In Business Today You Either Adapt or Die

March 1, 2012 By Leave a Comment

Stubborn attachments to ignorant beliefs kill your business.

3 things you gotta educate yourself and change today because it’s costing you sales and money.

#1 Use WordPress

  • About 1 in 4 new websites today are being built using WordPress simply because WordPress works.
  • If a web professional offers you a static html website, run away quickly.
  • If your website is an html site, change it to WordPress this year.
  • WordPress & other CMS systems empower you to change and manage your website’s content yourself.
  • WordPress is Free, Open Source and actively being developed.

#2 Start a regular email newsletter

  • Email works.
  • Weekly email newsletters work better (generate more business leads & clients).
  • Add your email contacts to MailChimp and invite them to receive your newsletter.
  • The source of your Newsletter content and articles is your Business Blog.

#3 Start using a CRM System

  • A CRM is a Client Relationship Management System
  • A CRM is an automated Sales Assistant / Secretary.
  • A CRM system helps you systematically deliver a consistent customer experience.
  • BTW (by the way) Outlook is not a CRM.
  • We recommend and support vTiger which is another Free, Open Source Software.

Okay. Let’s get’r done. Need Help? I offer a 2 hour technology strategy session where we talk through and create a technology plan for your business. This is a paid consultation and we apply the fee to any project you hire us to complete. Contact me Using the Contact Form to schedule a call.

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San Diego Web Designers: 10 Items to Consider Before You Build a New Website

January 3, 2012 By Leave a Comment

You’re thinking of putting up a new website and contacting a web designer in San Diego, but not sure where to start. Consider these 10 tips before you build your website.

  1. What does your website need to do? Are you going to sell products online? Do you need an online brochure for your business listing your services and fees? Are you gathering leads or email addresses? Do you want to build a community and charge a membership fee? Having a clear idea of the goal of your website will determine all your decisions for your website.
  2. Pick a domain name that describes your business or contains your business name. Keywords are vital in the URL (domain name) of your site. Ask your web developer or web designer to suggest a URL that will be keyword rich and appropriate for your business.
  3. Choose a web host. The web host is the virtual “land” that your “virtual” business stands on. You’ll need to rent space to host your website at. There are two types of hosting un-managed and managed hosting. It’s just like it sounds, managed hosting takes care of security and script up dates. With un-managed hosting, you’ll need to do your own updates. Keeping your updates current keeps your site from being hacked.
  4. Get keywords for your site. Keywords are what your potential customers type into the search field to find your site. A good list of keywords is essential for people to find your site. Usually web professionals will give you a list of about 30 words with various difficulty to rank for. Your keywords should be built into your website.
  5. Make sure your website user is friendly. Use more than one navigational menu, make sure that your logo shows on every page, have a site map and a privacy policy on your site. Make sure your webcopy is clear and understandable. (Edit, edit, edit, eloquent copy makes for the best copy.) Remember that visitors to your site will have different technical levels and you need to cater all their different skill levels.
  6. Utilize pictures, images and colors on your site. Reading on a computer is twice as hard as reading a paper. Break up the text on the page with pictures and images to rest a readers eyes. Images on your pages make a site more attractive, and readers will want to read the page.
  7. Sharpen your marketing message so that it converts your visitors to sales leads. You’ll need to talk from the benefits that your business can give clients. Feel their pain and solve it.
  8. Write your website copy. This is the single most impactful item on your website. Your content needs to be clear and concise. Write your copy set it aside and come back it the next day. Reread it and cut out words. Send it to friends or business colleagues, have them read it and give you ideas for improvement. Make changes, reread it and cut out words. Then send your copy to an editor or proofreader to clean up the grammar and make the final touches.
  9. Market your website to bring in visitors. If people can’t find you, they can’t visit your site, and they can’t purchase your product & services. Include a link to your website in your email signature, list your website on your business card and include it on all your printed materials and marketing. Utilize social profiles, social media and directory listings to market your new website.
  10. Don’t forget to monitor your site’s search engine performance. Google Analytics is an awesome free analytic tool for your site. It’s easy to use and will let you know how visitors use your website. Your web statistics will tell which and how many pages are visited, how long your visitors stay, the links the visitors came in from and the keyword your visitors used to find your website. You’ll need these statistics to fine tune your site and your marketing message.

Have a question about any of these steps? Give us a call at 888-249-8884. We are local San Diego Web Developers available to consult on your web design in San Diego.

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San Diego Web Designers meetup in Encinitas

December 15, 2011 By Leave a Comment

In our second North San Diego Graphic Designers Users Group meeting, we discussed theme basics, SEO, SEM and geo-local search. The room was filled with graphic designers eager to figure out how to use WP as a web design platform.

