IF BLOG

Tricks of the trade: what the big guns do and you can do too

May 21, 2015 by Ideas Fusion Posted in Marketing Tagged brand awareness, brand exposure, brand identity, brand logo, brand name, brand slogan, building business, business advertising

Tricks of the trade: what the big guns do and you can do too

In the last post on the necessary evil of advertising, we looked at why advertising is part of every business (whether we like it or not) and some of the strategies that you can employ to put yourself and your company ahead of the curve. This time around we’ll be delving into the murky, unholy world of corporate advertising and trying to see if there are ways to utilize these ‘big boy’ moves without mortgaging your house and selling your children.

Large companies, governments and Bond villains use a variety of techniques to get their products, ideas or world domination plans out there and absorbed by the population to ultimately sell things or make everyone come around to a particular way of thinking (in the end both are really the same thing). Some of these are overt and some are downright sneaky, underhanded and without a shred of human decency. But they work and that’s why the advertising industry is worth billions.

There are 5 ways that these giants use to invade your brain and your wallet; so leave your morality at the door and let’s see if any of them can benefit the little guy.

Branding. This is the holy grail of advertising. Once you get an image, a slogan or some catchy words associated with your brand, you can include them in everything and from now until the end of time your product or idea will have a deeply engrained association, which besides an environmental disaster or mass poisoning, will make it recognisable and successful.

With your business think about how the name sounds, the colours you choose for your company and the words that go along with it – market research; it’s worth doing well the first time.

Target audience. Large companies spend a fortune figuring out who will want their product/idea and how they will want it to be presented to them. This involve focus groups who test out every hair brained idea the advertisers come up with, until they find the widest demographic that works. This is time consuming and costly; and is not fool proof – a large alcohol manufacturer once planned to spread the smell of almonds through Prague as a marketing stunt – all the testing had been done and they were about to go ahead when one savvy employee (who obviously had nothing to with the plan before) pointed out that anthrax smells like almonds and that was that.

Every business has a target audience and finding yours doesn’t have to involve scaring an entire city. Look at other small companies on social media and who they interact with. Put together a mailing list of people who you think may want your product/service. You’d be surprised who gets in touch.

Form. Delivering a message can take many forms: visual, auditory or kinaesthetic – sight, sound and touch. Big companies will use all three, because they have unlimited budgets so why not. All advertising will be a combination of the three, e.g. TV has visual and sound elements, or the break in half balsa wood flyer for the Karate school – they’d pin a flyer to a talkative and very fluffy parrot if it’d sell more drinks.

You can do the same, without the need for flying leaflets with a mind of their own. Choose where to advertise, or if you do have a healthy budget, try all three and see what gives the best result. A good website, with catchy language, good visuals and a video or two will incorporate all of the above – especially if signing up to a mailing list gets you a small free gift (branded of course and so, so fluffy).

Needs, fears and desires. This is where things get a little grey and if you have a nervous disposition you may want to skip to number 5. These three tap into emotion and they seek to exploit every insecurity, dream and self-image there is. Evil? Maybe, but again it works – we humans are nothing if not predictable. Just to hammer the point home, the products/ideas/services we use every day all use psychological warfare against you – acceptance, security, change, excitement, beauty, and a whole host of other emotional connectors. What they’re basically saying is if you don’t own, think or use this then you will be a lonely, unsafe, boring, unattractive person and bees will hunt you down and steal your pollen (or not).

Now I’m not suggesting that you use these same tactics but there is something to be learnt from these techniques. People do need some products and services and by pointing out why (in a non-violent, Gandhi sort of way) you can sell yourself without resorting to bees. Make sure your product or service is genuinely good and you won’t really be selling anything.

Underlying message. This is how it all ties together. How it takes on a life of its own and connects people together through the product/service. Now that social media can map connections and the reach of a product or idea it’s revolutionised the idea of mapping appeal. Companies can see exactly how well their new products are being accepted and shared, along with any words and picture (that little share button is actually a gateway to money and power).

So do the same. Get your logo, words, pictures, videos and anything else that represents your brand and put it on social media. Even without paying them Facebook shows likes, reach and engagements – for free (how nice of them). This will allow you to see what works and how your message is being received.

Advertising: necessary evil or evil necessity?

