Finding your next star employee with Local Internet Marketing

March 29, 2008 | 1 Comment

The difference between a local consumer and a local job seeker is the product they’re researching online.

Finding good employees is one of the biggest challenges any company faces and just like selling your products and services locally you have to position your company to attract new employees.

That’s why your local online marketing plan needs to include your job candidate. There’s a term in the recruiting industry to describe the majority of candidates - passive candidates. Because they’re not looking for jobs they’re tough to find - and even harder to woo away.

When Shannon isn’t helping me with Local Na8ion she’s VP Interactive at the largest recruitment marketing ad agency in the U.S.. Shannon’s pet peeve is when companies spend millions on a new consumer campaign and fail to include the job candidate in the process. Your current and prospective customers that you’re trying to reach with your marketing are also candidates that could be your next best hire. Think about it, many of us choose or reject the companies we consider for employment based solely on how we experience that companies brand or product.

You just have to make small adjustments to your marketing strategy to include job candidates. Make yourself a careers page. When you run online or print ads include a link to your careers page and make sure there’s a careers link right on your home page. That way your consumer or B2B marketing gets people thinking of you as a preferred employer, not just a product or service. Check out this interview of Shannon on using social media for recruiting on Bill Vick’s XtremeRecruiting.org. Use examples of Shannon’s career’s web site projects for Discover, BofA, and Fedex as illustrations of the content you want to include on your small business careers web site.

Posted by Julian | Filed Under Blog, Connect, Create

Top Ten reasons Wordpress for Small Business beats the pants off the rest

March 28, 2008 | 6 Comments

Wordpress is best for small business

I’ve talked a lot about Wordpress but I haven’t explained why it’s better than all the typical offerings pitched to small companies (products from Yahoo!, Microsoft, Google, YellowPages.com, CitySearch, and others). Today I’ll do that in just 200 words. To accomplish my goal I’ll just hit the highlights and leave further explanation for later posts.

It’s the tool the Pros use and there is good reason for that
Offers you tremendous SEO out-of-the-box - this means FREE search engine marketing
Easy to write and publish new content with no need for technical knowledge
It can be a web site, a blog or both
People like me all over the world are showing you how to use it - for free
For less than $100 a year you can get an equivalent web site and blog for what you’d pay a designer or programmer $2-$5K for
It’s really free, (called open source) only pay for web hosting
Infinite design and feature customization
Access to Wordpress community of contributors numbering over 10,000 to assist with design, programming, training or consulting (size of community drives competitive pricing)
Geek stuff under the hood helping you without you needing to know Geek

Posted by Julian | Filed Under Blog, Publish & Design

Episode 10: Hosting your Wordpress Small Business Web Site on Midphase and using Auto-Install

March 26, 2008 | 3 Comments

In our session today, Episode 10 (run time 9:54) we cover how to get your small business web site and blog hosted and activated with our recommended web host MidPhase using a method called auto-install (also called a one-click install). In our next video how-to session we’ll cover how to select a FREE or Pro Wordpress design for less than $100.

Click to play

You may want to watch my previous posts on this topic where I have covered the reason why we recommend Wordpress for your small business web site and blog. We also covered how to select a Wordpress host which includes a useful web resource where you can read independent reviews on Wordpress hosts.

By clicking on my link to MidPhase and then entering my discount code “GOTAPEX-ROX-01″ (no quotes) during the order process you’ll get three months of free hosting plus your domain name FREE for life. Make sure your MidPhase order confirmation page reflects the discount. The package should come out to less than $72 in total hosting costs for the year (12 months) at which time you’ll renew for the next year. Disclaimer: I receive a small commission if you sign up with MidPhase that helps me defray the cost of delivering Local Na8ion. Even if I wasn’t paid this fee we’d still recommend MidPhase because we’ve used them and they’ve lived up to their marketing claims.

I also mention in my video today that you should pick up a copy of Wordpress For Dummies by Lisa Sabin-Wilson. It’s the perfect desk reference and self-paced study guide to help you learn Wordpress. Grab a copy of WordPress For Dummies today.

Let’s recap why we recommend Wordpress for small businesses in the first place.

From my Jan. 28, 2008 post “We Recommend Wordpress for Small Business”

“It’s FREE, easy to use and update, has more built-in Local SEO Goodness than any comparable product, and you can use it to power your regular web site, not just a blog.”

and

“Did we mention that Wordpress has an active community of over 10,000 contributors? They’re busy year-round making new theme designs that you can use on your site (most are free to use) along with adding specialty features and functionality (called plug-ins in Wordpress) that do everything from power a job board, help you run a newspaper, or make the SEO goodness in Wordpress even better.”

