Why?

Because I’ve seen so many people do it wrong time and again. Because I’ve listened to the heartbreaking stories of people who might have become my clients if they hadn’t wasted their time and budget on a web project that collapsed halfway through or failed to meet business goals. Because I listen to people every day tell me how they’re web developers just because they read “Become A Web Developer in 21 Days”.

But mostly, because you’re not a web expert, and you’re not supposed to be. You’re supposed to be good at what you do and you are fully entitled to expect that the person you hire to build your site is good at what he (or she!) does.

So before you start –  or restart – and repent later, arm yourself with some insight into how you should approach the web development process if you want a site that has marketing value for your business.

Define Business Goals

This bit of advice should precede every single marketing decision you make. Why do you want a Facebook page? Why are you sending an email newsletter? Why are you building a website?

“Because everyone has a website” is not a good reason.

“So I can have a web presence” is not a good reason, either.

You must define the goal and what you want to achieve. A goal has two important components: a specific intention and a measurable result.

“Get more traffic” is a common desire but it’s not a good goal. It is neither specific, nor can it be measured. What’s “more” traffic? One more visitor per day? Ten? Ten thousand?

“Increase traffic by 10% within 6 months” is both specific and can be measured. At the end of six months you will be able to say that you either achieved this goal or did not.

However, increasing traffic is not inherently a good end-goal, because it doesn’t really speak to your business needs. Why does it matter how much traffic you get? Traffic must mean something to you. Do you want traffic because it increases ad revenue, sales or leads? Or just because it makes you happy to look at an upward trend on your analytics graphs?

Every time you think you know what your goal is, ask yourself, Why? Keep asking why, all the way back until you can’t answer why anymore.

I want a website. Why?

To get more traffic. Why?

To get more leads. Why?

To make more money. Ah! That sounds like a business reason. Other good business goals might include decreasing human resource hours spent on specific tasks or reducing costs in specific areas.

There can be mini-goals along the path toward your ultimate goal. A mini-goal may be to increase traffic, but that isn’t your ultimate goal. Make sure you can define each type of goal, both big and small. Before you think about website pages, design or anything else, start by deciding why you want a website and what specific, measurable goals it will help you achieve.

Plan, Plan, Plan

Anyone who sits down and just starts building a website is either naïve or crazy. Without a plan, it’s impossible to know what to build. Even the smallest, simplest website must start with a plan.

Would you say to your contractor, “Build my kitchen”? Well, you could try, but he’d look at you like you’re a crazy person and then ask you what cabinets you’d picked out, where the sink was going, whether you had the proper electrical wiring and a host of other questions. You can apply this analogy to your website. What pages do you want? What content will go onto those pages? What message do you want to convey?

This is an example of a simple sitemap. Yours may be a list or a complex diagram, depending on your website goals.

I always start with a sitemap. It can be as simple as a list of pages or as complex as a series of flowcharts and diagrams. It all depends on your site needs, which will depend on your goals. An ecommerce site with the goal of making online sales will have an entirely different planning need than one that’s meant to generate a newsletter subscriber list. The important thing is to be as specific and detailed as possible.

Once you know what pages you’ll need, you have to decide how to fill them. I can’t tell you how many people I’ve spoken to who will say they need an “About My Company” page and then have no clue what to put on it. Or want a footer on the page but then stare blankly at it without an inkling how to fill it. A better approach would be to start with the content and build the site around it; not build the site then try to plug the holes with whatever you can find.

A wireframe can help with this. Sketch out a page and what content you need for that page. Start with broad strokes and global elements. Every page will need navigation, so spec a space for it. You may want your contact information on the footer of every page. Perhaps you know that you want to include a testimonial on each page. Define these very high-level spaces.

Then you can get more granular on a page-by-page basis. If it’s a contact page you’re planning, you probably need an area for a form, perhaps some contact info and maybe an introduction. Your “About” page needs a content area. Will you be including staff bios and photos? A photo of your office building? Whatever content needs to be on the page should be planned ahead of time. It will make the building process much easier and more efficient.

Here's a basic home page wireframe example. Sketch it out first because it's a lot easier to erase than to rebuild a website.

As you plan, consider the practical reality. You may want a testimonial on each page, but do you have a testimonial for each page? Or for any page? You may have visions of a welcome video on your home page but without the actual video you’re going to end up with an empty page and a lot of aggravation.

