KenHood.info

My motto for the year is “Starting again in 2010″.  After the last two years of economic decline, I am starting from the beginning and rebuilding, reshaping, and reinvigorating my business and personal life.

Wow, sounds like a lot of work.  Maybe I’ll start tomorrow.  NO!! I start today.

Join me in this mission.  However, three basic tenets of life and business must be observed.

1. Fighting against anything just gives it more power. What you resist, persists. Period.   -

Well if you can’t beat ‘em,  Join ‘em.  I have been fighting against the tide for the last 2 years. I have been patient and worked tirelessly trying to fend off the recession.  I have failed.  Now, I am embracing the recession and changing my habits accordingly.  I now have to act as if I am starting from scratch.  New marketing, new enthusiasm, new, hardened resolve.

2. In order to build a successful business, it is necessary  to be able to measure and monitor daily activity and performance against set quotas and goals. Crap!!!  Oh well, Now I must write down my goals and stick to a plan of achieving them.  This year, I am going to put down REALISTIC goals.  Not pie in the sky goals.  And, I am going to meet them.  I will monitor them weekly and adjust my planning and scheduling accordingly.

3. I will not allow my business to consume me this time like I did the first time around.  I will have more BALANCE in my life.

Sometimes it’s easier for us to allow ourselves to feel overwhelmed rather than taking charge and developing a prioritized list of things that need to get done. I will buck the trend.  I will develop a list of activities needed to be done daily and weekly.  I will set priorities. And then enjoy the satisfaction of crossing things off my list.

It is human nature for just about everyone to take on too many tasks and responsibilities, to try to do too much, and to own too much. I will not do anything outside of my work and my family for the next year.

So, I will be Superman for the next year.   I hope I don’t kill myself in the process.

Happy New Year everyone!!

No, not my two front teeth.  I want a few well thought out gifts.

#1.   A Search engine optimization program that really funnels clients to local businesses that actually are near the client.  I realize that the yellow pages have listings, but you have to pay to get listed, and the money is pretty tight in this economy.  Why can’t the search engines read the IP address of the computer that is being used, and search sites that are within the zip code or the same metropolitan area as the user?  That way the user can find local services or shops that actually specialize in what they want.  Further, the search will not consist of  businesses that are on the other side of the country.  I have had 3 requests for insurance quotes from people across the nation, and I can only write in Arizona.  Wouldn’t that be great for all involved?

#2.    An E-mail directory or repository that is like the phone book.  How many times have you been trying to contact a customer, only to find their telephone number is disconnected.  How many times have you wanted to send a message to a client, but your client files are at the office and you are in your PJ’s in your kitchen working because you can’t sleep.  Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to look up your client’s e-mail address and send them a note?

I realize many people use fake emails for personal or nefarious reasons, but many have had the same email for years.   I would love to be able to utilize a program that I can look up the client’s name and city and find their email.

#3.  A very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year for all of you.

OK – Its that time of year.  The time to remember when we were nostalgic.  Sitting around the table, hoping that Uncle Joe didn’t tell that same embarrassing story again.  Gosh- Good Times.

Here are the 10 Things for which I am thankful.

1.    My Family – I had to say this one, or my wife and everyone I know would think I am a schmuck.  But I am not so, there, I said it.

2.   The wayward driver.  Without this person, people would not need insurance.  As an insurance professional, we need all the wayward drivers god can send us.

3.   Glenn Beck -   Enough said.

4.   The fact that I still have a job.  Well the pay is going down, but I am still getting paid.  Kind of a glass is half full scenario.  I’m hoping the glass will become fuller.  How that happens is…..#5

5.   The quest for search engine optimization supremacy.  I actually get a thrill when I read a new article about how to enhance your web presence.  I am hoping that I will become the guru of web marketing and get a job with a fuller glass.

6.   Glass makers.  Did you know that due to the recession, glass manufacturers are making smaller glasses?  It makes for fuller glasses with the same amount of content.

7.   People that read #6 and believe me.  People are so easy!!

8.   Easy people.  My favorite sale is the person that just seems to easy to sell.  I walk away with the feeling that I am the best salesman in America.  Then I get home and have to clean up the mess the dog made.

9.  My son.  I delegate jobs like cleaning up the mess the dog made to him.  After all, Grace Slick – the lead singer for Jefferson Airplane-once said of having children,.. It’s great, everyone should have their own pet human.

