Jacksonville Video Production

DIY SEO

By Carl Weiss

English: a chart to describe the search engine market (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

If you own a small business and have a website or plan to launch a basic business website in order to get more visibility, it is imperative to consider Search Engine Optimization, otherwise known as SEO for your new website so that it can be found by prospects. This is especially important if you plan on selling goods directly on your site. The rub is that many times web designers spend more time fretting on form rather than function. As a result, many websites that we have surveyed are lacking many of the on-page SEO elements that are needed to get properly indexed by the search engines. To address this conundrum you need to either hire a knowledgeable optimization expert, or you can try a little DIY action. When you consider the number of website analysis programs on the market, DIY SEO is not as much of a mission impossible as many people believe. In fact, if you invest a couple of hours a month on your website’s SEO then you can do it yourself.

Before you start your analysis, it is important that you select the right keywords or phrases for your website. That is to say, you need to select the words or phrases that someone who is unfamiliar with your business would enter on the search engines in order to find businesses like yours. For example, if you have a furniture business, you must have the keyword furniture somewhere in your domain. We can take a second example, say your business is plumbing and fitting services provider, then you must have the keyword ‘plumbing’ or ‘plumbing services’ somewhere in your domain name.

Now that you have some suspects lined up you need to weed them out. The best way to do this is by entering your keywords and phrases into Google’s Keyword Planner which is found by accessing your Adwords account. (If you don’t have an Adwods account you can set one up by going to adwoords.google.com.) The tab for the Keyword Planner is located under the Tools tab at the top right of the page. Once you enter your suspects into the Keyword Planner’s lineup it will come back with the traffic count for each and every keyword or phrase entered. More importantly it will also suggest other keywords and phrases along with their respective traffic counts. The biggest mistake that most people make is to either choose too many keywords or choose keywords with little or no traffic. The Keyword Planner is the perfect tool to help you identify the best keywords to target.

Once you have selected the right keywords or phrases for your site now you need to plug them in. There are several areas that you need to apply these keywords, namely your Meta Tags, the Alt Tags and at the beginning and end of your website. The Meta Tags are located directly below the Title Tag. An example of how these tags should be formatted is listed below:

Next come the Alt Tags which are descriptors used at the end of the code for every image on your website. Since search engine spiders can’t see images, these descriptors tell the spiders what the image is all about. While many people ignore the alt tags this is a mistake since it is another way to let the search engines know how to rank your site. Below is some sample code that shows you what the alt tags look like. Make sure all off yours are complete if you ever hope to make it to page one of any search engine.

Next you need to include the keywords in your content. Whether you are creating verbiage for your website, blog or video you need to find a way to insert the keywords and phrases into each and every one of these. Just don’t go crazy with the keyword density or you risk being penalized by the very search engines you are trying to woo. (In fact there is a black hat SEO term called keyword stuffing that every search engine knows and loathes.)

So the key is to use the desired keywords in your content in a fitting way. That is to say, it should not look like keywords are thrown in unnecessarily. Always remember that content is designed first and foremost to be read by human beings. This means that keywords should be used only in the proper time and place. They should also be grammatically correct. Last but not least the most important keyword or phrase should be used at the beginning and end of your website in a font that is bold and italicized. This lets the spiders know that the word or phrase is important.

Off-Page SEO

In today’s content-rich world, even the best on-page SEO is not going to usually be sufficient to
generate a page one result on most search engines. But it is a good start. To really get into the game and get the spiders to sit up and take notice you next need to start providing regular content that is valuable and interesting. (That’s right folks, the spiders have learned how to read.) Weekly content has become king due to the increased competition of the marketplace. People are eager to learn what’s new and exciting with your business. They want to know how you can help them save time and money or overcome obstacles. They want to hear what other customers think about you. Since most people rarely update their website this makes it difficult for people and spiders to find out the latest about news regarding you and your business. That’s what blogs and social networks are all about. They are also good for creating backlinks to your website which is another benchmark that the spiders use to rank sites.

