What's your email address?

How many small business owners do you come across who don't have proper email addresses?

By not proper email addresses, I mean ones that don't use the company's domain name (assuming the company has a domain name) - yahoo.com, hotmail.com, aol.com etc.

Don't these people realize the messages they're sending out? "Not a proper business". "Doing things on the cheap". It's the internet equivalent of only giving out a mobile phone number. Or the guy who knocks on your door to ask if you want your trees lopped, hands you a business card and then asks for it back when you tell him to **** off. It's simply not professional.

A proper email address, and a domain name, cost peanuts. There's no excuse for any business not to have one even if they don't have a website. There's even less of an excuse if they do have a website!

So, if you've got a hotmail, or similar, address go out and get yourself a proper one today and ditch that hotmail address. It's making you look like Dell Boy.

123-reg.co.uk is a great place to start, you can set yourself up a domain name and email address for a few pounds, or call any website developer who should be able to set you up for only a few pounds more.

Mike Brogan

Marketing your Business and Advertising

"I've written books on advertising - checkbooks!"

That is a well known quote from Alan Sugar on the Apprentice TV programme and I, for one, can testify to the truth of it. Over the years I have tried many ways to advertise my business; Yellow Pages, telemarketing, mailshots, email campaigns, ads in directories and journals, editorials and even radio. For my business, they've all proved to be a waste of money.

The only responses I've had to ads in directories and journals are from people asking me to put an ad in their directory or journal. I've had some success with telemarketing but it's hard work, although I have had reports from other web developers who've had better success than me. It's probably down to the company you use to do the telemarketing. Similarly, I've had some response from Yellow Pages but not enough to justify the expense (isn't it strange how you always seem to be situated on the boundary of 2 or 3 Yellow Pages areas which bumps up the price if you want decent coverage?).

The only thing that seem to work for me is networking. Get out there, spread the word and meet people. Networking groups like BNI, 4Networking, BRX and Chambers of Commerce are the places to go. Most organize breakfast meetings where you can meet like minded people.

BNI worked the best for me but the format is not to everyones' taste. It's very formal and rigid. But if you can find a good chapter, you will get business. 4Networking is good because you can pay for, what they call, a passport membership which allows you to attend any of the meetings around the country. It's great for a business who's client base is spread around a wide area. Chambers of Commerce have worked the least for me and I've been a member of three different chambers over the years. I think they work for some types of business but not so well for mine, I've found.

Last but not least, of course, is the internet. Whatever your business, you should have a website. When you meet people in your travels you can hand them your business card with your website address on it. People tend to look online these days rather than using Yellow Pages. You can get a small website set up for less than a year's subscription to Yellow Pages so, for any business, getting a website should be a no-brainer.

Even if you can't live without a Yellow Pages ad, set up a website, reduce the size of the Yellow Pages ad and point people to the website from there. It will be a lot more cost effective.

So there you have it. Find out about your local networking groups, get out of bed and get out there and network. You'll not only find it gets you business but you'll find it lots of fun and you'll meet some interesting people.

Mike Brogan

Two things to ask your web developer

So you've decided to get a website for your business and you've found a company locally who'll develop it for you. What are the most important things you're going to ask them to provide on your site? The layout? The colours? The fancy flash header similar to one you saw on a website your recently came across?

Well you can ask for all those things and I'm sure your local web developer will be pleased to oblige, and charge for! But all these things are missing the point.

A good, professional design for a website is a given. You don't want to pay money and have it look like it was designed by a 5-year old. But the key things it must do are:

• Attract visitors. That usually means being visible on search engines where people are going to find it.
• Convert those visitors to customers or customer enquiries.

If the site can't achieve either of these things then it's a complete waste of time and money. Sadly many web developers don't consider these aspects when developing a site and are more concerned about showing off their design skills.

Don't be a victim of the designers pretending to be web developers. Always ask these key questions:

• What will you do to get my site listed on search engines?
• What will you be designing into my site to persuade people to do business with me?

