• Facebook
• iOS
• Android

Additional development skills such as the following would be greatly appreciated:

• WordPress
• Genesis theme framework

The candidate MUST also understand, and be able to implement, a RESTful API that can be used to create the apps across the above platforms. This is an ESSENTIAL part of the position.

We’re going to ask you to present us works you’ve done, so you must have an updated portfolio.

Aside from the above requirements, it’s very important to realize that we’re not just looking to hire someone that can be replaced within a few months. We are looking for someone who is a match with our organization and culture. Therefore, the following qualities are needed:

• Outstanding communication in English
• Punctuality
• A sense of urgency
• A sense of humour
• Patience
• An eye for detail (e.g. one of the reasons businesses hire us is so that they don’t have to worry about getting things pixel-perfect or glitch-free)
• Ability to adapt / learn quickly (new skills, new deliverables, new teams etc)

———————————————-

As our job says, we’re hiring on a per-project basis. For every project, a WordPress minisite, Facebook app, iOS and Android app are required all using the RESTful API.

We have multiple projects per month, and need to find someone who is all of the above to outsource to on an ongoing, frequent basis.

The budget for each project, all inclusive of the above deliverables, is approx. 5,000 USD (negotiable both ways depending on the quality of candidate).

We’re interested to talk to you, and wish you the best of luck in the recruitment process.

Please only apply if you meet the above criteria to save everyone’s time:

careers@easisell.com

Best,
Clément Yeung

The post Mobile and web app developer extraordinaire appeared first on Business Unusual.

Of course, this isn’t the case.

Your site’s conversion rate is influenced by other factors – factors that are NOT necessarily on your website.

Conversion Influencers

Understanding these off-page factors that influence your site’s conversion rate will help you move the conversion rate needle as much as possible and turn things in your favour.

Let me give brief explanations of some of the factors mentioned:

How You Communicate

Your conversion rate is influenced heavily by how you communicate. I’m not just talking about your copy,  but more about:

• HOW you say what you say – your communication style, personality
• The media you use (e.g., video, audio, webinars, newsletters, etc)
• How persuasive you are when you address your prospects’ questions and objections

Remember that when you communicate, it’s not about you, it’s about THEM.

It’s not about your offer, but how your offer can help your prospects live better, happier, easier lives.

It’s not about what a God’s gift to humanity you are, it’s about how your offer can turn your prospects into sexier, healthier, richer, more good looking, more fulfilled, more peaceful, joyful human beings. You get the idea.

Your Marketing Funnel Design

Your marketing funnel is the process you use to turn a prospect from being a stranger, into one of your raving fans or (better yet), business evangelists.

An over-simplified marketing funnel looks like this:

Traffic Source -> Lead capture form -> Communication -> Sales Page

Where:

• Traffic source = SEO, Social Media, blog post, video, advert, referrals, PPC, etc.
• lead capture form = give away a freebie to get prospects’ contact details
• Communication = could be a newsletter, periodic emails, weekly videos, webinar, etc.

Like anything you do, you must test your marketing funnel design to find the optimal process.

For example, some people’s marketing funnel looks like this:

Traffic Source -> Lead capture form  -> Sales Page

or

Traffic Source -> Sales Page

or

Traffic Source -> Lead capture form -> Communication -> Relationship Building -> Free Consultation or Product Tour -> Sales Page

Conduct tests and find out if a specific product convert better when you change or rearrange the marketing funnel. For example, if you’re selling a complex, highly technical offer that’s new to the market, you might want to send prospects to an educational material first (a webinar or a teleseminar or video series – whatever works) before you make an offer.

At this point I’ve pretty much said things you probably already know. Now let’s tackle other factors that affect your conversion:

The Complexity of the Sale

Selling a product that could pass as an impulse buy (e.g., it’s cheap, there’s little or no risk involved even if it turns out to be a bad buy) is not the same as selling a product that’s expensive, requires ongoing investment, tricky to maintain, and risky (if the buyer made the wrong choice they could lose their savings, or lose precious time or lose face, etc)

Consider the buyer’s thought processes, their buying behaviour and the buying process they would use when they evaluate your offer.  When you plan your sales and marketing processes or when you design your website, consider how complex a purchase of this sort is.

If you’re selling something and the purchase typically involves more than one decision-maker, modify your communication strategy so you address the concerns and buying motivations of all the potential decision makers.

The Quantity & Quality of Traffic You Attract

Are you attracting targeted, qualified traffic?

Are you attracting “the MAN”, or the person with the Money, Authority and Need?

Or perhaps your communication strategies are appealing to people with the need but not the money or authority?

(If your webpages have bounce rates higher than 60%, it might be because you’re attracting the wrong crowd in the first place.)

Importance/Urgency

Think of need as a spectrum that we can describe this way:

1. “Do I really need it? Hhhmmm …”
2. “I like it, but I think I can live without it for now”
3. “I want it. I’ll get it when I have XYZ sorted out”
4. “If I don’t get it today or this week I’ll be screwed.”
5. (critical) “I must have this NOW!”

