Below you'll find all the marketing and Web-related blog posts Lori wrote for Convert Marketing.
 

McCafe Branding: Thumbs Up from Convert

While I was driving down to San Francisco for a wedding, I noticed a very clever billboard ad for McCafe.  I didn't manage to get a photo of it but it proudly proclaimed, "Large is the new Grande."  I chuckled appreciatively remembering the countless times I was irritated after having been corrected by Starbucks server when ordering a large coffee... "You mean a Grande?"

When carving out a new brand, it is very important to distinguish yourself from other brands, especially when there are strong ones dominating the market.  In this case, Starbucks is the dominant brand.  Very cleverly, McCafe is positioning itself as being the choice for high quality coffee without the pretentious attitudes commonly associated with Starbucks.

Here is a McCafe commercial following this line of thinking:

Cheers to DDB who came up with this clever, brand-building campaign.  Look out Starbucks!  McCafe is coming for you...

The Importance of Verifying Ad Placement

I rarely recommend banner ads or the Adwords content network to businesses unless brand building is a primary goal.  The reason why is because banner ads and content network ads rarely lead to sales.  They do, however, help raise awareness of your company or product’s brand.

That being said, when you’re choosing the websites and web pages on which your ads will be featured, choose wisely or you may waste your clicks on an inappropriate audience, or worse yet, create negative associations with your brand due to bad placement.

On the Adwords content network, there is the option to let the network choose sites that Google’s algorithm associates with your product.  You even have the option to specify a target demographic.  But be warned.  Google’s algorithm isn’t perfect so the only way to ensure your ad gets placed on appropriate websites is to choose the sites yourself.  Google has this option available to advertisers.

When doing banner advertising on websites, you usually have the option to choose the page categories on which your ads will show.  This is a lot less random than the Adwords content network, but it can still sometimes result in bad placements.  See the following banner ad placement that was featured on FailBlog.

4 Reasons Why Sumo Lounge's Marketing Strategy Works So Well

 
Having put an offer on a bigger home recently, I started investigating options for setting up my new TV/ gaming room.  I wanted to make it a multi-purpose room in which I can play games, but also have the room to do martial arts training (Yes, I admit I'm a tad quirky...).  The problem is, the room itself just isn't that big.  I needed seating options that could be tossed aside to make room for training.  Having looked into a number of different options, a friend of mine sent me a link to Sumo Lounge's website.  Not only did I fall in love with the product (even though I have yet to actually buy one), I was also impressed with their marketing strategy.  Here's why...

1. Product Positioning.  The foundation to a successful marketing strategy is having a strong product that fills a need in a way that has not yet been addressed  Sumo Lounge's original product was the Omni.  It offers a neat alternative to the traditional bean bag chair.  It's essentially a super-sized pillow that can be shaped in a dozen different ways depending on how you want to sit or lie.  Talk about product positioning!  LOL...  Bad joke... my apologies.  The product is inexpensive, easy to clean, has great cool-factor and therefore appeals to a variety of consumer types.  

2. Branding.  Sumo Lounge is a great name for this company as they offer a variety of seating options that kind of resemble a sumo wrestler.  It is interesting and intriguing, yet links back to the products themselves.  I also love the tagline they use in their videos, "What's your favourite position?"  It's clever and suggestive (especially when you look at the attractive female models demonstrating the various "positions,") while also demonstrating the product's unique qualities.

3. Niche.  Sumo Lounge was very clever to identify a number of niche markets that the Omni would appeal to rather than simply attempting to market to the masses.  Starting from the smallest ones, these include: geeks looking for chairs to game in, parents looking for furniture that they won't have to worry about their kids damaging, students looking for cheap lounging options for their small living spaces, and trendy people looking for unique, conversational piece furniture.  By establishing themselves first with the geeks, the company was then able to move on to bigger markets.  Nowadays, they are doing wholesale business with larger companies, including Target.com.   

4. PR campaign. Sumo Lounge's PR campaign is a thing of beauty.  Originally based in Toronto, they first went after local media, getting coverage in the Toronto Star, Globe & Mail, Breakfast Television, Style at Home Magazine, etc.  One of their big breaks, from what I can tell, was when they got acceptance from the geek community as a gaming chair.  Sumo Lounge sent their products to dozens of geeky gurus, including bloggers, Web comic writers, gaming magazines, to have them reviewed.  This resulted in scads of positive reviews, both in text and video form on YouTube, which ultimately resulted in tons of inbound links to their website.  Another smart move for the company was offering to provide Omnis as furnishing at a number of high profile events, including: PAX (Penny Arcade Exhibition), LA Film Festival, Sundance Film Festival, 2008 MuchMusic Video Awards, various Playboy events, etc.  This got them invaluable exposure and some serious viral marketing action.

As you can see from Sumo Lounge's marketing strategy, it is quite possible for a small company to make it big with a great product and a solid marketing strategy, even without tons of money with which to launch a campaign. Read about the founder's success story.
 

Now I just have to close the deal on my new place so I can go and order two Omnis and a Sumo Sultan sac to make the ultimate gaming/ training room...   

Blogger Reviews and What They Can Do for You

Blogger reviews can do a lot for your web marketing campaign for a particular product.  Not only do they help with your link strategy (which helps you get a better rank on search engines), they also help get the word out about your product to a niche market.