If they don't have convincing answers to either of these questions then, bet your life, all you'll be getting is a website that looks pretty but is pretty useless.

Mike Brogan

Using Organic Anchor Text To Rank Higher

In the course of my business I'm often asked about linking and whether links can improve a website's search engine positioning. There are a lot of myths and misunderstandings out there but the answer is "Yes" and "No".

It all depends on the circumstances and there are a number of factors that come into play. Get it right and your site can benefit immensely. Get it wrong and it can get seriously penalized by the search engines.

In his article "Using Organic Anchor Text To Rank Higher" , Bill Hartzer explains a key aspect of link building and goes on to reveal some interesting facts about Google that will be useful to both site owners and users doing searces on Google.

Mike Brogan - Day 10 Solutions

You get what you pay for

It's the 1890's in Paris. A woman is walking down the street. Suddenly she spots a short man walking towards her and realizes that it's Toulouse Lautrec, the famous painter.

"Monsieur Lautrec" she says, as she reaches him. "Today is my husband's birthday. I wonder if you would be kind enough to draw a sketch of me so that I can present it to my husband as a birthday present".

"Of course madame" says Lautrec. And with that he produces a sketch pad and pencil and begins to draw the lady.

A few minutes later he presents it to her. "Oh monsieur" she says. "That's wonderful. How much do I owe you?"

"Ten thousand francs madame" he says.

"Ten thousand francs but it only took you 5 minutes".

"No madame. It took me a lifetime".

If you're looking for a website you can go to a professional website specialist and pay a few hundred or even thousand of pounds, depending on your requirements. Or you can go to friends or relatives and get it done for very little or even nothing.

But at the end of the day, you get what you pay for.

Mike Brogan - Day 10 Solutions

What's the difference between a graphic designer and a website designer?

If you you can't answer that then you're not alone. There are thousands of graphic designers out there who don't know either. How many times have you seen adverts from graphic designers, or printers, claiming that, as well as designing fliers, packaging, letter heads, business cards and online graphics, they also design websites?

There is a whole world of difference between the two. Graphic design involves creating images on a page, package or computer monitor. Website design is all about creating something online that will attract people and then persuade them to take an action. Yes it involves creating images that will be seen on a computer screen but it also involves creating a lot more - persuasive copy, a navigation scructure using links carefully designed to steer people through the site to where you want them to go, and content that will persuade search engines to give a prominent listing to the site.

The difference is a bit like the difference between a photographer and a movie director. A photographer creates images. A movie director creates something that uses moving images and sound (dialogue and music), together with a good script, to create an entire experience for the viewer.

Mike Brogan

2x0=0

I'm often asked, by people who have websites, if I can do anything to improve their search engine rankings because the site isn't bringing them any business. It's fairly typical for them to say that they've never even had an enquiry from the site.

More often than not, when I look at the site, the problem is obvious. The site is so badly designed that anyone who arrives at it, whether it's from a search engine or anywhere else, is just going to click straight away to somewhere else.

Generating business from a website involves two things. Persuading people to come to it, from search engines for example, and then enticing them to stay on the site and take action - contact you or buy a product depending on what the site was intended to do.

Those of us in the internet marketing business use a term called conversion ratio. That it the ratio of people who arrive at the site to the number of people who take action. If the conversion ratio of your site is zero, then before spending money on search engine optimization to bring more visitors, you need to do something about the site design.

Remember, if your conversion ratio is zero and you double the number of visitors coming to the site, the conversion ratio will still be zero because 2x0=0.

Mike Brogan

Truth or Fiction?

Some light hearted definitions:

Consensus

A consensus means that everyone agrees to say collectively what no one believe individually!

Management Consultant

A management consultant is a man who knows 101 ways to make love .... but doesn't know any women!

Mike Brogan - Day 10 Solutions

Don't Get Ripped Off!