Your prospects will be at varying levels of this spectrum. Their level of need/urgency is also affected by many factors (not just your persuasion skills), but  with some skill, you can slowly but surely take them from level 1 to level 3, and then from level 3 to level 5. It might just take some time and patience

Prospects’ Level of Sophistication

How well your page converts is affected by:

• Your prospects’ level of knowledge about your offer
  Ask me to buy a car and I wouldn’t have a clue what to look for, what questions to ask the salesperson or how to spot a good/bad deal. But ask me to hire a personal trainer and I’d know exactly what to look for and how to evaluate whether or not a certain trainer is worthy of my time & money.
  The same goes for your  prospects. If your offer involves many complex things to evaluate, many of your prospects likely need to be educated first.  So instead of pressuring them to “buy now”, focus on educating them and genuinely helping them make the right decisions for them.
• Their confidence in themselves to make your offer work for them.
  Sometimes people don’t buy NOT because they doubt the effectiveness of your offer or your ability, but because they doubt their own ability to take your product/service and make it work for them.
  Sometimes, raising your conversion rate may NOT be a matter of telling prospects to buy, but more a matter of empowering them and helping them believe that they – with your help and expertise and good looks – can make it work.

Perceived risks

Risks pertains to:

• The level of investment you’re asking them to make (time, money, resources)
• The potential repercussions to them if they make the wrong decision
• How much they trust you
• How credible you are in their eyes; How they perceive your company, offer or brand

The trick of course, is to demonstrate to them that the benefits of going ahead with you far outweigh the risks. Put another way, demonstrate to them that they could potentially be in a much worse situation if they don’t make the change you’re asking them to make.

Your conversion rate is influenced by factors that happens before your visitor landed on your site.

Your competitors

Even though your competitors’ strategies and tactics are outside of your control, their effects on your prospects can be influenced or counteracted by your own strategies and tactics.

Prospects’ economic or personal situation

Sometimes there are  people who really want to buy your stuff or hire you, but the timing isn’t right or their economic situation doesn’t leave much room for all the purchases they want to make.
Consider putting marketing strategies to help these people take the next step with you when they are ready.

The Macro environment

When the Nuclear catastrophe happened in Japan, I heard that sales of geiger counters online practically rocketed. If you’re one of the merchants selling these products, you’d know that the sudden rise in your conversion rate had nothing to do with your brilliant copy.

There are things that are happening outside our direct control or influence:

• environmental factors
• political situation
• influential events in your industry/marketplace
• cultural background of your prospects
• Legal restrictions

Conclusion

Raising your conversion is not just a matter of design or sales copy or changing graphics. There are many other factors that play a part, so do your best to influence a much of these elements as you can.

Although there are things that are outside of your control, it helps being aware of them and to strategize how you could respond to these influences.

The above list is by no means complete, so feel free to edit the table and add your “conversion rate influencers”!

The post Factors that Influence Your Site’s Conversion Rate appeared first on Business Unusual.

1. Getting enough targeted, qualified traffic

2. The percentage of your traffic that converts into paying customers

3. Your customer retention rate, and the number of customers who turn into your evangelists.

Interestingly, many online entrepreneurs these days are still only working on getting more traffic, traffic, traffic. Lots of courses and ebooks are being sold about increasing traffic. A lot of hype is built around traffic, but very little is mentioned about conversion optimization.

I find this weird, because actually for smaller businesses (who have more limited resources compared to bigger businesses), working on increasing their sales conversion has more advantages (and could yield more ROI) compared to trying to get more traffic.

(Don’t make the mistake of saying SEO or Social Media Marketing (SMM) is “free traffic” because SEO and SMM take a lot of time – plus constant, continuous implementation. Unless you have slaves working for you for free or you consider your time to be worth $0 per hour then yes you can say doing SEO and SMM are “free”)

Think about it:

Suppose you’re selling a product worth $100, and you’re getting at least 200 visitors per day to that product page. Let’s suppose that you currently  have 0.5% conversion rate (for every 200 visitors, 1 person buys).

Now let’s pretend that instead of trying to get more visitors per day, you focus your efforts on increasing your conversion rate instead.

Product price $100/unit

Traffic 200 visitors/day

Conversion 0.5%  (1 purchase per 200 unique visitors)

= $100 gross revenue / day

What if you are paying about $1.00 per click? That means you are actually spending $200 to get 200  daily visitors. So effectively you are making a loss of $100 if your conversion is 0.5%! To illustrate :

Traffic Cost 200 visitors/day x $1 per click = $200 per day

Conversion 0.5%  (1 purchase per 200 unique visitors)

= $100 gross daily revenue MINUS $200

equals – $100 loss per day

If you are using exclusively PPC or other paid means to drive traffic to your site, it’s even more VITAL for you to actively optimize your conversion rate. Otherwise you’ll be constantly in the red.

Now what if you made a change to your website and it resulted to a new conversion rate of 2%? That means going from making 1 sale a day to making 4 sales a day. In terms of dollars, that’s going from $100 to $400 daily gross revenue.

