Customers want to know “who is Apple and what does Apple stand for?” Basically tell your customers who you are, because who you are is the brand you/we are!

Changing gears, look at the adoption of Hotmail, Yahoo! Mail and Gmail over the last decade plus. As of August 2011 Wikipedia reports that Hotmail has 364 million users worldwide and Yahoo Mail has 280 Million and Gmail has 191 Million users. Obviously there probably is a high percentage of these mail accounts that are dormant, I know I have a few. But still there is a lot of business being taken away from the good ole United States Postal Service.

Just yesterday the New York Times reported that the USPS might shut down if they don’t make some drastic changes or get a bail out they will just plain run out of money. With everything else going on in the world today in the shock news genre it seems like no one actually cares. But wait! Do you think they won’t care if that Social Security Check doesn’t arrive in the mail? I know they won’t worry about my little postcard mailings.
Here’s a look at the data:

While first class mail has dropped significantly over the years the USPS is still stuck with all of the infrastructure and labor, and oh by the way the Postal Workers have a union contract that says they cannot be laid off, how is that for a deal in these tumultuous times? They might not get laid off but they all might just not get paid!

What amazes me at this point is the silence is deafening and I have not heard or seen much online or in the newspapers about the travails of the USPS. Just wait a few more weeks and month when the next big multibillion dollar payments are due from the USPS and if delivery is disrupted we just may hear more than a little noise, we could hear the natives getting restless.

As an end note what about the artwork in the post offices that was created during the depression era? What is that value and how will the assets be divided if they are dissolved or sold?

In doing a search for a well known business in SEO and local I wanted to see how they them selves ranked in Google Places. I mistyped the keywords so this is probably why they did not show up. However what was more interesting were the results that showed up after I clicked on “Rate Places to Improve my Recommendations.

What I got was a grid like listing of several places listings that I could: save for later, star, save as “not interested.” So now I am compiling a database for Google of the places I like and don’t like. I am compiling this database for myself as well so next time I want to go to a different city I can check the places I want to go back to or visit for the first time while I’m there with the easy access of Google.

Living, traveling, planning entertaining and working might just have gotten a little bit easier with Google.

Once the photo is tagged properly with the proper image tag it can sometimes find it’s way to the top of Google in the Web search results as well as the image search results pages. While this is helpful it is probably not going to convert into revenue however if you create a bunch of images that are similar in nature and have different but similar tags you might find a body of traffic that will be relevant to your niche.

At the same time video will do the same for you. Just the other day I created a simple sunrise in Marblehead video overlooking the ocean and it now ranks just a few days later for sunrise in Marblehead with a video thumbnail.

While there isn’t a huge amount of people searching on this keyphrase the point here is that is a very short time you/we/me can all rank for some keyphrases that we want some traffic on. And to make it one step better we have a compelling video to send the right message to our audience that can sometimes seal the deal. And to help matter even more for both photos and videos we can spread them around the social media camp fires and get some legs there as well. I hope you enjoy watching your sunrise in your organic search results.

Recently I got a call from a PhD client whom I built a site for and he said received an e-mail from Getty Images. The mail said that he was in rights violations of an image. He needed to contact the person(s) who built his site. (That was me). He needed to find out where I got the image from. Luckily I licensed it from iStockPhoto. I also had the receipt. Here’s a look at the photo.

When I spoke to the person at Getty Images I shared with them I purchased the image at iStockPhoto. She said that was a “problem.” I said but it is not “my problem.” She concurred. I asked her if she had a relationship with iStockPhoto and she said “yes, we own them.” So I’m not sure what happened on their side but the issue went away for now, but it might be resurrected now with this blog post, who knows. I was annoyed that I had to waste my time and my clients with their incompetence.

So I am creating a new “ad campaign” for my own business. I wanted to use some images from Times Square and create a campaign that says something to the effect as a website consultant I can cut through the clutter online and use a Times Square image and an example of information overload. I went back to iStockPhoto. I like their offerings. However I did not see an image that I was really excited about. So I went over to Getty images. I did find some Times Square images that I liked however if I wanted to use them for 2 years in social media or on my web site I was going to pay between $1,050 and $1,250 for the 2 year license. Ouch!

I’m originally from New York City. I now live in Boston. I work with John Hubbard of Hubcam.com. I told John we need to go on a road trip to NYC and shoot our own original content, which he said he will do. We need to take pictures of Times Square, the George Washington Bridge, Central Park etc….and sell them to the stock photography guys. When I got on the chat portion of the Getty Images I asked them how much does the photographer get of the $1,050? Guess what, I did not get an answer back. So this tells me that the photographer might get a very small portion of that fee, do you agree? They get paid well for licensing and enforcing those licenses, how is that for a business model? Pretty good if you ask me.

Here’s an interesting article John sent to me discussing the business model for photographers and the stock photo guys, total over saturation of inventory.

Destination Video from Jim Peake on Vimeo.

Facebook now has close to 700 million users
50% visiting each day
365 days per year
Avg. 5 pages each per visit
5″ of ad space for each page
2.7 Trillion Inches of Ad Space currently
Ad Space being added this year will be another 2 Trillion Inches

In a call I had with a client last night (May 11, 2011) we were getting philosophical about the Internet and ways that it impacted each of our businesses.  He mentioned to me that the single reason he left his previous SEO supplier was because they said that “Facebook and social media offered nothing.”   In paraphrasing they said “ok we’ll put up a fan page for you but it won’t do anything.”  Those remarks lost his previous SEO supplier, a paying client, bad for them good for me.  Even if the supplier was correct it was their thinking that got them into trouble.  How can you make that type of a statement without “testing” first?

