Ready or not: You’re running a media company!
I was in Nashville last year talking to some of the great folks who own and operate Denny’s franchises. As I did a little research on the local food scene, I discovered that – as with just about any city – there’s a healthy debate going on over who serves the best hamburger in Nashville. A couple classic burger joints are always in the running: Rotier’s and Gabby’s. (Rising country star Brett Eldredge weighed in on Gabby’s side.) But it’s not the merits of their burgers that I want to discuss here. I want to point out the fact that both of these fine burger institutions have recognized a fact of business life today: Every business is a media business. Owners of any local burger joints who think they can be successful by merely having the formula for a great burger, are very mistaken. Knowing how to publish media is just as important. (In this arena, I would probably say that Gabby’s enjoys a slight lead over Rotier’s. Check out the screen shots.) Not only does Gabby’s have a strong presence on FaceBook and Twitter, it has its own TV channel courtesy of YouTube! By the way, Gabby’s not only has a Facebook wall, it has a wall in its restaurant where customer photos are posted. They use their Gabby TV video to encourage people to send in photos and say what they would like to see posted on Gabby’s homepage. You see, even if you’re a hole-in-the-wall burger place that’s only open for lunch, you can still reach and engage your customers via the social media. Having an active social media publishing program keeps your business top of mind. Let’s say that this level of engagement might result in one or two additional visits per year. That kind of extra business adds up…and it may take a little business away from a feisty competitor…like Rotier’s. Just sayin‘. The important idea that I want to leave you with is that you absolutely must embrace your business as part chosen-industry and part media company. Your challenge, then, is to embrace and leverage the social media that will work best for your target market. Again, I think we can take a lesson from both Rotier’s and Gabby’s. They have established a presence on a variety of social media platforms, although if you dig a little more deeply, you’ll discover which they favor with the most posting activity. You’ll find some good guidance with regards to demographics in this article, but you’ll want to keep track of how well your selected social media platforms work for you. Use the analytics provided by each platform to see how you’re doing. You can also find which types of posts get the most engagement. You may discover that a certain platform isn’t worth your time and that will give you a little more time to post to and improve your targeting with the social media platforms that do a better job engaging your audience....
read moreEmployee Automobile Cell Phone Use: The Dangers and Your Liability
April is distracted driving awareness month and while you, as a small business owner, might think that all you need to do is give a little pep talk to your crew about the dangers of mobile device usage while driving, the situation is actually much more serious than that. There are many situations where you could be held liable for damages that result from an accident where an employee of yours is behind the wheel. Court rulings have made it clear that when an employee is acting “within the scope of employment,” the employer can be held liable. By the way, this doesn’t have to be within your standard nine-to-five workday. (We all know that today, when we keep our cell phones on the nightstand, the business day can be 24 hours long.) Further, it doesn’t matter if your employee is on his or her own device (rather than a company phone or tablet) when the crash happens; if the employee is acting within the scope of employment, you’re still on the hook. Financial and physical dangers The problem isn’t a small one, nor is your financial liability the only danger: Automobile crashes are the number one cause of workplace deaths. Even if you somehow manage to escape financial liability in the case of an accident, you may very well lose a valued and loved member of your small business team. Reporting the statistics on crashes related to mobile device usage is unreliable due to inconsistencies in how the data are gathered…or not gathered at all. But the accidents where mobile devices play a role certainly number in the hundreds of thousands. A 2014 estimate from the National Safety Council (NCS) put the number at nearly 250,000, and that was even before the year had ended. Small business cell phone policy It’s clear that small business owners need to take action to guard themselves financially and protect the safety of their employees. To get you started, the NCS offers a free cell phone policy kit and also has a series of 12 short videos that answer questions about cell phone use and driving. You need to make it clear to everyone on your team that you have a zero-tolerance policy regarding mobile device use while driving – and this includes texting, talking or even “hands-free” use. Unfortunately, studies are proving that moving to a hands-free system does little to nothing to improve the driver’s cognitive ability. Finally, don’t merely mention this topic once in a meeting and then drop the subject. You need to consistently reinforce your policy and its importance. Sadly, virtually everyone agrees on the dangers of cell phone use while driving, but at the same time nearly half admit to texting while driving. Leadership required This means that for many of us it’s not a case of ignorance, it’s a case of having the willpower and discipline to do what we know is right. This is where your leadership can play an important role by consistently and repeatedly stressing how critical it is to never talk and drive or text and drive. Let your team know that you expect them to safely pull off the road whenever they feel they must communicate via a mobile device. Safety first – in all things. PS – One...