Product price $100/unit

Traffic 200 visitors/day

Conversion 2.0%  (4 purchases per 200 unique visitors)

= $400 gross revenue / day

MINUS $200 (traffic cost)

= $200 per day

So just by getting from 0.5% to 2% conversion rate, now you are making a net profit of $200 as opposed to a $100 loss - from the same amount of traffic!

Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO) is that powerful. It can literally make or break your business.

Simple Changes, Big Gains

Now what if all you did was actually change the headline of the copy?

Or change the graphics at the top of the page?

Or you renamed the product from a vague name to something more benefit-oriented?

Yes, simple, little changes like these could actually result to big increases in conversions. Sometimes changing the headline or header banner of your sales page could dramatically change your results. Sometimes, restructuring the order of how certain elements appear on your sales page could be the difference between breaking even and making a profit.

(Caveat: not all changes you make will result to higher conversions. That’s why conversion testing is done, to establish which versions generate the most desired responses)

So now I hope you understand exactly why more traffic doesn’t necessarily mean more sales. You could end up spending lots and lots of time and money trying to generate traffic, but if your conversion sucks, you could end up at a loss.

We’re not saying “don’t try to increase your traffic” – NOT at all. What we’re advocating is that if you want to get the most out of the existing traffic you have, you must start optimizing your conversion.

If you don’t, you could end up joining others who are earning the money they’re earning now, completely ignorant to the possibility of doubling, tripling or even quadrupling their monthly revenues!

Want to improve your website’s conversion? Sign up to our newsletter or subscribe to this blog’s feed via RSS to receive more free tips that you can apply to your business right away!

The post More Traffic Equals More Sales? The Traffic Myth Debunked appeared first on Business Unusual.

Follow her on Twitter: @yetunde.

The post Driving Effective PR: An Interview With Yetunde Taiwo appeared first on Business Unusual.

She is also a representative for the Nike Women Under 30 CEO movement, a blogger for Forbes, a mentor for the Visa Business Network and has grown a thriving online community by being hands-on and practical with running a business whilst on the go.

I catch up with Natalie on the Huffington Post in this in-depth interview and find out what makes a successful Suitcase Entrepreneur:

Click here to watch the whole interview on the Huffington Post.

The post The Suitcase Entrepreneur: An Interview With Natalie Sisson appeared first on Business Unusual.

There, I’ve said it.

But that’s ok, because frankly, so does ours. And your competitors’. And your mom’s website. And your grandad’s. In fact, everyone’s website sucks.

Don’t you find it interesting that in spite of the many stealthy, magic and ninja tools available to us internet marketers, we somehow still manage to screw up and create web pages that have less than 1% conversion rate (CR)? Indeed, it’s regarded impressive to have a 3% conversion rate.

But why settle for a 3% conversion rate? – 1-3% response rate is typical of the offline direct response world.

Online, we have so much more tools available to us that give us so much more edge over your offline counterparts.

For example, when we advertise, we could ensure that only targeted traffic will see our offer. There are tools that would enable one to know exactly what the prospects clicked, where they came from, how they interacted with the website, how they found the site, etc – so, armed with such market intelligence, shouldn’t we be able to command a higher conversion rate?

Hell yeah!

How much higher could you aspire to? Check out the conversion rate of the Top 10 Online Retailers:

Top 10 High Converting Retailers Websites as of March 2010

There are reasons why website like these are converting at above 13% and your site isn’t.

Today I’m going to list 8 questions you could ask yourself that would help you gain insights on what potential actions you could implement that would help raise your site’s conversion.

So take your time to ask yourself (and answer) these 8 Questions…

1. Do I know my customers REALLY well?

Many marketing efforts are not effective precisely because they fail to speak directly to the prospects’ deepest needs and desires.

If you know your target prospect – their deepest fears, their highest hopes, their most frustrating problems, the thoughts that keep them up at night and the stuff they daydream about, you will know exactly what to say in order to persuade them.

So your first task after you get off this webinar is: get to know your prospects. Find out everything you need to know about them.

2. Is my Unique Value Proposition (UVP) clear?

Is it obvious what you do, what benefits you offer, and for whom? (Will visitors be able to discern those within 5 seconds from the time they hit your site?)

Is it clear what makes you different to the other providers in the marketplace? (Sure, they need the widget you’re selling, but why should they buy FROM YOU?)

One effective way to communicate your UVP effectively is doing the “5-second-man-from-Mars test”. That is,  ask someone (ideally, a member of your target market who has never been to your website) to look at your website for 5 seconds then look away.

Then ask them what your site is all about, what your business does, and for whom. If they didn’t get all those just by looking at your site for 5 seconds, you need to make your value proposition clearer.

3. Does my site/page address potential questions/concerns/objections they may have?

One of the top reasons for shopping cart abandonment is because the prospect didn’t feel confident about moving forward.  This may be due to lack of information (you didn’t provide enough information), or they didn’t feel going ahead was safe, or that the perceived risks of not buying was much less than buying.

4. Does my site elicit a trustworthy/credible image?

While many of your prospects may actually have decided they needed what you were selling, they decided to not go ahead because they perceived buying from you as a risk they’d rather not take. This could be because they didn’t think your website was secure, or that their credit card details could get hacked, or that they think your site looks cheap and therefore your biz might be a scam etc.

