Things You Can Do Now to Drive Sales, Traffic

It's easy to slip into the summer doldrums. People are on vacation, sales slow down, donations dry up, traffic disappears, and it's way too hot to do anything. Your business can't really take an extended leave of absence, so here's a few things you can do to get things moving again.

Lazy Summer: Flickr user Cali4Beach.

1) Borrow a move from Target's playbook, and have a summer sale. If you get their emails, you'll notice that they had a Cyber Monday sale earlier this week. What's cool about this is that no one else is having that kind of sale right now - Target's event really stands out. Check out this little website for a list of things you can celebrate with customers.

2) Have a secret sales event for your best customers. This doesn't necessarily mean you need to give them discounts, either. Do you have new products that you haven't put out to the larger market that you can promote just to them for a short time, or limited stock of certain items? This is a great way to say thank you.

3) For you nonprofits out there, what about a summer friend-get-a-friend campaign? All you need to do is ask your donors and members to recruit friends to your mailing list, or to your Facebook page (preferably both). Then, when it's time for you to do your next round of asks, you have plenty of new names with which to work.

What are you doing to beat the summer blahs? Please share!


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Customize Your Message for Each Channel

This week, I want to share a story with you about message customization.

I once worked with a client on an advocacy effort to improve local public safety. Because they'd been told to try more online messaging, they were using Twitter to try and reach all of their messaging goals. Not unexpectedly, it wasn't quite working.

Lots of ways to get the message out. Photo: Kevin Poh.

I encouraged them to think of the overall campaign, and all groups they wanted to reach - local government officials were the primary targets, but they also wanted to move petition-signers, public safety workers, crime victims, and local media.

We discussed the best channel for outreach to each group, based on the makeup of the group and the action we needed them to take. We found that most of the local officials we needed weren't active on Twitter, but we knew they were reading the local paper, and that journalists from the local paper were on Twitter, so we tweeted at targeted members of the media instead, in conjunction with some more traditional media outreach.

We also used Twitter to listen to local discussions of crime and public safety, and inserted ourselves into that dialogue.

When it was time to reach out directly to the officials, who had seen our news stories thanks to our media outreach, we found it was actually more effective to use a combination of more traditional channels to get the officials to act. They were more receptive to our emails and phone calls because they had seen the news stories we'd been able to get.

Facebook, we found, was a great place to reach our petition-signers and also to collect victim stories. These victim stories and petition activities then became online content, that we used in our continued email outreach.

Your takeaway?

Consider your overall goals and align the channels you use to those goals. Not every channel can address every goal. Don't discount traditional channels because they're not new. It can take a combination of messages to get the results you want.

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List Acquisition 101 - Which List is Right for Your Business?

As business owners and marketers look to grow their businesses, one thing we all do is search for ways to grow our customer base. After all, a strong loyalty program does have limits. Even your most loyal customers have a natural limit to what they can buy.

List. Flickr user Ex-Smith.

Thus begins the search for new customers. You can find new customers in a lot of different ways – advertising, social marketing, word of mouth, and list acquisition.

List acquisition happens when you rent a list of people and market to them. Those that respond to your marketing become members of your own house file. The ones who don’t respond can’t be marketed to past the terms of your list rental agreement, which may be for single or multi-use.

As a general rule, you can rent lists of people two ways –by demographics or affiliation. You can even combine the two. Here’s how it works:  

• By Demographics – you can choose the age, income, net worth gender, location, interests, and a number of lifestyle and buying habits. Do you want homeowners or renters? Parents or non-parents? People with pets?
• By Affiliation – you can also choose from a wide range of memberships and magazine subscriptions. Do you want members of AARP? People who subscribe to Cat Fancy? Graduates of certain colleges? Members of teachers’ unions?
• Both – Work with a reputable list broker and they will be able to provide you with, for example, Cat Fancy subscribers between the age of 25 – 45 who live on the Eastern Seaboard and make more than $40,000 a year.  

What’s the difference between mailing lists and email lists?

