Saturday the wife and I had a “free-day!”

Apple iPhone 3GS, Motorola Milestone and LG GW60 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Julia and Marissa had dance practice from 9am to 1pm.

Then a birthday party that started at 2pm.

The party was a sleep-over.

We missed the girls for sure, but we did make the best of it.

Of course Jamie had some cleaning and organizing on the agenda.

We wrapped that up just in time for her to get the girls from dance and bring them to the party.

When she got back we put our plan into action.

Our plan was pretty basic overall…

The mall in Manchester was the first stop.

Dinner.

And then a live comedy show.

Yea – I know the Bruins are in Stanley Cup Finals. Be being from Philly, it’s no big deal to me.

My father’s day present to myself was the new Samsung Galaxy 4.  I love it.

On the drive down to Manchester we decided to look for a restaurant.

We wanted to try a new place.

Jamie searched on her Iphone.

A few of the places she found we had already been to. We wanted something new.

She narrowed it down to two places.

She wanted to see the menus.

So she clicks on the first place.

To our disappointment she could not view the menu.

No mobile website to speak of.

Worse – the site was made with Flash so on her Iphone it was totally blank.

“NO THANKS!” She said.

If she could not at least glance at a menu she was not chancing it.

The next place still did not have a mobile website – but she did pinch and zoom her way to a menu.

She read enough of it and decided to make a reservation. The food was good. The service was good.

No. I did not sell the owners a mobile website after diner. But heck, they could use one.

And what about the place with the totally worthless site on a smartphone?

I guess they should be a prospect.

The key take-aways…

Mobile is NOW. Even though I have been encouraging mobile websites since late 2010 most still don’t get it.

This applies to just about every biz too!

The simple options…

1- If you are going through a site “redesign” (we do these for new clients very often) I recommend considering a “responsive site.” You can have a mobile website and a desktop website all in one.

Responsive design means the content is pretty much the same for all screens and the site “responds” to each screen. Think. Laptop, Ipad, Smartphone.

Or…

Option 2 – You can build a separate mobile website for smartphones.

This means we choose your content. We choose your most important information. And then we put that info in a simple to use site with a prominent “click to call” number. The mobile website is served to a smartphone browser.

Either way. Do something!

We test for mobile and can offer you a few ideas with our 48 Point Inspection.

 Internet Marketing Inspection

This week was packed with news.

Image via CrunchBase

Let’s jump in…

1- Facebook….

Two new developments here.

Not as “New” but Facebook will be scaling back on the number of “ad products.” Some are sort of redundant. My guess is Facebook wants to make things a little easier for smaller advertisers.

It’s funny how they want to win over the “big brands” but it’s the little guys like us who will keep the lights on and the servers running in the long-run.

What else is new with Facebook?

Hashtags… #hashtags.

Hashtags started as a twitter thing as a way to follow current information.

And I’m sure it will STILL be a “Twitter Thing.” This is Facebook’s way of getting in the “real-time conversation” game.

2- Google…

Introducing a G+ dashboard for businesses with an “owner-verified” G+ page.

The idea is to manage “all things Google” from this dashboard.

G+ is still struggling with engagement so perhaps this is a step in the right direction.

3- Yahoo…

Yahoo is trying to get back “old Yahoo Mail users.”

Those with accounts who have not logged in – in the last year are considered in-active.

I received an email from Yahoo (to my Gmail account) that said… “We want you back!”

It will be interesting to see how well Yahoo uses email marketing to get more folks using their email service!

Enjoy your weekend!

Related articles

• Yahoo to release IDs of inactive email accounts
• Facebook is Rolling Out Hashtags

I have come across this story twice in the last few months.

English: A Private Swimming Pool (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Purposely leaving out the details so I don’t “rehash” what’s already been “hashed.”

It goes like this…

There’s this swimming pool company that was doing relatively OK

They had a lot of “marketing” going on to help sustain business.

When the markets crashed and fear over-came the world back in late 2008 they ended up losing 250K in deposits because of canceled pool projects.

Then…

In the beginning of 2009 with minimal resources they were forced to cut their “traditional marketing.”

Without much to lose the company owner started “blogging.”

At first he was confused by the whole thing.

He figured blogging was all about keeping a “web diary” which really didn’t make sense to someone in the “pool business.”

But he kept an open mind and eventually through consistent content marketing his site became one of the most authoritative resources on the web for his industry.

Prospects found his content while doing research. His web traffic spiked and his conversations ( the prospects and clients who come from the web traffic) dramatically increased.

Now this company has more business than it can handle.

Good story. I gave you the Reader’s Digest version.

Key points…

I run into business owners and marketing managers all the time who feel the same way…

“What is this blogging thing? I’m not sure if that’s going to work for us?”

I think they picture some guy/girl in their pajamas revealing personal stories of life.

Or, maybe they’ve seen the movie… “Julie and Julia” where the gal makes a blog out of cooking every one of Julia Child’s recipes.

The problem really is the definition of blogging is too broad…

Yeep – it covers the guy in pajamas and the girl blogging about recipes.

And it also covers a KEY function of Content Marketing.

And that’s getting out relevant, timely and quality “NEWS” and information out about your business.

Ask yourself…

What’s new in my industry?