5. Does it reflect who I am and what I stand for?

Some buyers are Humanistic – they buy not so much because you are the best in your field, but because they feel you are trustworthy and honest.

They buy not so much because you are the cheapest or the most convenient, but because they resonate with your values and philosophy.

Some buyers don’t just buy what you are selling, they buy because they believe in what you stand for, and they believe there is so much value in what you are trying to accomplish.

So let your personality and your values shine

6. Does it provide easy/convenient means of contacting me?

Providing your contact details (and by this I mean telephone and address as well as email) and company registration number (if applicable) gives the visitors more sense of security, and assures them that you are legitimate and they can always call you should they have any questions.

7. Is the sales copy or web copy persuasive?

Your website’s copy is one of the main factors that will directly affect your conversion. Never underestimate its power.

8. Is my website/sales page easy to navigate/ user-friendly?

Are there clear and compelling Calls To Actions (CTAs)?

Is it cluttered?

Are there far too many elements clamoring for the visitor’s attention?

Is the right amount of emphasis placed on the right elements (if the main objective of the page is to generate you leads, is the lead-capture form being emphasized properly, or there are other elements getting the visitor’s attention?)?

———————

Simply by taking the time to reflect and answer these questions, and brainstorming for ways how you could improve your website, you would surely increase your conversion rate.

Be sure to create a to do list of what improvements you wish to implement, then prioritize your to do list by implementing those that don’t require too much resources and time.  If necessary, hire a website developer / designer to implement the changes you wish to do.

The post 8 Questions That Could Boost Your Website Conversion Rate appeared first on Business Unusual.

If you want to grow your business fast you’re going to need a fast forward button.

Okay, you know there’s no such thing. Maybe you’re right from one perspective, and wrong from another.

You can’t accelerate time in the normal way of thinking.  But time is a made up mental perspective.

Here’s why I believe that.

You would usually expect any business to take a while to get off the ground wouldn’t you?

I used to think that way.

But I found out how to jump ahead in time and become profitable with as many clients as you can handle.

And you can too with the right tools, right thinking and right strategies.

Here’s how:

Before you begin to implement your next marketing campaign segment each strategy into smaller action steps.

Think of this like a dial you turn one click at a time.

I’m going to use the five segments I believe to be the most powerful.

They are:

1. Identify problem
2. Identify person
3. Create uniqueness
4. Focus on finding
5. Solution partnering

Let’s look first at:

Identify problem

Think about your client’s problem, something that’s really getting under his or her skin.

I have a checklist for choosing products I want to either create or promote for others. It’s a seven point checklist I use as a guaranteed success guide.

Every time I use it I succeed. Every time I ignore it and let my ego run the show I fail.

The second on my checklist is:

What you offer must solve a common problem.

Note the emphasis on the word common. A lot of people must have this problem. They can’t fix it on their own because it’s too complex.

And that’s where you come in.

You must be able to solve this problem every time.

The three problems people typically pay the most to solve are:

• Money problems
• Relationship problems
• Health problems

And these are almost always the most pressing problems.

The next segment we’re going to look at is:

Identify person.

Who exactly is this person with this problem?

Once you figure out the type of person who has the common problem you know how to fix you would have pressed that fast forward button again.

You would jump about two years ahead of almost every other start up business.

So what do I mean type of person?

We’ll rewind a bit to type of problem. Let’s randomly choose health. And the problem is ageing too fast.

Who has this problem?

Women are concerned about their looks after the age of 35.  They begin to notice wrinkles and other signs of ageing.

When they are post menopausal they think almost no-stop about how old they are getting.

A woman of 50 would be a start. Perhaps she’s separated and looking for a romantic relationship so she wants to look and feel younger again.

And we know she is into complimentary health by the time she reaches 50.

The third of five is:

Creating uniqueness

The best two books on this subject are:

‘Reality in Advertising’ by Rosser Reeves.

He’s the guy that came up with the unique slogan for a brand of chocolate, ‘It melts in your mouth not in your hand.’

‘Positioning – The Battle for Your Mind’ by Al Reiss and Jack Trout.

I read this book when I first got started with my first ever client in 1990.  His business was called ’Bennet & King partnership.’  Not very sexy is it?

The book inspired me to come up with a name that meant something. So I created our uniqueness by coming up with the name ‘ChemClear,’ which described what we did: clear chemicals.

As an unknown waste disposal company we were soon doing business with blue-chip pharmaceutical companies.

Being unique allows you to ‘push the fast forward button’ and be seen as an established brand almost overnight.

It’s better than waiting years and having to say, ‘established since 1990.’

How boring it that?

Other uniqueness I’ve created includes:

Lacewood designs – for kitchens that work the way you do.

The Academy of Dynamic Development – The bridge to your goals.

There was a game shop in Salisbury can’t remember the name but they sold computer games so I dreamed up ‘virtual games at realistic prices.’