When it comes to self-promote your website you need to use both On-Page SEO and Off-Page SEO techniques. Once your website receives good ranking on all the major search engines, do not stop your Off-Page SEO activities. You should continuously work for your website each week so that your competitors will not overtake your ranking. Yes, you will require lesser effort and time to do the maintenance work as part of the Off-Page SEO once your website receives good ranking. If you do not have the time to promote your website, you can also outsource some or all of your online marketing tasks. Just take care to thoroughly check out any SEO expert that you are considering turning your web presence over to or your site could wind up DOA.

Carl Weiss is president of Working the Web to Win, a digital marketing agency based in Jacksonville, Florida. You can listen to Carl live every Tuesday at 4pm Central on BlogTalkRadio.

Google Gives Everybody the Bird with Their Pigeon Update

By Carl Weiss

Many of these birds are used for the release i...

SEO is for the birds, at least in terms of the last two updates from Google, the first of which was called Penguin and the latest that has been deemed Pigeon. While birds of a feather, there are big differences when it comes to the intent of the two most recent algorithm tweaks.

Penguin Puts a Chill on Black Hat Operators

First released back in May of 2012, Penguin was designed to penalize websites that were deemed to be using deceptive online marketing techniques to achieve ranking on the world’s most popular website. What this meant was that anyone using such tactics as keyword stuffing, link farming, hidden text or any of a number of other back door techniques employed specifically to generate search engine ranking was punished by having their sites relegated to the backwaters of Google. In some cases if the infractions were serious enough, Google delisted these sites, meaning that they would never again appear in search.

The reason that Google was able to accomplish this was due to the fact that their spiders were now sophisticated enough to not only read what was on a site, but they were able to comprehend the meaning of what they read. This made the job of sifting through hundreds of millions of websites possible. Prior to that it was necessary to flag a site and then have a human being physically check it out so that it could be determined whether black hat tactics were being used. When you consider that more than 130,000 new websites are published every day, this was a superhuman task prior to 2012.

Pigeon Flies the Coop

Male homing pigeon, (showing of ;-) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Where Penguin concerned itself with identifying and penalizing cheaters, Pigeon is more interested in improving localized search parameters. In fact the most pressing reason that Google commissioned its latest update was due to local directory Yelp complaining that its listings were being unfairly weighted in Google search. What this means is that local directories will benefit directly by the latest update. If your site is not listed, or if your directory listings are incomplete or inaccurate now is the time to address this issue.

Another vital task is for website owners to police their online reputation and to embellish it by actively pursuing a policy that encourages satisfied customers to rate your website. Face it, sooner or later you are going to rub a customer the wrong way. While in the past this could have produced a snub, what it is more likely to produce today is a ding. By ding I mean a negative review on any number of local directories such as Google Local, Yahoo, Yelp, Angie’s List, etc. Since many companies have no policy that encourages satisfied customers to post positive reviews, all that leaves for the public to find online are negative ones. Even if you have to offer a reward to customers in order to get them to post positive reviews, the reward to your business far outweighs the cost.

Learn a Few Tactics from Homing Pigeons

Homing pigeon (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

If you really want to create a local sensation on Google then you need to take a lesson from homing pigeons. These birds have been known to find their way back to their nests after being released as far as 1,100 miles away from home. So long has their ability been known and so accurate was their homing instinct that Genghis Khan used the birds as a pre-aviation version of air mail.

Like the homing pigeon, if you want to achieve outstanding local results then it is vital that you start feathering your next with local content. This can include everything from location specific landing pages with keyword sensitive urls, to blogs and social posts that are keyed to local events. Also make sure that you include a Google map on your site and landing pages. Include (and label) videos and images that pertain to your locale. In short, anything and everything that points out your location is going to be vital to getting Pigeon to roost.

Instead of Merely SEO You Need to be Concerned with GEO

If you want Pigeon to make sure that people in your neighborhood can find you, then you need to make sure the name of your neighborhood is included on your website, landing pages, your blog, your videos and your social posts. As geotargeting gets more and more prevalent you need to seed your site with geographical breadcrumbs that can be seen by the spiders. Just make sure that you don’t overpopulate any content piece with them or you might wind up being considered a spammer.

