Hello,

We recently overhauled our website and are now hosting this blog on our new site.  Please note that the new address for the blog is www.thesmallbiznest.com/blog our get our feed at www.thesmallbiznest.com/feed.

We will be adding much more content at the new site and we look forward to your comments and feedback.

Thank you,

- The Small BizNest Team

Are You Tracking ROI?

Too many times we see businesses haphazardly throw random campaigns at the wall to see what sticks.  One member of the marketing team is “trying out” a few Facebook ads while a colleague is independently “testing” a viral program on Twitter.  I continue seeing articles written about “Twitter done right” and “viral marketing success stories” and not once has there been any mention of ROI or CPA.  There are too many marketers patting themselves on the back for simply creating buzz.  When did it become acceptable to spend money to get people talking about your giveaway but not your unique selling proposition?

Lisa Barone shared a story earlier this week about a contest giveaway run by a company called Moonfruit celebrating their 10th anniversary.  The numbers were quite high – more than 200,000 posts per week.  Adam Ostrow over at Mashable wrote, “Not surprisingly, this promotion is working. #moonfruit is Twitter’s top trending topic today, beating out the likes of Michael Jackson, #iranelection, and Wimbledon-related tweets.”

This promotion is working?  How are these people measuring success?  Can you imagine approaching your boss and saying, “I’d like to spend $10K+ and use countless company resources so we can be ‘bigger than Michael Jackson’ for a week” on Twitter.  When asked for your ROI estimate you smile wryly and say, “Zero, BUT, hundreds of thousands of people who will never become customers will be talking about the Macbooks we’re giving away”.

This is the equivalent of a restaurant spending $10k for a big neon sign that says, “restrooms open to the public”.

Hello, my name is John, and I’m addicted to Google…

Now I understand why.  Jessica E. Vascellaro wrote an interesting article in this morning’s Wall Street Journal outlining the failure of this once promising marketing tool.  She sites the lack of tracking mechanisms as the reason for the plug being pulled but also pointed to the lack of interest on the part of radio station owners.

I don’t see it that way.  Nobody knew about the service!  The only reason I knew about it is because we were a big Adwords client and were allowed to kick the tires a bit.  I was planning on using the service as a compliment to the other inbound/outbound marketing services I offer to my clients.  I was also planning on using toll-free phone numbers and landing pages to track the success of campaigns.  So what if the Google dashboard didn’t currently offer such functionality – you know it would inevitably be developed or purchased.  Look how companies like ReachLocal track “local” online advertising campaigns.

The Internet giant dropped the ball by making Google Audio the best kept secret in company history.  Any business in this country could have had 1) access to professional voice talent to record spots 2) access to national, regional and local markets and 3) the ability to break down target audience by a complete set of demographic characteristics.

I love the radio guys who say, “we would have sold it on our own”.  That’s not true.  Google was paying a minimum on inventory whether it was sold or not.  Why were the radio guys complaining about the so called discounted pricing being introduced by Google?  $500 for a $1000 slot is better than $0, right?  That attitude worked out well for the newspapers.

Finally, the Google Audio service offered a CPM of slightly more than $1 which I challenge anyone to beat in any medium.  It’s a shame the recession came along and swept away what could have been a very effective marketing platform, at least for me and my clients.

Goodbye Google Audio – we hardly knew thee.

What Does He Know About You?

idea/invention/business that brings value to the market, then put your head down and push the rock forward. Don’t listen to the cynics out there. Those are the same people who would never take the risk and they don’t have the confidence that you have.

If you can dream it, you can do it. Everyone looked at Susan Boyle on “You’ve Got Talent” and jumped to the conclusion that she would not be successful. They were dead wrong.

If people look at your idea and doubt you or doubt that you can be successful in a down economy, they’re wrong.  Watch this clip, be inspired and enjoy the success you know you’re capable of achieving.

(YouTube wouldn’t let me embed this video, sorry for the primative link)

Then there’s the for profit versus not for profit debate.  If you’re in business to turn a profit and you’re only able to break even, wouldn’t it make more sense to be a “non profit” since you would then have access to federal grants?

Collaborating and Networking with Like-Minded Business Owners

I think sponsorships could be a creative way of subsidizing the operating costs associated with running a collaborative working facility.  I’m farily confident a local bank or business supply vendor would be interested in the naming rights of this new “business center”.

I’m testing the waters locally since there’s a substantial “free agent” population in my suburban community and I know I’m not the only one that would like to socialize and collaborate with like-minded people.  Once my preliminary research is done, I’m going to pick the brain of Alex Hillman who started www.indyhall.org down in Philly and is one of the few experts on the subject.

I’ll post updates as my efforts  progress and I welcome any feedback or suggestions you might have.

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The days of “inviting everyone to the party” are behind us.  Mass marketing is dead.  It’s time to welcome the era of advocacy marketing where you position yourself/your company as a trusted partner to customers and prospective customers.  By developing and sharing relevant information and guidance you will attract more qualified inquiries.  Build it and they will come.  Even if the prospect isn’t ready to purchase, they’re likely to recommend your product or service to a friend since you have effectively presented value.

The concept of inbound marketing is fairly new and can be comprised of many different mechanisms such as landing pages, SEO, social networks, and blogging.  There are services out there like HubSpot which aggregates analytics from the various mechanisms, however; it’s not a silver bullet.  Content is still king and you are responsible for developing a consistent message across all media.

New Marketing Labs announced on Tuesday that it acquired the Inbound Marketing Summit which should prove to be a very worthwhile event this year.  You’ll have the opportunity to hear Chris Brogan, David Meerman Scott and Paul Gillin share the latest strategies, tools and best practices to utilize new marketing methods to grow your business.

Bottom Line: Stop blasting to the masses.  Perfect your message (A/B and multivariate testing across all media).  Build community among customers and empower them to be evangelists.

I didn’t have any contacts at the other company so I logged into my LinkedIn account. When I located the CEO of the company, LinkedIn informed me that I had one contact who was directly linked to him. This particular contact was my manager at a fortune 50 company nearly twenty years ago (I was enrolled in a cooperative education program and traveled out to Oregon from Boston for a 4 month job) I sent an email to my contact outlining the opportunity and asked if he could introduce me to the CEO. That same day he made the introduction, the CEO engaged his VP of business development and we had a conference call two days later. We’re currently negotiating a substantial strategic partner agreement that will be extremely valuable to both companies.