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Posting on your blog - that’s what you’re supposed to do isn’t it?

Took me 3 hours the other night to do that post on SEO, and that only started from me deciding to roll out some stale SEO type stuff, and then deciding I should explain the benefit of posting “dead content” to your blogs - mindless keyword stacked spiels.

That’s 3 hours for one post!

Surely I could be using my time a little better.  I could have been building backlinks by commenting high ranked blogs. I could of emailed a whole bunch of my regular clients just to make sure they were doing good, or mailed out to my email list a high value proposition or a scarce or limited deal. Or y’know.

I could make the effort to establish my email list!

Well there’s a lot of stuff you could be doing to grow your business that’s a lot better than just spewing forth on your blog.

Because unless ads or affiliate sales or some such is you main income, your blog is not the main source of your revenue. But I don’t know why a “Problogger” would be reading my blog, my blog is more for people who use a blog to promote their business, not people who plan to make the blog their business.

I think that’s a really difficult way to earn money, just through your blog. You’re honestly talking about a two time year scale. I’m making plans right now to make money next week.

And that’s about looking at those key areas where you’re creating the highest margins for the value your providing and . . . basically, maximising your explosions!

Let’s review the process by which somebody chooses to buy something from your website.

But wait wait. Let’s work backwards. It makes sense because there’s no point launching a multimillion dollar ad campaign if you haven’t got an email address.

Email: I don’t know what you think is appropriate email etiquette but it’s a good sign when you get back to an enquiry quickly. You might have to decide what steps you’ll take to respond to a lead.

Generally, I will not meet in person or call someone who hasn’t already given me money. I will accept calls from a lead but I will not call them.  I’m not that great on the phone though, so that’s just me. I feel like I come across on the phone like a kid looking for an after school job. But obviously, if I wasn’t so passive in this area, I’d get more business.

Another bad thing I do is sure - I TELL them how much they’re looking at spending - but then I tend to conclude things (uh emails) with a tone that suggests: well you can either pay me money now and we can do something . . . or not.

In fact like I wouldn’t even go and listen to their music or go to their damn myspace until they had paid me a deposit and I’m sure a lot of people would pick up on my attitude.

Now I try to exchange a few emails about the project to show I’m interested in them and all that before I move to - well . . . now’s the part where you need to give me money.

I mean it is the internet afterall and people need to be reassured.

But often I find because I have at least a significant amount of authority from my free content posts, a lot of the work is already done.

So

Now we jump back in time with your potential customer. woooooo to Call to Action: So when they came to your website and were impressed by your proposition did the prospects know what to do? Were they happy but then . . . decided check their emails? They need to be told what to do. It needs to be clear. They’re sold on the proposition and now they need to be instructed to task. They need to contact you immediately by email.

Like, you. Me. Matt Turner, that’s my name, I’m a real person, and I’m not at all nigerian.

Here’s my picture, I wear a tie and drive a beamer. You can trust me!

- And your actual email. kurbpromo@gmail.com

none of this silly “I can trick the spam spiders” nonsense.

- Your Mobile, and other stuff you should have that I don’t, that I’m positive would probably generate at least some new business: Your Skype, all your IM’s - msn, aim, yahoo

And so now another step back to the Proposition: this is really two parts isn’t it? Firstly is it good and secondly . . . does it sound/look good. The first part is about the value you’re leveraging. My stuff is the cheapest, that’s it’s unique selling point.  The first part is more rational. Is it a good deal? The second part is about your whole sales pitch, all the copy and presentation, the persuasive element of the proposition, where you’re really nailing the emotional response and working those benefits.

You don’t want to be confused and burdened by the past in a new era of digital economies, but why take the risk with costly consultants? Matt Turner is the affordable expert realising rapid growth and transformation for small and dynamic New Zealand businesses.

Listen to that! I sound like I’m the man! Email me, quickly, before I melt! kurbpromo@gmail.com!!! haha

I am constantly rewriting my copy. When you are satisfied with your flagship website and copy etc. you may as well go and die somewhere, you need to constantly developing and reviewing your persuasive factors with your targets in mind so it’s almost like crazy how people must get hold of this thing.

Now your website is going to send a certain message isn’t it? We’ve always got that comparison that your website is like your retail store. If your store is old and clunky and dirty and musty and crazy to get around, it might be cute but you wont be doing a whole lot of business. I don’t want to rush in there and say that your website must look “professional” because  honestly, if you have one of those really white websites with a 2 colour palette and some cheesy stock photos and the fake shadows on everything, y’know it just . . . it looks like a million other plastic websites it truly is a Godin alert, truly unremarkable.