Keep in mind if you find out that Google Pigeon has done to your site what pigeons the world over do to statues, the best way to keep pigeons from dropping all over you is to leave breadcrumbs in front of someone else’s door.

Eggs of the homing pigeon (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The Top 5 Ways to Feather Your Nest:

1. Use location specific landing pages.

2. Create more location specific content such as blog posts.

3. Encourage your customers to review your site on local directories.

4. Generate more local links

5. Make sure your local profiles are accurate and complete.

Carl Weiss is president of Working the Web to Win, a digital marketing agency based in Jacksonville, Florida. You can listen to Carl live every Tuesday at 4pm Central on BlogTalkRadio.

Does PPC Advertising Spell Pay Per Crook for Your Business?

By Carl Weiss

When you think about it, it’s amazing that the bulk of Google’s revenue is derived from Pay-Per-Click (PPC) advertising.I say that because many small business owners whom I speak to, who have used PPC ads, are dissatisfied with their results. It’s not that they aren’t appreciative of the fact that PPC can generate a Page One position for their business. It’s more that using PPC does just that and little else. Generating a click doesn’t mean generating a lead or a sale. It simply means generating a click, every one of which erodes your ad budget. While some clicks are spurious at best, before you decide to declare your PPC ads DOA, there are a few things you should consider.

#1: Have You Fine Tuned Your Ad?

One of the things that many neophyte PPC advertisers don’t realize is there are a number of ways to fine tune their campaign. Adwords, along with most every other PPC engine will leave the pipe wide open unless you specify otherwise. This means is that you need to determine when, where, and how often your ads are displayed. If you aren’t the kind of business that offers 24-hour service, why run your ads all night along? Simply by specifying you only want your ads to be displayed form 9 a.m.to 5 p.m. will literally cut the burn in half. If you don’t sell your products or services worldwide (or in every state in the Union for that matter), you need to tune your campaign to specify its geographic scope. Keyword selection is also key. Not only is it important to choose the keywords and phrases that best describes your business’ products and services, you also need to add negative keywords to exclude your ad being displayed for similar keywords that will generate browsers as opposed to buyers.

#2: Why Being Number One Isn’t the Best Bet

Other than failing to test and measure your keywords effectiveness, the second biggest blunder that any PPC advertiser can make is to insist on being the number one result. In the first place, since all PPC advertising is based on an auction, jumping right to the head of the line only assures you that you are going to pay top dollar for every click you receive. It doesn’t necessarily mean you are going to generate the most results. Far from it, since you will burn up your ad budget the fastest this way. All that shooting for the top slot means is that you run the risk of creating a bidding war that you can’t win.

What we aim for is position number three for our clients that use PPC. The third from the top means that your ad will display at the top of Google. It also means that your limited advertising budget will go further before your ad reaches your daily limit and goes dark.

#3: How Strong is Your Offer?

If you really want to get the biggest bang for the buck, you need to spend more time working on your message and offer, and less time worrying about being atop the pile. In fact, a world-class, text-based ad can help you generate more clicks in the number three spot than a weaker ad can at the top of the page. Since PPC ads are the only thing online that requires you to be more succinct that when you use Twitter, less is definitely more.

The key to maximizing results is to thoroughly understand the demographic and psychographic profile of your ideal customer. What age brackets do you wish to target? Which income brackets are representative of your ideal prospects? Where do your ideal prospects shop? Knowing these factors will not only help you hone your ad to a fine edge, but it will also aid you in selecting the best keywords and phrases from which to campaign.

Once you have a complete profile of your ideal prospects then it’s time to create the ads that are designed to appeal to this group. That’s right, I said ads. The beauty of working online is that every click can be tracked. In order to maximize your results in any PPC environment you want to design and test a number of different ads. What sounds good on paper may quickly prove to be next to useless in the fast-paced world of the Internet. Unlike print ads that are fixed in stone for a set amount of time, online ads are imminently adjustable. Within a few days of launching any PPC campaign, you should be able to determine which ads are pulling their weight and what ads need to be either tweaked or pulled out of rotation altogether. You should also do the same for your keywords, as well as the networks upon which your ads are displayed.