May 14, 2015 by Ideas Fusion Posted in Marketing Tagged brand awareness, brand exposure, brand identity, brand logo, brand name, brand slogan, building business, business advertising, targeted advertising

Advertising: necessary evil or evil necessity?

The word advertising comes from the Latin, ad vertere meaning ‘to turn toward’ and that’s exactly what it has always tried make people do. To make them focus on something and stay focused, on a colour, a sentence, a polar bear drinking a well-known soft drink with its unbelievably cute offspring; remembering it for a day, a week, a month or the Holy Grail; ‘forever’ (whispered softly).

Now some ads are more successful than others, and I’m sure like me you’ve wondered at the stupidity of some ads while sharing others on social media because – “you have to see this – it is genius”. Well that’s called targeted marketing my friends, and like me and everyone else you’ve fallen for it because it works. It taps in to something inside your head and latches on for dear life, magically making time, money and cupboard space disappear with ease. Some of these things you need, some of them you don’t – but a beautiful free market economy can’t tell the difference – and the world turns.

It’s easy to call advertising and marketing evil, but the truth is that as a business you need them. They sell your product and get that product in whatever form into the world and into the minds of consumers – the nice people who pay your rent and make sure you always have Pop Tarts (maybe that’s just me). Big companies use brand recognition and a steady slew of new and improved audio and visual aids to bombard your mind and achieve their ends – but as a small business you don’t have that kind of buying power.

The most important thing to remember when designing an advertising campaign, however small, is to keep it simple and keep it in line with what you do and who you want to do it for. There’s no point advertising in bass fishing monthly with a full page spread if your business is making treehouses. There may be the odd bass fisherman that wants a treehouse but it’s not really going to tap into your target audience – think building and lifestyle magazines (or Tree House Times – yes it’s a real magazine).

Where to advertise?

There are literally a million places to advertise a business or service but as mentioned above using all of them will be a waste of time and money. There’s the usual suspects, which I’m sure you’ve thought of already:

Word of mouth, Newspapers/magazines, Direct mail, Business cards, Email, Websites, Social media, Trade shows/conventions.

It’s all about attracting the right people, the people who will want and benefit from what you’re selling – so target, target, target. All of the above are useful and finding the right mix might take a little trial and error.

Be different, be creative, be bold

Easier said than done – right? Well sometimes, but with a little creativity and a lot of Google power you can come up with something to reel in the customers and make yourself memorable. I recently heard of a company that designs lighting, sending out an invitation that could be only be seen in the dark – ingenious – well – to start with maybe, but they also used them as their convention leaflets in a huge hall with a thousand lights and no dark corners. Make sure your genius works in the environment it’s going to be used in.

Here’s few ideas to get those creative juices flowing:

Make your flyers/leaflets something to do with your business – for example, a karate studio that sends out balsa wood flyers that can be broken down the middle.
Sponsor an event or sports team – this will make you part of your local community and get people talking about you and your business – also a great place to network (take some business cards).
Reward your customers – everybody likes free stuff. Offers and discounts are good but some indirect marketing with free t-shirts, mugs or beer cosies are better (and all with your brand and slogan on them).

Every business is different and some market research will help you to focus your campaign and attract the people you need. Even if you have to paint the logo on your dog to get it done.

Customer satisfaction

A small business relies on repeat customers and the chances are you’ll get to know them. Remember everything (birthdays, Christmases and Bar Mitzvahs) and send a handwritten card, an email, or a carrier pigeon; whatever makes them feel valued – because they are. People are social creatures and everyone likes the personal touch. If you have happy customers they will tell their friends and then there will be more happy customers; one more step to retiring early and reading your copy of bass fishing monthly.

Sell the hole not the drill: The difference between benefits and features

May 7, 2015 by Ideas Fusion Posted in Marketing Tagged benefit, benefits, business, feature, features, marketing, sales

Image courtesy of inhabitat.com

Sell the hole not the drill: The difference between benefits and features

When it comes to product/services descriptions we’ve all had the misfortune to read the ramblings of a lunatic copy editor who believes in his heart that this is the way to sell a product:

‘The Donkey Kong 3000, laser Wi-Fi 802.11n cloud connected super-duper geographically independent data access node.’

What!?

