5 Reasons Why Landing Pages Are a Must
Posted on 16. May, 2012 by John Jantsch in Blog, Duct Tape Marketing, Premise, Small Business Internet Marketing, Small Business Marketing, Social Media
Online marketers have used the term “landing page” for many years to describe a sales tactic focused on getting people to take one, specific action. Today, landing pages have simply become a required element in the marketing toolbox for every imaginable business, including local brick and mortar types.
Example of a personalized lead capture landing page
A landing page is just the page people land on because an ad or email directed them to that specific page as opposed to your site’s homepage.
Effective landing pages make it very clear what a visitor is going to get from a page and how to get it. That’s it plain and simple. There are many great articles on how to create better landing pages (including this one from Unbounce) but today I want to focus on why you need to create and use landing pages as a core online tool
Local content
One of the best ways to get your site to rank higher when people search locally and on mobile devices is to have lots of local content. Creating landing pages that feature very localized, down to the neighborhood perhaps, content is a great way to start building the local content and link necessary to have your pages move up in the search index for local search.
Social content
Sending your LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook connections to landing pages that are personalized to each network is a great way to deepen the connection. By running Twitter and Facebook feeds on these pages and acknowledging the connection with those that come from those networks you will also find a much higher degree of engagement in those networks.
Smart content
By creating landing pages that address the specific market segments, product segments or key content segments for your business you can begin to better funnel people to the specific types of content they desire. Using a tool like Survey Funnel in conjunction with your landing pages could allow a visitor to tell you what they are looking for and be directed to specific content based on their choices.
Lead capture
Landing pages are your lead capture workhorse. If you have a great eBook or free workshop to promote you may want to create signup forms for most of your web pages, but your signups will soar when you create a page that details, sells and demonstrates the benefits of acquiring your free report. A landing page with video, audio, images, descriptions and very intuitive call to action is a must for lead capture campaigns.
Advertising conversion
Any form of advertising will be much more effective if it is targeted to a page that contains nothing but content that supports the message in your ads. The more relevant the page to the ad, the more effective. Smart marketers constantly experiment with ad and landing page combinations, including creating keyword optimized pages for specific groups of PPC ads.
Get Premise
There are many resources geared towards helping you create landing pages, but my favorite at the moment is Copyblogger’s Premise. I run my entire website on WordPress and Premise is a WordPress landing page plugin that gives me total flexibility in the creation of landing pages. The tool includes predesigned configurations for sales pages and opt-in pages and is very easy to configure and style. A tool like Premise is a must if you plan to take today’s advice to heart.
5 Reasons Why Landing Pages Are a Must is a post from: Small Business Marketing Blog from Duct Tape Marketing
How to write & use white papers in your content marketing strategy
Posted on 01. May, 2012 by Laura in Blog, SEO Content marketing, Small Business Internet Marketing, Small Business Marketing, Tips and techniques
So what is a white paper? A white paper is a cross between a magazine article and a corporate brochure. As white papers possess both the educative qualities of a magazine article and the persuasive qualities of a corporate brochure, they are considered to be one of the most powerful tools for content marketing, lead generation, branding, and more!
How Can You Use White Papers In Your Content Marketing Strategy?
Below is a list of the different ways in which you can use your white paper as part of your content marketing strategy:
1. Generate leads
White papers can help you generate leads. They are normally used earlier in the sales cycle when the customer is still looking for the perfect solution.
Through its informative nature, a white paper helps to educate the client about the problem they are facing and what they need to do to solve the problem. After the solution to the problem is provided, an option to use a readymade solution is offered.
As all the informative content provided earlier in the white paper shows the reader that the company that produced the white paper knows what they are talking about.
By displaying their expertise, the company’s hope is that the reader will want to work with them – trusting their solution to them rather than trying to accomplish it on his/her own.
2. Improve your brand image
White papers don’t have to be just used for generating leads. They can also help you build a brand image by educating your readers. By exemplifying problems and their solutions, you can explain how your company is run or how you are managing a certain project.
A great example of this is a white paper by Carol Tice, which she wrote for a big software company. The white paper didn’t pitch a product or service to the reader. It simply educated the reader about how the company makes an effort to recycle computers.
This type of white paper not only helps build a good brand image – as in the above example, it showed that the company cares about the environment – but it also helps them generate new clients, as people who are passionate about protecting the environment will likely prefer to work with them.
3. Make your products or services stand out
Using a white paper you can show your clients that your product is better than your competitors. In the white paper you can analyse different types of services and their flaws and let your readers know how these problems could affect them.