Unless you intend to shred a mountain of money in your initial attempts to locate and appeal to your ideal prospects, all of the steps above must be accomplished before your campaign is activated and the first click is produced.

#4: Looking for a Happy Landing?

Unlike in aviation, where it is said that any landing you can walk away from is a good one, if you want to have a high probability of converting clicks into cash you need to look at the place you intend prospects to land. The single biggest mistake advertisers make is to send the prospect to their homepage. Your homepage is designed to showcase your business, not to create new customers. As a general rule, it’s too busy. It offers too many choices to prospects. It wasn’t designed with the express purpose of dangling the bait and reeling in the fish. In short, if you send a prospect to your homepage you have just reduced your ROI by as much as 90%.

Just like your ad, your landing page needs to be customized to funnel the prospect through the buying process with the least amount of speed bumps to accepting your offer. It needs to contain a short series of selling lures that will make your landing page stickier. In short order, you need to answer the following questions:

1. What need or desire are you trying to fulfill?

2. How does your offer remedy a problem or ease a pain?

3. How does your offer stack up to the competition’s offer?

4. What counteroffer are you promoting in case the fish doesn’t take the bait?

The best way to crystalize the process is to take a look at your existing landing page. From a visual standpoint, what catches the eye? Are you wasting valuable real estate above the fold with nebulous graphics or fancy Flash cells that do little to entice the prospect into taking action? What type of funnel have you created to limit the prospects’ choices and lead him or her inexorably to agreeing with your marketing message and taking the bait? How much sales resistance is your offer likely to cause and how does your copy address it?

#5: Don’t Drop the Ball at the One-Yard Line

U.S. Air Force Academy senior linebacker Aaron Shanor recovers a fumble by California Golden Bears tailback Justin Forsett during the Bell Helicopter Armed Forces Bowl at Amon G. Carter Stadium in Fort Worth, Texas. ID: 071231-F-0558K-010 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

So you have made a successful pitch and have generated a lead. Bravo! Don’t pat yourself on the back just yet. The secret to turning leads into sales without running yourself to ground is via a drip marketing program. While most business owners feel that they can kick up their feet and relax once the lead or initial sale is in the bag, I disagree. All you have done is taken back a tiny amount of ground for a battle that was hard-fought. If you really want to maximize the ROI of any online marketing campaign, what you need to do next is craft a multi-touch drip marketing plan that reaches out and touches a prospect no fewer than ten times.

If you want to enhance your return, I suggest sending buyers a monthly online newsletter that keeps them appraised of your growing business. Feel free to include an offer at the bottom of each newsletter. This tactic not only is a cagey way to dangle an offer in front of a prospect, it is also a way to keep your business top of mind. If you really want to generate maximum return on every dollar invested, this technique is truly gold-plated.

While many business people lament the sometimes uneven results that they achieve when they employ PPC ads, the best way to turn clicks into cash is to up the ante and make sure that you aren’t robbing yourself blind by failing to fine tune your campaigns.

Since 1995, Carl Weiss has been helping clients succeed online. He owns and operates several online marketing businesses, including Working the Web to Win and Jacksonville Video Production. He also co-hosts the weekly radio show, "Working the Web to Win," every Tuesday at 4 p.m. Eastern on BlogTalkRadio.com.

In Search of Sir Spamalot

By Carl Weiss

The Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch, originated from Monty Python and the Holy Grail. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Everyone remembers the 2005 musical comedy Spamalot along with its irreverent send up of the Arthurian legend. Directed by Mike Nichols, the Broadway production garnered three Tony awards and grossed more than 175 million dollars. Flash forward nearly ten years and the term can be applied anew, only this time without coconut shells substituting for horses or the Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch. What I am referring to is online spam.