Unless you happen to have a subscription to ‘Router Monthly’ (and I sincerely hope you don’t) then the above will mean absolutely nothing, and in some cases will not even point in the general direction of a product – let alone one you need or want to buy. The same is true of services. If all the information you get is a list of letters after the doctor’s name, telling you that she is MB, BCh, BAO, MBChB, MBBChir, BMBCh, MBBCh, BMBS, BMed, BM – it’s not very helpful except to let you know she is very qualified – but in what exactly?

Whilst the features of your product or service are very important and shouldn’t be overlooked, people tend to gravitate towards things that they know will help them – by solving a problem, making something easier or just because they want it.

To let a consumer know these things you need to focus on benefits. This means shifting the focus from ‘How’ to ‘What’. By doing this you tell people what the product will do for them in reality, not a copy editors head (which is obviously full of bats). The woolly description of a router above becomes a paragraph on the speed, reliability and location free use of the device – it does A, B and C making it better, faster and cheaper than X, Y and Z.

An easy way to write clear copy, highlighting benefits, is to start with a list of features. For each feature write one corresponding benefit. For example:

Feature – The bike has 21 gears.

Benefit – This means that you can easily get up that huge mountain you’ve been longing to ride.

Another exercise, which can help you see the potential of your product/service is to take a feature and ask the question – why does it have/need that? The answer (and hopefully there is one) is your benefit. For example:

Feature – The phone comes in multiple colours.

Why does it need that?

Benefit – This allows you to express your personality through your choice of colour.

Take a feature and activate it. Make it about what it does and what it will do for you. The biggest mistake any product/service or business makes is not paying attention to the distinction between features and benefits and therefore failing to market the right way to the people who would want to use them (if only they knew).

The benefits will entice and reel in your ideal customers. If you get it right your endeavour will shine above the rest like a bat signal drawing all eyes to the wonder of ‘The Donkey Kong 3000’.

Activate your business and the benefits will be obvious.

Using Facebook to disconnect: dark posts and the next small thing

April 30, 2015 by Ideas Fusion Posted in Uncategorized Tagged business advertising, darkposting, Facebook, social media advertising, targeted advertising

Using Facebook to disconnect: dark posts and the next small thing.

No one likes to be spammed; I know I don’t. Since email became an everyday tool it’s been used for communication, marketing and those friendly Nigerian princes looking to transfer vast sums of money to your bank account. So thank God for spam filters, otherwise that relentless stream of adverts and junk mail that my inbox has coped with over the years would have finally driven me to smash my computer and head to a cave in the hills.

However, as bad as email splurge marketing and e-greeting cards from a company I used ten years ago have become, something worthwhile has found its way through the jungle. In short, it has shaped the way we view online marketing; how we deal with it, consume and discard it, every day. We live in the information age, and knowledge is king, no getting away from that, but what information do we really need or want? And how can you as a business control that flow? How can you use the flow of information without ending up in the spam folder or irrelevant list on social media and sharing space with a MySpace invite from 2002?

Let’s focus on Facebook; because, well it’s the biggest, baddest, continually evolving, marketing machine on planet internet, with many built in features that can used to target an audience. They do this in a variety of ways; some successfully, some not so much (but that’s the point isn’t it?). Which side will you be on?

In the past page managers would roll out content across their followers and test its response rate by seeing how the post interacted across other forums on the site. Sound familiar? Well it should, because there is no difference between that and the deluge of spam email marketing inhabiting your inbox. And as I’ve mentioned – nobody likes to be spammed. This ‘spamming’ will eventually lead to a loss of certain subscribers as they become more and more disconnected from the original reason they liked your page and sour them to connecting with your content in the future. No followers – no exposure – no business; simple!

So what’s the solution? And what tools are available to you now?

Facebook wants you to use it to advertise. If they didn’t they wouldn’t make any money and they would soon cease to exist. The most recent and possibly underused of the tools they give you is ‘dark posting’ or ‘unpublished posts’. This type of posting gives page manager total control over who sees which message. For the first time, you can create posts for the sole purpose of promotion. And whatever you share never has to show up on your page. This means that it is now possible to specifically target diverse groups, with different language, in different social, economic, age and gender groups; whilst keeping the original voice of your brand.