After you have made the problems clear you could let your readers know what the best solution would be and write this solution in relation to your product or service. This will show your readers that your product or service is much better than your competitors and it will convince them to hire you.
An example is a white paper I wrote for an electrical services firm that offers its services to offices and homes. The white paper demonstrates to the reader why it’s better to use a proper firm that offers all services than to hire tiny firms or electricians who work on their own. This helps my client show potential customers that their service is the best option.
4. Build a mailing list
Having a mailing list is one of the most important requirements of a blog or a website as it can help increase traffic, build relationships and generate leads. Normally just trying to convince people to sign up to your mailing list can be an extremely hard task, but if you give them a free gift like a helpful white paper in exchange for signing up to your newsletter, you can considerably increase the number of subscribers you get.
How To Get Started With Writing White Papers
Writing white papers can seem like a daunting task, but by following the right tips and techniques, the process can be simplified.
A few tips to help you get started:
1. Read
Before you start writing white papers, you need to read all the information you can find about white papers. This includes books, blogs, and free guides you can find on the internet. This will help you learn a lot about white papers.
Another thing you could do is study well written white papers. This will help you learn more about what white papers are, how they are structured, how they are written, etc. Once you get to know how good white papers are written, you will find it easier to produce a quality one of your own.
2. Write
Once you know what white papers are and how they are written, you can start writing them. You can start writing your first white paper on an imaginary company or on your own company. This will give you some practice and experience to help you write better white papers in the future.
Writing can be divided into three parts:
a) Research
Before you do any actual writing you need to perform some research. Research can be in the form of reading and/or interviews. Read anything you can get hold of: website copy, other white papers, brochures, annual reports, articles, blogs, etc. Also interview the experts who work in your company. These experts can educate you about the product or service.
During this research process, find out more about the target audience and the best subject for your white paper.
During these interview and reading sessions make sure to take down notes of all the important points you come across that you think you could use in the white paper.
b) Structure
After you have gathered enough information for your white paper, you can outline its structure. A basic white paper structure starts with a headline, followed by an introduction. After the introduction the problems faced by the reader are discussed in detail and after that the solutions to the problems are discussed clearly. Finally, after the problems and the solutions comes the “persuasive brochure” section of the paper, which consists of the company information and product/service information.
c) Writing
Once you outline the structure and you know where all the information needs to be placed, you can start writing the white paper. Choosing the structure makes the writing part extremely easy. The writing part just consists of writing the content in the right places in the white paper. These are the places you’ve already decided while developing the structure.
After you finish writing the white paper, placing the appropriate content in the right places, you may find that you need to do some rearranging and rewriting so that all the elements flow logically. This final reworking and editing process will help ensure that your white paper is professional, educational and persuasive. You can then use your white in your content marketing, lead generation, and branding!
About the Author – Mitt Ray
Mitt Ray is the Director of imittcopy. He provides more white paper writing tips on his White Paper Blog, where you can download his free white paper on How to Write a White Paper. Mitt is also the Founder of Social Marketing Writing where you can download his free guide, “How to Promote Yourself With Pinterest.” He is also the author of the book White Paper Marketing. You can follow him on Twitter @MittRay.
Don’t miss out! The SEO Copywriting Certification training price is increasing to $769 on May 15th. Register now for the best price!
photo thanks to katerha (Kate Ter Haar)
Today I Think I Shall Blog in My Underwear
Posted on 23. Apr, 2012 by John Jantsch in Blog, Hugh MacLeod, Small Business Internet Marketing, Small Business Marketing, Vision
Odd as it may sound the title to this post isn’t really odd at all. In fact, most days I blog before the sun comes up and most days I wear whatever I feel like while doing so.
One of my favorite bits of Hugh MacLeod inspiration
Now, that doesn’t mean I’m not serious about my blog. It is quite easily the most important business asset I’ve built. Today’s post title, however, is a nod to the freedom that my blog and the Internet in general have created for my business over the last ten years.
This week, my friend and long time blogger, Hugh MacLeod releases his 3rd book, Freedom Is Blogging In Your Underwear, a sharp tongued tribute to the freedom we now have to work how we want, where we want and with whom we want. Hugh’s humor and wit, expressed through his unique characters and drawings, is one of the most inspirational romps anyone in the world of business can enjoy.
Hugh credits his blogging habit with altering the course of his business and personal life and creating the flourishing business that allows him to work at his craft.