What Constitutes Spam? (And I’m not talking about the kind that comes in a can.)

Ever since the Internet was begun there have been a number of individuals who weren’t willing to play nice with all the other children. Spammers have been the bane of many people’s existence online, especially in terms of using the worldwide web as a kind of email assault weapon,. How big of a problem is spam mail?

According to securelist.com as of August 2013:

· The percentage of spam in email traffic in August was down 3.6 percentage points and averaged 67.6%.

· The level of phishing increased tenfold compared with July, and averaged 0.013%.

· Malicious attachments were found in 5.6% of all emails, an increase of 3.4 percentage points compared to the previous month.

http://securelist.com/analysis/monthly-spam-reports/57893/spam-in-august-2013/

Add to this the fact that not only have malicious emails increased during the past year, but spammers have become much craftier, using everything from “Back to School” themes during August and September, to other lures relating to everything from popular holidays, sports, lifestyle, age and gender slants.

Recent spam trends have included fake airline ticket offers, cruise ship deals and other inducements targeted toward people looking to take a vacation. A number of these emails were even made to look as though they had been sent by legitimate companies such as Delta Airlines, Royal Caribbean Cruise Line or shipping companies such as FedEx, UPS and DHL.

“Fake notifications often utilize the names of popular international delivery services such as FedEx, UPS and DHL. They tell recipients that a courier failed to deliver their parcel due to an incorrect delivery address. To get the parcel, the recipient should print out the attached document and call the company's office or confirm specified data, including the delivery address. Malicious files can also hide in fake documents supposedly containing detailed information about the parcel, which does not in fact exist. Spammers try to make their fake notifications look legitimate and typically use not only an apparently real sender's address but provide non-existent order information, genuine contact details from official websites and a copy of a privacy notification letter.”

There Ought to Be a Law

While there are indeed a number of laws on the books in the US, the problem begins with trying to determine where the spam originated. In fact the preponderance of spam originates from foreign shores. A number of spammers also use proxy servers, slave drives and other forms of subterfuge to cover their trail. There are a number of state, national and international laws in effect to prosecute these crimes. However, this type of subterfuge not only makes it difficult to prosecute the offenders, it makes it nearly impossible for the average citizen to seek any sort of redress should their system be compromised by malware.

An Ounce of Prevention is Worth a Pound of Cure

The first line of defense in the fight against spam is to never open an email from an email address with which you are unfamiliar. This doesn’t guarantee success either, since email addresses can be pilfered and/or spoofed. So if your best friend sends you an email that goes something like, “Check out this blog/offer/link,” don’t go there since your friend’s address has in all likelihood been compromised. The quickest way to infect your system with malware is to get you to accept a link.

Also look for odd word choices or misspelling since people to whom English is a second language frequently have a hard time getting a fluent grasp on our native tongue. If the message tells you that you have either won some contest that you never entered, or are about to be penalized due to an implied negligence, don’t fall for this trick. (Note: The IRS does not notify you by email.) When in doubt, call the company from which the notice was purportedly sent or talk to an expert such as your business partner, accountant, or attorney if you need to check out any offer’s validity. Never click on a link due to any emotional response.

Do not fall for an unsubscribe that requires you to enter your email address. This is just a ruse designed for you to verify that your address is active. There are dozens of ways for a spammer to get your email. They can purchase a list or they can use a bot to trawl your site looking for contact information. Don’t make spammers lives easier by signing up to win a free iPad. Guess what, the only winner is going to be the spammer.

Need to leave your contact info on your website? No problem. If you use Gmail, you can create a number of subsidiary email addresses that you can use and eventually change once the spammers get hold of them. Here’s a tip from WikiHow:

Have one main account, and then make a separate account for different purposes (one for friends, one for entertainment sites, one for your financial websites, etc.).

· In gmail, you can add a "+" button to your email address. For example, you can signup for newsletters like JohnDoe+Newsletters@gmail.com if your email address is JohnDoe@gmail.com

· Set all those addresses to forward the mail to your main account so that you do not have to check multiple accounts.