So why don’t more people know about this?

Simply, because you don’t have a team of social media managers working day in day out to find patches, tweaks, backdoors and dancing pandas to use every corner of code to promote you and your business. But don’t despair with a little research you too can utilise these tools and make them work for you.

Now for a serious, instructional paragraph – I know what you’re thinking – but keep reading, I promise it’ll take less than twenty seconds and be infinitely beneficial – trust me!

To create a dark post, log into Power Editor, add your message, photo, or link as normal. Until you select “Publish Post,” the post will remain unpublished, but is still available for promotion. You can use unpublished posts to find the optimal post content without committing all your ad spend to one message.

There – easy. Using this method means you’ll never have to blanket your subscribers or potential subscribers with irrelevant information. They’ll be happy – you’ll be happy. But be warned, there is a real possibility of getting carried away and losing the voice your brand and your page started out with. Restraint is the key to success with dark posting, but used correctly and sparingly it could be an invaluable tool for promotion and communication; until Facebook introduces the next small thing of course.

Guest blogging – the audience you’ve been looking for

April 23, 2015 by Ideas Fusion Posted in Uncategorized Tagged audience, backlinking, brand exposure, guest blogging, networking

Guest blogging – the audience you’ve been looking for.

Guest blogging is two-fold. One, you write something and it’s posted on someone else’s page. Two, someone else writes something and it’s posted on your page. Seems simple and by all accounts a win-win situation for both parties who get to expose themselves (metaphorically) to a whole new audience, ready to absorb their words and then come visit the holy land that is your site, and on the flip side you get content to further your mission to take over the world or become some kind of messiah one follower at a time.

Your main aim here is to widen your audience and draw traffic to your site, thus getting you one step closer to total world domination.

There are all sorts of ways to build up relationships and kick start your guest blogging odyssey.

A good place to start is my guest blog, a site just for such purposes and an ideal way to also research who and what would be a good fit for you. This will help you effectively weed out the chaff and go straight for that sweet sweet candy.

Then there’s the About.com Blogging Directory of Blogs That Accept and Publish Guest Posts (quite a mouthful), where you’ll find blogs who except guest writers will post ads, and you can do the same. However, before you go advertising your contact details on an open forum, consider that not everybody is as conscientious and passionate about what they do as you are; there be trolls in these woods.

Like so many other ventures onto the interweb, the best course of action is to contact the people out there who you like to read, the people who have similar content and quality, and most of the all the ones who you think will write to you as an equal, not as a blog bug to be ridiculed and then crushed under foot – you deserve better, so do your research. Make sure you’ll be getting into an even relationship not an ‘I’ll scratch your back you steal my wallet’ arrangement.

Now a self-preserving warning or maybe a selfish one – you decide. Something to consider in the information void is content is queen (or king). Seriously think about whether you want the gold that is good content to end up on someone else’s page – drawing traffic to them like a moth to a flame – yes, you will get backlinks but they’ll get more.

Now most people don’t care about the above because basically you need to gain an audience and established blogs will give you that start and exposure; so how do you do it?

Here’s my 5 point guide to approaching the blog behemoths.

Research the blogs you approach – know their content and appeal to it.
Provide your page stats – they need to know your content is a winner as well.
Provide links to what you’ve done before.
Give them your best stuff (I know I’ve contradicted my own advice but if you’re going to do this than don’t go half assed).
Promote, promote and finally promote. Never stop promoting. Do this and people will come to you (then you can ignore them – oh the power!)

So there you have it, a comprehensive 578 word guide to guest blogging. Follow my advice and you’ll be wearing a white dressing gown, arms out stretched, shepherding your followers to blog nirvana in no time.

Not all social media relates to your business: the business of connecting

April 16, 2015 by Ideas Fusion Posted in Marketing Tagged business, exposure, productivity, social media

Not all social media relates to your business: the business of connecting.

Everyday a new start-up social media company attempts to be the next Facebook or at least get bought out by them. It would appear that all it takes is a fancy logo, offices with a water slide and a silky voiced receptionist to get the attention of the mega media Bond villains in their hollowed out volcanoes. There are so many online sharing, communicating, picture swapping, stumbling, tweeting, pinning, linking, instantly know what I had for dinner apps, pages and invite only social media companies, that it’s becoming impossible to keep up. Are they all the same? And how do you choose which ones work will for you?