More to follow, but if you’re interested in WordPress join us in January 2012.

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If you build it, will they come

August 10, 2010 By Leave a Comment

In response to a Facebook comment…

A business website is like any business development method, the one you do consistently and master is the one that will get you business. If you hate writing, don’t setup a blogging site.

For Example; each month, people type into google “san diego real estate” about 200,000 times and that’s just one keyword phrase. Every Realtor(r) who pays member dues can give people MLS access. So what. People hire real people to help them buy and sell real estate.

The reason you have not been directed to many blogs or websites is that most of them suck (mine included).

You are already doing the right stuff (video, advertising, car wrapper, sign spinners). What a blog does is get people to know you and what you stand for.

People visit websites (whether blog centric or not) for humor. The #1 blog is http://huffingtonpost.com (political in nature) it is also #148 of all websites in the world. OR http://peopleofwalmart.com #5116 of all websites in the world.

If you are only going to write promotional and self serving dribble, then you will never get new clients. If you share your opinions, talk about injustices, what sucks & what you love about San Diego, Real Estate, Mortgage people, Title Reps, County recorders, the idiots at banks in the short sale department, stupid real estate investors (nothing down, land contracts, etc) and GET REAL about Real Estate instead of being a watered down, politically correct “stepford agent”, then you can have an interesting web site. (This is not a slam on you, but 99% of all Realtorss(r)).

Yep you will offend and piss people off. But for everyone you piss off you endear 3 more who think and have experienced the same thing. If you write something worth reading, then people will visit your site/blog. If people visit your site and you invite them, some will become clients. It’s elementary my dear Woolgar.

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Do I need a business blog?

August 10, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Here’s what I’ve found. Yes. Get a blog (recommendation below). But not a blog that is hosted on one of the free services (wordpress.com or blogger) is of little use to a business owner or licensed professional. Your articles benefit the hosting company and not you. Also the features are limited and restrict what you can do.

Blogging platforms/software like wordpress.org are now full blown websites with CMS (Content Management System) capabilities. These capabilities include a blog or blogs, but also allow you to accomplish 3 key business goals:

  1. Build your brand.
  2. Collect leads
  3. Service customers

A well designed site built with a solid SEO foundation will build your business by having people find you on the search engines.

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Web Integration vs Social Media Consultants

July 26, 2010 By 2 Comments

Social Media Consultants are rapidly replacing SEO consultants as the hype du jour. Do you need a consultant to manage your social media activities? I don’t think so and here’s why.

First: Social Media is based on relationships NOT volume of friends, followers or fans/likes. There maybe a relationship between the quantity of Facebook Friends and Page likes, but statistically I’ve not had anyone show me traffic logs where traffic spikes from a Facebook click throughs. You can get traffic to your website using twitter and with the properly designed tweets you back links are generated.

Second: Most of the people who promote social media as a business development strategy make their money selling social media consulting. Why is this important to pay attention to? Simple, if you are joining Facebook, Twitter, et al for more business you want to know how it works the quickest and most efficient method. Who better to show you than a Social Media Consultant? Here is the question that I have not had answered as yet: How much business do your clients get? In other words:

  • How many escrows have you Realtor® clients closed directly trackable to their social media presence?
  • How many new patients have your Chiropractor, Dentist and Cosmetic Surgeon clients received?
  • How many appointments have your Plumbing, Interior Design & Financial Planners clients booked?
  • I recently spoke to a group of business owners and only about 12% of them could directly track business back to Facebook and other social media efforts.

Bottom Line, how much business have you closed /will you close directly from a social media presence? If the answer is little of NONE then is it a good business decision to hire a Social Media Consultant? I personally hate ROIs of Zero!

Third: What do you find interesting, fun and rewarding? When you sign onto your Facebook , Twitter or LinkedIn account do you care about the people with whom you’re connected? I ask because, if you don’t care about reading their updates, will they be interested in reading your updates? Especially when your updates are only promotional and informational in nature and never personal?

Look at how the kids use social media. The share real, stupid and personal updates about themselves and their lives. You ask who cares? The answer is people who know them. Their friends, parents and family that’s who cares.

Forth: When you use the social media sites, you build their website footprint and not your own. There are millions of people who have joined Facebook, Twitter & LinkedIn and each one of these sign ups translates into success for that website not your own.

Why is this important? Because you DO NOT OWN OR CONTROL THE CONTENT YOU POST ON SOCIAL MEDIA SITES. Sorry to shout, but this is very important to understand. The social media site owns and directly benefits from your content NOT you! Not your business. This is the difference between Image Advertising and Direct Advertising. Here’s how. When you post to a social media site, google gives that site credit. The most you get is an atta-boy/girl link back to your site and possibly some curiosity seeker traffic to your site.