· If you start receiving spam through one of your alternates, you can trace it to one of your disposable addresses and simply delete that account.

You Need More than One Line of Defense

While most email systems come with a spam filter, this is not nearly enough to protect your system from malware. I recommend you not only invest in a first rate virus and malware protection system, but you should also invest in a secondary adware/malware system such as Malwarebytes or Advanced System Care. Today one level of defense is insufficient to protect your system and your data. Better to pay a few dollars now than many thousands of dollars should your security be compromised.

If you haven’t realized it already, spam is not going to go away. If anything, it is becoming ever more prominent, effective and insidious. While laws will continue to be created, these will have little or no effect slowing much less stopping those who wish to spam a lot. Unlike the Knights of the Round Table, the call to arms when it comes to spam is not ‘One for all and all for one.” It’s more like, “Every man for himself.” That being said, it is up to every individual to defend themselves against this ilk since the courts are for the most part stymied by the international nature of this techno crime. Where’s the Holy Hand Grenade when you really need it?

When Carl Weiss isn’t tilting against technological windmills, he helps clients learn how to start working the web to win. He is also co-host of the weekly online radio show of the same name that airs live every Tuesday at 4 pm Eastern.

Are You Ready to The Win BIG Game Online?

By Carl Weiss

When Fall is just around the corner and anyone mentions the big game, most people immediately think of the Super Bowl. And why not? With a viewing audience of a hundred ten million for a game that commands nearly four million dollars for a 30-second TV ad, this is one game that’s hard to beat. Well, at least it is on TV. When it comes to that other big game, the online marketing game, we’re talking about a whole other arena.

With a worldwide audience of nearly three billion, Internet marketing is in a league of its own. Unlike pro football, this is one game where literally every business owner on the planet is forced to play. The problem is that most businesses are still sitting on the bench when it comes to online visibility. Statistics show that 95% of businesses in the US have little or no presence on page one of the major search engines. This is primarily due to the fact that this is one game where the rules constantly change.

Time to Get Off the Bench and Into the Game

Most businesses have a website. In the past this was all you needed to get off the bench and into the

Quarterback Shaun Carney rushing Français : Le...

game. That’s because before 2005, the Internet used a website-centric architecture. What this means in plain English was that back then all you needed was a properly optimized website to get into the game. This was in the time before such things as blogs, social networks and online video. Once these online elements became commonplace on the Internet, the rules of the game were changed forever. So much so, that by 2014, your website only contributes 25% to your overall ranking. The other 75% consists of activity related to your blogs, social nets, podcasts and videos.

Sad to say but the days of set-it-and-forget-it online marketing are over. If you want to succeed online, you need not only to embrace the off-site elements of your web presence. You need to feed them. More importantly, before you spend a lot of time and money playing the game of online marketing you need to start off by taking a look at your current strategy. More precisely, you need to ask yourself the following questions:

1. How many page one positions does your site currently have and under which keywords?

2. How much traffic are you now generating?

3. How many sales per month are a direct result of your website?

If your answer to these questions is either none or “I don’t Know,” then you need to head back to the locker room and rethink your strategy. Because if your current game plan is not scoring, the only solution is to make some changes.

If the name of the game is to score, then the first thing that every business owner needs to do is define what is meant by scoring. I mean, are you trying to generate leads, sell your products and services, or simply brand your business. If you can’t define your online goal, how are you going to be able to achieve it?

The Starting Lineup

The Patriots defense rushes the Eagles offense during Super Bowl XXXIX. The Pats D had 4 sacks costing the Eagles 33 yards. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Once you determine what you are looking to achieve on the playing field, then you need take a look at both your offense and defense. Where most people consider their website to be the quarterback, in today’s online arena it is really only an eligible receiver ready to move the content you create.

You really need to look at your blog as the quarterback, since it is responsible for passing on timely information regarding your business. Face it, once you create or refresh a website how often do you change it? Once every year or so? I you want prospects and clients to stay current with your business weekly blogs are the best way to move the ball down the field. Of course, there are a number of other positions that are vital to your offense.