A few words from Hugh:
I wrote the book as a love letter to the blogging, as it were. Blogging matters. Sure, the apps are good things. Sharing photos and finding out new restaurants is a definite positive. But as an artist, I come from a background where getting your work seen and heard was REALLY HARD. Gatekeepers galore. Had blogs existed back when I was a kid, a lot of my creative peers wouldn’t have given up their dreams in order to go do some bill-paying government job.And what’s true for artists is also true for ANYONE who gives a damn about their work. Too many voices, lost unnecessarily.
I too would make a similar claim. While some are quick to rush in and hail the next new online tool as the death of blogging, I would suggest that blogging is never going away. Blogging is the underpinning that launched a revolution of sorts in business and the only thing that will kill that off is a radical retreat in our desire to work in ways that allow us to control our destiny.
See, it’s not really about the tool; it’s about the behavior it unleashed. It’s about the fact that anyone, with any roots, experience, or desire could freely publish information directly to the audience they wished to influence. And that the stories, images, opinions and ideas shared would stand on their own merit and be consumed and shared by others regardless of what the established media, gatekeepers and experts said about it.
And for me it’s not even about the exposure my ideas enjoy. I wrote my first blog post in 2003 and knew immediately it was something important. It’s not that I knew blogging would become an essential tool, but I did sense that the act of blogging would change my business forever.
There are a few about blogging I did not know at the beginning, however, and it is these things that have produced the most profound and lasting benefits.
- Blogging would make me a better thinker – (understand that better is relative!) In an effort to create content for a blog that is succinct, reveals new ways to look at common things, or apply simple solutions to seemingly complex problems, I believe I now think about business much differently.
- Blogging would make me a better listener – When I engage in conversation or listen to radio interviews, I listen with a writer’s ear and often find my head filling up with blog post ideas by simply listening to others discuss sometimes unrelated subjects.
- Blogging would make me a better writer – The fact that I practice writing daily has made me a better writer. It doesn’t mean I’m the world’s greatest writer, but practicing something makes you better at it – hard to deny that. Of course writing publicly like this also allows for community reaction to help you get better faster.
- Blogging would make me a better salesperson – I write like I speak and often I write to sell an idea or even a very specific tactic. It’s amazing, but I find that clearly stating idea pitches in writing has improved my ability to quickly articulate them in a selling or interview setting. It’s like you build up this reserve bank of pre tested discussion points.
- Blogging would make me a better speaker – This one falls nicely from the previous point but I’ll also add that working through blog posts on meatier topics, those that readers weigh in on, has produced some of my best presentation material to date.
- Blogging would keep me focused on learning – The discipline required to create even somewhat interesting content in the manner I’ve chosen requires that I study lots of what’s hot, what’s new, what’s being said and what’s not being said in order to find ways to apply it to the world of small business.
- Blogging would allow me to test out ideas – I’ve made some incredible discoveries about some of my ideas (okay, and had a few flops too) based on the immediate and sometimes passionate response from readers. Many of the ideas in my upcoming book were tested and molded here.
- Blogging would make me a better networker – I have developed hundreds of relationships with other writers that provide me with ideas, tips and resources to share and who willingly pass on my ideas, tips and resources. Some of these relationships remain professionally on the surface, but some have evolved into very strategic and fulfilling personal relationships as well. (Sharing a beer at a conference helps that along)
- Blogging would allow me to create bigger ideas – This one is related to testing out ideas, but the habit of producing content over time also affords you the opportunity to create larger editorial ideas that can be reshaped and repurposed for other settings. I’ve taken a collection of blog posts on a specific topic and turned them into an ebook more than once.
So Hugh, thanks for the inspiration and to all the bloggers, readers, commenters, linkers, sharerers and grammar defenders that stop by, thanks for collaborating on the canvass that gives me the freedom to practice what I feels like art.
Today I Think I Shall Blog in My Underwear is a post from: Small Business Marketing Blog from Duct Tape Marketing
5 Ways to Make the Social Layer Pay
Posted on 13. Apr, 2012 by John Jantsch in Blog, Duct Tape Marketing, Small Business Internet Marketing, Small Business Marketing, Social Media
5 Ways to Make the Social Layer Pay
This content from: Duct Tape Marketing
As I continue to try to help small business owners and marketers embrace all things social, I’ve begun to talk about it in different terms.
We’ve moved beyond the notion that social media is department or even a set of tactics, but what is it then.
Il conte di Luna via Flickr
To me, for the typical small business, it’s a layer – a layer of data, behavior, access, engagement, awareness, and trust. And, like a typical layer, it serves to add to the whole.