I hope you enjoy today’s video and as always, let me know your questions and comments.

Julian Seery Gude
editor Local Na8ion
Where you are is where it’s at

Posted by Julian | Filed Under Blog, Connect, Video

Oh no, not another story on social media for small business

March 25, 2008 | 4 Comments

I know you are probably ready for a new topic other than social media for small business but I want to give you an important quick heads-up and link (hat tip to Ramon Ray over at smallBiztechnology.com for linking to this). I thought of just adding this as an addendum to my last video Podcast on social media but it’s too important to be that easily missed. What’s special about this article is its broad perspective. It gives you a picture of social media and blogs over the last two years, making it a worthy primer on the topic.

One of the points I made in my series is that aspects of social media (like blogs) have been over hyped. That’s resulted in people tuning them out - especially companies that look to more proven and mainstream ways to advertise and market their business.

Here’s an excerpt

“Monday 9:30 a.m. It’s time for a frank talk. And no, it can’t wait. We know, we know: Most of you are sick to death of blogs. Don’t even want to hear about these millions of online journals that link together into a vast network. And yes, there’s plenty out there not to like. Self-obsession, politics of hate, and the same hunger for fame that has people lining up to trade punches on The Jerry Springer Show. Name just about anything that’s sick in our society today, and it’s on parade in the blogs. On lots of them, even the writing stinks.

Go ahead and bellyache about blogs. But you cannot afford to close your eyes to them, because they’re simply the most explosive outbreak in the information world since the Internet itself. And they’re going to shake up just about every business—including yours.”

Here’s the full article called “Social Media Will Change Your Business“

Julian Seery Gude
editor, Local Na8ion
Where you are is where it’s at

Posted by Julian | Filed Under Blog, Connect, News, Reviews & Rants

Episode 9c: Social Media for Small Business and Local Marketers

March 24, 2008 | Leave a Comment

Introduction

In part three of our series on social media for the small business and local marketer (run time 9:46) we conclude by discussing two more practical tools or applications of social media.

Hint: I will introduce you to online word-of-mouth marketing and next generation online public relations.

Click to play

Show Links for Word of mouth Marketing

WOMMA.org - The Word-of-Mouth-Marketing Association.

Make sure to by read Learn WOM 101.

Next, check out the story about how nimble small businesses are especially well positioned to take advantage of word-of-mouth-marketing. Of course you already know this, you may just need to make the transition to using your existing WOM skills in a new online venue.

Show Links for next generation Public Relations (PR)

Fellow Internet OldTimer, plus Twitter Bud and Facebook Friend, the amazing adventurist PR God Peter Shankman.

Then there’s the magnificent, the magnanimous, the one, the only PR 2.0 Guru Brian Solis and yes, another Twitter Socialite like Peter and yours truly - Jinfinite8.

Enjoy and let me know what questions and comments you have - it would be downright social of you.

Julian Seery Gude
editor, Local Na8ion
Where you are is where it’s at

Click to play

Posted by Julian | Filed Under Blog, Connect, Video

Episode 9b: Social Media for Small Business and Local Marketers

March 23, 2008 | Leave a Comment

If you are like most people you do not like hype and that may well have kept you from exploring social media as a tool to bring you new business. After all, the fervor and hype surrounding things like Blogs, Facebook, Second Life and the cool kid applications like Twitter are enough to make you puke.

Here’s the thing though - there are also really practical applications of social media that represent big opportunities for small businesses to market yourselves for free.

Click to play

In the next two sessions I’ll try to dispel some of the hype about social media and show you three to four practical social media tools that almost any business or local marketer can use today to win new local customers. I hope you will give social media a try and come to realize what I have - that social media is beyond hype - it’s revolutionary.

In this episode (runtime 9:58) I’ll explore some pitfalls of social media and also outline a simple definition of social media. I’ll finish by discussing two great social media tools that you should focus on today. My next session will cap things off with my final two social media recommendations for businesses that want to attract new local customers from their town or city.

I mention during the podcast that I would link to a previous post on how small business people can quickly create blog content for use in their blog marketing campaigns. Here’s the post I wrote back in January called The best kept secret for quickly creating new content for your blog and web site.

