Mobile Marketing Update

As the mobile marketing wave continues to grow, it seems like more and more small businesses are finally beginning to see the picture and jump on the bandwagon. And this is a bandwagon that you do not want to get left off of.

The world of mobile is much more than just your iphone, Android phone or Blackberry. It’s a world full of phone enabled devices along with tablets and mini-tablets that searchers keep with them from dawn until after dark.

No longer is the mobile phone the device of preference. It seems that the land of tablets is taking over and slowly but surely making it’s way into each and every business and household.

      It’s an ever growing list of both devices and marketing that seems to have no end in site.

Here’s the overview list if you haven’t been keeping up.

Mobile Websites are the first step for most small businesses. This simple step can mean the difference of being seen and clickable versus being somewhat seen and kind of clickable. Having a mobile site for most small businesses will make the difference in visibility.

Mobile Responsive Sites can make all the difference in the world for a business or organization that needs to be seen in the world of mobile. These sites respond and resize for the device that calls them. It’s a great way to be seen and not have to maintain multiple sites to get the job done.

SMS Texting has grown ever so popular with restaurants, doctors, dentists, sports organizations and service businesses that book appointments in advance. This mobile marketing tool may or may not be for your small business, but be on the look out for how you can text your way to increasing sales.

Mobile Apps are fantastic for the business or organization that has a repeat clientele or needs to have constant contact with its prospects and existing customers.

Mobile Advertising is one area that we’ll be seeing more and more of. It’s growing leaps and bounds while newspaper sales continue to plummet and lose ground. Capture your searcher while he or she is in the market and you might find your newest customer arriving at the front door tapping on his or her tablet.

Now you could be far along in this mobile game and have your act together with a mobile site or even a mobile app and maybe you even have tested some mobile ads on different search engines or networks and seen results.

No matter, even if you are just getting your feet wet with mobile, take it one day at a time and just be glad you got started.

To your mobile marketing success,

Dave Krygier
Publisher 

For more on mobile marketing and to see if you website is mobile compatible, the Small Biz Mechanic is offering mobile check ups. You can get yours by going here.

 

 

How to Market Your Restaurant Online – 5 Tips You can Use Today

When it comes to restaurant marketing it surprises me how many establishments just don’t seem to understand the power of online reviews and what their customers are saying about them.

This past fall I found myself meeting with a local restaurant owner that had some serious issues with the bad reviews that one of his many restaurants was experiencing.

In this particular case the restaurant we met at was one that I had frequented since it first opened, and overall the food was pretty good. Certain items on the menu had become favorites and pricing was pretty reasonable. But when it came to service, this is where I felt the ball was being dropped. Sometimes the service was pretty decent and other times it just seemed mediocre.

The one big thing that stuck out in my mind was that I didn’t know who the manager was? In all of my visits to this restaurant I had never been able to pinpoint or determine who was actually overseeing the restaurant?

So I decided to contact the owner to see if he was interested in meeting to discuss my findings and he agreed to get together. Now this took a few times and ultimately a combination of a phone call & text message got the owner to sit down one Saturday afternoon.

It was a pretty short meeting and as we were wrapping up he said something to the affect of, “Usually when I get done with a marketing meeting I’m not excited, but this time I am really excited.”

The ‘exciting part’ was that this owner now understood that he had a problem and it could be fixed. The question remained as to whether he would take action in-house or hire us to do the clean up? More on this in a future article.

So let’s get back to How to Market your Restaurant Online.

I mean how does one go about promoting online and getting the word out about the great food, service and whatever else it is you bring to the table?

Here are my Five Tips you can put into use today:

1. Create and Setup Profiles on the top citation sites, search engines and social media outlets. Once the profile is created, make sure to continually optimize it so reviewers are kept up to speed about your establishment.

2. Monitor each and every one of these Citation Websites, search engines and social media outlets for reviews about your restaurant.

3. Promote Citation Sites that have credibility and your customers are posting to about your business. In other words, if your customers are mostly using Urbanspoon or Tripadvisor, make sure your profile is optimized(with video and pictures – where permitted), you are responding to reviews, and consider testing some advertising on mobile devices.

4. Utilize Social Media outlets to attract, create buzz, and connect with both prospects and existing customers. This is more than the occasional post or tweet. It takes daily effort, so consider having a few different people work on this. Plus you can 

5. Get a Mobile App for your restaurant and promote it to your customers both on and offline. This will pay dividends if your app is developed correctly and you use the promotional features.

In closing, how do you market your restaurant online and really make it work?