I do a fair amount of outdoor activities and layering is an essential practice when you are going to be out for long periods of time under changing or unpredictable conditions. Every layer of clothing or protection is intentional and in some way supports the other layers, but it’s the whole of the system that may make the difference between comfort, and at times even survival.
I think that is the best way to look at your social participation. It’s not a stand-alone or even add-on activity, it’s a layer that allows you to do what you’re already doing more efficiently and effectively. Taken in that light and done with intention, there should never be a question about the payoff – it’s practically guaranteed.
Below are just five ways to view your social media activity as a layer of your entire system.
Move to email
Email is still the most effective form of marketing and relationship building. It is a tremendous tool for building the kind of long-term relationship that allows you to convert sales. While many have concluded that the same thing cannot be said for social media relationships, you can and should view your connections in these networks as a way to gain more email relationships. If you’re offering something valuable enough that people will exchange their email address to receive it, you can effectively promote that exchange in many social channels.
Find you referral champs
By appending your customer data with social media data, either by way of a service, API or CRM add-on, you can often discover your more active and potentially influential customers and prospects. It’s funny, but this information can hide in your standard customer profile because the way people act offline and the way they participate online is often dramatically different. A customer that buys very little from you currently may turn out to be your greatest potential referral champion, but go unnoticed and therefor ungroomed lacking this layer of data.
Understand your customers
I’ve often said that the ideal way to learn about the needs of your customers is to go home with them, hang out with them, find out what they like, don’t like, listen to, eat, drink and care about. Well, and you know where this is headed, guess what many people talk about in social media – yep, what they had for lunch today just might be important after all.
Improve your SEO
Great content isn’t great until somebody reads it, shares it and links to it. That’s the reality of the online inbound marketing world we live in today. It’s not enough to produce lots of great, education-based content you’ve also got to do things that draw attention and links to it. Social media participation is yet another layer, perhaps one of the most effective, for enhancing your search engine optimization, drawing eyeballs and those all-important inbound links to your content.
Build PR muscle
One of my favorite uses of the social media layer is the ability to draw closer to the journalists that cover your industry or community. Today’s journalist relies on social media as a lifeline to real-time information and as a tool for collecting resources – it also makes them much more available through direct communication. By targeting key journalists and using the social layer to build a relationship as a resource, you can quickly enhance your overall chances of media coverage.
How and Why to Create Smarter Content
Posted on 12. Apr, 2012 by John Jantsch in Blog, Duct Tape Marketing, Google Analytics, Klout, Small Business Internet Marketing, Small Business Marketing, Social Media
How and Why to Create Smarter Content
This content from: Duct Tape Marketing
For several years now people like me have been advising you to create educational content as a foundational element of your marketing – and many of you have listened and profited.
law_keven via Flickr CC
But, and you knew this was coming; it’s no longer enough. Now that pretty much everyone gets that content is a must, it’s time to send your content creation and distribution to school to get smarter and more sophisticated.
The technology that gives you the ability to tailor your web content to the more specific needs and attributes of individual visitors exists right now and is very affordable.
Smart marketers are using these tools to deliver entirely different web page, message, offer and browsing experiences tied to the history and known data of the visitor.
It just makes complete sense that someone that comes to your site by way of a very specific search term, for example, would respond better to content that specifically addresses why he or she came in the first place, rather than the default home page experience.
Starts with analytics
The engine that drives the smart content experience is data. To gain full access to this level of personalization you must use a tool such as Google Analytics or Spring Metrics (a client) that can allow you to access publicly available data on your visitors such as IP address and location.
You can further enhance this approach by integrating CRM data as well. Imagine how powerful it would be to deliver only upsell products to current customers or special offers and discount coupon content as a way to reward customer loyalty.
Social tells story
For years I’ve followed the notion that 20% of your customers offer the opportunity to produce 80% of your most profitable work and sales. This isn’t new math, most people get this, but the trick is oftentimes it is difficult to identify the 20% simply based on their past purchase behavior.
I believe that social media offers us one of the greatest opportunities to identify those 20% based on a layer of influence, sharing and activity. A seemingly small client, in terms of purchasing from you at the moment, may be your greatest referral source if treated as such. Adding the social layer of data allows you to put metrics to that assumption.
What would happen if, for instance, you were able to determine a customer visiting your site had a high Klout score and therefor equipped them with content, context and offers that made it easy for them to talk about you. We all know hotshot online folks that get all kinds of free stuff in hopes that they will talk about their experience. What if your content on your site could automate that for even the smallest business?