Julian Seery Gude
editor Local Na8ion
Where you are is where it’s at

Posted by Julian | Filed Under Blog, Connect, Video

Review of Apple MacBook for Small Business - Display Dismay

March 19, 2008 | 1 Comment

G’Day Local Na8ion!

It’s time for a Small Business Tech Review of the Apple MacBook for $1,299. I’m catering this review to small business people like myself who need access to reliable, low-priced, do-it-all computers. If you’re considering creating web content, audio, or video content for your web site or local marketing effort then I strongly recommend Mac’s, and I’m not an Apple fanboy.

While I’m not an Apple snob, I will admit to being a complete Geek. Don’t worry though, I won’t inflict my disease upon you! In fact, here’s what I usually say about business and technology:

“…with technology specifically we often lose sight of people. At exceler8 and Local Na8ion we love to experiment with the leading edge of web marketing and technology but we do so in the pursuit of value, not at the expense of it.” - Julian’s bio on Local Na8ion

For most of us, computers aren’t high entertainment as they are for me, they’re critical business tools. We take orders on them, make marketing materials, crank out business correspondence and balance the company books.

I’m a long time Windows user (aren’t we all) but I also really appreciate how Apple bounced back a few years ago and started making really high quality hardware and combining it with a rock solid operating system - OS X.

Today, there’s no way I’d buy a PC with the sad state of the Windows operating system (XP is now solid but feature-poor compared to Mac’s OS X and Vista is a joke).

I splurged on a PowerBook (the high end version) over three years ago and it was everything I’d hoped it would be in terms of being a digital creativity powerhouse. Apple has loads of built-in goodness when it comes to making user-generated content like audio, movies, and blog posts. For example, the bundled iMovie program that comes with OS X allows me to make all my Local Na8ion podcasts and it didn’t cost a thing.

Now that Apple allows you to run XP or Vista on your new Mac there’s really no reason NOT to buy a Mac anymore since you can now run legacy (er, old ass) PC only software on a Mac. In fact, a few months ago, PC Magazine listed the best (fastest) laptops to run MS Vista and the 17″ MacBook Pro was the top system. That says a lot of good things about Apple Hardware. Also, in my experience working at large companies, plugging an Apple Mac laptop in to your corporate network is dead easy.

Unfortunately my old PowerBook is now SO slow when I’m processing video (very resource intensive) for Local Na8ion and doing my client work I had no choice but to upgrade. Hey, that’s my excuse but Shannon didn’t buy it. This time around I went for the lower cost MacBook. There’s a $700 difference in the MacBook I purchased vs. the higher end MacBook Pro. What do you get for an additional $700?

Bigger hard drive (200GB instead of the 160GB I got). Big deal.
More mousepad gestures. Cool, but no big deal.
PC card slot (very helpful for business for high-speed wireless Internet cards so popular with road warriors like my wife Shannon). OK, I can live without it since I’m not a road warrior.
A dedicated NVIDIA GeForce display card

Now, that doesn’t look like $700 in value to me. In fact, I liked the smaller MacBook for its lighter weight and dimensions. The keyboard is nice (not as good as the Pro but still good) and the glossy screen looked rich and colorful in the showroom. A note on the glossy vs. matte display. People usually have a strong preference for one over the other with most coming down on the matte screen side. Why? The matte screen is much easier to read in outside lighting (the glossy display reflects everything like a mirror when outdoors). For the MacBook, Apple chose the Henry Ford Model T manufacturing method: You can have any display on the MacBook as long as it’s the glossy one. I prefer the glossy screen (it’s the glitzy Great White Way Marketer in me) so the glossy screen wasn’t a problem.

So how does my new MacBook perform? Everything is fantastic except for one very important thing - the display quality. If you plan on hooking up your MacBook to a larger external display I think you’ll be very disappointed with the MacBook’s screen.

According to post-purchase research I’ve done I’m not the only one. You can’t just blame it on the integrated Intel display adaptor either since it’s commonly used on Windows based PC’s and similar PC systems haven’t generated near the kind of angst that the MacBook screen has. In part, that’s because people expect Apple to nail things that involve design, look, feel, and craftmanship. Can you imagine an iPod with a badly pixelated screen?

If you’re just using the MacBook as a laptop, then by all means purchase the less expensive MacBook and save your business $700 in expense. If you like working with photos, images and er…web sites, which all rely heavily on display quality AND you use an external monitor, get the MacBook Pro. If you don’t need a laptop you can spend $1,499 for the iMac desktop and get the same exact processor (2.4GHz Core Duo 2) with a beautiful 20″ screen and a solid video card - the ATI Radeon HD 2600 Pro with 256mb of display memory.