What has changed?

What’s coming in the future?

What do prospects need to know about these new developments?

How can I help my prospects?

What’s going on in my business that I can talk about?

In short – your blog for your business is “News!”

Related articles

• The Difference Between Content Marketing and Blogging

I was thinking about this guy lately…

Joe Girard.

Girard is the only retail sales-person to make it into the Guinness Book of World Records.

He sold something like 1200 cars per year.

Chevy’s! Face to face and belly to belly. No fleet or bulk orders.

I first heard of him about twelve years ago during a Zig Ziglar seminar.

Over the years I read a few of his books.

When you study Girard’s work you’ll note one of his secrets was…

“Frequent Contact!”

His main driver of business was to send postcards to his customers once a month … FOREVER!

WOW is right! That’s a whole lot of mail.

His cards were simple greeting cards. They just showed up. The cards didn’t sell anything… but they sold the most important thing… HIM!

Over the years I have applied a few of his ideas to our own mail campaigns.

I guess he popped into my mind recently for two reasons…

One… we are constantly re-thinking and brain-storming our marketing and the marketing of our clients.

We’ll be doing some “Girard Style” stuff in the near future.

Two… I just ordered some new business cards. Guess what Girard used to do with his business cards…

Throw them around the stands at Detroit Tigers’ games!

He was a constant and genuine self-promoter.

You can use those two ideas… (Just don’t litter with your business cards!).

And I bet if Girard were selling cars now he’d be one of the few car people who would use email marketing correctly. Yeep – I bet he’d have an email and a direct mail program going on to drive business.

Lastly… My greatest Joe Girard take-away…

Recent – Frequent – Relevant…

RFR!

In all you do think about how you can be…

Recent (so your fresh in their mind).

Frequent (because good prospects RESPECT your staying in touch).

Relevant (do your best to be helpful, fun or both).

That’s it for now.

More another time.

Make it a great week!

Related articles

• 12 Ways to Thank Your Customers

You’ve heard it before. 

“Think Big!”

“Have Big Dreams”

“Develop Your ‘BHAG’” (Big Hairy Audacious Goal)

There’s been plenty of books…

“The Magic of Thinking Big” and more.

For sure…

Thinking big and getting out of your comfort zone is a good thing.

Being ambitious and believing you and your business are destined for great things is no doubt one part of your success formula.

But many are let down.

Let down because all they do is “think big.”

They are too busy thinking big so they lose site of the problems and opportunities that are right in front of them. UN-realistic expectations cause failure!

Examples?

Sure.

Personal example? Fine…

I was once involved in a franchise relationship.

The franchise was new in a sense because it had only been in one market.

Business model proven – but greatly unproven.

The goals were BIG! National roll out. Industry Dominance. (blah – blah – blah).

New franchisees were focused on the “big picture” being painted by the CEO.

Problems? There were many.

I can’t speak details – but while the big picture was being painted nothing that had to do with the immediate needs of the business and franchisees were being met.

Contracts breached, ethics questionable and I can go on.

Had anyone bothered to read the documents most would have seen the writing on the wall. Sometimes the writing on the wall is in very small print!

In fact… my lawyer saw it – but I was too busy “thinking big” and missed some important details.

Your take-away is always balance big thinking with small details in your business and life.

Another example…

Twitter. We all know what it is.

I was reading an article about the numerous problems Twitter is facing.

Mainly… “An Identity Crisis.”

Their BIG Goal…

Twitter wants to reach everyone on planet earth.

I would say Twitter has a BHAG.

But guess what…

Twitter should be thinking smaller.

That’s right.

Twitter is NOT for everyone on the planet. Don’t you agree?

It’s clear to see. If you look at social medial stats Facebook is the closest to being for “everyone.”

LinkedIn is a good contrast. LinkedIn is for professionals. Period!

Think Small and Have it All!

Don’t get me wrong – thinking small is not about settling for less.

Thinking Small is not about being close-minded to new ideas.

Thinking Small is simply about balancing your big goals with attention to a few small items.

Have an awesome week!

In this post a little news for you…

English: Mary Meeker portrait (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

First…

Facebook has announced a new “verified Pages” feature.

Basically… an authentication system to help Facebook users make sure the celebrity or business page they are viewing is “real.”

For now it’s just being launched to a select group of celebrities and high profile businesses.

I’m sure, it will eventually find its way to the rest of us.

Next…

Mobile Update…

Mary Meeker pulled back the curtain on her recent Internet Trends report.

A few key points…

1- 2.4 Billion Internet Users World-Wide. That’s up 8% over the previous year.

2- There are more than 5 Billion people who have Mobile Phones. About 1.5 Billion of those are Smartphones. That’s up from 1.1 Billion the previous year.

3- Mobile Web Traffic…

15% of ALL web traffic is now coming from mobile. That’s up from 10% the previous year.

You can make the assumption that 15% off all visitors to your website are coming from a tablet or a smartphone. Your site analytics can reveal the exact number.

The question is how well does your site display on mobile devices? Is it “responsive?”

Feel free to run it through our 48 Point Inspection to see how it does on mobile…

48 Point Internet Inspection

Related articles

• Internet hits 2.4 billion worldwide users; mobile usage soars