Use the five suggestions above and then tap into as many online sources as you can afford to invest your time and money into. This way you can test each source and find out which ones drive the most traffic and bring the right kind of prospects to your table.

Until next time,

Dave Krygier
Publisher

PS – Should you get stuck or need a little help with marketing your restaurant online, The Small Biz Mechanic has the latest recipes to help you get there.

Small Business Success Stories – Secrets of the Tiny Store – Part I

Is your business becoming extinct and you don’t even realize it? Or is all your hard work, blood, sweat, tears, and money about to go up in smoke or down the drain and you feel helpless to do anything about it?

Let me share a short story about a small family business that struggled, fell, tripped and succeeded….

 9.11.2001 6am

It was on this day that I was supposed to fly to Wisconsin to meet with our biggest vendor, hoping they would approve of the new buyer who was soon to purchase our small family business.

The call came from my sister-in-law around 6am Pacific Time. It came as quite a shock so my wife and I quickly dressed and drove to my Mother’s home to view the unfolding tragedy in New York, the place of my birth and early years.

We quickly realized that I would not be flying that day and that our business sale may be put on the back burner. But we continued to watch and then waited to see if more disaster was to come.

In the weeks after Nine Eleven, we worked to salvage the sale and the buyer did purchase our company, although without the #1 vendor on board.

This vendor, who we had promoted and marketed for 12 years, was at that time the biggest in the industry. We had aligned ourselves with them so we could grow our small enterprise and this decision turned out to be one that we would not regret. Although it did cause some serious aggravation with our buyer.

Ultimately the executives at our #1 vendor held our fate in their hands and decided that the buyer of our business would not be permitted to sell and promote their products.

How ironic it was that we as small business people had to get their blessing and the people approving this deal were not even involved in a small business. They were corporate folk, doing their jobs, looking for increased sales and covering their bottom line.

To my knowledge, not one of the original executives are still working for this vendor and the business we sold….

Well, that’s another story that I will continue with in Part II. So stay tuned, avoid online extinction today and look for my next article where I’ll share what happened after the sale…

Dave Krygier
Publisher

PS – Want to learn more about the Tiny Store and how this small family business dominated niches? Get the inside scoop and check out Secrets of the Tiny Store and you’ll find out.

Mobile Marketing – Are You Ancient History?

Is your business Mobilized yet or are you still fiddling around, being indecisive and holding onto old, outdated marketing? Well, I will tell you that now is not the time to be putting off these important decisions about mobile, because mobile marketing is on a role and there are billions of humans helping that roll pick up steam.

Mark my words that this mobile revolution and evolution will catch up with you sooner or later, whether you like it or not. I mean 77% of the world population has a mobile device and according to recent research, it’s expected that over 1 Billion people will have Smart phones by 2016!

Not to date myself but I’ve been around since the
beginning of the mobile rise in the 1980’s. Yep, yours truly had the grand pappy of cell phones, an original brick phone, circa 1988.

Ancient Mobile Marketing Device
Ancient Mobile Marketing Device

Now it goes back a year before this when I had my first EF Johnson ‘car phone’ and boy was it a robust setup!

The picture to the right is of a Motorola 8900 Ultra Classic II that I used for several years in the 1990’s and believe it or not I went back to this after having a Microtac flip phone.

Boy those were the days and technology was changing at a fast pace but not as fast as today. But this is where it all started for the land of mobile.

And you could even say it started with pagers and yes I had a few of those, even one that  allowed anyone to leave me recorded message that played back over a little speaker on the pager. Hi-tech, eh? Well, it was for 1987 and we used this technology until the mid 1990’s.

So all this ancient tech history leads me to today and where we are currently at with mobile and your business. Yes, your business and mobile marketing.

In my article about mobile marketing on November 15th I mentioned that mobile traffic had surpassed the 10% mark and with billions and billions of people already mobilized, this should tell you something.

Now whether you arrived at this article though our mobile site, a tablet or desktop, it makes no difference, but know this my loyal reader…

If you are still lugging around old technology(and marketing baggage) like the Motorola bricks(they might only work in a very, very remote area) , you best take a hard look at the world of mobile and engaging your target audience. Because mobile is here to stay. It’s growing by leaps and bounds and it’s over taking the desk top world very fast.

From mobile & responsive websites, to mobile apps, SMS texting, QR codes, Games and the marketing that drives it all so your mobile experience is as good or better than the desktop.

So stay tuned here at Click and Mortar Blog because we’ll be keeping tabs on the world of mobile and maybe we’ll even bring back some more history about the ancients.