With mailing lists, for the most part, you’ll be able to bring the names into your database and use them for the rental period as you see fit, per the terms of your rental agreement. This gives you the opportunity to send a series of promotions. Anyone who responds remains on your list after the rental period is over, even if they don’t buy.

Email lists are, in general one-time or one-campaign use, and you don’t get to send the email from your desk – the list rental company or list owner does that – you provide the creative content. Again, anyone who responds and opts in joins your house file.  

What about those coupon sites?

I have posted on this blog before about my wariness of coupon sites– after all, we all have to deeply discount our product and the customers get more and more loyal to the coupon brand – Groupon, LivingSocial, or whichever - rather than our own brand.

HOWEVER, it’s worth investigating how much this might cost –the contract with the coupon site, your discount, costs of doing business, AGAINST the costs of a traditional email list rental campaign. After all, the coupon sites’ customers are loyal to that site and thus likely to open the email with your deal. Those who sign up for the deal become your customers. Depending on your business and your offer, you may garner more customers this way.

Do the math, before you do anything else. If numbers aren’t your thing, it’s worth paying your accountant for an hour of her time to show you what’s what.

How are you building your list? Please share in the comments.

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Information Overload - Getting Noticed in a Crowded Space

It's a jungle out there.

Photo: Flickr user Casimusica.

People send 168 million emails every minute. That's a lot of information.

Email is a fantastic way to reach people with customized messaging about your latest deals, new products, and other goings-on.

But it's totally pointless if no one's reading your messages.

So here are four ways to make sure you get noticed in the overflowing inboxes of the people on your email list:

1) Customize it. Customize messages based on whether or not someone has purchased from you before, and the type of purchase - show past customers similar items by price, type or occasion. Give new customers a reason to try your product.

2) Tell your story. Use user-generated reviews and videos to tell the story of your product. Or put together some rich content - like videos and other how-tos to bring your business to life for your users.

3) Use a great subject line. Subject lines tell readers why they should open their emails. Is there a special deal just for them? More of what they like? A new video or blog? Give them a good reason to open and click through.

4) Be relevant. Use data customers give you about their interests and preferences to provide relevant information. Track trends and time your promotions accordingly. Don't sell skis in June, unless you live in the Southern Hemisphere.

Need help cutting through the clutter? Drop me a line and let's talk about it.

Your 2012 Strategy: Messaging on Multiple Channels

Like most marketers, you probably operate on multiple channels. You've got a web site, an email list, an advertising plan, some press releases, a Twitter presence, a Facebook page, and maybe even some direct mail.

Channels. Flickr user Dustin Askins.

While you don't want to repeat yourself verbatim across every channel all the time, it's a good idea to at least coordinate the message a bit. Why?

Your community now expects a pretty seamless brand experience. If they see a blog post promoted on Twitter, they want to be able to find it on Facebook if that's where they go next time they're online. If they find a sale on their tablet, they also want to be able to call and talk to your call center about the same deal. If it's mentioned in your ad, it should be on your web site.

How do you get this working?


Make sure you use consistent branding across all channels - customers want to be sure the company they trust on email is the same company they trust on Facebook. If your channel presences  have a consistent look, the experience is more seamless.

Keep your marketing and sales team in the loop. A good marketing calendar tells everyone what's going on when. You never want your sales floor to be caught flat-footed because they don't know about your latest Facebook deal.

Connect to your community where they live. Don't abandon channels because you don't see immediate results. It can take time to develop a strong Facebook and Twitter following, and you will likely find that customers may not buy directly from Facebook, but they do like to connect with your brand there while they purchase from  your email promotions.

Make information easy to find. Because your community expects a seamless experience, make promotions built for one channel (say, Facebook), easy to find other places people might look (like your web site).

Need help leveraging all your channels? Let me know. I can help.

Making the Most of Your Email Marketing in 2012

If you think email is over, you’re wrong. But this is a popular time of year for people to unsubscribe from email lists that aren’t providing any value, so why is email important and how can you make subscribers stay?

Photo from Flickr user Cambodia4kidsorg.