Location based content
In my mind, there are several very obvious uses for smart content. One of the first is location based. Imagine if you had a business with offices in a couple cities. What if you could deliver the hometown office info to visitors by city?
Services such as Get Smart Content are springing up to make this a very simple thing to do at the full page or even page region level. Imagine if you were holding an event in a specific community and wanted every visitor to your site from that community to get a sales message for that event while people from everywhere else got another message. Now you can.
Segment based content
Many businesses successfully sell multiple market segments that have very different needs. Imagine how powerful it could be to deliver market segment content based on how a visitor came to your site.
Get Smart Content founder Jim Eustace showed me a mini case study for truck dealership that sells a line of very green electric delivery vehicles as well as traditional commercial trucks. They found that it was rather easy to distinguish, through search queries, the very different content needed by these two market segments.
Cycle based content
By adding CRM type of data to the measurement mix you can customize content delivery on your site based on the history of a prospect. Someone that has come back to your site after requesting a free eBook by filling out a form or clicking on a link is probably ready for different information or even very specific product or service information based on their past activity.
There is no magic wand one can wave to make this work for every business. It is certainly a trial, test and refine project that will get it wrong from time to time, but even simple enhancements to what content gets featured and when can dramatically impact the initial and ongoing experience for your visitor and allow you to use content as a clear competitive point of differentiation.
Marketing Is the New Selling
Posted on 23. Feb, 2012 by John Jantsch in Blog, selling, Small Business Internet Marketing, Small Business Marketing, Social Media
Marketing Is the New Selling
This content from: Duct Tape Marketing
In order to thrive in today’s digitally driven business environment, sales folks need to think and act more like marketers. I suppose to some degree this has always been true, but it is painfully so now that prospects have access to mounds of information, have tools to deflect unwanted sales messages and have the ability to freely publish both flattering and unflattering information about the companies with whom they choose to do business.
So, in order to survive in this new world order salespeople need to take things in their own hands and connect much more deeply with the marketing side of things. I’ve often said that getting marketing and sales on the same page was one of the biggest challenges for departmentalized business, but now it’s become an individual challenge.
In the traditional model marketing owned the message while sales owned the relationship. In the new model there can be little distinction. Marketing must get better at relationship building and sales must get better at message building and delivery.
For the individual salesperson this means the following:
Listening is the new prospecting
While it has become much more difficult to gain access to prospects via phone and email, it’s actually become much easier to understand the individual needs of a prospect due in large part to social media.
Salespeople need to create their own socially driven listening stations via tools such as Trackur and HootSuite. They need to add social profiles in their CRM tools. Then need to create Google Alerts for customers and competitors.
Prospects and customers will voluntarily and publicly scatter sales clues if you listen actively. When you employ a tool like Rapportive you never have to pick up the phone or send an email to a prospect without digesting the last few things they said on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.
Educating is the new presenting
In days of old salespeople were encouraged to perfect their pitch. They still teach this in many sales training courses. The pitch became little more than they effective manipulation of proven psychological principles and gimmicks.
Today’s salesperson must be ready to teach, publish and demonstrate expertise. Every salesperson should answer questions via blog posts, engage in social media conversations and conduct online and offline seminars.
It is very hard for some to turn the selling off, but the ones that do are reaping the benefits.
Insight is the new information sharing
Our prospects have access to the best information in the world. They have access to all the information we put out, all the information our competitors put out and all the information shared by customers and partners about us and the industry in general.
This collection of information allows them get either very smart about what we are selling or very confused about what we are selling. Today’s salesperson must act as a filter and provide insight about the information.
Today’s salesperson must help the prospect understand the questions they need to consider before providing the answers. Today’s salesperson needs to get very good at helping the prospect aggregate, filter and condense the mass of information.
Storybuilding is the new nurturing
Stories are the greatest relationship builders. Good old Mister Rogers used to say – “It’s hard not to like someone once you know their story.”
Today the job of storytelling is a collaborative one. Salespeople must be able to relate the organization’s core stories to the world of the customer and they must help the customer build a new story that stars them in the leading role in a world where their problems and challenges are a thing of the past.
While this may sound like a nice fairy tale, the fact of the matter is that this is accomplished with proof over promise. Today’s salesperson must actively understand, measure and communicate the real results that clients achieve in every engagement. And they must bring those real-life stories to new customers and prospects.
Relationship building is the new closing
Whenever I hear the word closing all I can think of is Alec Baldwin’s epic speech in the film Glengarry Glen Ross. Well, today’s salesperson must always be building relationships.