10.  Ken Hood – An all round great guy, fantastic web designer, and teacher.  I have learned a ton from this man.  Anyone can host a web site, but Ken teaches you why.  It is kind of like that old adage…

“Give a man a fish and he eats for the day, teach him search engine optimization and his glass gets fuller.”  – Or, something like that.

The difference between utility and utility plus beauty is the difference between telephone wires and the spider web.Edwin Way Teale quotes

I love this quote as it relates to the net.  Your web site is the center of a spider web, and the links that attach to you are the redials that capture your customers.

So, how do we spin our web quick enough to capture leads and create buzz for your site and your products?  Also, how do we do it without breaking search engine rules?

Many smart people have developed highly visited sites and created a continuous stream of fresh links not by cheating the system, but by making it to work to their advantage by attracting thousands of natural links from high quality, trusted sites and blogs.  Plus, they bring relevant traffic, they build a web brand, and they build trust and credibility with both  search engines and people.

Social media is fantastic for bringing your brand to the attention of a huge community of people and spreading your ideas. But, if your goal is to build a sustainable web brand,  you can’t rely on social media alone to build your traffic and hits.

Many bloggers post “link threads” wherein they offer personal, direct referrals to sites they find worthwhile. Link to your site, but use these sites to discover great content and become a subscriber to new sites.   Then, add relevant comments with links back to your blog and site.

Taking this one step further, write a post with a lot of niche appeal then, at the end of your post, invite people to republish with a link to your blog.

These methods not only establish you as an individual that knows what is what in your chosen field, but they generate traffic and spin your web.

I recently saw Yahoo’s commercial for its web hosting service.   It showed the many painful and wrong ways a small business used to have to go to get a website up and running.  My favorite was the couple reading an HTML book and saying they were designing it themselves.  I know that I did design my own site.  It was a pain in the rear end.  If I had tried to do it with my wife, I would be divorced now.

One of the other methods was to “Hire a professional, and wait and want and wait.”  I hate to tell them, but most professional web designers work by word of mouth and strive to get the work completed on time and within budget.  If they don’t, the words shared won’t be pleasant.

The preferred method touted by Yahoo was the “Design Your Own” where you basically customize their web templates with the colors and options you like.  Then, miracle of miracles, the world will beat a path to your site and buy your products.

There are problems associated with this off the shelf methodology.  First  is that you may have a pretty/macho/utilitarian  site that would excite the nearest 10 yr old.  What about necessary forms for contact, orders, and payments?  What about the need to add and delete photos of your merchandise?

Second, what about all of the meta tags, RSS feeds, links to your blogs and social networking sites that comprise the spiderweb of search engine optimization?  Oh, that’s right, Yahoo is going to show you how, for a fee, to get more people to see your site.  I have one word in response – bullhockey!!Most people don’t have a clue about how to maximize their web presence.  They publish and pray.

Creating a professional website, finding the best hosting, and maximizing your search engine optimization are critical in your web success.  I was lucky.  By “word of mouth” I found Ken Hood.  He had basic templates that could be custromized to fit my Agency’s personality.  But, he had even more.  He had vision.  Ken Hood is inovative and pushes the envelope.

Go tohttp://www.kenhood.net and contact him.  Sure, you pay a little more, but all services are included, no nickle and diming you to death with a call center operator to assist you.

Ken isn’t the only designer out there, but in my book, he is the best.   Just remember -

Ask for references.  Then ask the references for others they referred to the designer.

Get the low down on the hosting charges.  What is included and what is the security arrangements?

Finally, get the total per month fee for hosting, changes and web mail.

More than likely, you are going to pay more, but you get what you pay for.  Visit my site http://www.timhawley.net and see how it differs from the quasi-design- it- yourself models.

At first blush, this questions seems a bit ridiculous.  Me?  Buy friends?  Ok, maybe I am a bit if a social outcast.  Perhaps I should be nicer and not such a misanthrope.  I guess I should bathe more often. 

But, think about it.  You spend oodles of money purchasing leads.  You spend even more time and money mailing, calling and prospecting those leads looking for the gold nugget that is the sale.  A new site,www.usocial.net claims that each face book friend, if marketed correctly will yield $1.00 worth of revenue to your business.  The cost for 5000 friends (the maximum Facebook will allow to add at one time) is  $654.00.  That’s not too bad considering these leads are supposedly tailored to your particular marketing niche.  Not a bad investment even if you only get a 1% ROI.