I look at my website which was basically the shell of my old DJ collective’s site and it looks all grimy and urban.  I’m sure for some consumers that doesn’t work. But for a lot of my customers they’re seeing things on my site which are a whole lot different than other websites, and it actually adds to the sense of comfort they get.

The prices are right there. No contact form. These are the prices, here’s my email, here’s my number. I used to hate that when looking round for stuff on websites like printing and cd’s, merch etc. I just wanna know if your cheap or not!

Direct contact with me, again, no contact form.

My videos. Again, some people probably don’t dig my video’s, but I never hear from them. I just hear from the odd customer who has clearly been influenced to trust me because there’s a video there of me saying what I do. Oh and I’m wearing a tie and standing up straight and trying to talk in a deep voice.

Marketing. Finally we arrive at the beginning.

And really, the moral of this post is: don’t go crazy on marketing if your product sucks, you don’t know how to sell it, and you’re not presenting your product or engaging with potential clients with some competence, because you may as well set a bunch of money on fire and film it and put it on youtube as a testament to what your company brand stands for.

I say competence because in some of these areas I am only simply competent, but it’s good enough.

when it comes to the marketing part, we’ve talked about creating content specifically for google, it was all in my last post, that post on SEO.

So yeah, you get on your blog and your site and your networks and as it turns out you do do some posts. But you start kicking out content that is laser targeted to the person who’s gonna want that thing that you’ve got or do, and you’re rocking around kicking down those backlinks with the keyword anchor text.

The exciting thing is once you know what you’re doing, you’ll be into pay per click. Then it’s a whole new game learning to get the best clicks and paying the least for them, while seeing how much money you can tip into adwords before the peak of return on investment is met. Recently I’m rocking about $50 p/week, but Im just building up the courage to double it. Doubling my adsense won’t double the leads I get, I doubt it. But . . . will it increase my profits enough to justify another $50?

Big hrmmm isn’t it? But the beauty of adsense is I can adjust as I go depending on how much work is available.

Now the secret to adwords is basically having dozens of iterations that are targeted broken down into specific niches:

Bad adwords copy:

Kurb does online stuff

Good adwords copy

why are 29yo male auckland
entrepreneurs taking off?

extreme examples, but you get my drift, i hope. One is so broad it’s useless and the other is laser targeted to a specific group.

Google gives you cheaper ads the more relevant they are, and the more niche your keyword targets are.

What that means is though with Google it seems pretty cool to be getting your ad shown without having to pay for it unless someone clicks, the way the system works, the less it’s shown but the more it’s clicked . . . the less you actually end up paying.

Here’s an example:

when someone searches for “dvd duplication” and clicks my ad for “cheapest cd/dvd duplication” it costs me about 73c. But if they search “dvd duplication” and click my ad for “dvd duplication” . . . it’s only been costing me 60c per click, because it’s a more relevant ad for a more targeted search.

Crazy world, huh?

So with my good ad I’ve got the intrigue “ask a question” thing going on to suck them in, classic adwords technique, but remember with adwords you actually want to keep low quality punters away. You don’t wanna be sucking them in, you want buyers, not browsers.

Try this

why are 29yo male auckland
entrepreneurs taking off? only $350

That’s a bit useless I guess but it should at least keep the brokeniks away.

I usually try and put a price in so everyone who clicks in knows that I am trying to sell a product so they’re already in the frame.

SO basically . . .

aside from 1000 other stupid useless things you could do, that’s all I have to say about marketing and advertising for short term profit because almost every decent strategy for online business I can think of involves a long term effort, and we don’t have all day!

So if your serious about boosting profit,

spruce up your adwords, so you’re targeting is more refined, and boost the budget.

spruce up your seo keyword targeting, know your keyword phrases that you’re hitting and assault directly with a content surge to your site, blogs, network etc

go make some backlinks, dont be lazy

spruce up your engagement so that people who want to buy from you know you’re real

smarten up your website so it’s clean and not all shabby like some 90’s throwback

hit your persuasive copy hard. work it. people must know that it’s needed.  Is it needed? Why not, drop the price, compete, god damn it!!!

And finally make the communication and negotiation process simple. They know exactly how to contact you in a way that suits them; And that you at least commit some degree of interest in their project and them that doesn’t stem from the first reaction that there’s blood in the water and fresh meat for you to feed on.

GUESS WHAT? I’m A NEW ZEALAND BASED SMALL BUSINESS CONSULTANT!!! I HELP SMALL BUSINESSES GROW REVENUE WITH ONLINE STRATEGIES. EMAIL ME, MATT Kurbpromo@gmail.com
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