Relationship building coupled with education makes traditional closing tactics a thing of the past. But this isn’t simply a call for more schmoozing; this is a call for genuine, mutually beneficial relationship building.
This includes building relationships with referral sources and strategic partners in ways that benefit your best clients as well as your partners. Today’s salesperson must build a relationship platform that allows them to provide introductions to anything that a customer needs to meet their objectives, regardless of how unrelated it may be to the products and services their organization offers.
Today’s salesperson can operate as a one person army, generating their own opportunities, creating their own leads, and taking control of their own direction by effectively applying the tactics of marketing to their proven ability to build relationships.
Is Your Marketing Producing the Results You Expected
Posted on 07. Feb, 2012 by John Jantsch in Avinash Kaushik, Blog, Duct Tape Marketing, Small Business Internet Marketing, Small Business Marketing, Social Media
Is Your Marketing Producing the Results You Expected
This content from: Duct Tape Marketing
Image:One-Fat-Man via Flickr CC
The poll question above is a bit loaded and, not that I want to skew the results, the answer for most lies in the fact that they don’t really know what results they expected or what result they are actually getting. Mostly they know the results aren’t what they had hoped for, but that’s another issue.
Setting expectations
One of the simplest, yet most effective, things you can do is set expectations or goals for your marketing. You can create overall revenue goals, campaign goals or more product or service specific goals, but either way, simply defining a target number will prove to be one of the best first steps.
Goals are like magnets in a way. If we define them and measure our results towards achieving them, they can produce some pretty dramatic pull.
I know this is an obvious bit of advice, but experience tells me that few businesses actually set real, tangible and meaningful targets. How many widgets do you need to sell this month? How many press mentions do you want to add this quarter? How many newsletter subscribers, webinar attendees or trial evaluations must you complete this week?
Measuring results
Once you define your marketing expectations you must define and track the most important indicators that will tell you if you are on track.
You can make this is a simple as a weekly sales total or as complex as the results of multivariate ad element testing, but the key is start measuring something and sharing the numbers.
If you’re not measuring anything, break a few key numbers down and figure out a way to produce a weekly spreadsheet that you use as a guide and also use to share with team members. Then start looking for ways to add key indicators to the list so in addition to simply measuring results you can start measuring individual effectiveness.
Add Google Analytics to your web site and pick up a copy of Web Analytics 2.0: The Art of Online Accountability and Science of Customer Centricity
by Avinash Kaushik.
If you’ve been measuring key indicators and you’re comfortable with a tool like Google Analytics, consider looking at a more advanced form of measurement from the use of a tool like KissMetrics. This tool can measure so many things that it can also overwhelm, so don’t start here unless you’ve mastered the basics.
10 Apps I Use Every Single Day
Posted on 05. Oct, 2011 by John Jantsch in Blog, dropbox, Duct Tape Marketing, Evernote, Hellofax, Small Business Internet Marketing, Small Business Marketing, TweetDeck
10 Apps I Use Every Single Day
This content from: Duct Tape Marketing
More and more, we’re becoming an app happy world – Apps that run on our laptops, apps for the mobile and apps for the iPad or tablet. Even better are those apps that sync across all of our chosen devices, keeping us on task and on track in an increasingly online world.
Below are ten applications that I use on a daily basis to get more done, manage more information, communicate more ideas and generally keep the plates spinning.
TweetDeck – This is my primary social media dashboard. It’s a desktop application that runs on Adobe Air and while there are lots of alternative choices, I’ve just always stuck with TweetDeck. I do however use the Twitter app for the iPhone too.
I have groups, lists and searches set up at all times and use the scheduled Tweets feature to meter out content I want to share throughout the day.
Evernote – This is my brainstorming, idea clipping, bookmark storing powerhouse. Evernote syncs beautifully across all devices and allows me to outline my life in so many ways without having to commit anything to memory.
I’ve stored everything from ideas for my books to wines I want to remember. Here’s my Evernote routine in case your interested.
Dropbox – This is my online backup and file storage tool of choice. I probably overuse this tool, leaning on it as a file server for my team as well as a backup for important files, but it just works so well.
I also use it to share large files and grant conference attendees access to my PowerPoint presentations.
You can see my Dropbox routine here.
Reeder – This is an app that turns my chosen RSS reader, Google Reader, into something much more functional and much more attractive.
I do most of my blog reading on my iPhone or iPad and the Reeder app gives me a ton of functionality. I can easily share a post on Twitter, clip to Evernote and bookmark to delicious right from the post in Reeder. Great time saver.