For everyday personal stuff it’s easy – the ones that suit you will be obvious, but when it comes to business; for the act of promotion, communication and hopefully in the end ‘selling’; not all social media is born equal.

Obviously there’s Facebook and Twitter and let’s be clear: you need to be on both of them, because simply, they are the biggest and most used platforms globally. But what about all the rest? For the sake of time, for my sanity (and yours) I won’t try and list all of them, but there are a few worth mentioning.

Depending on what type of business you have (or want to have) you’ll probably have been exposed in the course of your research to platforms such as Pinterest, Instagram, YouTube or Google+. All of these have uber amounts of subscribers but will they actually benefit you?

Let’s start with Pinterest; whilst it is a novel idea it’s rapidly becoming a forum for food porn and things I made earlier – so unless you you’re an aspiring chef or creative genius with pipe cleaners it might be more of a vanity platform.

Instagram? Well we’ve all seen ‘Rich kids on Instagram’ and thrown up a little watching a bunch of over financed youths lounge on cars that would solve a third world country’s water shortage – so it’s really just a forum for people with too much time on their hands, weird light filters that make your lunch look other-worldly and more food porn (unless you’re a wealthy, creative type who wants their food to look purple). As an alternative I would recommend Flickr. Simple photo portfolio that allows you to share, copyright and organise your media for easy use – what could be better?

Videos? They’re helpful right? Well, maybe. But that all depends on who’s watching. YouTube is the bored person’s friend – where life can be explained by cute kittens in boxes and dogs who can’t catch things. YouTube used to be the place to showcase your talents and see how many people are awake at 3am, now it’s more a time wasting exercise. As an alternative let me recommend Vimeo – very similar to YouTube and will easily let you embed their videos practically anywhere. So what’s the difference? Well, Vimeo is taken seriously and isn’t the wide world of cute pets and funny accidents. Creative people use it to showcase their work and for this reason it gets targeted traffic.

Google+ – don’t bother. When they first came out the whole world signed up and then promptly forgot it existed. On paper it might have millions of subscribers but in reality there are more people using Bebo (You remember – think back, way back) on a regular basis.

So what’s good, innovative and more importantly useful? A platform I recently discovered is called Stumble Upon it allows you to add pages you like (which can be your own) for other people to ‘stumble’ on. Based on your tags and interest your pages will be added to the void and as people view articles, pages, blogs etc. yours will be shown to them – a whole readymade group of like-minded people. Just make sure your content is good and get stumbling.

Before I leave you to scratch your head and take some pictures of your lunch (we all do it) a quick word on organisation. Nobody has the time to post to every platform every day or even every other day but there’s help at hand. Hootsuite was the first, biggest and best of these and allows you to schedule posts across all the platforms so your days are free to actually do some work. Now the good people at Hootsuite have decided that money is their ultimate goal (and really why shouldn’t it be, they are after all a company in a capitalist-centric free-market) and they’ll charge you for anything over 3 feeds. But for small businesses in need of every penny there are alternatives; my personal favourite is Over-graph. It does exactly the same things as Hootsuite but is open-source and completely free (the magic word) regardless how many feeds you add. Time saving is the key to success and this platform will help you do that.

Social media isn’t about directly making money, it’s about exposing your products and skills to the world and keeping anybody interested up to date with any developments, promotions, or thoughts you may have about jam (but only if you’re a jam maker). So choose wisely and find ways to streamline your social media management to the feeds you really need.

When to say No to the wrong clients and make the Right ones love you for it

April 9, 2015 by Ideas Fusion Posted in Uncategorized Tagged building business, clients, efficiency, Freelancing, productive business

When to say No to the wrong clients and make the Right ones love you for it.

Your clients should be a perfect fit for you and your business. Turning down clients would seem counter-productive to some and downright stupid to most. Why would you say no to business in whatever form? Well you should. A client that doesn’t fit your business will be a burden to you and to them. Why, you might ask? Well, let me tell you from experience that working with the wrong people will drain your resources and your will to work. Without an effective working relationship you might as well go back to the soulless cubical that made you want to work for yourself in the first place. The whole point of growing your own business is picking the people you work with – people like you, who share your passion, your outlook and possibly your insistence that you don’t work on Monday mornings. Just like the right networking, the right clients will help you grow and in return you will do your best work for them – growing their business or personal dream along the way. Sound good? It sure as hell does to me.