Now the flip side.  ( those of you who have no understanding of music media prior to CD’s and MP3’s I’m sorry)  My wife was telling me about an incident on her Facebook page where she got a request from someone she didn’t know.  Apparently, she was found through a mutual contact.  My wife did not accept the request, but wrote a message instead questioning how got her information.  The woman stated that she got my wife’s Facebook info from a mutual friend and that she wanted to promote her business.  My sweet patootie  gracefully declined any further contact from this person.  I asked mi esposa bonita “Por Que?” (Why?).  She stated that she gets enough junk on Facebook from her real friends.  Why would she want to be sold crap through Facebook each day from someone she hardly knows.  If it was someone she had a relationship with – even an acquaintance – she would be more apt to buy.

I guess the decision is up to you.

You can contact me @ tim@timhawley.net  or Visit my website timhawley.net

In Minnesota, authorities were able to levy back taxes on the wages of a long-sought tax evader after he announced on MySpace that he would be returning to his home town to work as a real-estate broker and gave his employer’s name. 

Nebraska collected $2,000 from a deejay after he advertised on his MySpace page that he would be working at a big public party.

California, which has recently been so strapped for revenue it has had to pay some bills with IOUs, agents are also using social Web sites. When one delinquent was identified as a rigger of sails, a curious collection agent searched his name and the term online and found a discussion board used by local riggers. In one thread someone asked where the rigger was because his store had closed, and a reply was posted, “Oh, he moved across the bay.” The agent found the man and collected a four-figure sum.

These examples from The Wall Street Journal show how savvy the Government is getting at attempting to collect what it deems it is owed.

As I mentioned in a previous post, you really need to watch what you put in your Facebook.  Now, I don’t believe that most people are avoiding taxes, but using these examples, do you really want everyone and their Grandmother to know you or your company’s financials.  Thieves sure would like to have that info.  Hey, I know – tell the world where you bank.  Better yet, let everyone know when you go to make your nightly deposits.

Sound silly?  You Bet.  But with all of the blogging, tweets, and random messaging,  people are putting out so much information something is bound to slip.  I saw a friend of mine last week.  I hadn’t seen him for about 2 weeks.  I asked him how he liked the French restaurant he dined at the Friday before.  He looked at me quizzically.  Then I asked if he had a great time at the baseball game on Saturday, and that his bright red shirt made his face look very pink.  He was getting agitated now.  He asked how I knew what he did, since he hadn’t seen me for the last two weeks. I told him about his girlfriend’s Facebook page, and he was – perturbed to say the least.  He doesn’t use his private Facebook, but his girlfriend tagged his pictures so I saw them.  Picture tags open a back door to private Facebook sites.

Just today, I was driving home from work and learned that the Republican party chief has called for the resignation of two Democrat incumbants  because they had posted on their Facebook Pages that the were going to run for different offices in 2010.  In Arizona, you must quit your current elected office to run for another office.  The Republicans are stating that an announcement on Facebook constitutes the beginning of the campaign and that they should resign.   It is going to the courts.

Be easy on yourself.  Watch what you post.  Keep personal items off your professional social network site.  It may save your job, or your client base.

www.timhawley.net

Contact me at tim@timhawley.net

TWITTER -

Many of today’s online marketers are serious in using Twitter to drive traffic to their business sites. The social network is considered as one of the most effective and impressive ways to increase traffic. But, how do you get the most out of your twitter network?

First off, you need to let people know you have an account. (gasp! a truly obvious point) I would stress right now, you need to have a separate business account.  You may want to have some of your contacts on both your personal and business accounts, but some people really are only interested in you and will, most likely, never buy from you or need your service.

Add value to your Tweets.  Treat your twitter posts like a micro-blog.  When you’re writing on Twitter, approach it the same way you would approach your blog or copy – only publish posts that add value to your followers.  Generally speaking, you shouldn’t be broadcasting what you had for breakfast or that you are late again – carefully time and use status updates to tell your network that you are speaking at a conference or launching a new product line.
 

If you are nervous or unsure how to begin tweeting,  you should be! Your brand is on the line you don’t want to risk a social backlash. You don’t normally go “all or nothing” with a new product or service and the same rule holds true with any potential social media program. Mitigate risk by hiring a professional who knows the platforms and can objectively consult your business on best practices.