Part of the planning process includes having a vision for what might change. You may not have a video now, but if you plan to develop one within two months it would be smart to think ahead and make sure your website is flexible enough to accommodate it.

Create And Collect The Content

If you need copy written for your company profile, personal bio, product descriptions, case studies or anything else, it’s time to start writing, before a single page of your site is built. If you’re ready to tackle that video, do it and have it prepared. If you need a headshot, call a photographer. Create whatever content is necessary for your site if you don’t already have it at your disposal.

I’ll go a step further and say it’s not even good enough to simply have the content. You’ve got to collect and organize the content. Otherwise you may find you’re doing a lot of hunting around for things you thought you had, delaying the process and racking up the expenses.

Here’s a common scenario: a client tells me they want a photo gallery of their work. I ask if they have photos. Yes, they have photos, great photos, high-res photos, tons of photos. That is, until I ask for the photos. Then it’s two weeks of, “I thought they were on my computer” and “Our drive crashed” and “The last person in charge of our website lost them”.

Do yourself, your sanity and your budget a favor and collect your assets: photos, video, copy, graphics, whatever. If it’s content that needs to go on your site, gather it, sort it or create it before you start to build the site.

Decide On The Aesthetic

I don’t want you to design the site, but I do want you to think about what you want the design to convey. Corporate? Fun? Edgy? Traditional? Cutting-edge? Warm and fuzzy or starkly modern? Whatever you decide must be in line with your brand and the image that you want to convey to customers.

Colors, typography, and style should reflect your goals and brand. Don't get caught up in what looks great but doesn't work for your business.

It can help to look at other websites to get an idea of what’s happening on the web. Of course, it can also be a double-edged sword because there are so many things happening on the web that it may be distracting and overwhelming. If you do decide to look to other sites for ideas, try not to get too mired in what other people are doing and forget that your site has to be a reflection of your business – not theirs. Looking around can give you ideas you might not have thought of. Maybe you never thought to add a Facebook fan box to your site but once you see it, you realize this could be the perfect engagement tool for yours. But if it’s not a good tool and won’t further your business goals, don’t add it just because it looked great somewhere else.

I’ll leave you with one final consideration about design: the design must support the business goals and meet the business needs. Too many people get hung up on how a site looks but don’t consider how it works. Design is subjective. What one customer may love, another may hate, at least from a visual standpoint. But if the design makes it easy for visitors to find what they need and do what they want, and leads them to your end goal, then it’s fulfilled its business purpose.

Many paragraphs later, you may have noticed we never got around to actually building the website. That’s because building a good website starts long before you actually start building. If you’ve got the vision, goals and plans in place before you start, you’re already halfway there.

Your brand is not…

A logo.  Your logo is a visual reinforcement of your brand.  A symbol.  It’s important to strategically choose colors, fonts and a design style that capture the essence of your business and grab the attention of your target audience, but a nifty logo with no substance behind it is useless.  You know what they say about putting lipstick on a pig.

A slogan.  More often than not, your slogan is a catchy line that gets people to remember who you are and what you do.  An effective slogan might offer a glimpse into your brand.  One of the most memorable slogans of all time, AT&T’s Reach Out And Touch Someone, did a phenomenal job at capturing the emotion of a personal phone call.  The warm and fuzzy jingle didn’t hurt either.  As successful as that slogan was, it wasn’t AT&T’s brand.  Actually, the goal of that slogan and campaign at the time was to soften AT&T’s image amid growing concerns of a monopoly.

Your brand is…

A promise.  It’s a promise to solve a specific problem or fill a specific need for your target audience.  This promise should shine through everywhere and in every way that your business interacts with your target audience – conversations in person or by phone, emails, text messages, social media posts, or any type of marketing.  When you fulfill this promise consistently, your brand becomes the foundation of the long-term relationships, both emotional and psychological, that you build between your company and your target audience.

Your brand does…

Create perceptions.  At the end of the day, your business is only as good as the public perceives it to be.  Positive perceptions can take you to new heights.  Negative perceptions, accurate or not, can doom any business.  This is why it’s so important to deliver on your promise to every single client, and if you ever fall short, make it up to them to reward their loyalty and maintain that positive perception.  The way you correct a mistake can sometimes leave a stronger impression than a flawless transaction – but do yourself a favor and shoot for the flawless transaction.