Client (ness) – the qualities you should look for.

Respectfulness

You need to respect each other. Sounds obvious, but the amount of people who enter into a business deal or contract with absolutely no respect for what the other person is trying to achieve or what they bring to the table is mind boggling. The dollar signs shine in their eyes and they’ll do and work for anybody regardless of how they feel about their credentials. This is the worst way to enter into a relationship and like the boyfriend/girlfriend you had when you were thirteen will end up on the island of misfit toys. Choose people with the skill set and attitude that’s right for you and identify the same things about yourself.

Thoughtfulness

If a client utters these words, “I’m not sure what I want”, run. Run away with all of your might, because those are the words you will hear every day that you work with them. And every time you come back to them with what you think they want, you’ll hear the words, “It’s not exactly what I wanted” (time to start twitching and unconsciously pulling your eyebrows off). I’m not saying that they need to have everything mapped out – that’s what business relationships are there to uncover, but some idea is a good start and will make both your lives infinitely more productive (and less homicidal).

Decisiveness

On the other side of the spectrum of client types, there are some clients who are extremely indecisive and cannot make final decisions. At this point work will grind to a halt and both parties will become extremely frustrated with each other. You need that spark of adventure, the hell with it attitude of the vanguard, to blurt out a YES or a NO and see where the journey takes you! Okay, maybe I’m being a bit too Indiana Jones about decision making within a business relationship but the point is the same – they and you have to make decisions in a timely fashion or nothing gets done, and if nothing gets done no one gets paid and there is no business (logic at its finest).

Conscientiousness

No matter what, I always try and do the best work I can. It’s not always easy and there are days when it feels like motivation is a swear word. But regardless, I see myself as conscientious and I try to work with people who I think are the same. Not only will you like each other for it but as time goes on and timelines become more important you will both be on the same page or least reading the same book.

Communication (ness)

Goes without saying really that you need to communicate with the people you work with. You’ll be amazed at how often this isn’t the case. Humans on the whole are bad at communication, they assume that you will somehow, by using The Force or a Vulcan mind meld over Skype (Star Wars and Star Trek references for all the geeks out there) have the perfect picture of their picture, in your mind, and inevitably you will sit there none the wiser, shitting your pants for the day when they expect their brain child to be born out of your work and delivered. Pick clients you can talk to and get a semblance of reality from – it’ll make it all better.

Search engine optimisation and angry bees

April 2, 2015 by Ideas Fusion Posted in Marketing Tagged brand identity, building business, networking, search engine, SEO

Search engine optimisation and angry bees

If I talk to one more web designer or online copy editor who uses the words, “Is your content up to date for SEO?” I’m liable to cover them in honey and unleash some angry bees. It seems that everyone is obsessed with search engine optimization (SEO) and how to get that little bit more out of their content to gain one place on the elusive hierarchy that is the ‘search engine’. So who do we have to blame for this? The simple answer is Google. The most used search engine on planet earth. Their continuously changing algorithms, which rank, sort and search for content have become more important than the actual content. Give it a few years and web copy will be nothing more than a collection of random phrases interspersed with hash tags and emoticons and backlinked to every page vaguely associated with yours – unreadable, unknowable but sitting pretty at the top of the search page making its author giggle with churlish glee.

But is it that important and is there an easier way to navigate it without losing your mind?

In a nutshell – Yes. SEO is important. But not for everybody. If you have a local business in Melbourne you need to show up when somebody types in your type of business, and Melbourne. If there are a lot of the same type of businesses in the area then you need to be above them – a smaller task than, for example, a blogger in Perth who wants the whole world to be exposed to their musings on the best burrito in Australia. It’s all about audience and the amount of exposure you think you need.

Basically there are a number of ways to optimize your site: editing its content, HTML and associated coding to increase its relevance to specific keywords and to remove barriers to the indexing activities of search engines (sounds like a party, right?). Promoting or networking a site to increase the number of backlinks, or inbound links, is another SEO tactic – one that can show how popular your site actually is. Finally there’s guest blogging, which allows to spread your word(s) on someone else’s page and get all the tasty backlinks your little heart desires, from other relatable and relevant content.