I’m still undecided as to what I’ll do exactly. I might just get the desktop for the $200 more and use my old PowerBook when I’m out at the park with my kids. Then agian, theMacBook Pro is an awfully nice machine. Would you put in a good word with Shannon for me? Better yet, hire me so I can afford to buy one!

Here’s a video review of the Apple MacBook on my personal blog with some additional links if you want to know more about my MacBook display dismay.

Update: I’ve gone back and re looked using my 17″ Sony Display and I’m much happier with it. The crazy pixelation is gone. I’ve also continued researching my issues and found that most people are going with a maximum size of 20″ for their desktop monitor (my Samsung is a 22″) if they use a MacBook with an external display. 20 inches is sufficient to me and I’m now moving into new monitor research mode.

For now I’ve decided that I can live with the smaller screen (I still have two desktops after all) and don’t want to give up all the stuff I like about the smaller MacBook (and its great price) for either a desktop iMac or a much more expensive MacBook Pro. My original recommendation still stands - just know what you’re getting into before you buy!

Posted by Julian | Filed Under Blog, News, Reviews & Rants

Episode 9a: Social Media for Small Business and Local Marketers

March 18, 2008 | 1 Comment

In this three ~~two~~-part series I discuss using social media to connect with local customers (run time 8 minutes). Guy Kawasaki - co-founder of Alltop, an aggregator of great web content

First up, I’ll relate a personal story about a great new site called Alltop.com, and how using social media got Local Nation listed on the small business section of Alltop.

Click to play baby!

In my follow-up vlog session I’ll give you three practical uses for social media that can help you build traffic for your site and win new business from your local marketplace.

Saving loads of money on marketing expense highlights a fundamental value of social media marketing - that is, you can connect with customers online without spending a dime. The visitors I’ve already received from Alltop would easily have cost me thousands of dollars to acquire if I were to have used traditional online media like banner ads or offline media like Yellow Pages or Newspapers. Do I have your attention yet? Great!

Yes, using social media in your marketing mix will save you tons of money, but that’s not the only reason you should consider it. There’s also a very good chance that social media will connect you with new customers who aren’t using traditional advertising to find local products and services. This number is already large and grows bigger each day. Sure, some of them are younger and you may or may not care about this market (yet) but I can assure you that some social media tools connect with every age, race and demographic group. In other words, there are social media tools that you can’t afford to ignore.

I’ll end with a BIG THANK YOU to Guy Kawasaki, Kathryn Henkens, and Will Mayall who run Nononina the company that produces both Alltop and other sites like Truemors.

And now for a story about Julian (that’s me) and a guy named Guy.

Julian Seery Gude, editor Local Na8ion - Where you are is where it’s at.

Watch part II in our series on social media for small business and local marketers.

Posted by Julian | Filed Under Blog, Connect, Video

Episode 8: 28 minutes to better Google Local search results

March 9, 2008 | Leave a Comment

We will give you three simple-to-implement tips that can rocket your site to the top of Google’s local search results. In episode 8 of Local Na8ion’s video podcast (run time 12 min) we detail how we used these exact methods to move Linda’s Cleaning Service - a house cleaning service in Wellington Florida - from page four of Google Local search results to page one. This didn’t take months, it took days.

We discuss

Using your city name in your URL (your web site address)
Putting your location information on your web site
Adding your business to Google’s Local Business Directory

Yes, you can do all of these things in 28 minutes, even if you’re not a techie!

Subscribe via iTunes iTunes Podcast or our regular RSS subscription!

Click to play

Corrections: apologies on our typo on slide 6 of the presentation (your NOT you’re - Yes we know the difference!). Would have taken 2 hours in video processing time to fix. Also, Linda has been in business since 2002 - not the two years I reported. Damn, I’m getting old.

Background: Linda’s Cleaning Service is my mother-in-law Linda’s local small business in Wellington Florida. Since Linda’s daughter Shannon (my beautiful wife and partner in crime here at Local Na8ion) and I are both web marketers it’s no surprise that we work on her site for free - and yes - Linda sends her cleaners to our house once in a while for free as well. Will market for cleaning!

Julian, editor Local Na8ion - where you are is where it’s at

Posted by Julian | Filed Under Blog, Connect, Video