It’s totally customizable! You can tailor email messages to your customer’s latest purchase, stated interests, location, or age. Whatever data you have on your customers can be used to make messages hyper-relevant. The more relevant your message, the more your subscribers will appreciate it an stay on your list. Ever try customizing your tweets?

You can test and re-test! Testing subject lines, images, and PS text will help you understand what drives your audience. Test a small portion of your email list and then send the winners to your larger list, driving up your open, click-through, and action rates. Testing also provides you with a scientific basis for your marketing strategy. Strategic proposals that are proven winners are likely to get more support from your executives and investors.

It's economical! Unless you are paying sites like Groupon or LivingSocial to do your email marketing for you while you deeply discount your products, email marketing can be very cost-effective- much more so than doing large direct mail campaigns or major ad buys.

Email should be a key part of your multi-channel strategy for 2012. It can help you generate leads, qualify customers, predict which products will be winners, and drive repeat business.

Drop me a line if you'd like to talk email marketing strategy.

Your 2012 Strategy - Understanding Your Customer Data

Last week, I kicked off 2012 planning with a some notes on crafting your marketing framework around your overall business goals.

Data Disks. From Flickr user Emilian Robert Vicol.

This week, I want to have a bit of a chat with you about your customer data.

What do you know about your customers and how can you put that to use?

Here are a few basics to consider:

1) Geographic location - provide customers special deals based on the closest store location, on the season it is where they live, on the local sports team, or on common leisure activities in their part of the country. A strong local marketing strategy should be a key driver for your business.

2) Demographics - like age, income, net worth, and education - While lifestage is a stronger marketing metric, you can still tune the language and the imagery you use based on these kinds of metrics. Also, knowing the typical demographic of your customer is critical when you're considering where to advertise and how to price new products.

3) Purchasing behavior - this is really the strongest data you have. People's past behavior is the strongest indicator of future behavior. Important points to consider:

• Frequency - how often each customer buys
• Recency - when the most recent purchase was made
• Method of purchase - at the store, online on a computer, or online via a tablet or other mobile device
• Source of purchase - referred by another customer, responded to your catalog, clicked on an email, web search, responded to an ad, or direct visit to your web site

Once you understand purchasing behavior, you'll be able to group your customers by behavior and market accordingly - sending emails more often to email customers, turning up ads from places where customers are responding, and tuning your search marketing based on the keywords that are working for you.

Data is your most powerful marketing tool. If you're not using it, you're marketing with the lights off.

Need to turn off the dark? Let me know, I can help you make the most out of your data.

How's Your Week Going So Far?

It's been a big week so far...

According to the National Retail Federation, 226 million shoppers spent $52.5 billion on Black Friday, an average of $398 per person. This is up 14 million shoppers, $7.5 billion overall, and $33 per shopper compared to last year. The stock market has been feeling optimistic all week.

From Flickr user storebukkebruse.

So far, the word on Cyber Monday is positive, too, with Multichannel Merchant reporting a 33% increase in sales over 2010 numbers. Average order value was also up - about $5 over last year to $198.  See this article for other important points - like the mobile device/tablet factor, and the effect of social media on shopping.

So, is it time to celebrate yet?

Sure, but you're not done yet, unless you're 100% sold out of merchandise and you've surpassed all of your annual goals. Sometimes early good news means bad news later - we won't really know how the 2011 holiday season is really doing until the after-Christmas sales are over.

Still, this seems like an auspicious beginning to me - customers are feeling more optimistic than last year,  merchants are offering lots of deals and options, and people may have a bit more cash for gifts, having paid down record amounts of consumer debt over the past few years.

What's next?

Keep going - your customers are still looking for gift ideas, new packages, and great deals. Shopping may slacken a bit later this week, but it will swell again the week of December 11th as shipping deadlines loom with major retailers. Make sure you're staying in touch with customers who've bought once - if they've had a good experience buying Mom's gift from you, they may come back things to give Dad, Sis, or Aunt May.

How's your week going? Drop me a line and let me know.