If you don’t want to use a slogan then capture the essence of what you do in your company name like I did with ChemClear.

And like I’ve done with ‘The Science of Getting Clients.’  This works because of the rhythmic value and the rhyming sounds.

I learned this from Eben Pagan who uses ‘Double Your Dating’ as an eBook title.

I also came up with ‘Startup Successful,’ which also rhymes. And like Double Your Dating has two D’s, Startup Successful has two S’s.

These make the name easier to remember.

And you get to stand out from the crowd and rise to the top of your potential client’s mind to the number one spot in your category.

How?

Because you create your own category.

When you do you’re automatically the best. People love doing business with the best.

Don’t you?

Focus on finding

The question I discovered for the genius marketer Jay Abraham was, “Who has your clients just before you do?”

This takes a bit of thinking power to come up with an answer to this insightful question.

So let’s use our imagination.

You have a clothes alteration business. You also repair clothes.  Who has your clients just before you do.

One possible answer is a off-th-peg clothes shop.  Someone slightly up market who doesn’t have a tailor.

You could approach them and say as a part of their service the offer to their clients they could come to your shop and get a 10% discount.

Another possibility is a laundrette. People often notice a broken zip or buttons missing when doing their washing.

A flyer in a local to you launderette would tell people what you do.

Create a solution focus partnership with the ideal authority figure in the client you want to attract.

Yes I know that’s a bit long winded but it saves you time when you know who your ideal client looks up to.

Here is where you go to someone who has access to your clients and your clients look up to them.

You could befriend someone like this by helping them in some way.  Or provide your product free for them to try.

Then you ask this person to endorse you to the people you want as clients.

That’s it.

You’ve identified the problem, the person, created uniqueness, found where your clients get together.

Then you asked for help by someone they respect, admire and trust.

The formula looks like this:



How about looking at a real life recent example of exactly how I used this formula?

Here’s what I did:

I have a client who sells a health product called wheatgrass.  The main benefit of the product is that it gives you back the vitality, strength and stamina you had when you were 10 years younger.

So let’s look at the five part formula and see how I used it.

1. Identify problem
2. Identify person
3. Create uniqueness
4. Focus on finding
5. Solution partnering

The problem is that people above 45 start to feel the effects of aging. I could go into this more deeply, but I think you get the picture.

The person with the problem is in my opinion women over 45.  Okay, there are men who notice the signs of slowing down at this age, but women actively seek to keep their youth, looks, and beauty far more often than men.

And we may as well go with the biggest market on this planet – - women.

Now we need to stand out from the crowd, so I gave my client the tag line, “Health by Choice – Not by Chance.”

This naturally implies that if you choose his wheatgrass you’ll have chosen good health.

The next part of the formula is where do you find this people. I suggested you’ll find women over 45 who want to slow down their aging process would attend a yoga class.

The last part was fairly easy. The guy who grows the wheatgrass is friendly with the head yoga teacher in his area.

In fact this yoga teacher was already taking the product and loved it.

So I asked my client to get an endorsement from this yoga teacher.  He not only got one, but two endorsements. The second was another well respected yoga teacher.

Only then do you create your marketing message. And that’s what I did.

Imagine you are a woman over 45 who attends a yoga class given by a teacher she admires, respects and trusts.

You’re given a letter with his photo on the front page and his words saying how good he feels the products is, and what a great thing his friend is doing by providing this to our community.

Would you at least read it?

Of course you would.

So phase one of our strategy is to take it directly to the yoga teacher’s class.

So far everyone who has read it has bought some wheatgrass.

The great thing is that almost everyone who buys the wheatgrass buys it every month.

That’s great for business.

Phase two is have this head yoga teacher phone other teachers in the area to tell them about the product and send them some letters to give out to their class.

Phase three is to get testimonials from people in this area and scale up by going to other yoga communities around the country.

I hope you enjoyed this look at how I use the fast-forward button to get start up businesses successful fast.

Of course there is more to it than this.

You now need to create a compelling marketing piece like I did in this example.

I have some great information on the do’s and don’ts of how to structure your marketing so that clients feel compelled to do business with you.

Get your free Science of Getting Clients Kit here.

——————————————————————————————————-

About the Author

Clive Cable is a master copywriter who has a 20 year track record of creating money making business launching promotions. Some of his sales copies made clients gross over £100K within the first year. Since 2003 his response rates have ranged from 7% to 38% (UK average is < 1%). He is a Founder Circle Member of American Writers and Artists Institute (AWAI), the world’s largest school of copywriting.

The post The Science of Getting Clients appeared first on Business Unusual.

Although I believe a sizeable chunk of this success is the result of good karma, there are certain things we’ve learned and implemented to get here and I’d like to outline those for you now, so that you too can increase the success of your own efforts throughout 2011:

1. Major in your passion until you get bored of it or you kick the bucket.

Making it your job to do something you are clearly not interested in is a surefire way to a quick business death. Contrary to common conditioning, it is very possible to make a living (and an amazing one at that) from doing something that you’re completely passionate about. Even if you don’t make a shit load of money, then at least you’re fulfilled.