People DON’T go to Facebook to buy. People DON’T for to twitter to buy. People DON’T go to LinkedIn to buy. That is NOT the intention of those sites. People do go to Amazon, eBay, Half.com to buy. It’s that simple.

So What! Now What? This seems to be the million dollar question doesn’t it? Here’s what I recommend…

Create your own website which you OWN, CONTROL & Directly Benefit From all of your efforts. This builds an online footprint for you and your business which Google and the other search engines index. Then automatically integrate your content with the social media sites where your community and network will know you’ve updated your site. Then spend your time building your own website and presence.

The biggest benefit I see for Social Media Consultants is having your social media accounts setup and configured for you. These credentials are then used to integrate your dynamic website into your social media accounts. But do you really want a consultant making connections for you and your business?

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3 Common WordPress Mistakes Newbies Make

June 17, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Are you a WordPress newbie? This popular web platform is ideal for small business websites. There are hundreds of themes, plugins, options and support available. WordPress is my development platform of choice for my sites and my client’s sites. In my opinion there are several dozen reasons why I prefer WordPress and reason numero uno is it’s inherent SEO capabilities.

I have several clients who love to tinker with their own sites and they call my when they get stuck. Like when they get a white screen of death (nothing but white), 500 fatal server error or a fatal error with a reference to an offending line of code. The first time this happens is a real sphincter pincher… WTF did I do?

Now that it is possible to add plugins and themes through the dashboard and API access to WordPress.org, it’s very easy add and try new bells whistles and features on your site. Not too long ago, we had to load everything into WP via ftp…

These are the 3 most common mistakes I see people have made when I go in and fix their install:

  • Mistake 1: Using a buggy theme. There are hundreds of themes at WP.org. When selecting a theme, I recommend you look for 1 key metric besides the look. That is a rating of 4+ with at least 10 votes.
  • Mistake 2: Plugin compatibility. Plugins are mini programs you add to WordPress for additional functions and options (one of the best benefits). Plugins must be compatible 1st with the version of WP you are using, 2nd with the theme you are using and 3rd with the other plugins you are using. Any compatibility problem can cause plugins to NOT work or your site to crash.
  • Mistake 3: No test site. It’s a best practice to have a test or development site where you can play test new options, bells whistles and upgrades before adding them to your live or production site.

When problems happen and they eventually will remember that you can always delete the incompatible plugin folders to get your site working again quickly.

Have fun.

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Melinda Martin Responds to James Arthur Ray White Papers

January 14, 2010 By

Melinda Martin is named in the James Arthur Ray white papers. The documents were prepared by Ray’s legal council and states that Martin is wanting money from Ray. We asked Melinda if it was true. Here’s what she said.

Melinda Martin did ask to JRI provide her an attorney. JRI never responded.
Megan Fredrickson filed a worker’s compensation claim for Melinda Martin without Martin’s knowledge. Martin learned of this when contacted for an interview about her disability. Martin declined Worker’s Compensation. Martin does not have a worker’s compensation lawyer.
Martin has not requested monetary compensation from JRI.
Martin has not received compensation from any of the news interviews where she has appeared.
Melinda Martin was trained in CPR.

As James Ray’s possible indictment looms near and the Death Ray Defense unfolds, I’m amazed by my naivety. I’m in my late 40s and still feel our legal system should be about what’s right and the truth and

Article by terry hall @ bizsayer.com…

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Something is Conspicuously Missing from James Arthur Ray / JRI Disclaimers & Waivers

January 13, 2010 By

No Where in the Spiritual Warrior Waivers and Disclaimers is it mentioned that it was James Ray’s intention in the Spiritual Warrior Seminar to take customers to the brink of death for an Out of Body type Spiritual Experience. James Ray decided and planned for this “good day to die” long before his customers showed up in Sedona.  He orchestrated a 5 day seminar to take them there.
He did NOT inform them when he took their money of his plans to endanger their lives. When he finally did tell his customers that he may be planning a sweat lodge, he did not disclose his plans to take them to the brink of death! Ray’s Spiritual Warrior Seminar was his own personal version of Flatliners and he assumed as all Gods Do, that he knew what was best for other human beings.
When JRI customers were informed that they had bought a

Article by terry hall @ bizsayer.com…

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Beware Haiti Scammers Scammers are prepa…

January 13, 2010 By

Beware Haiti Scammers
Scammers are prepared to steal money intended to assist Haiti. http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2010/01/13/world-looks-help-haitians-scammers/

by Terry Hall @ MrTerryHall.com

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