read moreThis Week in Small Business: 15 tips and tricks, $15 minimum wage and 15 lousy industries
Fifteen seems to be a magic number this week. We have 15 SEO tips and tricks, the 15 least profitable industries and the impact of a $15 per hour minimum wage in San Francisco. Need more than 15? How about 53 great ideas for blog posts? Leadership, management and productivity Are you talking to your customers? It could be the most important thing you do in your small business. Sometimes we can get distracted by the details. This article discusses the one thing you must have to achieve small business success. There are a lot of benefits to being recognized as an social media authority, but merely being on Twitter doesn’t get the job done. Small and medium-sized businesses are taking two distinct paths for growth: mergers and acquisitions versus launching new products and services. Here are some interesting survey results. Investing in yourself and getting help for your small business virtually always pays an impressive ROI. Marketing and sales Jonathan Ebenstein, managing partner of Skoda Minotti Strategic Marketing, offers five steps to turn strangers into profitable customers. Anyone hunting for a good – and thorough – look at social media marketing should check out this post from Hootsuite. But if you’re ready to take the next steps in content marketing, Neil Patel has put together an advanced guide. There’s a lot of money to be made in niche marketing and this article from the Shopify blog offers a lot of tips on how to market within a niche. Carter Hostelley discusses how social media can help you optimize your B2B account-based marketing. Need ideas for blog posts? Here are 53 good ones. If you’re serious about optimizing your return on email marketing, you must have a strategy. These 15 SEO tips and tricks from Sujan Patel, will definitely help boost your content marketing efforts. Entrepreneurship, startups and innovation Need money? Here are seven ways to find investors for your startup. Ted Coiné discusses the simple question that must obsess all entrepreneurs. Know what it is? Please! Avoid these 15 least profitable small business industries. (You’ve been warned.) Politics, government and the economy The IRS clock is ticking down. Have you eliminated these three small business tax time worries? See how a $15 minimum wage is impacting three businesses in Baghdad by the Bay (that’s San Francisco, by the...
read moreWhat do you know about Small Biz SEO? Take the Quiz!
Basic knowledge of and the willingness to implement search engine optimization is fundamental to achieving success with any website. Without good SEO, your website will never get found by your prospects who are using search engines like Google. Here is a short quiz to help you see if you have a grasp of some of the SEO basics. If you don’t score as high as you thought you should have scored, scroll through these articles on SEO to build on your understanding. (Correct answers will appear green when submitted.) facebook...
read moreBreaking News and 5 Tips for Instagram Marketing
If your small business has a following on Instagram, you need to understand how the algorithm governing its news feed has changed recently. Items used to appear chronologically in the news feeds of your followers, so if your followers checked their Instagram accounts shortly after you posted something, your photo would appear at the top of their news feeds. That has changed. Instagram, as you probably know, is owned by Facebook and the Instagram news feed algorithm has been reworked to parallel how items appear in the Facebook news feed. Items that generate more Instagram user interest get priority news feed placement – or items that Instagram believes will be of more interest get better placement. This paves the way for more profitable advertising in the Instagram news feed. However this ultimately plays out, it shines a very bright spotlight on the importance of engaging your followers on Instagram. You need to do everything you can to prove to the new algorithm that – darn it – people like you! With that goal in mind, let’s look at five strategies that will help you engage your followers and gain you new (engaged) followers. 1. Capitalize on the special interests of your customers. What are your customers passionate about? Maybe it’s sustainability. Use a “hook” like that to build your Instagram marketing around. Create a hashtag. Use other general hashtags related to your topic of choice so you can branch out to new people. “Diversity” has been a mainstay of American culture for a generation and the Internet has allowed us to push diversity further than ever before. This is great for marketers because it creates all kinds of “micro-niches” that can be exploited. Find these niches and use Instagram to develop them. Hint: Sometimes you can discover these micro-niches by looking at the long-tail keywords that perform best for you. 2. Feature your employees (great for a local business). With all the talk about moving jobs overseas, let people know that your hire locally and support the local economy. Have your employees post to your business Instagram account showing their activities in the community. When your employees post, they bring in their social network following, so you can greatly increase the size of your digital marketing footprint with zero cost. 3. Post a discount code via Instagram. Create a custom graphic or just have an employee hold up one of those hand-written signs with a discount code and other offer details. If you do this on a regular basis, you can get your customer tuned into what you’re doing and they’ll regularly check your Instagram feed to see if you’ve posted any more discounts. 4. Get your customers to post using a hashtag you’ve created. If there is any “lifestyle” angle to your business create a contest where people post pictures of your products being used in their lives. This can also be adapted to the B2B environment in many cases. Pick one random winner each month for a discount, special recognition or a prize. As with encouraging your employees to post, when you get your customers involved, you also get their social network followers involved. 5. Let your followers know that some of your special offers are ONLY communicated via Instagram. As with any social media marketing, you need...
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