What techniques you choose to use are all about research and finding the right blend to suit your needs.

Focusing on Google (as Bing and Yahoo are frankly pants) you need to understand that they are actively trying to stem the flow of nonsense, copied content in an effort to avoid ranking manipulation and keep content up to date and relevant. In the past stuffing your page with keywords could in theory get you a higher rank, but not anymore. To actually affect your ranking (without paying) you will need to:

Research which keywords are most relevant to your business (ironically using google to search for this).
Have relevant content – with a spattering of keywords and phrases in the right places.
Network your page with other similar ones to add backlinks and inbound links.
Research bigger/similar companies then yours and see who they link to and who links to them.
Keep the overall identity of your site – if it’s all over the place with articles on a million different topics Google will know (cue ominous laughter).

SEO is a three headed monster at the moment and everyone you talk to or read online will give differing opinions on techniques they claim worked for them – beware – most of it is gibberish, or worse still, SEO hipster hubris. They all have a new, experimental approach that will waste your time when you could be doing something genuinely productive. SEO is important and at some point in your businesses journey you will have to look into it. But in reality unless you want to win the Quondos blogging and SEO competition (Yes, it is a real thing) you don’t need to go completely down the rabbit hole of Search Engine Optimization – good, relevant, well researched content and a healthy dose of networking will get you where you need to go.

It’s about who you know, so why don’t you know more people?

March 24, 2015 by Ideas Fusion Posted in Marketing Tagged brand exposure, building business, entrepreneur, networking, owner, people

It’s about who you know, so why don’t you know more people?

Networking strategies for the shy entrepreneur and why you should never assume everyone knows about you and what you do.

The world is full of confident people. Every magazine, online article or business review features a perfectly dressed, perfectly smiling, perfectly profitable business owner on its cover. With all this perfection it’s easy to assume that that person is smiling only at you; the insecure, not so well dressed and not so profitable mirror image of them. We’ve all been there – looking up at the people we want to be and asking ourselves the question – ‘what makes them so goddamn confident?’

Well I can tell you from experience that most of them didn’t start out that way and it took falling on their ass a few times (or many) to get to that place in their lives and their careers.

Like anything worthwhile in life, networking is hard and will be hard until you get it right. And getting it right takes practice. Those successful people know what rejection and humiliation feel like because they’ve lived it, just like you might be right now. With each cold call, email splurge and awkward face-to-face you will get better, stronger and more confident in yourself and with your product; because at the end of the day if you believe in those things other people will as well.

So, down to brass tacks. You may think you know what networking is, you may even think that it requires a mammoth amount of effort – I did – at the beginning. The simple truth about networking is that if you do it right from the start (however shy you might be) then it will take on a life of its own and let you get back to the business of business. As your business grows so will you, until eventually you’re knowingly smiling back at the next crop of entrepreneurs.

Some facts I wish I’d known at the start.

Word-of-mouth marketing is the best way to get new business and grow creative connections.
Networking (at the beginning) is not about selling either your products or yourself.
Networking is about using shared interests to build and develop mutually beneficial relationships.
Networking is just as much about listening as it is talking.
Networking will save you time in the future. What takes ten phone calls now will only take two when you have the right network in place.

Here’s how to do it.

Start with the internet – shy or introverted people can find it difficult to have face to face conversations. This can stem from a lack of confidence or with some people a conception that networking is disingenuous at best and downright manipulative at worst. So use what you know – social networks, old friends, alumni networks – all of these are already in place and there to be exploited (for both sides).

Pay attention – as your first networks grow on the internet or in the real world, people are going to tell you things; facts about their work and facts about themselves – remember them. Information is your most prized asset – use it to your benefit.

Set your own pace – just because the extroverts out there can network at a million miles per hour doesn’t mean you have to. Start slowly and if things get too much drop it down a notch. I promise it will get easier and less terrifying over time.

Be prepared – remember being a girl scout? Well even if you don’t, preparation is the key to a dizzying array of success. If you’re prepared then you have nothing to worry about. Write everything down – I carry a small pad of paper around everywhere for just such cases.