Set expectations.  First and foremost, your brand gives people the expectation of a result that they anticipate experiencing after purchasing your product or service.  Remember, people don’t care about your business until you’ve shown them how your business can make their lives better.  That said, your brand also sets an expectation of what it will be like to do business with you.  By living up to these expectations, you build trust, strengthen relationships and give people a reason to care about your business.

Give people a reason to choose you.  How will you solve a problem or fill a need in a way that’s different, better or more appealing than your competition?  Obviously, other factors will contribute to someone ultimately deciding to business with you, like customer service, value, price and the effectiveness of your marketing.  But your brand – your promise – should be at the core of your customer service, convey real value, justify your price and provide the foundation of your marketing message.

As you analyze, evaluate and fine tune your business model, think about what your brand really means – not just to you, but to your target audience.  After all, when it comes to shaping your brand, they have just as much of a say as you do, if not more.

What are your thoughts about what a brand is, what it isn’t, and what it does?

I almost regretted publishing the Biggest Marketing Mistake, thinking that this new infraction was truly the worst way to conduct business. So I’ve given the number 2 spot to this mistake: failing to build your email list at every opportunity.

Why Email Matters

Email still holds one of the top spots for ROI. That means, dollar for dollar, email is one of the least expensive marketing tools and returns one of the highest yields on your investment. Email is relatively easy to create, ridiculously easy to send and if you’re using a good email campaign management program you can measure a ton of useful statistics to track your progress and success.

But you can’t send an email unless you’ve got an email address to send it to. Preferably a lot of email addresses. Think about it: you’re going to put the effort into designing, composing, creating and setting up your email campaigns (or you’re about to pay a professional to do it for you). Whether you send the email to 10 or 10,000 people, the effort is the same. So wouldn’t you rather have 10,000?

This article isn’t about how to send emails or what to say when you do. It’s simply about how to collect those precious email addresses so that when you’re ready to put in the effort, it’s worth your time and money.

Some Simple Ideas For Building Your Email List

If you’re consistent in your efforts and pay attention to opportunities, there’s no reason you couldn’t exponentially grow your email list almost immediately.

Ask Your Clients

If this sounds obvious to you, I breathe a sigh of relief. But it’s not so obvious to many people (just ask my friend). You should be collecting and storing your clients’ email addresses for more than one good reason, but for now let’s just say that every one of your clients should be on your email marketing list.

They can always unsubscribe if they don’t want to get your brilliant and charming newsletter, so be sure to maintain a contact list outside of your campaign management program so you can effectively manage both campaign and non-campaign emails.

Ask Your Prospects

Surely you’ve been to at least one meeting, lunch or coffee with a potential customer. They may not hire you but that doesn’t mean you can’t continue to market to them so that one day when they’re ready to hire someone like you, you’re the one they think of. Heck, they may never hire you. But maybe they have a friend or colleague who asks for a recommendation. Guess who’s name will be top-of-mind?

Sometime during every prospecting meeting, preferably close to the end after you’ve proven how intelligent and witty you really are, ask your prospect if you can add her name to your mailing list (most people won’t say no) and promise you’ll never share, sell or spam.

Ask Your Friends

Maybe you don’t like to mix business and pleasure. It sure can be awkward doing business with a friend, especially if one of you is short on time and the other is short on budget…

But that doesn’t mean your friends couldn’t be a networking and referral system for you. Your friends may not hire you but your friends have other friends and jobs with colleagues who may. Again, it’s about being top-of-mind, and the person who your friend thinks of when her boss asks if she knows someone who can do what you do.

Add A Subscribe Box To Your Website, Blog And Facebook Page

The awesome thing about a Subscribe box is that you can entice perfect strangers who you may otherwise never have met to join your list (and either become customers or another part of your referral network). The trick is how you sell it.

It’s not altogether likely that someone will subscribe to the corporate newsletter of some arbitrary company (snore) but they may if you offer something more. That may come in the form of something other than a newsletter, such as tips or helpful information. You can also entice subscribers with a free-something. Offer an eBook, coupon, special video, discount or other incentive that you only release once someone subscribes.

The next trick is letting people know about your Subscribe box and offer. For that, you’ve got to do some more smart marketing and tweet it, post it, advertise it, blog about it and generally let people know that there’s a really great deal if they sign up.