 As some of you already know, I run a martial arts blog.  A company recently asked me to do  review of the unbreakable umbrella.  My blog isn't huge, but I do get over 1,000 visits a month from martial artists all over the world.  The company recognized that that its primary niche market is martial artists and, as a result, saw the opportunity to get publicity for their product with a small, but very targeted audience.  And I got a free unbreakable umbrella out of the deal, which was pretty cool since the product sells for a hefty $179.95 US.

While blogs may seem like a very small way of getting publicity as most of them don't have huge readership, in addition to reaching niche markets, they have the potential to create viral marketing for your product.  The blogging community is tightly knit and many blog owners follow and support other related blogs.  By getting a review on one, your product may get noticed by other blog owners who may then feature it on their blogs.

If you're considering having your product reviewed on blogs, the first thing you should do is identify various niche markets to which your product would appeal.  Once you have identified these, you can research appropriate blogs on blog catalog websites like Blog Catalog, Blogged or Technorati.  Ideally, you want to find blogs that are written on regularly, at least 2-3 times a week if not more often, and have an active following.

Once you've decided which blogs are appropriate for your product, it is simply a matter of sending an email to the blog owner.  Many blog owners are flattered when approached to write a review and are happy to receive free products.   Always contact the blogger first before sending your product to them.  This saves you the cost of the product and its shipping if it turns out they're not interested in writing a review.

Using Misspellings as Adwords Keywords

If you’re going to advertise on news sites or any site on which the content can be very random, be aware that inappropriate placements like this can occasionally happen.  It makes your company appear careless when the faulty placement was just a result of bad luck.  It is worthwhile to verify the exact pages on which your banner ad is appearing to prevent embarrassing placements like the one above.

Many people ignore misspellings when generating keyword phrases for Adwords, thinking that they aren't worth prioritizing in their campaign.  What these people don't realize is that misspellings can be a great source of inexpensive, yet relevant clicks.

While it's true that the proper spellings of your targeted keyword phrases will get far more search volume, misspelled keywords can and do get entered into search engines.  And because most Adwords advertisers focus solely on the proper spellings, there generally isn't as much competition for misspellings.  This means that it's easier and cheaper to get higher placement and the clicks that are generated from misspelt keywords will cost you less, oftentimes much less than the clicks for proper spellings.  While misspellings won't generate as many impressions and clicks, the ROI (Return On Interest) on the clicks you do get is often significantly higher.

There are 2 types of misspellings to consider: actual misspellings and typos.  To generate a list of keywords that are actual misspellings, look through your main keyword list.  Think about ways that these keywords may be commonly misspelled and add these to your list.  You can also use the Google Keyword Tool to discover ones that are linked to your keywords and are commonly entered into Google.  If you do this, be sure to keep the synonyms box checked.  Misspellings usually appear in the 'Additional Keywords to Consider' list from your search.

Typos offer a different opportunity.  There is a sea of hundreds of mis-typings for any given keyword phrase.  It would be far too much work to try and mentally come up with all of them.  You can, however, use a misspell generator tool to come up with a big list of them.  While the individual keywords from these massive lists have a very low click-through rate, because most Adwords advertisers don't bother to include all the various typos, your ad position will probably be at the top and your CPC (Cost-Per-Click) will be much lower, giving you better ROI.

How to Advertise on Craiglist

 
I am a huge fan of Craigslist. With its simplistic, straightforward layout, it makes it easy for just about anyone to sift through postings and find what they need or put up their own post and sell their own stuff. That being said, because of its accessibility, there can be anywhere between several dozen and several hundred posts added in any given section on any given day. This means you can expect mucho competition for your humble little ad.

To help your ad rise to the top of the sifting process, I’ve written some tips to follow when writing an ad for Craigslist or any other classified advertising website. While these tips may seem basic, many people fail to follow them then wonder why they can’t manage to sell their wares. Incidentally, the ideas behind these tips hold true for any and every advertising initiative.

1. Tell people what they want to know. Whether you’re advertising a job opening or a selling a sofa-bed, there are certain things that everyone looking wants to know. If you put these things right in your ad’s title, people are a lot more likely to click. For example, let’s say you’re looking for an apartment to rent. What are the 3 most important factors? Location, apartment type (i.e. number of bedrooms, etc.) and price. Naturally, you’ll look for these things in ad titles as you sift through the listings.

So when if you’re writing a Craigslist ad, you not only want to include all the most pertinent information, you want to do so in the most clear and communicative way. Consider the following two apartment rental ads.

 

 

In the first one, the location is stated, but in the form of an intersection. What if the person looking at the ad is new to the city? That intersection will mean nothing to them. In the second ad, however, the ad clearly states the region of the apartment, emphasizing its proximity to shopping and transit. This presents a more complete picture of the advantages of the second listing’s location.

2. Show AND tell.  No matter what you’re selling, if you can show a picture of it, people are a heck of a lot more likely to buy it. This is true in all forms of advertising. And yet, many people don’t bother to post an image, even though Craigslist makes it very easy to do. If a picture is worth a thousand words, then a photo on a Craigslist posting answers a thousand questions: What colour is it? Is it in good condition? How big is it? Etc. I know myself and when I’m looking to buy something, whether it’s a candelabra or a couch, I usually skip over ads that don’t have photos. I don’t have time to go trek out to someone’s home to look at what they’re selling unless I’m already pretty sure I’m likely to buy it.