And Finally – Take a risk – nothing is ever as bad as it is in your mind.

At the end of the day, focusing on your positive characteristics and avoiding the pitfall of trying to change yourself to what you think people want, will ultimately benefit you and the quality clients you end up working with. Networking is not a dirty word, it is the key to success; because no business was built on an island.

How to create your brand.

March 19, 2015 by Ideas Fusion Posted in Uncategorized Tagged brand, brand awareness, brand exposure, brand logo, brand name, brand slogan, startup

How to create your brand.

Like it or not, brands and branding are a part of everyday life; every waking minute of every day. What we eat, where we eat it, how we eat it, whether what we’re about to eat ate something else that we find cute and therefore now we don’t want to eat the something that we’re holding in a delicious mayo covered sesame seed on rye. I guarantee you all these edible analogies have a brand.

Whatever it is; from food, clothes or technology we buy into whatever fits with our sense of the world and how we want to interact with that world. The brands we consume will target themselves to us the consumer and they really know what they’re doing. Their branding and advertisements will feature all the things you want or see in yourself; style, philosophy, ethics – it’s you. You need this quinoa salad because you will look super awesome in your recycled yak hair moccasins, riding a Segway and eating your quinoa with a sustainable cardboard spork – now we’re cooking with ethically obtained propane.

Having a clearly defined and recognisable brand is one, if not the most important part of a successful business. Once you get it right, everything about what you do and how you do it will be familiar and digestible to potential clients without you lifting a finger.

Here’s the five parts of a successful brand, and later on brand awareness.

Product
Name
Logo
Slogan
Exposure

Product – number one might seem obvious, but it’s amazing how many companies start out without clearly defining what they do or what they sell. If you have a great physical product(s) then it becomes a lot easier and all you need to do is come up with some great copy-writing to tell everyone about it. But what if the product you’re trying to sell is you?

This is really no different from a physical product but it does require you to actually decide why you’re worth hiring and what you bring with you (cue wide eyed panic). But it doesn’t have to be difficult – all you have to do is look at what you want your business (and by extension – you) to do and work backwards. So, number one – why are you the one with the skills to do the job? Number two, what experience do you have that allows you to confidently state number one? What can you offer that no one else can? Work through the logic a few times and you’ve got a product.

Name – the moniker your product/business will be known by from now until the end of time. That is a lot of pressure and rightly so. The truth is that unless you are a giant multinational with an unlimited marketing budget you can’t change it once you’ve done all the hard work – to do so would be to almost start again with brand awareness. So put some thought into it – research the competition see what’s out there. Run it past your friends and family and try to get them to be honest rather than tactful. If your name is Nancy and you’re selling pants, ‘Nancy Pants’ isn’t too bad. But if your name is Bob and your selling footballs, ‘Bob’s Balls’ isn’t quite as appealing. Or it might be, if you want to create a brand with a sense of humour.

Logo – again this is a bit like the name, once it’s up there it’s hard to change without losing some of the brand recognition you’ve worked so hard to achieve. And the same principles apply – make sure it accurately fits what you’re trying to communicate and that it’s eye-catching and memorable. There are lots of freelance designers who will design one for you a lot cheaper than you might think – you can try Elance, People per Hour or Fiverr.

Slogan – a good slogan is worth its weight in gold and will put you ahead of the competition. Think about all those slogans you’ve read and will always associate with the brand – ‘Taste the rainbow’ – Skittles, or, ‘Probably the best lager in the world’ – Carlsberg. These will make your business the first one on somebody’s mind and the first number that they call.

Exposure – you’ve got a product, a name, a logo and a slogan, the full package and you’re ready to show the world. So now what? Now it’s time to send yourself (electronically) out into the world via social media and email. Research the people and businesses that might use your product/service and put together an email list to market to. Setting up a mail client like mail chimp is a good idea if you’re looking at a large number of emails and little things like a snazzy looking email signature are a good idea – the more professional you look the more likely you are to sell your brand and get hired.

Social media will be your friend, start by build up a following using existing contacts first and branching out from there. You can use these platforms to keep people up to date with developments in your business and as a platform for your ideas. Keep it interesting, relevant to your readers and on topic (NO clickbait!) so the brand you create has cohesion.