Ask At Your Next Networking Meeting

Whether you attend a formal networking meeting or show up at a business card exchange, you should walk away with a stack of new subscribers. What do you plan to do with all those business cards, anyway? Paper your walls? Fill up your wallet? Make a series of time-consuming phone calls? Or, more likely, forget about them until they show up in your junk drawer six months later and you can’t remember who the person was anyway?

You cannot assume that just because someone hands you a business card that he or she wants to be on your mailing list. But you can ask. Especially if you’ve got good content or a good deal, this shouldn’t be a hard sell. Remember to lead with “here’s what you get” and end with “and you can unsubscribe anytime”. Somewhere in the middle promise not to share that email address with anyone else.

This can be as simple as marking the business cards of people who agree so you can later enter them into your email program, or as efficient as walking in with an iPad and having people subscribe on the spot. People don’t magically show up on your email list – you’ve got to ask!

Keep a Signup Sheet At Your Place of Business

If you have an office or store, invite people to sign up as they walk in. Have them add their names to a regular old notebook page, or let them drop cards with their email addresses into a box if privacy is a concern. You’ve probably seen this done at restaurants. If you drop your business card into a fishbowl, you get on their mailing list and a chance to win a free lunch. Sounds like a win-win.

Ask At Your Next Trade Show, Event Or Seminar

Any time you’re in a room full of people you can be building your email list. If you attend an event, course or lecture, you’re probably mingling and connecting with other attendees. Use the opportunity to ask them to join your list. You’ve got to use your judgment here. You don’t want to be the annoying person running around collecting emails. But if you strike up a rapport with someone, there’s no harm in asking. They can always say no.

If you’re presenting at an event or teaching a course you should absolutely be asking for email addresses! I am shocked at the number of people who give their time away in the form of lectures, demonstrations and presentations and walk out without a single contact. I’m more shocked that it never occurred to them to ask.

How To Build Your Email List The Wrong Way

In the quest for numbers, it can be tempting to think that numbers matter. While they do matter to an extent – the more people on your list, the more opportunities you have to market – the number is not the goal. You’d be better served with 100 qualified people on your list than 1,000 people who hit the delete key every time they see your name.

Don’t buy your email lists. For starters, nobody likes their email address to be bought and sold. How do you feel every time you get an unsolicited bit of junk mail because some company sold your email address because the fine print said they could? Someone who gets your email unexpectedly may resent it and that can create a bad impression that’s not worth the numbers. Secondly, if you buy email addresses, you may not be getting a list of qualified prospects. Building a good list is partly about building relationships, so make yours count.

Don’t scrape email addresses from the web. Just because someone is your “friend” on Facebook and his email address is listed in his profile, you don’t have the right to send him your newsletter. You can ask – but you can’t take. You also don’t get to take email addresses from blogs or forums where people have posted or commented.

And no, you don’t even get to take your colleague’s email list. You can capitalize creatively, perhaps by asking your colleague to send an email requesting that her list join yours, but sharing is bad form.

The Single Best Thing You Can Do To Grow Your List

Free. How powerful is that word? How many times have you signed up for an offer just because it was free? I can’t tell you how many granola bars, packets of laundry detergent and shampoo samples I have because someone offered them to me free. I don’t even like granola bars. But here’s the thing: my mother does. You may wonder what that has to do with anything, and I’ll tell you. I give her the granola bars. And she likes them. And she buys them. New customer and everyone’s happy!

The point is that if you offer something free just for joining your email list, you’ll get a lot more responses than if you just offered… well, the honor of joining. You can also be reasonably certain that you’re getting qualified subscribers, because unlike granola bars, your content or coupon is specifically relevant to your list. Someone is not going to sign up to receive your 10 Secrets To Peeling Potatoes unless they really want to know how to peel a potato.  (Unless you’re running a cooking site, I hope you never tell me how to peel a potato.)

So offer something free. A webinar. An eBook with ideas and tips that can’t be found anywhere else on your site or blog. An exclusive discount on your product or service. That little enticement is a big selling point.

Remember, email marketing is your friend. You can reach people all over the globe for a fraction of a fraction of what it would cost to send them a bit of mail or take out an ad. You should constantly be in list-building mode. Even if you grab one person a day, that’s one more person who may hire you or buy from you… or share your granola bar with someone else who will.