3. Make your ad stand out. This is about helping people sift faster by making it clear that what you’re selling is what they want. When there is a ton of competition for what you’re offering, this tip is especially important. This is not to say that you should use spammy attention-getting devices like in the following ads:

People see through those types of tactics and are generally suspicious of these tactics and will usually pass over them. To make your ad stand out, you should focus on benefits-oriented statements that draw the right people’s attention, like this ad for a developer position for example:

It suggests that the company likes to treat its employees and people would naturally wonder what other ways they do so. Ads that pique curiosity like this will draw more clicks.

Everything you need to know about marketing, you can learn from Craigslist. Or at least the most important things. If you can apply this article’s three main ideas to any type of marketing initiative, it’ll strengthen its foundation and improve its results.

Facebook Social Ads: A Great PPC Option for Targeted Advertising

Facebook Social Ads are becoming a popular PPC (Pay-Per-Click) option for businesses who are looking for ways of targeting specific demographics.  Sound interesting?  Here's how it works:

1. What to Advertise. First you choose whether you want to advertise a website or something on Facebook (like a business or product page).

2. Create Your Ad. Next, you write your ad with headline and body text.  You can even add an image.  You also have the option to add social actions to your add.  This means that Facebook will attach any relevant interaction that a user’s friends have with your brand or business on Facebook as the headline for your creative.  Pretty neat!

3. Choosing Your Target Audience.  This is what makes Facebook Social Ads really great.  You can target specific geographic locations, age groups, genders, education levels, relationship status, even sexual orientation.  You can also specify people by keywords included in their interests, music & movie tastes, job titles, etc.

For example, let's say you were a wedding planner.  You could opt to advertise to women within your targeted age range who are engaged.  Facebook even tells you how many people are included within your target demographic.

4. Setting Your Budget.  Similar to Google Adwords, Facebook allows you to pay for your ad per click.  You set your budget by the maximum you want to spend per day and the amount you're willing to pay per click.  For any given ad unit, Facebook chooses the best ad to run based on the cost per click. So if you're competing with other ads, your ad will be shown if its CPC (cost per click) is highest.

Facebook Social ads are a great PPC option for businesses, like restaurants, hotels, service industries, etc, who tend to target specific demographics.  It can be even more effective if you combine Facebook Social Ads with a Facebook business or product page, which is free for you to create.
 

When writing Adwords ads, you have very little creative room to work with.  You have to make your point quickly within a tiny space.  Oh, and there's a good chance there are other ads next to yours competing for audience attention.  Here are a few tips to help make your ads stand out and convert to sales better.

4 Adwords Ad Writing Tips to Improve Conversions

 When writing Adwords ads, you have very little creative room to work with.  You have to make your point quickly within a tiny space.  Oh, and there’s a good chance there are other ads next to yours competing for audience attention.  Here are a few tips to help make your ads stand out and convert to sales better.

1. Ad text should reflect keyword phrases.
Text that is the same or very similar to the keyword phrase that has been entered into Google is highlighted within Adwords ad text. This makes the ad stand out more on the page, as you can see in our example.  This also makes ad bids cheaper due to increased relevance.

For example, if the ad group primary keyword phrase is “Toronto flowers,” you could include phrases like “Toronto fresh flowers” or “Toronto wedding fowers”, etc. The ad text would then always include the primary keyword phrase “Toronto flowers,” which would be highlighted no matter which keyword phrase in the ad group gets searched.

2. Test several versions of ad text.
By testing several versions of ad text, you're not putting all your business’s eggs into one pay-per-click basket. It allows you to evaluate which ones perform best for your business. This allows you to test different selling points and wordings. You can then make modifications to the campaign after it's been running awhile.

3. Differentiate from the competition.
Check out what your competition is doing for their ads on your chosen keywords phrases. This allows you to create ads with messages that stand out against the competition.

4. Use geo-targeted keyword phrases (when relevant).
With geo-targeted Adwords campaigns, we always use the targeted location in the ad text.   Even if the keyword phrase doesn't include the location.  If a person is shopping around for a Toronto flower store, they will be more likely to click your ad if they see Toronto within the ad text.

These are only 4 Adwords ad writing tips, but if you implement them well, they bring about noticeable improvements to your ads' conversion rates.

How to Do Viral Marketing Using YouTube

YouTube is a great way to do viral marketing for a website. It is by far the world’s most popular online video site, holding over 500,000 user accounts and hosting over 6 million videos. With so many people on the YouTube band wagon, it’s worth it to consider whether or not it can be used to help promote your website.

Here’s how it’s done:

Step 1: Create an intriguing, relevant video. This is the hardest part. You have to come up with a video idea that intrigues, whether it does so by being funny, interesting, or shocking. Not only that, it should somehow relate to your business and get people interested in learning more about your product or service.

A perfect example of a viral marketing success using YouTube is Blendtec’s “Will It Blend?” campaign.  We talked about this company previously in another article about viral marketing. Five days after posting their videos on their specifically-designed website, they had 6 million views on YouTube.

“Even though we had the best blender in the world, people didn’t know who we were. We wanted to demonstrate the power and durability of the Blendtec blender,” Tom Dickson, Blendtec’s company founder says. “For years I’ve been doing a test where I start the motor and jam a piece of timber into the blades and test the strength of the drive component, the electronics, and the blade itself. We thought it might be fun to try out some other things that people might find amusing. “

As their video popularity on YouTube grew, Blendtec’s online sales grew by 500%.

Here’s a video in which he blends a golf club:

In addition to blending light bulbs, toy cars, a crow bar, a garden hose and other common household items, Dickson has even gone on to promote other companies’ products by blending them in his videos, including an iphone, a Wii remote, and a Weezer album together with a can of beans.