Dragon Dictation – This iPhone app (at least that’s the only version I use) allows me to speak a memo and have it converted to text. I’ve not really tested this out, but I think I could compose a blog post using this tool.
The app then allows me to email the text or manage it in various other ways. I use this tool whenever I get a flash of brilliance while driving or think of something when trying go to sleep and want to capture the idea right away.
HelloFax – Actually this is billed as a fax machine replacement, but I don’t really use that function. What HelloFax allows me to do is receive a document, like a contract, agreement, vendor form or non disclosure (I get lots of these.) that need edits and my signature.
Instead of editing, printing, signing, scanning and emailing back I simply download the document, upload it to HelloFax, make my edits, drop in my stored signature and email it back.
And 4 just for the Mac
Text Expander – There are dozens of snippets of text that I need to use frequently. Text Expander allows me to write chunks of copy once and then paste those chunks whenever I need to with a couple keystrokes.
I have entire emails that I send in response to certain requests, email signatures, blog sponsorship messages, and even HTML code snippets that I use frequently committed to short, time saving keystrokes that are easy to recall.
Pixelmator – This is my replacement to Photoshop. Now, I’m not a graphic designer, so I don’t have major league design challenges, but I’ve used Photoshop for years and for $29 this tool does everything I need it to do and is much easier to use than Photoshop.
I’m sure Adobe would challenge this statement, but this tool is at least on par feature wise with the $99 Photoshop Elements.
Adium – I use Adium for all things related to IM – this Mac only client allows me to converse with folks via instant message regardless of the IM platform they use – Facebook, GTalk, or AIM. .
Transmit – This is my file transfer tool. It’s lightening fast and allows me to upload and manage files via FTP to my web sites. I also use it to access my Amazon S3 file storage as I use Amazon’s cheap hosting and streaming for my videos and other larger downloads that I make available on my sites.
I also use Transmit to move files around on my laptop. Instead of using two instances of the Finder on my Mac, I use a split window in Transmit that allows me to drag and drop files more easily.
10 Apps I Use Every Single Day
Posted on 05. Oct, 2011 by John Jantsch in Blog, dropbox, Duct Tape Marketing, Evernote, Hellofax, Small Business Internet Marketing, Small Business Marketing, TweetDeck
10 Apps I Use Every Single Day
This content from: Duct Tape Marketing
More and more, we’re becoming an app happy world – Apps that run on our laptops, apps for the mobile and apps for the iPad or tablet. Even better are those apps that sync across all of our chosen devices, keeping us on task and on track in an increasingly online world.
Below are ten applications that I use on a daily basis to get more done, manage more information, communicate more ideas and generally keep the plates spinning.
TweetDeck – This is my primary social media dashboard. It’s a desktop application that runs on Adobe Air and while there are lots of alternative choices, I’ve just always stuck with TweetDeck. I do however use the Twitter app for the iPhone too.
I have groups, lists and searches set up at all times and use the scheduled Tweets feature to meter out content I want to share throughout the day.
Evernote – This is my brainstorming, idea clipping, bookmark storing powerhouse. Evernote syncs beautifully across all devices and allows me to outline my life in so many ways without having to commit anything to memory.
I’ve stored everything from ideas for my books to wines I want to remember. Here’s my Evernote routine in case your interested.
Dropbox – This is my online backup and file storage tool of choice. I probably overuse this tool, leaning on it as a file server for my team as well as a backup for important files, but it just works so well.
I also use it to share large files and grant conference attendees access to my PowerPoint presentations.
You can see my Dropbox routine here.
Reeder – This is an app that turns my chosen RSS reader, Google Reader, into something much more functional and much more attractive.
I do most of my blog reading on my iPhone or iPad and the Reeder app gives me a ton of functionality. I can easily share a post on Twitter, clip to Evernote and bookmark to delicious right from the post in Reeder. Great time saver.
Dragon Dictation – This iPhone app (at least that’s the only version I use) allows me to speak a memo and have it converted to text. I’ve not really tested this out, but I think I could compose a blog post using this tool.
The app then allows me to email the text or manage it in various other ways. I use this tool whenever I get a flash of brilliance while driving or think of something when trying go to sleep and want to capture the idea right away.
HelloFax – Actually this is billed as a fax machine replacement, but I don’t really use that function. What HelloFax allows me to do is receive a document, like a contract, agreement, vendor form or non disclosure (I get lots of these.) that need edits and my signature.
Instead of editing, printing, signing, scanning and emailing back I simply download the document, upload it to HelloFax, make my edits, drop in my stored signature and email it back.