News This Week: Shopping Habits of Frugalistas, Curated Content

Early online shopping. Flickr user Garethjmsaunders.

What should you be paying attention to this week?


39% of Americans have already started their holiday shopping, and some frugalistas are already done. Retailers discounted aggressively in October, and without any one toy or tech gadget rising to the top as this year's must have, there's no reason for shoppers to wait.

Your Takeaway: How are you helping holiday shoppers plan their shopping and get great deals? Help them get organized with gift lists and gift ideas by type of recipient. Click here more posts from this blog about holiday planning.

Macy's, Target and other major retailers now using editorial and curated content to drive sales. Macy's and Target both launched online magazine-type sites that include trending news, fashion guides, and user-generated content to help guide shoppers to the right looks.

Your Takeaway: You're probably not in a position to create something on the magnitude of what Macy's and Target are doing, but that doesn't mean you can't give your customers a little more guidance. Consider putting together outfits or other sets of product that go together, linking relevant posts from your blog to your product, and bringing up the prominence of customer generated content on your site. This doesn't just mean customer reviews - get customers to send you pics and videos of them using your products, and you may gain some marketing gold.

Consumers shop in stores but buy online, finds a new survey by electronics site Retrevo.com. The most typical behavior is for today's frugalista customers to find something in your store that they like, and then use their smartphones to compare other retailer's pricing and availability to yours.

Your takeaway: How will you measure up when customers do this? People don't always buy the least expensive thing, but you'll need to be competitive, on service and quality as well as price. Also, now is a good time to make sure your site is optimized for mobile and you're available on check-in sites like FourSquare. After all, people will be in your competitors' stores checking your prices, too.

Have a great weekend, and thanks for reading.

Improve Your Web Site

Now is a great time to take another look at your web site.

Why?

Old-school web site. Photo: Flickr user Cybershotking.

It's a smart idea to do a regular site audit. Sometimes when we upgrade our design and update our content, important things get lost. Take some time today to go through this checklist:

• Is it easy for users to find multiple ways to contact you (online form, phone, email, live chat)? Is your contact information on every page?
• Are your navigation bars intuitive, and complete on every page?
• Does your search function deliver results that make sense? 
• Do graphics download quickly?
• Does your site look good using different web browsers and screen resolution?
• Does the user's natural progression through your site end in the result you want - an inquiry, purchase, or other engagement?
• Are you promoting your other customer channels, like Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn so users can join you there?

Hopefully you can answer yes to all of these questions. If not, fix these now, before they cost you more sales. Need help? Let me know.

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Starting Your Marketing Plan

So you you've been updating your Twitter account like a good kid, posting to Facebook often, but not too often, you make sure your blog and your web site always have fresh content, and you may finally get that press release done this week. For some reason, though, you feel like none of this is helping. The traffic just isn't coming.

Planning Essentials: Photo: Flicker user JacQueLyne

Why?

Because it's not part of a larger marketing strategy. Twitter, Facebook, blogs, web site, and PR are tactics, not strategies.  These tools play their part to support a larger plan. If you don't have a larger plan, then won't realize their true potential to grow your business.

OK, so now what?


I like to lay out an annual plan, mapping out the year and determining some major themes. Marketing events might include promotions around holidays, the launch of a catalog, a major web site update, and a quarterly PR push. This is also a good time to think about new product that will be launching in the next year, where that goes on your marketing calendar and what you'll be doing around it.

"But, I can't possibly think of every single tweet, Facebook update, or blog post I'm going to do for the next year!" you say.

And you're right. You'll plan those things out on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis, depending on how you prefer to work. It's important, now, though, to lay out your year so you can see what needs to be done in advance. For example, if you're launching a major new product line in the next year, you'll need to build in time to update your web site, put together a new catalog, write a press release, and make sure the rest of your online properties are updated.

Your Takeaway?

Set a goal to put together a marketing plan for 2012 by the end of October. Think about what your major campaigns will be, and what you'll need to do to execute them. I'm happy to review what you've put together and offer my feedback. You can connect to me on twitter at @leahibraheem or on LinkedIn here.