Step 2: Connect it with your website. Once you have shot your video, be sure to include your website’s URL somewhere in the titles. This way when people pass it along to others, either by email or by embedding your video on their sites, the people on the receiving end can go to your site for more information.

Step 3: Give it relevant tags. When people search for new videos on YouTube, they enter keywords into the site’s internal search engine. These search terms are connected to the ‘tags’ that are connected to each video to turn up relevant search results. When you upload your video, be sure to enter tag words that are people are likely to search to find videos like yours.

Step 4: Pass It On. Don’t just rely on people finding your video through YouTube. Pass your video link along yourself. You can do this by posting it on social networking sites like Digg or Reddit, posting it on forums, adding it to a Facebook page, even emailing it to your friends. If you are going to post it on a forum, make sure it’s relevant otherwise your posting may be deleted as spam.

Good luck with your YouTube viral marketing projects!
 

4 Ways Companies Can Benefit from Wikis & Other Collaborative Content Sites

 Everyone has heard of Wikipedia, the Web’s most well-known wiki.  But most people don’t realize how useful collaborative content websites can be.  Some companies are starting to twig in and use them, but few are using them to their full potential.

Here are 4 ways how your company can benefit from a wiki or other type of collaborative content sites:

1. Project Management. A wiki can provide an effective central hub within which everything can be in one place so people can see an entire project.  It allows a company to streamline their workflow and reduce their reliance on email.  It can also be used to keep everyone in the loop on the progress of a project, helping to keep everything on schedule.  And because its collaborative nature, a wiki makes it easier to incorporate feedback over the course of a project rather than after the fact.

Here’s a fun video that very clearly breaks down how it works:

2. Client Collaboration.  We use our collaborative content site, BackPack, regularly to collaborate on projects with clients.  It allows you to create writeboards, which work like a standard wiki pages, allowing multiple people to work on the same document.  Here’s an example of how it works when creating a website for a client.  First, the designer we’re working with makes a web page, attaches a screen shot.  But then the project manager from Convert looks at it and realizes it needs a wireframe diagram to give it context for other people working on it, so she attaches a link.  Our developer might have also created a mock-up of how a menu works, so he adds a link to that.  Our client might email the link around then add some comments to the page.  A collaborative page makes this entire process infinitely easier than using email.

3. Documentation. A wiki can be useful for creating content for use in product documentation, reports, whitepapers, etc.  I have used a wiki in the past to develop product documentation for a client.  Throughout the process, the project manager and client could see my progress on each of the various sections, offer feedback as I finished the draft of each section, and easily export the finished content as XML for print production.

4. Resource Hub. A wiki is especially useful for making commonly needed information available such as guidelines, FAQs, human resources forms/tools, policies, logo image files, etc.  Editing permissions can be set so those responsible for the documents have the ability to edit them, giving print/read-only access to everyone else.  This eliminates the need to distribute paper copies every time a change is made.  The person responsible for the change can simply send an email announcing the changes with a link to the document on the wiki.

A wiki or other collaborative content site is one of the most versatile organization tools one can introduce to a company. Ultimately, what makes the wiki or other collaborative content tool so useful is its simplicity.  People can learn to use it and put any of the above examples into practice.  And once they do, they’ll wonder how they managed without it.

Some popular wikis and collaborative content sites include: Backpack, PBWiki, Conflence, MediaWiki, TikiWiki and DokuWiki.

4 Things Not to Do in Live Chat Customer Service

 
Live chat is becoming a more popular way to provide customer service.  When done right, it can be efficient, personalized, and help customers get the information they need faster.  Done badly it can make your company look cold and uncaring. 

Here are 4 things not to do in live chat to keep you in good standing with your customers:

1) Over-rely on canned responses. I realize that canned responses make the process of live chat more efficient, but when you over-rely on these responses, customers can get frustrated.  The customer knows they’re chatting with a live person, but that person responds to them like a computer, which often comes off as insulting.  Here’s an example:   

Sharon:  Hi. I have a question about your Acme 2000 toaster oven.

Customer Rep:  I would be happy to assist you with any questions you have.

Sharon:  Ok. Well, I was wondering if you could tell me where it’s manufactured.

Customer Rep:  I’m sorry.  I don’t have that information available at this time.

Sharon:  Can you get that information?

Customer Rep:  I’m sorry.  I don’t have that information available at this time.

Sharon: Alright. Then who does have that information?

Customer Rep:  You can call the 800 number on our website and ask to speak to a customer service  representative.

Sharon: Aren’t you a customer service representative?

Customer Rep: I’m sorry I have been unable to help you today. Please visit again soon.

You can imagine how frustrating it would be on the receiving end of these unhelpful canned responses, but this sort of thing happens quite regularly in live chat customer service systems.  In this case, the rep would have been better off trying to find the answer to the question or at least providing an explanation why the answer is not available.

2) Information overload. When people ask a simple question, they usually want a simple answer.  Sometimes, the canned responses that are used have way too much information.  Here’s an example:

Bob:  Hi. I have a question about your company’s paper products.

Customer Rep:  I would be happy to assist you with any questions you have.

Bob:  Does your company use recycled materials?

Customer Rep:  Paper accounts for 40% of all municipal waste. The U.S. alone uses 100 million tons of paper a year & use is increasing.  Recycled paper means less trash, lower taxes & other disposal     costs. Recycled paper uses 55% less water & helps preserve our forests.  That’s why the Acme paper company is committed to using 100% recycled materials to produce its paper products.