Local Search

You’ve probably noticed that web addresses aren’t the only things that come up in search results anymore. Along with standard website URLs come maps, reviews, and even social updates and profiles. You don’t need a website to show up in local search listings or in map results. You just need to list your business. One of the key players in local search is Google Places. It’s quite simple to list your business with Google Places. Simply enter your phone number into Google’s business search and it will either return results that already exist, or let you know that your business is not yet listed. In either case you can take advantage of your listing by publishing key information to let searchers know about your business, including:

• Your address
• Your phone number
• Days and hours of operation
• Payment methods accepted
• Service areas
• Your logo
• A description of your business, using keywords that searchers might be using
• Photos to personalize your listing and make it interesting and compelling for searchers

When you list your business, you should also claim it. This means that you have verified that you are the owner of the business and the definitive authority of published information about it. A verified listing lends legitimacy to the accuracy of the information and you can edit or update your listing at any time.

Once you have a listing, you can encourage customers to write reviews, which will be appended to your listing and act as testimonials for others who find your business. Be attentive to the reviews because they may not all be as good as you might hope! Whether good or bad, as the verified owner of a listing you can respond to reviews which gives you a great opportunity to engage customers and show yourself as a problem-solver and company that cares about its customers.

There are other local services, such as Yelp, where you can also list your business for free. Every listing is another opportunity to connect with searchers, even if you don’t have a website or an ad space. In fact, you should consider your local listing as free ad space and treat it with care.

One important local search tip: before you start throwing your business name out there, think about what you want to say, and what details you want to convey. You should be extra careful about keeping your listings consistent. Your address, phone and other contact info should be identical across listings. And by identical, I mean identical. Do not include so much as an extra comma in your address if it’s not in every single listing. This is important when it comes to boosting your listing in search results.

Video

You may have noticed that among the variety of media appearing in search results, video makes a pretty good showing. Video is one of the most widely shared and consumed types of media so if you have a cell phone video camera or a built in camera and mic on your laptop, go set up your free YouTube channel right now. You can sit in front of your computer or find a friend to help you by holding the camera and compose a 30- or 60-second clip of something. For more ideas about what that something can be, check out this article about creating content.

Video will put a personal touch on your marketing and let you look straight into your customer’s eyes, so to speak, and share something entertaining, educational, interesting, and uniquely you. You’re not advertising during the Superbowl; you don’t need high production and glitz and a gecko. You just need a steady hand, a decent microphone and your imagination. It’s your chance to create a commercial for your business, whether it’s in the form of a testimonial, funny skit or informational how-to.

YouTube isn’t the only player on the block when it comes to video. There are other services that you can use, like Vimeo, and I suggest you take advantage of every opportunity. This will increase the likelihood of your video showing up in search and it will arm you with content that you can use to build credibility, authority and brand awareness.

Social Networking

Here’s something I bet you never heard me say before (where’s that sarcasm font when you need it?): People do business with people. And they do business with people they like. I’ve connected online with people who I’ve hired and people who have hired me without ever stepping out from behind my monitor. Before things like the internet came around, people would do business by meeting with prospects, shaking hands, having lunch or a drink, making house calls and phone calls and generally being present. That’s called networking. Lucky you, you can do a tremendous amount of networking without ever getting out of your pajamas.

The advent and explosion of social media has given you an amazing opportunity to find, reach and engage with people who may become customers, or who can help connect you with other people who may become customers. The not-so-secret secret to social networking is that you must be consistent, engaged and you must help others first. If you run around asking for help and pushing your products and services on other people, your networking efforts are going to backfire.

Networking could be a full time job by itself because there are simply too many opportunities to list. Here are just a few:

• Connect with people on Facebook. Yes, your personal Facebook page. You can have a brand page for your business but it’s a lot easier to connect one-on-one than to convince people they should Like an arbitrary business page they’ve never heard of.
• Connect with people on Twitter. Not only is Twitter free, but there are a host of tools you can use to find people who might be interested in what you have to offer. Again, you can have a business account but a personal account is easier to grow and to engage one-on-one.
• Connect on LinkedIn. Yes, LinkedIn has an option for you to simply “connect” with other people, but unfortunately that’s where most people stop. You should also find (or start) a group that will let you engage within your area of expertise.
• Comment on blogs. There’s one thing bloggers want almost as much as a good stream of ad revenue and that’s comments. Find blogs in your niche, especially those that only receive a few comments and make a name for yourself as the person who always has something helpful or interesting to add to the conversation. Commenting on a site like Mashable.com probably won’t get you noticed, but commenting on another local business or startup blog will.
• Get on Google+. There are arguments a dime a dozen about whether you should be on Facebook or Google+ and what it means and whether it will survive. I say, “Who cares?” For the purposes of this conversation, you should take every opportunity that you can and Google+ is one of them. There’s a different audience there, a new batch of people to meet and another way to connect.