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Why All Marketing is Local

OK, all marketing isn't really local, but local marketing should be a strong component of your marketing strategy, whether your customers are consumers or other businesses. Why?

Local businesses. Flickr user RachelVorhees.

1) Being local gives you a natural connection to your customers. You're from the same place. You live and work in the same place, and this gives you a serious, valid reason to support one another.

2) You'll be able to make face-to-face connections. This is especially important if your customers are other businesses. You can call on new and prospective clients in person, sharing local stories, and building long-term connections. Your customers won't need to wait for you to fly into town to see you - you'll be able to stop by anytime. If you sell to consumers, you'll also be able to invite them to your store or call on them much more easily.

3) You'll have a much better understanding of the market than your non-local competition. Since you'll be selling to people who live and work in the same community as you do, you'll have an intrinsic understanding of the needs, environment, and conditions of that community. Knowing your local market inside and out will put you one rung above your non-local competition.


How do you access that local network? Simple is best - use your local papers (web and print properties), local events, local chambers of commerce and business groups, and local groups on LinkedIn to connect. Facebook also allows you to advertise by location, so you can find local customers there as well. Don't forget other networks that focus on local business reviews - like Yelp, ServiceMagic, and MerchantCircle.

What are you doing to strengthen your connection to your local community? Please share in the comments.

Are you local to the DC area? Drop me a line or let's connect on Twitter or LinkedIn.

Do You Need to be on Twitter?

This is an important question to consider as people have less and less time and resources to do more and more. After all, Twitter can take over your life if you're not careful. Is it REALLY necessary to have a presence?

Twitter. Image: Flickr user Danilo Ramos.

In a word, yes. Why? Let's do the numbers.

First, how many people are on Twitter?

• 13% of US online adults use Twitter.
• Half of those people are accessing Twitter using their mobile phones.
• 20.6 million US adults access Twitter at least once a month.
• 460K new accounts are created each day.
• 177 million Tweets sent daily.
• 77% of the top US companies have Twitter accounts, and 72% of all US companies are on Twitter.

Your Takeaway: Simply, a huge number of people are on Twitter. If you need to reach more people, it's worth a try to start talking to them, and more importantly, to see what they are talking about.

What kind of People are on Twitter?

Statistically, the person who is most likely to use Twitter is a female Latina in her 20s who attended college, lives in a city, and earns less than $30K annually, or $50 - $75K, though all kinds of people have Twitter accounts.

Your Takeaway: This means that if your product appeals to minority audiences (African-Americans are currently adopting Twitter at higher rates than other groups), this is a great way to reach them. You'll reach people at all income levels, and fairly educated users, some low-income, but others moving up in the world. If you'd like to reach people who are looking to save money, who like to follow the news, and who are interested in pop culture, Twitter is one place to find them.

What are people doing on Twitter?

Posting their own status updates, but also keeping in touch with friends, checking the news, using it for work-related needs, and for research.  About 25% of Twitter users check their accounts several times daily, from multiple devices, including their phones.

Your Takeaway: Once you've started posting to Twitter, make sure you include content that other people want to retweet and that you're meeting the needs of your followers. Are they following your feed because it helps them with their research or work, to save money, for entertainment, for news? Keep this in mind as you craft your posts.

How do I use Twitter?
I use Twitter to keep in touch with others in my industry and small business owners who are looking for guidance on marketing. My feed is a mix of retweets, replies, links, suggestions, and references to my blog. I have a modest, but growing following (thanks all). Click here to see my profile.

Stats thanks to the generous folks at Pew Internet and Hubspot.

How do you use Twitter? Please share.

Using Facebook to Drive Traffic to Your Store

Like most retailers, you've got a Facebook page. You put one up because you felt like you couldn't afford not to have one, and you were right.

Facebook. Photo: Flickr user Max-B

But having a Facebook presence is only the beginning. The Facebook page itself won't bring people into your store - you've got to turn it up a notch to really drive that traffic. What should you do to your page?

First, make it relevant.