And 4 just for the Mac
Text Expander – There are dozens of snippets of text that I need to use frequently. Text Expander allows me to write chunks of copy once and then paste those chunks whenever I need to with a couple keystrokes.
I have entire emails that I send in response to certain requests, email signatures, blog sponsorship messages, and even HTML code snippets that I use frequently committed to short, time saving keystrokes that are easy to recall.
Pixelmator – This is my replacement to Photoshop. Now, I’m not a graphic designer, so I don’t have major league design challenges, but I’ve used Photoshop for years and for $29 this tool does everything I need it to do and is much easier to use than Photoshop.
I’m sure Adobe would challenge this statement, but this tool is at least on par feature wise with the $99 Photoshop Elements.
Adium – I use Adium for all things related to IM – this Mac only client allows me to converse with folks via instant message regardless of the IM platform they use – Facebook, GTalk, or AIM. .
Transmit – This is my file transfer tool. It’s lightening fast and allows me to upload and manage files via FTP to my web sites. I also use it to access my Amazon S3 file storage as I use Amazon’s cheap hosting and streaming for my videos and other larger downloads that I make available on my sites.
I also use Transmit to move files around on my laptop. Instead of using two instances of the Finder on my Mac, I use a split window in Transmit that allows me to drag and drop files more easily.
5 Ways to Use the Internet to Drive People Off the Internet
Posted on 13. Sep, 2011 by John Jantsch in batchbook, Blog, Small Business Internet Marketing, Small Business Marketing, Social Media, Vokle
5 Ways to Use the Internet to Drive People Off the Internet
This content from: Duct Tape Marketing
One of the greatest uses of the Internet for small local business is as a tool to enhance their greatest offline strength – the ability to engage in person.
Mike_fleming via Flickr
While the Internet offers the ability to reach globally, it possesses real power for the local business in its ability to extend reach locally.
Local marketers that fuse what they are doing offline, in their store, in their leads groups and in their community, with the awesome depth and ease of reach available through an active online presence can amplify the impact of their efforts in ways that produce a much greater return on investment all around.
The in person experience is the ultimate competitive advantage for the small business and it’s how they beat the online and big box competition. Many people have begun to call this thinking O2O or online to offline marketing.
Here’s a taste of what I mean:
Meetings that start online and end offline
What if you started a local leads group and used MeetUp.com to help facilitate the promotion and invitation to your referral group that also met in person once a month in your place of business.
This could create a powerful network of strategic partners using a suite of online tools to build each others businesses passively while still connecting at a much deeper level by meeting in person.
Networking that is both on and offline
Local business owners understand the power of networking and belonging to local groups such as their Chambers of Commerce. What if you supplemented your local networking events with social media and networking tools?
Think about the impact of meeting someone at a local event and then connecting through Facebook or LinkedIn to continue to communicate and share. Now, imagine what the relationship might look like the next time you bump into each other simply because you were able to connect, learn and engage online in between meeting face to face.
By connecting some simple tools like Rapportive, SproutSocial or BatchBook you can easily add the social network participation of everyone in your contact database. Do you see how that might speed communication and networking in the best sense?
Snack sized online showcase
The next time you plan a seminar or workshop, add this feature. Invite all of your clients and prospects to the live event, but add several opportunities for them to sample the great content in a few easy to attend online events.
Interview speakers, tease content and give them a taste of the value of attending in person. It’s become much harder to attract customers and prospect to events and so you need to sell the value in many ways.
By creating preview type marketing and distributing it through online channels using tools like GoToWebinar or Vokle you can create a sense of excitement and offer potential participants proof that there is a compelling reason to attend the full deal.
GPS as a marketing game
Mobile is for the most part an online game that is played locally. People that use their mobile devices for locating, shopping, and sharing are often doing so with local buying in mind.
Smart local businesses are plugging into tools such as Foursquare to build brand pages and reward local offline purchases, but they are also creating their own games using platforms such as Twitter and Scvngr.
Create a local social group
Social networks such as LinkedIn allow members to create and moderate groups on any subject.
Some smart local marketers have picked up on this and created very locally based groups around a topic of interest. Of course the topic has the most traction if it has broad appeal rather than simply promoting one business.
If you can create a group that brings lots of your prospects and network together in support of a topic of interest you might find it to be a powerful way to drive offline behavior inside the group as well.
Bryan Elliot’s Linked Orange County is a good example of what’s possible.
There are so many ways to use online tools to make your business more attractive to offline prospects. The key is think about how to efficiently access increasingly larger online audiences to build the trust required to drive them into your profitable offline offerings.
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