This client is not really adept at the Internet but he is far from stupid and he knows that in order to get ahead in this world you need to hire experts and let them do their thing.  He offered his analysis on Google and Facebook.  He said, “Google is robotic human thought, it is no more than an electronic phonebook, Facebook on the other hand is human function.  There is a trust factor with Facebook and there is competition to be the best product.”

On the other hand there are businesses and people competing to beat Google at PPC and SEO, so if you really don’t have the best products or services and you know how to “beat Google” you “win” but you/we all really lose in the end.  So his point here is that we need to be the best at what we do and not at beating Google, for Facebook this comes out when 10 or 100 or 10,000 people “like” your product or services.  It means everything to someone evaluating a person or a service/product, compared to a placement on a search engine SERP page.

Why is the fact that other people “liking” a product or service so powerful?  One word, TRUST.  Trust is the single biggest converting attribute anywhere, trust converts.  If I go to a Google PPC ad and I click on the link a lot of times I am being sent to a “landing page.”  In this landing page environment I am being “sold” creditability with lots of copy and testimonials usually from strangers.  But on Facebook this is not so, the trust factor are already there because my friends are there and I trust my friends.

This client of mine is in the addiction treatment field and really crystalized the point best by saying, “instead of being the best at beating Google be the best at what you are being in yourself and your business and everything will take care of itself.”  And what he means by this is the normal stuff of doing all the right things and then going beyond.  For example, he gets calls from people who have no money or are on Medicare that are suffering from addiction (he can’t profit from these folks) but he will take the time out to refer them to the government agencies who can provide some sort of assistance.  He said that he feels that in some sort of way there is something spiritually positive about doing this for him and his business.

He also said that you’d be surprised at how many times a family calls asking for help who don’t have two nickels to rub together but a couple of days later he is on the phone with their neighbor arranging getting the person into treatment because the neighbor pitches in to make it happen.  I don’t know if you call this good karma but it is nice to see happen when we do the right thing.

1. Social Media
2. Referrals and Networking
3. Speaking
4. Offline Contacts
5. Search Engines

First we have to look at who this question is being targeted towards and that is the “internet savvy” folks.  So naturally the options are geared towards that audience.   What if I’m in the roofing business do you think the options would be slightly different?  Newspapers, bulletin boards, yellow pages phone books (yes they still do exist).  While the question allows us to “add an answer” we can see by the results after about 91 votes there are only 5 categories.

As an internet marketing consultant or a direct response media consultant I would answer the question this way.  My primary method for acquiring my clients is first be writing for trade publications, second by e-mail marketing and third word or mouth and referrals.  However, it must be noted that all three of these are working together.  It is NOT just one primary method of marketing.  It is ALL of the above.

So that said, in my first conversations with all new clients I ask them how are you getting your clients today?  And they give me a list like the ones above.  Then I ask them why do they want to do something new when something they are already doing is working?  I usually get an answer like, “I have to quit my current channel because of a conflict,” or I hear “social media is the next big thing.”

The best advice I can give any client is that if something is working to generate income for your business keep doing it but do it better.  If something you are doing is not working, stop it and either change it fast or kill it all together.  So if referrals are working how are you bringing in those referrals today?  Do you have a system set up for bringing in those referrals?  Do you have a sales force bringing in those referrals?  Are you helping those sales people or people who refer you more business with some sort of a referral system like postcard marketing?

The question is how can you make your referrers provide you with more leads?  How can you make their life easier?  Can you systemize the process for them?  Can you incentivize them?  Can you recognize them?  Asking these types of questions and asking your referrers these types of questions will get you answers that will bear fruit.  If you offer a product or service of value your clients will help you help them in providing them with the answers to their problems.

So once we get the “systems” in place for better customer acquisition we have some additional profit to play around with we can then go off and test new methods for marketing.  For example, if you are a recognized expert in your field and you speak on occasion what kind of “bookstore” do you have in the back of the room so that people can order your products and services after you speak?  Do you have registration forms ready to take orders or capture names?  Do you have people on your team helping you?  If you don’t then why don’t you have people helping you? Find a way, hire temp workers.  Bring your staff to these meetings…..oh it is expensive to do that?  Well, maybe you are not speaking at the right venue if they aren’t buying what you are selling?  Maybe your staff needs better training to help you close more business in the back of the room?

If your website has converted a few orders or leads each month how are you doing against your competition?  How many back links do you have versus them?  What keyphrases are you ranking for?  Can you improve on your search engine optimization?  (That’s a loaded question because unless you are Google the answer is always YES).

The name of the game is leverage.  Speak once distribute many times.  For example, speak at a conference and share your info with people in the room, next video record the event distribute many more times on the internet and through e-mail, next transcribe the speaking event and distribute many more times on the internet and e-mail and blogs and social media.  So the 1 hour speaking engagement can be distributed some many more times than to just the folks in the room.  Does this require work, yes.  Do you need help?   If you require help call us at SpeechRep Media at 781-990-8844 and we can assist you in a plan customized plan that we can do for you or do partially for you depending on what your resources are.

How to Write Compelling Content