Your fans want to know about your sales, specials, and upcoming events.

Second, make it engaging.

You can't spend all your time on Facebook selling - you'll turn people off. Try quizzes, contests, and questions to get people talking. Make sure you're checking back regularly to respond appropriately.

Third, make it trackable.

Use tools like Facebook Insights and Hootsuite to monitor your Facebook reach and engagement. You'll be able to see what kinds of posts generate the most comments, likes, and shares.

What are you doing on Facebook to make your presence known? Please share in the comments.

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Low Cost Sales Channels

Last week, I wrote about using different sales channels to find better customers. I mentioned that it might  be a good idea to figure out which customers are the most costly to serve and the least profitable, and direct them to lower-cost channels.

This is only part of the story.

Adjust customer channels to find the right balance
of profitability. Photo: Flickr user Dustin.Askins.

Just because a customer is expensive to serve, doesn't mean that customer is the least valuable. In fact, customers who require a lot of time, energy, and money can certainly be very profitable customers.

The key, then, is aligning client profitability with the appropriate channel, or balancing profitability across channels.

How does this work?

I used to work for a large company that served customers in several different ways. There were low cost channels and high cost channels, and I think we did a pretty good job of aligning customers accordingly.

Our low-cost channels included web sales and telesales. It was inexpensive for our company to do business online and via our call centers, so, where possible, most customers were directed to one of these channels - "Just call or click," we'd say.

Our retail stores were medium-cost, because we were able to effectively bring in new customers this way, and sell them lots of profitable add-ons. Once we had these customers in the fold, they were encouraged to deal with their bills and any additional service they needed via lower-cost channels like web and telephone. In this way, we balanced channels so that high-value sales, like signing up for new service and purchasing equipment and accessories could happen in-store, and lower value activities, like address changes and billing questions, could be directed to lower-cost channels while still providing customers with great service.

Our highest-cost channels were what we referred to as "National Accounts." This included a sales force who called on businesses with multiple customers in-house. While it was expensive for us to maintain this sales force, provide them with the right equipment and tools, and send them all over their territories to meet with customers in-person, it was still profitable for us to serve customers this way since these were very high-value customers that provided a high rate of annual revenue.

So, what's the moral of the story?

Take a look at your channels, and make sure you're putting your energy in the right place. There's nothing wrong with a high-cost channel as long as you're getting a return on your investment.

How do you balance across channels and where are you realizing economies of scale? Need help doing this?  Let me know.

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How to Find Better Customers

The last couple of years have been hard on retailers. Customers expect sale after sale, more and more discounts, incredible service, and tons of freebies. And loyalty? Forget it. There's always another deal around the corner.

Photo: Flickr user Zizzybaloobah.

So how do you find better customers?

Reward the behaviors you want, and discourage the ones you don't.

First, examine your best customers.

How profitable are they? What are they buying? Are they on your email list? Do they follow you on Twitter? Are they your fans on Facebook? What's converting them to buy, and buy again?

In the process of this examination, you might find that your best customers are frequent responders to your Facebook promotions. That's great, but how can you use this knowledge?

Second, reward the behaviors you want.

If Facebook is your most profitable channel, then make your promotions even more profitable by crafting deals with the greatest possible margins.

Encourage customers on all channels to join you on Facebook as well. If your Facebook promotions are generating the most profitable customers, the more fans you have, the better.

Third, discourage the behaviors you don't want.

Which customers are the most expensive to serve? How can you redirect them to more profitable channels? If you find, for example, that customers who call your call center are the least profitable, consider adding more ways in which to serve them, perhaps encouraging them to use instant messaging, online resources (your FAQ are comprehensive, right?) or Twitter to ask questions.

Re-examine your shopping cart - is it too difficult to buy online? If you have a two-screen process, can you get it down to one screen? Can you highlight the safety and security of your shopping cart process?

At the same time, make sure your customers still have several options for both sales and service- your stores, call center, web site, and email. You don't want to turn people off unless you're absolutely sure you don't want their business.