Get mobilized!

Dave Krygier
Publisher

PS – Have you seen this mobile marketing solutions video from our friends over at Small Biz Mechanix.

 

 

 

 

Direct Sales & The Return of the Milkman

Whether you’re lactose intolerant or love a mug of milk, this is a story you have to hear.

Recently I attended a local chamber of commerce function and one of the first people I ran into was the local milkman. Boy was this a surprise and more so that he was just getting started and had hundreds of customers who received their dairy products on a daily and weekly basis.

The most interesting part of this is that he was utilizing a method that most small business owners would look down on. But with this method he did in two months what most businesses do in a year or two. And with this said, I tip my hat off to him.

So maybe you’re not old enough or never met the milkman when you were growing up? Well I did and we even had a milkman back in the late 1990’s in the Central Washington Community of Wenatchee. This service was one my wife and I really liked but we ended up moving and didn’t find a milkman in our next community.

Fast forward to today and the milkman shows up on your doorstep offering you a variety of items and service to boot. And this kind of service fits hand in glove for the busy mom and dad who almost always forget to pickup milk on their way home from work or soccer practice.

Now with all this talk of the milkman how do you think this pertains to your small business or organization?

Here’s my Take…

Think outside the box and you might find the simplest method for marketing your business and increasing sales to be one that is time tested and still works, even though the techno folk will say you’re an old fart for doing it!

Direct Sales is still Alive and can be a very lucrative channel for certain businesses. Maybe your business is one of the ones that could still be utilizing direct sales.

Maybe your business or organization could increase or even double sales with direct response marketing and direct sales combined?

You know – you test some mailers with phone follow up or a little pay per click, video and a real person to answer the phone when the searcher clicks or calls.

So do not write off direct sales until you’ve sat down and put the pen to paper or fingers to the keyboard…

Because your next big client, customer or patient could be right around the corner when your mailer shows up or ad appears on his mobile device.

Think outside the box this next year and consider direct sales and direct response marketing if your business or organization needs additional revenue to keep the doors open.

To your success,

Dave Krygier
Publisher

PS – As of this post The SmallBizMechanic is still working in this arena and might be able to help you uncover a few new clients or patients.

PPS – If you come across this post and he’s swamped or no longer working taking on new clients, let us know and we’ll see who we can refer you to.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sports Marketing – The One that Got Away…

Recently my daughter tried out for the regional ODP(PDP) soccer team in our state. It was a last minute decision to make the five hour tirp to the field with her having to stay overnight with another family.

Needless to say upon arrival at the fields I was surprised to find that the check in was not very professional and somewhat disjointed.

The coach of this new team gave us parents about two minutes of his time to basically “ask questions now” because this is the only time you have.

This is the same coach that her current team coach highly recommended and maybe he is great on the field and with the kids, but his approach to us was less than charitable and somewhat brash.

It has been my experience dealing with the youth soccer world that certain coaches have this attitude and this coach was no different. Now maybe he is a really nice fellow underneath the standoffish exterior. But for an estimated $2000 to $2300 over 7 to 8 months it seemed like he could have given us a little more time, or at least an FAQ handout?

After all we parents do pay the bills, invest our time, drive the miles and so I feel a little common courtesy would have gone a long way. At least with me that is. 

In five plus years of dealing with youth soccer I have never seen a more unorganized tryout. It was like the people running it had no personal relations skills whatsoever and the organization behind them only scored a 2 (out of 10 – with 10 being highest) in my marketing and PR book.

You see, as a marketer that is actively developing and growing businesses, I am attuned not only attuned to ads, slogans, headlines, colors, sayings and results, but more so the entire package. And in this case the entire package was weak and left much to be desired.

So what this organization did was ‘not build up my confidence’ and for this next year they lost a great player.

Yep, I’ll toot the horn for her. She really is a great soccer player and everywhere we go, parents approach her and us about her abilities and skills. She works very hard and soccer is her only sport at this stage in her life.

For us first timers(at this regional level) this was an experience that I hope not to come across again in the future. 

And now this leads us back to your business…

Most youth sports organizations need PR and marketing people who specialize in sports marketing. These people should be up front telling the story, sharing the facts, and paving the way for the programs and leagues that are to come. It’s that simple.

This is also the case for most small businesses and this is where soft selling comes into the picture..

DO NOT ASSUME that your prospects know all about your offer, your business, and how great you are.