2. Think big.

You want to make big progress? Then take adult steps. Set lofty goals – there’s a really good chance you’ll make them if you put your mind to it.

3. Take action.

At the moment, Jim Kukral’s Gmail chat status is: “Doers get what they want.” Sean Malarkey usually quotes Abraham Lincoln when he tweets: “Things may come to those who wait, but only the things left by those who hustle.” I generally listen to these two internet marketers because they practice what they preach and lead by example.

Any way you look at it, nothing ever gets done unless action is taken. If you want to get a ton of stuff done, then take a ton of action!

4. Hiding does not take danger out of the equation.

Stop curling yourself up like a ball. Instead, open up and be all you can be – experiencing massive success is more than worth the pain of negotiating the tough challenges on the way there.

5. SEO, SMO & CRO mean nothing if you don’t master in “Personal Optimization”.

The most important optimization in your business starts with YOU. If you cannot master your thoughts and emotions, then how the heck are you going to effectively manage your time and money?

6. Always be on the lookout for people/services/tools whose resources you could leverage.

Whether you’re at a networking event, you’re browsing the internet, or you’re taking a shower – there are opportunities passing by you at any time of the day. A lot of them go amiss, but many get noticed and some change not just business, but the world. As long as you’re on the lookout you’ll be equipped to catch them when they come along.

I recently had the pleasure of meeting Natalie Sisson, the owner of WomanzWorld. After working with her to redesign her site, we’re now in the process of putting together a kick-ass, stupendous webinar on what constitutes effective design which should kick off within the next 30 days. All of this stemmed from one blog comment.

7. Outsource as much as you can that you aren’t good at, but need done.

When you start taking massive action, this and #6 are going to be absolutely necessary to implement if you want to make your continued growth sustainable. Without help from others, you’ll have to do everything yourself and that’s just not possible when you have big plans. There are plenty of places to outsource your work depending on what you need done, but ScriptLance, oDesk & LinkedIn are some of the sites that I prefer. If you want to know all about how to use LinkedIn, I recommend you read Lewis Howes’ blog and connect with him on Twitter.

8. Aspire to be a true leader.

True leaders inspire their workforce, lead by example, maintain composure in the toughest situations, use clear & thoughtful communication, balance metrics & gut instinct, are honest with themselves as much as they are their workforce, take responsibility for their actions and the state of the business and follow through no matter what – among other things.

9. Build friendships, not relationships.

A new friend I recently made is James Coleman, the founder of Tech Room and an advisory board member for Apple. The majority of what we’ve spoken about to date has been outside the boundaries of conventional business, but rather of our passions, life and those little nuggets you just have to share for the sake of conversation.

When you make a friend, they become more than just a connection in a chain. They become a powerful force in your life who will help you any way they can to meet your goals, just as you would for them.

10. Work on eliminating what you can until you have left only what’s useful.

This doesn’t just go for physical items, but also intangible ones such as concepts, excess emotions, stress and such. The less you have the more focused you become. Focus on what MATTERS.

11. Use criticizm as an opportunity to better yourself.

See your “criticizms” as stepping stones to success. Think about it as a feedback system – you can either act on that feedback or not.

It’s also important to note that taking someone else’s opinion to heart is kind of… well, insane! If they have that opinion of you then so be it – that’s their business. What you think about yourself is what really matters. If you believe you’re worthy then nothing anyone else can say will ever bring you down.

12. Be strong enough to say “no”.

Chris Garrett says it perfectly in this blog post.

13. Have the confidence to ask for what you’re worth.

Dave Navarro talks about the 3 Reasons You’re Not Charging What You’re Worth and it’s a must-read for freelancers and business owners everywhere.

14. Communication is key.

If you have issues communicating what you mean when you talk, then you have a problem. If you have issues communicating what your business is and does when you market, then you have even bigger problems.

Both inter-personal and marketing communication in businesses are extremely common problems that can be solved with a little quiet time (introspection), careful review of past problem-scenarios and solutions on how to improve. If you can locate the root causes of the communications breakdowns then you can begin to fix them.

15. Be spontaneous – even outrageous.

Do you feel thrilled with life? If not, what the heck happened? When did it become mundane? Oh wait, I have a solution - BOMCHIKAWAHAH!

You totally didn’t expect that, did you?

16. Your language could be the reason for your shortfalls.

Ever notice yourself saying the most negative things when you’re simply walking around living your day to day life? If so, you’re not alone. Negative chatter is just one of the things that we have when we’re scared of the unknown for example. It can be so powerful that it filters into our verbal communication and vice versa.

By really focusing on being aware of when this negative chatter happens on – either in your head or through your mouth – simply noticing it should be enough to eventually ween yourself off of that behavior and this can open up doorways for you that perhaps you felt had been closed indefinitely.

17. Focus on customer experience, and continuous improvement.

The two most important things in the life of a business. The customer experience is intimately linked with the site conversion, word of mouth buzz, reputation, customer attrition and so on. Continuous improvement will guarantee that your customer experience and other elements of the business are always improving, not slipping.