What are you doing to reward your best customers? Please share in the comments.

Creating Your Marketing Plan

You've got a Facebook page, a blog, a twitter account, and a web site. You send out emails, do press releases when you can find the time, and you made a New Years' resolution to update your direct mail program and get on top of your SEO.

But how are you connecting all of these things?
photo © 2005 Francis Bijl | more info (via: Wylio)

Does your SEO support your press releases and your new product launches? Is your twitter feed engaging customers about the same deals you're promoting on your email newsletter? How do you keep everything straight?

This is where a basic marketing plan can help you get organized about how you invest your marketing time and money. First, list all of your marketing channels. Channels are ways of engaging with your audience. Channels include things like direct mail, PR, advertising, web site, email, Facebook, etc.

I like to map out each week with related promotions for clients. That way, if we take the time to update the web site, videos, and in-store merchandising, our press releases, advertising, and social marketing all support those investments. Since we know what we'll be promoting in a strong, multi-channel way, it's also easier to forecast what will be selling best each week.

Too many channels? I can help.

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It's Monday. Three Ways to Drive Sales Today

It's Monday morning. You're still waiting for that coffee to kick in.

Meanwhile, you're reviewing last week's sales. And they're not where they need to be.

What can you do?
photo © 2006 Pete Barr-Watson | more info (via: Wylio)

1. Beef up your customer loyalty program. 
What are you doing to thank your most loyal customers? Are there any sales you have going on right now that they might want to know about? Make sure that 1) you're thanking them, and 2) you're asking for a sale.

2. Push your most profitable product.
Which one of your products has the best margin right now? Shouldn't you be selling more of it? Put it in your stores' front windows, advertise it front and center on your web site, and promote it on your social media channels. The more you sell, the more efficiently you're making money.

3. Try a new channel.
Today is the day it's finally time to stop procrastinating and start your Facebook page. You can let fans know about your latest specials, events and promotions, and new products.

So, what are you waiting for?

Make Monday work for you. Need help? Ask me how.

Do You Need a Mobile App?

So a new report from Flurry claims that consumers are now spending more time using mobile apps than on the Internet (thanks, Mashable, for getting this some attention). Consumers are spending an average of 81 minutes daily using mobile apps vs. 74 minutes of web surfing.

So, this means you need to go right out and create your own mobile app, right?

Not exactly. We'll talk about this in a second.
photo © 2010 clive darr | more info (via: Wylio)


The first thing you need to do (if you haven't already), is visit your web site while using your mobile phone, and the mobile phones of a few of your friends. What you see on your desktop isn't what you'll see on your Blackberry, Droid, iPhone, or tablet. Make sure people using any popular smartphone or tablet these days can use your site. 

Questions to ask:

1) Can they read your content or do they have to keep zooming in, zooming out, and scrolling back and forth?

2) Is your site fully functional via mobile? Can people order your products, access customer service, and easily navigate to your content?

3) Is there something most customers on a mobile would want to see first on your site, like maybe your phone number or directions? How can you make this easier for them to find?

So, now it's time to create your own app, right? Not exactly.

It can be expensive to get a developer to make you your very own app. So think about apps that are already out there that can be used to promote or access your business. Ask yourself:

1) Is your business available to people using social apps, like Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn?

2) If you're brick-and-mortar, are you sharable on check-in apps like FourSquare and SCVNGR?

3) If you run a restaurant, are you available on review sites like Urbanspoon, and reservation apps like OpenTable?

So NOW is it time for my own mobile app?

Sure. But really give some thought to a problem your mobile app will solve, and if there's an app already out there that can be used. After all, existing apps (like Urbanspoon, for example) already have a dedicated audience. If you make your own app, you're starting over.

Also, games are great and it's tempting to make your own game for people to play. But how does this help? Does it really get people to buy more of your product or is it just an opportunity for people to play at your expense?

That said, it can't hurt to talk with an app developer and see what kind of ideas they might have for you.

You might also consider holding an app development contest for your customers. See what they think you should be doing on your mobile.

All apped out? Let me know. I can help.