1. You need to tell the story.

2. You need to provide the facts and testimonials(if you have them).

3. You need to be proactive and follow up with your prospects.

4. You need to provide customer service and this starts before the sale!

And if you are running any kind of youth sports organization that relies on parental funding to keep the paychecks, fields and operations running…

Then I suggest you Over Communicate and Build Repore.

Until next time,

Dave Krygier
Publisher 

Reputation Marketing & Your Small Business

Have you ever considered that your reputation may be tarnished and you don’t even know it? What are people saying about you offline and online? Are all your markting efforts being sabotaged by a disgruntled employee or competitor?

All your fancy TV ads, blog & Facebook posts, Tweets, and direct mail are for nil if bad reviews keep popping up all over the place. This is where reputation marketing comes into the grand ole’ scheme of things.

Reputation marketing is still relatively new and is growing leaps and bounds as more and more search engines and citation sites are jumping into the review game. And don’t expect this game to get any easier anytime soon. It’s heating up and just getting interesting. 

In my previous post about Local Marketing I mentioned the foundation. This is usually where the trouble starts, but not always.

Sometimes there’s a rogue element like someone in the business or associated with it who is having a bad streak or is possibly disgruntled. The foundation is really strong but this one person is wreaking havoc, leaving a trail of dissatisfied customers, lost opportunities and plummeting sales.

Could it be you, the owner or manager, who is creating all the collateral damage? Or maybe your partner or senior manager?

These are the questions we need to ask you, the small business owner, because your online reputation can and will have an impact on your company moving forward.

Simply just posting reviews online is not going to make it all good. You need to have a simple plan for building your reputation online and then the foundation to support the plan.

You see it all comes back to the click and mortar again, doesn’t it. In the offline world you, your partner and your staff need to do the work to keep the foundation intact. From answering the phone and emails to posting on social media sites and meeting with people in person. It all comes together as people create their opinions about you and your company and then spread the word, good or bad.

If this seems too simple that is because it really is. This is not rocket science here but there are best practices and ways to do accomplish the plan and grow your business.

The bottom line is that every prospect and lead you come in contact with can either have a positive or negative impact on your business. These people you deal and work with everyday are the ones who will post and share their experiences online with other people.

Reputation marketing, or what some call reputation management, is the key. Yes, it is the key for small businesses to attract and connect with new prospects and existing customers. Reputation marketing (I prefer this term) is where small businesses can make it or break it online.

That’s why you need to be working on your foundation and reputation at the same time. It’s an ongoing process that requires work and planning.

So get started now and touch bases with the Small Biz Mechanic if you need a little help fixing the foundation or bad reviews.

To your reputation marketing success!

Dave Krygier
Publisher 

 

Micro Finance & The Harvest of Hope

A few years back I was introduced to the world of micro finance through a gentleman on a treadmill. I wrote about this episode in a post called Micro Finance. Yep, I was feeling creative that day(Not!!).

And so today I want to continue with insights about the world of micro finance but also mention the Harvest of Hope project.

Here goes…

When it comes to helping and encouraging small business owners from around the globe,     there is no better way than through micro-finance. This allows us to reach those people that really desire to own and run their own business. They are not looking for a handout, but are looking for opportunity.

Now this may come as a surprise but many small business owners who are located in certain countries don’t have the ability or resources to secure funding for their business, and this is where micro finance comes into the picture. One of the latest numbers I came across is that micro finance is a $70 Billion industry! That really got me thinking about all the business owners I know, and how they could connect with other business owners in need.

As a small business owner you already know what it’s like to go through the startup process. You’ve been there and done that. Maybe the process went smoothly (probably not) and maybe there were lots of bumps and bruises.

Your business may be flourishing and could even be struggling due to the economic challenges of the last 5 years, but for as little as $25 to $50 you can have a positive impact on a small business owner.

The point I am making here is that you can make a difference no matter what your situation is.

Here’s how…

Micro Finance Organizations

There are many different micro finance organizations out there but the two that I highly recommend are Kiva and World Vision. Kiva’s focus is micro finance where as World Vision also offers other programs and services.

Now Harvest of Hope on the other hand is operated by the folks at Partners International out of Spokane, Washington. This project is more than just micro finance, it’s reaching people who need help in their day to day lives.

I’ve personally met with and worked with the senior management and they are a top notch organization that literally partners with people around the globe. Their Harvest of Hope project is just one of many that is having a positive impact and is reaching people in areas that need the most help. You can check out their site at http://harvestofhope.org.

I want to encourage you to research and check out these organizations and if you find it in your heart to support a fellow small business owner or individual, then do it. Your support will make a difference and help change lives one person at a time.