—-

Thanks for reading this post – if you like it please share it with your friends. If you want to share your thoughts or your own top 2011 tips for business success, then leave us a lovely comment.

The post 17 Nuggets of Business Wisdom for 2011 appeared first on Business Unusual.

In these situations, we find ourselves faced with two options: fix the problems caused by the previous developers, or we scrap the whole website and start from scratch.

Often, the option that would bring the desired results and a higher-ROI is the latter option, but if that option is not viable for you at the moment, here are some of the most basic, non-technical, actionable tips that you can implement yourself to help boost your website’s ability to generate leads and prompt enquiries from prospects.

Landing Page Optimization

1. When someone visits your website for the first time, the very first question they seek to answer is, “What’s in it for me?”. So your home page (which is often the default landing page – or the very first page a visitor sees), must communicate what exactly it is that you do, what benefits/value you give, and who you do it for – in 5 seconds or less.

There are several ways you can do this, but one way is to include a tag line that summarizes what your company does in a customer-oriented way. Place your tag line so that it’s visible even if your visitor do not scroll down.

Unsure how to craft your tagline? Use a punchy, solution-oriented statement that emphasizes your unique value and describes your promise, using words your visitor would use.

2. The second concern most visitors have is, “Can I trust this person/business?”. Therefore, providing content/links to elements that boost your credibility is important:

• Provide links to your sample works and showcase the results and value you brought to your customers. If you have case studies and testimonials, showcase them.
• Include a link to your “Contact” page, and on that page include all contact information: email address, phone number and physical address.
• Include a link to your “About Us” page, with information about your business, your mission, and the people behind it. Team or staff photos add a touch of realness and humanity to a website, so include them as much as possible.
• Having a link to your business blog and posting amazing content on it regularly helps in getting visitors to perceive you as the real deal.
• Include a footer on every page of the website to reassure visitors that it’s a legitimate business, with:

a. Company name and business registration number (if applicable)

b. Contact details: postal address, email address, etc.

c. Landline phone number

d. Terms of Service link

e. “Privacy Policy” link

Copy Optimization

3. Communicate in a way your audience would understand. Don’t try to sound erudite, use highfalutin sentences and speak jargon – unless you are marketing to a crowd that speaks that way.

4. Give visitors enough information to help them understand what you do and how it relates to them, Have enough copy (not too short but not too long – about 200-300 words per page); it also helps search engines identify your pages as having enough information to help the searcher.

5. Use customer-focused, keyword-rich, well crafted messages that explains your competitive advantages and the the unique benefits of your offers. Demonstrate how you solve their needs, but don’t sound douchey, hypey or salesy!

6. Reading things online is different to reading things on paper.  Make it easier for your readers by using “benefit-rich” bullets and short paragraphs (40 to 70 words each) to make the content easy to scan.

Lead Generation

7. Design your website so that it pre-sells and generates leads for you. Offer to give prospects something they truly value (what we call a ‘money magnet’) in exchange for their contact details. You can read about how to create a money magnet here and how to create a high-converting lead-generation page here.

Links

8. I once came across a website and one of the navigation links was “Thingamabobs”. It led to a page selling kitchen gadgets, recipe books and a collection of other stuff.

I got confused so I clicked away.

Lesson: use words as your navigation links that your visitors would understand: About Us, Portfolio, Contact Us. Using “clever” words often cause frustration, it wastes users’ time, and it also does NOT help the search engines contextualize your site’s content.

9. Make your anchor text look obvious (‘anchor text’ are text that are linked to another page – i.e. clickable). The standard appearance is blue underlined text like this. For branding purposes, you might want to use a different color scheme, but keep in mind that some people are color-blind, so keep the underline.

10. Use links within your content area sparingly so readers don’t end up clicking away too much and getting too distracted.

11. Avoid using anchor texts like as “Click here” or “Learn more”. Use descriptive, action-oriented, benefit-rich and keyword-rich anchor texts instead, like “Download your free Digital Marketing video tutorials now.”

Graphics and Animations

12. Optimize graphics to web-appropriate sizes. Large files slow down page viewing, especially for those with lower computer specs or slower download speed.

13. Use images that truly supplement the message of your copy, instead of ones that serve as mere decors.

14. Flash intros, most often than not, are annoying. Most people don’t put up with it and they just click away. So ask yourself if you really must have it.

15. Video or audio should not autoplay, unless they are the sole content of the page. Give the users the choice to turn them on by displaying a PLAY button (and a call to action) prominently.

16. For maximum readability, it’s best to use black type on a white background. If you must stray from this for branding reasons, ensure there’s enough contrast between background and type, and the color palette should not hurt the eyes or cause confusion.

17. Overuse of bright, hey-look-at-me graphics and special font styles gives off a desperate, douchey look and feel, so use them sparingly or avoid it altogether. Limit font styles to 3 maximum per site. Don’t get too fancy.

Search Engine Optimization

18. Use your keywords in your Title tag (limit it to 70-85 characters max).

19. Use your keywords in your Meta Description. Write benefit-focused sentences that would compel your target audience to click (this may be displayed in Google SERPs; limit it to 150-185 characters)

20. Always write Alt tags to describe charts, photos and other graphics with relevant keywords.

Are these simple fixes enough?