We regard our social networks as our offensive line. They give us the ability to run interference so that our receivers can get in position to catch the pass before the quarterback gets sacked. Like any good offensive line, these players need to workout daily in order to keep in shape. They need to stay healthy throughout the long season. And they need to get off the bench and into the game.

That brings us to special teams, which is how we regard videos and podcasts. It used to be that the Internet was text only. Today that isn’t the case. Back in the late nineties people who found your business online would spend quite a lot of time clicking around your site to check you out. Today you have less than two minutes to score. Add to this the fact that people are five times as likely to watch a video or listen to a podcast than read text and you have to ask yourself if going multimedia isn’t a winning strategy you need to adopt.

Your Offense is only as Good as Your Defense

When it comes to winning, defense is every bit as offensive, right. Think about what would happen to t

Shea Smith, the former quarterback of the Air Force Falcons, looks to pass during the 2007 Armed Forces Bowl. Español: Shea Smith, el ex mariscal de campo de los halcones de las Fuerzas Aéreas, se pase el fútbol durante el Armed Forces Bowl de 2007. Français : Le Quarterback Shea Smith juste avant de faire une passe. Suomi: Pelinrakentaja Shea Smith valmistautuu syöttämään. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

he quarterback if the ball was hiked to him and there weren’t any linemen to keep the other team’s defense at bay. That would be either a very long day or a very short day for that QB.

Before a consumer or another business owner decided to do business with you, they need to check you out. While your website, your blogs, your videos and social posts tell them a little bit about what you do, what it doesn’t tell them is what your customers think of you.

The main reason that prospects are reluctant to give you their contact information or make an initial purchase doesn’t have as much to do with price as it has to do with trust. The Internet is known to be a den of scammers and spammers. You read about it every day. Today things like reputation management, online reviews and video testimonials are vital to giving a prospect the confidence to make an initial purchase or sign up for an offer.

That means they want to read reviews and they want to hear what your customers have to say before they do business with you. I you aren’t cultivating positive reviews and posting credible video testimonials then don’t complain if they decide to do business with someone that does.

Worst of all is the fact that if you do not have a mechanism in place that fosters positive reviews then that only leaves what: Negative Reviews. I don’t care how conscientious you are then sooner or later you are bound to rub someone the wrong way. When that happens don’t be surprised if the disgruntled party doesn’t post negative remarks and ratings about your company. That’s just the way the web works today. That’s also why you need to make the effort to cultivate positive reviews. This way if you take a hit, you will be able to get back on the field and continue to play.

Gimme the Ball, Coach!

Last but not least the thing that separates the dynasties from the also-rans in the NFL is one thing:

Coaching. If you are still trying to put together a winning team without a coach, or are trying to coach your team by yourself, let me give you some food for thought. Working the web to win is not a game

to be taken lightly. The success or failure of your business could well hinge on your company’s web presence. Get it wrong and your website could languish in the backfield of this money game. This also holds true for anyone you hire to manage your web presence.

Unless you have the manpower and intestinal fortitude to lead your team onto the field week in and

U.S. Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, commander, U.S. Central Command, gets ready to toss the coin at Super Bowl XLIII, Feb 1, 2009, at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, Fla. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

week out you are going to have to hire a coach. While there are many highly reputable online marketing firms out there, there are also a number of firms that can do more harm to your business than a wily competitor. That’s due to the fact that there are still some people who make their money by trying to cheat the search engines in order to beat the search engines. While black hat tactics can jump you to page one in a hurry, once discovered these tactics can cause your website to be banished from the playing field altogether.

Therefore it is important that you check out the credentials of anyone who offers to help you promote your web presence online. Among other questions, you need to ask the following:

1. How many years have you been promoting businesses online?

2. Can I speak to some of your current clients?

3. What are your fees and what will I receive should we choose to hire you?

4. How long is the contract?

5. Do you offer any guarantees?

6. What happens if you fail to deliver?

7. Who do I call if I have any questions or concerns?

8. Have any of your clients ever been de-listed by the search engines?

Last but not least you should search online to see if their firm has any positive or negative reviews. (Having no reviews is almost as big of a red flag as having a bunch of negative reviews.) The last thing you want to do is trust the future of your team with anyone who has not been able to deliver a winning season or who has been penalized by the league. Because when it comes to playing the game of online marketing, you’re only as good as your last season.