I was recently studying some web statistics on behalf of a client who we did a website for a couple of years ago. He had asked me to analyze current performance for him with a view to upgrading the site.

To my surprise and puzzlement, I noticed that the stats were reporting traffic from a page with a completely different domain name.

I immediately typed the domain name into my browser and was presented with a website that looked remarkably similar to that of my client. By now you've probably guessed what happened. My client's site had been copied, changed around slightly, but not enough that it wasn't recognizable. To add insult to injury, they'd even left my client's stats code embedded in it!

When I finally tracked down the owner of the site, he was most apologetic took the site down immediately. It transpired that it had been written by a friend of a friend.

The moral of this story is clear. If you need a website, go to a reputable web designer. I may cost a little bit more but you won't get ripped off like the site owner in this story. He paid for a website that had to be scrapped.

Mike Brogan

4Networking

I'm often asked by other businesses, how do I get new clients? Over the years I've tried many things but the thing that works for me the best is networking.

There are many ways you can network; Chambers of Commerce who organize breakfast and lunch meetings, local Business groups that do the same, the Federation of Small Businesses.

Currently most of my networking is done through 4Networking. It's a very flexible organization. I'm a member of the Hereford Group but, because I have taken out, what 4Networking call, a Passport Membership, I can also attend meetings of any other group in the country.

There are other networking groups. BNI is very good organization and works very well for getting business but it is extremely formal and, as such, does not suit everyone. BRX is another, slightly less rigid than BNI.

Over the years I've tried all kinds of things to get business, advertising, cold calling, advertorials in trade papers, directories, Yellow Pages. For my business they've all been a waste of money.

Go online to http://www.4networking.biz/, find the nearest group to you and go along as a guest to their next meeting. I promise you won't be dissapointed. You might pick up some business in the process.

Mike Brogan

What Does Your Home Page Say About You?

When people arrive at your home page what’s the first thing they see? A splash page with a flash movie and a button saying “Click to skip into”? Or a page full of waffle giving the history of your company starting with how your great-great grandfather started it in 1895?

Either way I not interested. I’m looking for a business that can supply me what I need. I’m not looking to be entertained or to get a local history lesson. If your site can’t show me in 5 seconds that you might be able to supply what I need, then I’m out of there to another site that I’ve also found on Google.

It’s easy guys. Follow what I call the “Four W’s Principle”.

What do you do?

• We’re accountants.
• We’re a marketing agency.
• I’m a business coach (on second thoughts for this one, tell me what a
  business coach is because I’ve no idea and I’m sure many others haven't either).

Where do you do it?

• We operating primarily in the greater Birmingham area.
• We service clients throughout the UK.
• We operate worldwide.

Who do you do it to?

• We supply our services to people in the hotel and catering trade.
• We sell our products to beauticians.
• We specialize in developing website for customers in the aviation industry.

Why should I let you do it to me?

• We have over 100 satisfied customers who’ve used our services in the past 24 months and here are some testimonials from some of them.

Simple as that! No waffle, straight to the point. If that fits with my requirements then I’m almost certain to look a bit deeper into your website. And if your site convinces me, I might just be in touch.

But that's another story for another day.

Quotations

"You get what you INspect, not what you EXpect" - Bill Johnson, Digital Equipment Corporation.

"Strategy is good tactics seen in retrospect" - Mike Brogan, Day 10 Solutions.

"Fake it 'till you make it!" - Unknown.

"It is the set of the sails, not the direction of the wind that determines which way we will go" - Jim Rohn.

"Man does not control his own fate. The women in his life do that for him" - Groucho Marx

"Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering" - Yoda, Star Wars The Phantom Menace.

"Train yourself to let go of everything you fear to lose" - Yoda, Star Wars Revenge of the Sith.

"Yesterday is gone for ever. Tomorrow never comes. Today is in your hands" - Unknown.

"Don't wish it were easier, wish you were better" - Jim Rohn.