Twitter-jack Active Social News & Twitter Users’ Friends – When you find a popular Twitter user who’s also using your social sites a lot, go through the list of people they’re following and follow them too. This can be a long but rewarding process. It may take hours, but it may ultimately lead you to a lot of new Twitter friends.

You may want to use a 3rd party  software program like Hummingbird -            http://www.twitaddict.com/hummingbird/

this is a quicker means of adding followers and thus more potential clients.

You can contact the author @ www.timhawley.net

It is a very strange world out there.  The economy is still contracting, the government is in the auto business and wants to be in the health care business, people are still waiting to buy, so what should you do?

Keep in contact with your client base!!

JD Powers, in a  recently performed a study of financial advisors, discovered the relationship between financial advisers and investors to be the most important aspect impacting investor’s satisfaction.  The investor’s satisfaction rate on financial advisors has increased from 22 percent in 2008 to 30 percent in 2009.  At the same time,  investment performance declined in  importance from 24 percent to 15 percent in 2009.  Why?  Because people felt more confident after having contact with their advisor on a regular basis.  They felt more assured.  They had a person that was looking after their interests.

As a business owner, you need to contact or touch your client base a minimum of 12 times a year.  The benefits are meaningful and measurable.   The reasons are:

1.  Client Retention – It costs less to keep a current client than to attract a new client.

2.  You can increase your share of the client’s spending in the market you represent by creating cross selling opportunities.

3. You increase your chances of obtaining referrals.  By keeping your name in the client’s mind, you are more likely to get a referral when the subject of your product or service arises in conversation.  This type of client is called an engaged client, and 3 times more likely to refer you than a client that doesn’t feel connected.

How you engage your client list is up to you, but you need to make sure that you:

1.  Communicate

2.  Educate

3.  Manage your client’s expectations by focusing on customer service.

Communicating with the client is obviously best if done personally.  Make sure your CRM  is updated with important dates like birthdays, and call your clients to wish them a happy birthday.  DO NOT MARKET during these calls.  Just make a friendly call to say hello.

E-mail marketing is also a great way to keep in touch.  I use Constant Contact, but Mailchimp is also very good and seems to be less expensive.  When I use Email, I try to tie a theme together with an event that has happened to me and that my clients can relate to.  Then, I try to tie products to my theme and let people know that I am there to satisfy their insurance needs in these areas.   I do market.  I do cross sell, I do want more business from my client base.  Further, I actively ask my clients for referrals.

I am always looking for new ways to reach out to my clients.  I want them to know how important they are to me and how much I appreciate them.  You should too.

I was driving into work the other day listening to my favorite talk show host, when I saw a billboard that drew my attention.

AUTO INSURANCE FROM $150.00

CALL JOE BLOW INSURANCE  XXX-XXX-XXXX

I am an insurance agent. I have owned my own agency for 20 yrs. I know what insurance costs.  I know that there are many variables that go into the pricing of insurance.  Can an insurance policy be had for a paltry $150.00?  Sure, if the stars are aligned, you have A-1 perfect credit, you live in the lowest risk area of town, and you pick the barest of minimums for coverage. 

So, why bring this up?  I do so because I feel this type of advertising is akin to lying.  It is bait and switch all the way.  Progressive insurance avertises that we can “name or own price”, but what do you really get? Do you really protect your investment? Do you really protect your family?  Do you really get protection?  No! No! and Hell No!  You get what you pay for and that is that.

You must be saying “What gives?  This is a blog for Internet marketing.”  Well, true that!  But this story cuts to the core of all advertising.  Flash is just flash.  Style over substance can work in the short term, but long term, substance will ALWAYS win out.  I am very impressed by cool websites, but I am more impressed by the professional behind the scenes.  You may pay thousands of dollars to develop your site, but if you can’t back it up with the same level of customer service, it is all for naught.  At the same time, remember that you need to not be pennywise and pound foolish.  A cheap website with no bells or whistles to enable ease and convenience for your customer is worthless.

Further, you need to be active in the design of your site.  Look at the competition.  What can you do to imitate their ideas (don’t steal ideas – imitate), while at the same time improving on what has been done?

You do not need to have bright lights and dancing girls.  You need a solid product or service and you need to convey to the world their need to see you about it. 

Substance and style do matter when they work together, but misleading people only leads to failure.