Turn Your Best Customers into Your Best Salespeople

Everyone thinks that being on page 1 of search engines like Google is the be-all, end-all of online marketing. Far from it. In fact, I have known a number of companies that were all over page one but were still failing to convert clicks into cash. Like it or not, the biggest roadblock you have in finding the net profit on the Internet is not only related to generating a page 1 result. The other and even more important factor is credibility.

Face it, if someone clicks from a search engine to your website there is a 99% probability that they don’t know you. Add to this the fact that there are more scammers and spammers online today than ever before and it is natural that most trust is at a premium online. While things like Google reviews and rave reviews on sites like Angie’s list can go a long way toward building customer confidence, there is an even better way to seal the deal. If you are looking for the ultimate Internet confidence booster, allow me to say two words: Video Testimonials. Now I know what you're thinking, "I already have testimonials on my website. Why do I need to create videos of them?"

If you want the short answer to the question, pick up the phone and call a friend and ask him or her when they look at a printed testimonials, who they assume wrote them. Nine times out of ten the answer you will receive will be, "The website owner."

That's the problem with printed testimonials. They lack credibility. Just like backlinks, it is all too easy to rig the game by planting bogus testimonials on a website. Video virtually eliminates the possibility of chicanery. Since seeing is believing, by taking the time to shoot a 60-second testimonial, you automatically gain points on the old credibility meter.

The second roadblock stopping many businesses from taking advantage of video testimonials is the fear factor. They are simply too afraid to ask a satisfied customer to stand in front of a camera. One of our clients is a chiropractor. When we suggested that he ask patients to drop by for an interview he was aghast. “I can’t ask patients to tell you about their treatments. Our relationship is too intimate.”

To make a long story short, I convinced him to humor me and ask a couple of patients whether they would be willing to be interviewed on video. Not only did the first few patients jump at the chance, but after a year and a half more than forty of his patients and that of his partner across town have trouped by our studio to stand in front of the green screen in order to tell us what great chiropractors they are.

The bottom line is if you don’t ask you don’t get. While credibility is a great reason to take the time and trouble to shoot video testimonials, it is not the only reason. Another reason that I encourage all our clients to videotape their testimonials is due to the fact that satisfied customers are able to toot your horn the loudest. Where you would draw incredulous stares by brazenly stating what a wonderful job you do, or how much your services help people solve their problems, a client can tell your audience exactly how they feel about your business. They are not hemmed in by the constraints of humility in the same way that a business owner would be. They can call it as they see it.

For a sample of a video testimonial, click on the link below:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7aHMTq0W3Hw

The best part is that it's not all that difficult to get a customer or two to agree to tell their story via video. In fact, it's been my experience that most customers are thrilled to be invited to participate in a taping. Some of them are real hams. The important thing is to tell them that they don't have to rehearse what they are going to say. All they have to do is answer a few simple questions in front of the camera. That's all there is to it. Then you or your videographer can cut and paste the best sound bites together and leave the rest on the cutting room floor.

Video testimonials do not have to be long or involved to create real impact. You would be surprised how much a happy customer can impart to your audience in 60-90 seconds. The objective is not to program a reality TV show, but to show prospects a few choice bits of information about your business designed to goose them into taking action.

Employed properly, a couple of carefully crafted video testimonials can be some of the best sales tools you will ever have. Once you create them don’t forget to share the wealth. Embed them on your site’s homepage as well as your blogs. Push them out to all your social nets. Create a QR code that can be printed onto brochures/ As I said, for a minimal amount of effort, these videos are worth their weight in gold.

So turn your best customers into your best salespeople by letting them toot your horn for you. The results will be music to your ears.