Of course not. The problem must be viewed from a holistic perspective. Maybe your brand sucks. Maybe you’re not providing enough value. Maybe you don’t really understand your target market in the first place. You have to be willing to ask – and  answer – the really tough questions.

Your website is just one tool in your marketing mix. But if you’re currently frustrated with your website, if you plan to get your new website done, or if you’re contemplating a website redesign, it’s best to work with web developers who don’t just know what they’re doing, but they also seek to understand what YOU are doing – and work tirelessly with you to help bring your vision come to life.

If that sounds good to you, let’s talk.

The post 20 Website Conversion Optimization Tips For Your Business Website appeared first on Business Unusual.

This is a common situation that many business owners find themselves in. If you are in a similar situation – that is, if you are looking for ways on how to improve website traffic, increase web sales (improve conversion rates) – here are four fast, cheap and simple website optimization tips that you can implement right away:

1. Do Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the process of making your website pages get found more easily by people who use search engines to find specific information.

SEO begins with keyword research, or the process of finding out which keyword phrases many of your prospects type  in the search engines when they are looking for someone like you. For example, if you are a dog trainer in Dallas Texas, your prospects might be typing in Google the following :

“dog trainer in Dallas”

“Dallas puppy trainer”

“best Labrador trainer Dallas”

Once you have found what keywords are highly-searched for, use those high-demand keywords as basis for your website content. Here are a few things you could do to accomplish this:

• Write your web site copy using the keywords. For example, you could create an ‘About Me’ page and write about why you are the “best Labrador trainer in Dallas” .
• Once you have written content based on the keyword phrase, you could also put the said keyword phrase on that webpage’s meta title tag, header tag, and the page description.
• If you have an image on that webpage, be sure to write the image title and ALT text for that image using the keyword phrase, too.
• When you create links to that web page, use the keyword phrase as the actual clickable text (a.k.a. ‘anchor text’) that links to the said page (avoid just using ‘click here’).

The above action points are just part of what’s known as “on-page SEO”. You can boost traffic to your business just by knowing how to build perfectly optimized web pages.

Get started now and use Market Samurai to do your keyword research.

2. Build a Squeeze Page.

It’s shocking how most business websites are mere brochure websites. What you want is a website that generates as much leads for you as possible – on autopilot!

So what’s a squeeze page? A Squeeze page is a lead-generation page, basically designed for the sole purpose of collecting names and email addresses of prospects. For example, here’s a page we use to generate leads for us:

Once you’ve collected their contact details, you could seek to build further relationship with them via email marketing, or you could seek to engage them further via your lead nurturing process.

You can create your own squeeze page using Optimize Press, or you can just get us to build one for you. For a step-by-step lowdown on how to build your list of prospects on autopilot, read How to Make a High Converting Lead Generation Page.

3. Get Your Blog  On!

One huge mistake many businesses still do is NOT including Blog Marketing as part of their marketing arsenal. I don’t exaggerate when I say you are practically killing your business by not blogging.

Another mistake many businesses make is actually blogging, but blogging about the wrong things. These are what I call the ME-ME-ME business bloggers. They just talk about their offers, promotions and their idea of a blog post is a sales pitch.

If you’re guilty of this, STOP. Instead, create content that delivers great value to your prospects:

Help them solve a specific problem.

Answer some of their burning questions.

Give free advice designed to truly contribute to their lives.

Communicate what you stand for, what you believe in, and why you are doing what you do.

Make some waves! Ask questions that provoke reactions and challenge commonly held beliefs or practices within your industry.

All of these things could increase your influence and get them to perceive you as a credible expert in your field. If you blog often enough about the things that truly matter to your prospects, your blog would start attracting traffic from the search engines and your readers could also forward your content to their networks, thus helping drive traffic to your website.

4. Get Social

The ROI you’ll reap from using Social Media marketing could increase even more if you have a blog that frequently publish awesome content. Leverage social media to connect with key people who could then help bring your message to bigger groups of your targeted prospects.

These key people may be owners of businesses whose products & services complement your offers and they are marketing to the same target market, influential people within your industry who you can partner with, etc.

Just find out where these key people hang out – whether it’s Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or other blogs – then join them there, join the conversations they are having, provide value and continually engage them.

Many people have made Social Media complicated but it’s really just a tool or a technology, although a very powerful one. At the end of the day, it’s still all about connection.

Conclusion

Don’t just expect traffic to come to your website once you have built it. Traffic generation is an ongoing, deliberate process that you will need to learn how to do if you really want to make sales or generate leads via your website. There are many traffic generation methods, and two of the best ones are Blog marketing and Social Media marketing.

Click the link above to learn more about how exactly you can use these two tools help your business get found online.

From there you will be able to download:

• Our special Social Media marketing strategy roadmap
• Learn why you’re killing your business by not blogging
• Business Blog Buyer’s checklist
• and much more!

The post Website Optimization Tips: Four Fast Fixes To Get Your Business Found appeared first on Business Unusual.