The length of the rep’s response in this example is ridiculous considering that the customer was really only looking for a yes/no answer.  While there may be cases in which a rep might have to provide all this extra information, they should be instructed to give simpler responses when it makes more sense.

3) Ignore the customer’s tone. Every customer on live chat is different.  Some make jokes to lighten the conversation.  Others use sarcastic remarks to express their frustration.  Here’s an example:

Matthew:  Right, I get it. It’s not covered under warranty, even though the sales rep failed to mention    that it wouldn’t be under these circumstances when I asked about it.  Thanks for nothing.

Customer Rep:  Thank you for contacting Acme.  Your business is important to us.

In this case, the rep chose to offer up their usual polite canned finish in response to the sarcasm, which if anything, would irritate the customer further.  The rep should have offered up some kind of apology and explanation even if they weren’t able to satisfy the customer’s desire.

4) Be inhuman.  I understand that it’s easier for customer service reps to be robotic in their responses.  That’s why it’s very important to school them to follow the spirit of each individual conversation, not the letter.  If they’re going to use a canned response, they should tailor it to the situation as appropriate.  If a customer makes a joke, they ought to acknowledge it in some way.  Reps should do their best to give personalized attention to each customer as though they were standing right in front of them.  That’s the whole point of live chat.  If a customer wanted a canned response they would have consulted your website’s FAQ.

When Choosing a Domain Name, Choose Wisely

 
Choosing a domain name is almost as important as choosing a company name.  In fact, domain name availability should be an important consideration when a company names is being chosen.  There's nothing worse than finally deciding on a business name only to find out that you can't get an appropriate domain to go with it.

Your business name is usually considered the number one pick for your domain name. People will generally try "www.yourbusinessname.com"   first when searching for a commercial site. If it’s difficult to spell, it's a good idea to register misspellings of it too. Choosing a domain name may not be as easy as this, particularly if you have a common name for your business. You can try abbreviations/ variations of your company name, if your first choice is unavailable.  Some  people  use hyphens (i.e. "www.your-business-name.com") but this practice makes it hard to remember and awkward to tell people your domain verbally. 

When conducting business in an international environment, .com domain names are usually considered the best. If you’re only conducting business in one country, you can use country-specific endings like .ca. in Canada. There are other endings like .org, .net., .biz, etc., however, when a person knows of your company they’ll usually check .com first.

One last thing to consider when choosing a domain name is that the name can't be mis-read as something other than what you intend.  This can lead to misconceptions about your site's purpose.  I remember coming across one site that sold pens as its business.  The company name was Pen Island.  Naturally, the domain they went for was www.penisland.net, which can be mis-read as... well, you get the idea.  Some companies do this intentionally to get attention, but it often just gets the wrong kind of attention.

4 Ways to Put the 'Viral' into Your Viral Marketing Initiative

 
Viral marketing has exploded with the proliferation of the Internet and many businesses want to get on board with the free publicity that can be generated from a well-executed viral marketing initiative.  That being said, for every successful one that gets spread to all the right people at the just the right time, there are hundreds of unsuccessful ones that fall flat and go nowhere.  So what can you do to put the 'viral' into your viral marketing concept? 

 Here are 4 ways that can work together to accomplish this:

 1. Exploit human behavior. People get excited when something new, interesting and/or useful is introduced. They want to be the first to let others know about it and therefore takes initiative to spread the news around. Knowing, or being able to make an educated prediction of certain trends in behavioral patterns goes a long way toward the success of your viral marketing initiative.

2. Give something away.  "Free" is a magic word for marketers in this context.  Pretty much all great viral marketing initiatives give some sort of product or service away free.  Some examples include: email, Web tools, videos, images, software programs, games, contests, etc.

3. Make it easily transferable to others.  The most virulent viruses are ones that are easy to transmit.  This holds true for viral marketing.  The medium you choose to transmit your marketing message must make it easy for people to pass your initiative on along to others, like email, websites, downloads and graphics.  As you can imagine, the Internet plays a huge role in modern viral marketing because its "cheap & easy" nature.

 4. Use existing communication networks. Unless they're a big company that already gets a lot of media attention, most companies need to use already existing communication networks to help spread the word of their viral marketing initiative.  The Web provides endless possibilities, including blogs, forums, social media sites (i.e. Facebook, Digg, Twitter, StumbleUpon, etc.), affiliate programs (ex. Google Adsense), etc.  By using other people's Web resources, to spread your marketing message, you need not deplete your own.  Smart viral marketers also target communication networks that are particularly relevant to their industries.

All of these are principles are important, but always refer back to #1.  Ultimately, your viral marketing initiative must be something memorable, whether it's because it's something unique, funny, eye-opening, useful, etc.  Without this, it doesn't matter how much you try to spread it around.  It simply won't catch on and become 'viral.' 

7 Web Marketing Tips to Help Boost Business in Real Estate

The real estate industry is crashing all across North America.  This is creating a big push for real estate companies to invest substantially in online marketing campaigns to increase sales. 

Here is a list of 7 Web marketing tips for real estate companies:

1. Improve your Website usability.  Most real estate businesses already know the importance of having a website.  But it's not just about getting online.  Your website should be organized and designed to make it easy for people to find the information they need.  If it's not, people get frustrated and surf away as quickly as they came.

