area in the realm of building a business.

One of my biggest frustrations with clients is when they refuse to declare their intentions.  The three words that will keep ANY service professional poor are , “I HELP EVERYONE.”

When you strive to target everyone with your marketing message – in essence, you’re targeting no one!

I love Tom’s choice of words in the paragraph above – “Yes you can develop the inspired confidence to move mountains but you’ve got to identify the damn mountains!”

The Indianapolis Colts have identified the mountain they’d like to move – just as every other team in the NFL is targeting the mountain named “Super Bowl.”  Every game they win or lose is translated into their “chance” for a playoff berth.

Every professional sport has its own mountain.  Every game that is played is played with the goal in mind of getting the opportunity to ultimately move that mountain and claim it as the team’s own.  There is no greater hell than to be a fan of a team that obviously has not defined their season goal as winning the ultimate championship.  (I live in Miami Dolphins territory – believe me, I’ve seen the pain of that dilemma over the past few seasons!)

What mountain are you attempting to climb with your blog?  If you haven’t identified one you’d like to own -you’ve still got a few weeks to make it your 2009 New Year’s Resolution!

Halloween Humor and an Object Lesson on Trust and Marketing

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I talk a LOT here about the importance trust plays in marketing your product or services.  Establishing trust with your marketing is especially essential if you’re selling “nothing but air” a.k.a. making an intangible major sale.

Trust is hard to win and easy to lose. In the world of Web 2.0, transparency is the key.  For example, In the “old days” (pre-web), if a business owner got a reputation for lying and ripping of his/her customer,  he or she could always pick up and start anew in a new location.  However, in the world of Web 2.0, your reputation can follow you ALL over the world!

Here’s a bit of Halloween Humor making the rounds these days which offers a thinly veiled object lesson on trust and marketing.

A cabbie picks up a  Nun.  She gets into the cab, and notices that the VERY handsome cab  driver won’t stop staring at her. She asks him why he is  staring.  He replies: ‘I have a question to ask, but I don’t want to  offend you.’

She answers, “My son, you  cannot offend me.  When you’ have been a nun as  long as I have, you get a chance to see and hear just about  everything.  I’m sure that there’s nothing you could say or ask that  I would find offensive.'”

“Well, I’ve always had a  fantasy to make out with a nun.”

The nun responds, “Well, I could probably oblige you under two conditions.  First, you have to be single and second, you must be Catholic.”

The cab driver blurts out, ‘HOT DOG!!!  Yes,  I’m single and Catholic!’

The nun says.   ‘Pull into the next alley.’

The make out scene that followed in that alley would make a hooker blush.

When they get back on  the road, the cab driver starts crying.

‘Why is wrong?” the nun asked.

‘Forgive me but I’ve  sinned.  I lied and I must confess; I’m married and I’m Baptist.’

The nun replies, ‘That’s  OK.  My name is Kevin and I’m going to a Halloween  party.”

It’s a beautiful thing when a liar gets taken by a con artist.

It’s not a beautiful thing when good people get taken by “gurus” and “experts” who don’t know enough to know they don’t know anything!

That’s why I’m a REAL fan of blogging.  See, there’s no better vehicle to build trust than with a blog.  It’s hard to fake expertise over the course of a couple hundred blog posts!

If you’re here and you’re offering “real deal” services, then get a blog.   There’s no better way to demonstrate the breadth and depth of your knowledge!

80% Discount To Celebrate Successful-Blog’s 3rd Birthday

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For those of you who don’t know her, Liz Strauss is a MASTER of building community through blogging.

When a blogging client tells me that he or she wants to build an active and alive community with their blog,  Liz’s blog is at the top of the list.  When Liz Strauss blogs – people not only listen, they respond as well.

One of the reasons Liz is such an ICON in the blogging community is her spirit of giving.   She writes in her post, Celebrate Successful-Blog’s 3rd Birthday with me and 718 SOBs!

I’ve been putting up that list for 157 weeks of Successful and Outstanding Bloggers! In last week, I’ve combed over the SOB List. What a memorable walk that was. I got the full impact of how many blogs had grown and how many were gone.

She then lists 719 links to bloggers who have participated in her previous “celebrations”.

See, celebrations are nothing new over at the Successful & Outstanding Blog.  Liz is always looking for new ways to “celebrate” other blogger’s blogs!  For her blog’s third birthday, she’s having yet another celebration where she shines the spotlight onto other people’s blogs.  As for gifts, she wants people to bring gifts to share with all.

Due to recent reader questions, I’ve just added a whole new case study to the Fast Track to Blogging Success to make it even BETTER.  Even blogging beginners can understand how to effectively find and use the best keywords for your blog using free tools on the internet!

To celebrate the Successful-Blog’s third birthday,  from now until October 31, when you enter the code “SOB”, you’ll get 80% off  this informative eBook which looks at finding and using the right keywords for your blog.  To celebrate Liz’s blog’s third birthday, Instead of $24.95, you’ll get it for only $4.95.

Remember, enter the code SOB to get 80% off this informative resource.
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HAPPY BLOG BIRTHDAY LIZ!!!