Make a difference, change a life and bring hope to those in need.

Dave Krygier
Publisher

 

 

 

Email Marketing Strategies for Small Business

Even with all the new social media sites, text marketing, video marketing, blog marketing and every other kind of marketing, email marketing is still one of the best ways to communicate and connect with your prospects, subscribers and customers.

But why is it that the emails sent by retailers and service businesses seem to be the same ole’ broadcast with a drab layout and too much information.

This hasn’t changed much since the late 1990’s. In most cases all you will see is sell, sell, sell, sell – blah, blah, blah… It’s a tragedy that I see all the time. From big corporations to the smallest of small businesses, the list is long.

Now you can avoid this if you are going to build your subscriber and customer list by using email marketing.

When it comes to Email Marketing Strategies for small business, here is one you might consider:

With this strategy the idea is to Captivate the Subscriber(who may also be a customer) so he or she really looks forward to receiving your emails. Below are three different examples of how you can do this.

1. Write a Story Board just like you would if you were creating a mini-series for Television. Not that you have to be a screenwriter, but you need to tell the story over a period of time, breaking it down into little gems and nuggets to keep the subscriber’s attention.

2. Write Often and Daily if possible. The more often you write the better you’ll get at it. This method basically goes like this: write an email every day and insert it into your follow- up sequence. The goal is to eventually have an email arrive in your prospect’s or customer’s inbox every day. With this method you effectively polarize the reader, capture their attention and if your content is interesting, they will stay subscribed and purchase your products, services or information.

3. Write in Blocks as this creates continuity. So if you are going to write about indoor organic gardening, then write a series of 10 to 20 messages that covers the topic from A to Z or tells the story. Simply create an outline about the topic and then translate this outline into the individual emails. This method works well with number two from above and you might find that your blocks will fit with certain emails, if they are within the same niche or business category.

No matter what email strategy you use(mine, your own or some other marketer’s), I recommend that you utilize an email auto-responder versus your own email program like Outlook or Gmail. There are lots of reasons for this, but primarily the email software allows you to keep your database up to date, track and sequence your messages and provide a vehicle for permission based marketing.

With all this said I hope you take your email marketing seriously and develop relationships with your prospects, subscribers and customers.

To your email success,

Dave Krygier
Publisher

Mobile Marketing & Your Small Business

Mobile marketing is becoming a force to be reckoned with and I hope your small business is riding this technological wave to bring you more leads and customers.

Marketing online is shifting to the mobile platforms and those businesses that are taking advantage of this shift are, and will see both traffic and conversions if they know how to adapt, attract and capture.

This past October Mobile web traffic passed the 10% mark for the first time ever.

Mobile accounted for 10.3% of total web traffic in October 2012. Believe it or not this figure is about double the 5.6% at the same time in 2011. This total does include both mobile devices and tablets.

Now with that said, The Big G still owns 89 percent of the Mobile Search Market but Apple fans still represent 60% of the mobile web browsers, whileThe Big G’s handsets make up 26%. This leaves Blackberry, Opera Mini, Symbian, Msoft IE with the balance of the mobile browsing out there. This last group is a small percentage and who would have thought that Blackberry would be in the back of the pack, considering they were one of the first to the party.

Ok – enough with the stats.

My questions to you about mobile are these…

1. Is your business mobilized? Meaning, is it ready to attract and capture searchers in the mobile environment?

2. If Your Small Business is ready and you are mobile enabled, then are you staying on top of what to do next and maximizing all your opportunities.

So this leads me back to the question; What does it mean to be mobile?

Here are the simple answers:

1. Your site needs to display properly on a mobile device. And this means that it needs to be simple and fast to navigate, which only a mobile site or fully responsive website can do. Two, three or four simple touches. Or maybe more if you are ordering takeout or a double tall frap with no whip and extra hot. 🙂

2. You need to show up in the search engines and especially when a mobile user is searching for your business. Keep it simple and do the work so your business is listed on all the search engines, directories and citation sites.

3. You need to be actively utilizing marketing avenues like ads on mobile devices and mobile apps that stay planted on your prospects and customers mobile device screen top. I would say desktop but that just doesn’t make sense does it?

So if you find yourself stuck in the mobile mud and need some help getting unstuck, then contact the Mobile Marketing Mechanic and his team will pull out the gear to get you mobile in a jiffy.

To your mobile marketing success,

Dave Krygier
Publisher

PS – The stats I mentioned above were not pulled out of a hat but are quoted from Netmarketshare. So they get the stat gathering credit.