2. Write your website content around your keywords. Search engine optimization is heavily dependent on the textual content of your website.  By knowing your most important keywords and peppering them throughout your site content, you'll help search engines associate your site with those keywords, which can in turn give you a higher rank when surfers enter them into search engines.

3. Create a resource section on your website. Having a solid resource section on your website is a great marketing tool on a number of levels.  It helps establish you as an authority on your industry.  It adds more content to your site, which helps draw in more visitors.  The content of the resource section itself helps educate potential customers about what you offer.  Need I go on?

4. Be active online. Write on blogs (yours and others').  Post messages on forums.  Submit articles to relevant websites.   This is a great way to help establish your credibility, but also draw in more traffic to your website. 

5. Support your online marketing campaign offline.  When you circulate letters, postcards, etc. to potential clients, make sure you provide a better call-to-action than simply, "Learn more on our website."  Invite them to sign up for online alerts about new properties for sale.  Tell them about a promotion that is only available through your website.  Whatever you do, give them a good reason for them to visit your site.

6. Set up website analytics.  Many real estate businesses have websites, but have no idea whether or not their sites are actually doing what they intended.  By setting up a good website analytics system, you can track what people are most interested in on your site, what Web marketing initiatives are bringing in more sales, at what pages on your site you're losing visitors, etc.  This will help you keep your website on track with your goals.

7. Keep your website up to date.  Every time a property is up for sale, it should immediately be up on your site.  Likewise, if a property is sold, it should be taken off your site immediately.  If you have something newsworthy to announce write a press release and publish it on your website.  By keeping your website current, visitors are more likely to come back regularly to check out new content.  It also prevents people from getting frustrated by outdated, irrelevant content.   

If you run a business with a strong presence in a particular area or city, whether you run a flower shop in Toronto or provide tax preparation services out of Ottawa, you should be utilizing web marketing strategies that target your specific area.  There are 3 specific strategies I recommend to clients with a strong local base.

3 Search Engine Marketing Strategies to Help You Target Your Local Area

 
The lettered listings you see next to the map are all Google Local business listings.  These also appear when people search for businesses on Google Maps.  When people click the link, they are taken to the business's website.   When people click 'More,' they are taken to the full Google Local listing, complete with descriptions, photos & videos, reviews, even coupons.

So even if your business doesn't rank very high in organic results, you can still get your business on the first page for local searches by creating a Google Local listing.

1. Google Local.  This is a free service that Google offers with the intention of helping searchers find products and services that are offered specifically in their areas.  As a business, you can create a Google Local listing that will appear whenever people search their specific area for what you offer.  For example, if you were to enter "flower shop toronto" into Google, you would get the following results:

2. Geo-Targeted Adwords. Many people are cluing into the value of Google Adwords as a search engine marketing strategy.  Most people know how to geo-target their ads so that they only appear to people searching in the area where they do business.  In addition to this, it is also well worth it to create one or more ad groups with geo-targeted keyword phrases with ads that are geo-targeted in terms of their ad text.  Let's go back to our original Toronto flower shop example to illustrate.  In the sponsored results along the top and on the right side of the page, you see the following:

By creating Adwords groups around geo-targeted keywords phrases like "Toronto flowers" or "Toronto flower shops", for example, the ads you write for your ad groups will appear when people enter these phrases into Google.  To make the ads more noticeable on the page, the businesses who created the bottom two ads used base words from the keyword phrase like "Toronto" and "Flower" within the ad text.  As a result, Google automatically highlights these words in the ad text due to their increased relevance.  Increased relevance of ad text to keywords phrases also helps make the ads cost less per click.

3. Geo-Targeted Website Content.  Your business website, particularly your home page, should make reference to the locations you serve.  If you work this into your headings, body text and meta tags, it will help search engines associate your services with these locations.  When done right (no black hat SEO tricks!), this helps get your website a higher organic rank so that people are more likely to find your site when they do geo-targeted searches for the products and services you offer.

Even if your business is not limited to your specific area, it's a good idea to use geo-targeted search engine marketing strategies as part of your overall Web marketing campaign.  Many people feel more comfortable  dealing with businesses in their immediate area because they are seen as more accountable.

Good SEO Leads to Good Publicity

Everyone who runs a website, particularly for business purposes, should have their text optimized for their most important keywords.  If you manage to achieve a high organic search rank for those keywords, you can not only increase the amount of business that comes your way, you can actually get more publicity with traditional medial outlets as well.  In the past few months, I have been experiencing this with my Vancouver martial arts school.

My school's website is well optimized for a number of keywords.  It comes up on the first page for a number of relevant keyword phrases including: Vancouver self-defense, Vancouver Jiu-jitsu, Richmond BC martial arts, Richmond BC Jiu-jitsu, Richmond BC self-defense, and so on.

As a result, I've had a number of journalists from traditional media contacting me about issues related to self-defense.  Back in February, I was interviewed on CBC Radio about self-defense in relation to muggings.  Last month CTV wanted me to do a "news-you-can-use" piece on the 6 o'clock news, demonstrating a variety of self-defense moves.  Unfortunately, they gave me only 2 hours' notice so I couldn't do it.  And most recently, a columnist from Canada's national newspaper, the Globe and Mail, interviewed me about my career as a martial arts and self-defense instructor.  You can see the article and hear an audio clip from my interview on the Globe and Mail website.

Journalists use the Internet to do a substantial portion of their research.  Because I was optimized for "self-defense," a keyword that has great media relevance, I've been getting a lot more attention from them.   Consider which keywords that are relevant to your business that might also be relevant to journalists.  If you can get a high organic rank for those keywords, you may be able to get more publicity for your business in traditional media outlets.

Competitive Analysis and Its Role in Marketing

 
When we work with new clients, they often discover ways to improve their business's offerings, ways that position themselves better against their competitors.  This is because when we create a website, write a brochure, or develop any other sort of marketing piece, we conduct a competitive analysis and often offer suggestions as a result of what we learned.  It is a key aspect of business and marketing strategy that sometimes companies don't consider enough.

There are three main components of competitive analysis and its application to your business.  They are as follows:

Research. Competitive analysis involves researching everything that's out there that competes directly and indirectly with your business.  If you're running a small specialty coffee shop, for example, your direct competition would be other specialty coffee shops, whether they're small places like yours, or big chains like Starbucks and Second Cup.  Your indirect competition would be restaurants that sell coffee but are not primarily focused on coffee, like Tim Horton's and McDonald's.  Look at what they all offer, how they offer it and the benefits and disadvantages of the way they do business.  You may even want to consider even less direct competition like coffees that people brew at home.  By looking at everything that offers any sort of competition against your business, you'll get a more complete picture of your consumer market and the buying patterns of people within that market.

Product. The next step is to consider what you offer.  There are certain minimum market standards that people expect regardless of whether it's a small coffee shop or a big corporate chain.  If the coffee you offer tastes like battery acid, don't expect to stay in the business very long.  No matter what business you're in, you have to meet or exceed that minimum standard.    

Position. If you're going to compete directly with a big coffee shop chain like Starbucks, you have to offer something they don't, positioning yourself against the competition.  As a small specialty coffee shop, you might want to create a unique, artsy atmosphere, which people might prefer over the branded corporate feel that chain stores can't help but have.  Another position point might be that your shop offers coffee that exceeds the quality people expect from chains because you buy higher quality beans.  Whatever you do, try to offer something unique that will draw people to your store over the competitors.

Conducting a competitive analysis and applying what you learn is well worth your while and can greatly improve the way you approach your business and marketing strategy, and ultimately draw in the customers for whom you are doing business.
 

How Scarcity Can Be Used as a Marketing Tool

 
Scarcity is a compelling way of increasing the selling power of any product or service.  I had this reinforced recently with the Jiu-jitsu school I run on the side.

I was in the fortunate position to have filled up my membership roster and no longer had space for new students.  I posted a message to this effect on my website.  Instead of pushing potential students away to other schools, however, it had the opposite effect.

In the weeks after having written the message on my website, I got more inquiries in such a short space of time than I had ever received before.  I was dumbfounded.  I had collected a waiting list of 8 people in only 2.5 weeks, people who wanted to be informed if the space were to become available.  I found myself wishing I had posted the message back when I was in need of more students, though ultimately I would not have.  I am an honest person after all.

The reason why this happened is because of the scarcity (or in this case, complete lack) of space for new students, it gives people the perception that the club is filled up for a reason - because it is in some way better than other clubs.  This is why people wanted in so badly.

It doesn't even have to be about a perception of quality as it was in my case.  Lack of supply on its own can create its own demand.  Take the Beanie Babies craze, for example.  One element of their marketing strategy is to limit the production of certain models deeming them 'rare.'  This helps keep people excited over the product as a collectible, causing people to obsessively keep track of the release of new rare models and snap them up as soon as they hit the shelves.

Coming up with marketing strategies like these to leverage the value of business's products or services is one of many ways marketing consultants help businesses increase sales.

Canadian Politicians Lack Strong Web Presence

 
When you look at American politics these days, you'll see forward-thinking politicians using the Web effectively to promote themselves and their party platforms.  So how do the website of the MPs from the Canadian government compare?

Barack Obama has an excellent website that is well-laid out from a usability standpoint and has an eye-catching design.  It is even set up to take donations online.

Jack Kingston, member of the United States House of Representatives, uses his website in very unique ways.  It has an active blog and a photo page that links to his Flickr account.  It also features "MailTube", whereby the congressman solicits video questions, through YouTube, from constituents which he will then respond to in a YouTube video.

Now compare this with the leaders of Canada's major parties... well, I would, but NONE of them have their own websites, except for Stephane Dion of the Liberal Party whose site is not very elaborate.  Considering that Dion is a party leader, I would expect more.  It just goes to show how behind the times Canadian politicians are.   

I had a look at all the websites of all the Federal MPs.  A large proportion of them are replicated sites.  This is to say that a template was created and made available for MPs of specific parties.  Brian Pallister's website, MP for Portage-Lisgar, is an example of a website that uses the Conservative party's website template.  All the major parties except for the Bloc Quebecois seem to have templates sites available for their MPs (most of the Bloc members don't have websites at all).

There are a small handful of MPs that did put some effort into creating decent websites.  Michael Chong, MP for Wellington-Halton Hills, created a fairly decent website.  Nothing overly innovative but it is well-laid out for usability and has most of the things you would expect to see on an MP's website. Dawn Black, MP for New Westminister/Coquitlam also has an appealing template with many personal touches. That being said, these examples are some of the top websites created for any Canadian MPs and they are a far cry from the top sites made by American politicians.

Nowadays, a good website need not have tens of thousands of dollars put into its creation, so there is really no reason why we shouldn't see better quality websites from our members of parliament.  With the right Web marketing expertise, it is possible to create a website that draws attention to issues, gives people the information they need, and reaches out to the community.  For the next Federal election, I hope a few more of our politicians step up to the plate. 

Poor Usability Leads to Customer Confusion

This past Sunday, I went to go see the new Indiana Jones movie.  But how could I go see a movie that has not even been released, you might ask?  The answer is simple:  I couldn't.  But I thought I could because of poor website usability.  Here's how it happened.

I was under the impression that the movie was releasing on the long weekend, but to be sure, I consulted the Cineplex website.  I went to the list of times for the movies that were "Now Playing" at the theatre of my choice.

I scrolled down through the movies that listed below were presumably "Now Playing."  I found my movie of choice, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.  From here I figured it was simply a matter of choosing which of the myriad showings available to go see.  My friends and I chose the 7:20 showing and made arrangements to meet at the theatre.

We arrived only to be informed that the movie wasn't opening until May 22.  The girl at the counter said the movie was mis-advertised on the Internet and that a lot of people having seen the same misinformation.  I went home to see the "error."  I discovered that technically, it wasn't mis-advertised.  It was a natural mistake surfers would make as a result of a usability sloppiness on the site.

If you look closely at the screenshot here, the site does have in small print that the Indy film is showing as of May 22, even though it is under a list of films that were labeled "Now Playing."  So why didn't I and many other people notice this?  It is because of the nature of the Web.

When people read things on the Web, they tend to do so hastily.  They scroll and scan, looking for the specific information they're looking for.  If they don't find it quickly, they'll move on.  This is because oftentimes the sites a search engine lists for a search term aren't relevant.  To compensate for this, as surfers, we'll scan sites quickly and click from one site to the next if we don't find what we're looking for.  This makes our search efforts more efficient.  This is why it's so important to consider usability issues when creating a website.  Everything should be accurately labeled, easy to find, and laid out in a way that makes sense with minimal thought.  This sounds easier than it is. 

Creating a website with good usability involves knowing what visitors expect to see and and the way they surf.  You have to know all the web-wide conventions visitors expect when they surf, as well as typical surfing behaviours like eye tracking patterns, text scanning, etc.

With all the websites on the net competing for visitors' attention, usability is massively important.  If you've got plans to make a website, be sure that the people you hire to do it for you have a solid understanding of it.  As Indiana Jones said, "X marks the spot."  Or it should anyway.

Jumpstarting the Creative Process

Clients frequently tell me that I come up with ideas that blow them away.  Whether it's a clever tagline or an intriguing banner ad concept, these are the type of ideas that are compelling, but are also on target in terms of the audience.  Went I hit one out of the park like this, the client sometimes asks, "How did you come up with that?"  So here is my reply.

Target Audience Mindset.  When I start a project, I'm usually given the demographics of the potential customers the client is trying to reach.  This is necessary but not enough on its own to help me come up with great ideas.  The key is to consider what desires, fears and concerns these people have regarding the client's product/ service.  I usually create lists of these for reference to help me get the emotional pull that every great idea has.

Competitive Research.  Whatever project I happen to be working on, I look at what the competition is doing to see which campaigns are effective and which are lack luster.  I do this not with the intention of copying, but rather so I can avoid doing the same thing so I can come up with an idea that stands out from the competition.

Similar but Unrelated Industries.  This is a fun one.  While I'm brainstorming, I'll consider what industries have target audiences with similar thought processes then I'll check out what those industries are doing.  For example, if I were creating a website for a dog groomer, I might look at websites for hair salons, the common link being grooming.  Or if I were creating a tagline for a top quality furniture company, I might look at what high-end fashion stores are doing, the common link being personal image.  This can lead me to stumble across an idea that can be reshaped for the industry I'm working on.

Of course, in reality, the process is not as simple as this.  There are many more branches on the creative tree that I don't necessarily explore on every project.  These are simply the primary branches that I'm required to climb so I can narrow down the millions of smaller branches that are available to explore.

Donuts at Starbucks? A Serious Branding Goof...

 
"Whether you're counting calories, watching your fat and sugar intake or looking for something with more fiber and whole grains, we offer a great selection of tasty options for you to choose from."  This comes directly from Starbucks's website.  So where do donuts factor in?

Starbucks have introduced Top Pot donuts to their menu in over 2,500 stores in the US.  The donuts are now heading further east, being introduced to  Oklahoma and Texas, the heart of Dunkin' Donuts country.  Interestingly, they have yet to be introduced to any of the states where Tim Horton's has opened stores.  You can read about all about it on the Seattle Times website.

Right up there with ice cream and potato chips, donuts are considered one of the worst foods widely consumed by North Americans.  A donut is essentially a deep-fried bagel made from white flour, and covered with sugary toppings. Donuts are very calorie dense, high in saturated fats and are loaded with sugar.  While Top Pot was required to recreate their recipe to omit all trans fat, as a food, donuts are the complete opposite of what we have come to expect from the Starbucks brand.

Brand differentiation is a key component of brand strategy.  It is what makes a brand stand apart from its competitors. A brand should be as unique as possible. Its health is established and maintained by offering a set of differentiating promises to consumers.  This is used to leverage value.

By diving into the donut market, Starbucks is diluting its brand by creating a mixed identity.  They are catering to two different markets; consumers who want health-conscious choices and those who desire rich, indulgent treats.  Because the latter is in such opposition of the former, it puts a dent into the brand identity already established by the company.