Guest Blogging

Sharing your expertise on someone else’s blog is a great way to get exposure. Blogs can help promote you by showcasing your knowledge and by offering perks like an author bio and links back to your site or other profile page. The blog gets you noticed and the links get you “juice”, which is good for your search listings. You’ve also got the bonus of a built-in audience.

Start small, with smaller and less trafficked blogs. You can reach for the stars and submit a guest blog to the big industry sites but it can take time to get published since popular blogs have a long queue of people dying to get published there, and the competition is more intense. So submit to popular blogs, but in the meantime, get your name and brand out there wherever you can. Make sure that you have something valuable to say and remember that blogs are publications, too. You should create unique content for each submission because it’s unlikely that blogs will allow you to reprint something you’ve written for them.

Email

Email as a marketing tool still provides one of the best ROIs. There are programs like MailChimp that will allow you to create a free account as long as you don’t mind their logo in your email template. It’s a worthy trade, considering that you can build, customize, send and track email campaigns at no cost. Here are a few ideas for using email:

• Send newsletters to keep people apprised of your successes, services, products or other interesting information.
• Send special offers or discounts.
• Offer tips, insight or how-tos.
• Ask for referrals.
• Tell a story. Some of the best emails that I receive from companies are the ones that start, “I was doing my grocery shopping the other day when suddenly I saw…” Kind of makes you want to know what they saw, doesn’t it?

Mostly, you should use email to stay top-of-mind and remind your customers and prospects that you still exist. It’s easy to fall of people’s radars. Trust me, nobody is thinking about your business right now except you. Even if you’re selling the exact widget someone needs, they’re probably still not thinking about you – unless you’re in front of them. Email is a great way to get in front of people so that even though they may not want or need your widget 364 days of the year, you’ll be there on the 365^th when they do.

We’re fortunate to live in a time when marketing has become so personalized and the opportunities so available. Successful business has always been about relationships, so harness your time and get out there on the web where you can find, connect with and convert yours.

What The Heck is “Content” Anyway?

Dictionary.com defines content as:

Something that is to be expressed through some medium, as speech, writing, or any of various arts; substantive information or creative material

Notice the first key point in that definition: any of various arts. Content is not “a thing”. Content is many things. It may be words or graphics, photos or videos, speeches or presentations. I bet you’re already creating content and don’t realize it. If you’ve ever produced a brochure, pitched a prospect in a meeting or updated your Facebook status, you’ve created content. Yes, even a tweet is content, even if you don’t quite think of it that way yet.

The second key point in the definition is creative material. I know this panics some people. Me?? Creative?? Sounds hard. And like work. Well guess what, folks, if you’re in business it is hard, and it is work, but that doesn’t mean you need to be an artist or a writer or think of yourself as an especially creative person to come up with creative content. You just need some ideas, a push in the right direction, a willingness to work hard and the insight to know when it’s time to hire a professional to help.

Why Does Content Matter?

When Bill Gates wrote the original “Content is King” article I’m sure he didn’t expect to spawn a cliché. Many marketers and business people have had the “content is king” mantra banged over their heads to the point where it becomes just more noise in an endless cacophony of “do this, don’t do that” advice.

So forget the cliché for now and focus on the reality of the impact that content has on your web, search and social marketing:

• The only way you can get into search engines and in front of customers and prospects looking for your product or service is with content.
• The only way you can educate your customers and prospects about your products and services is with content.
• The only way you can interest anyone in what you’re selling is with content.
• The only way you can persuade someone to buy what you’re selling is with content.
• The only way you can establish authority and credibility is with content.
• The only way you can connect in a personal, meaningful way with customers and prospects is with content.
• The only way you will rise above the competition, be noticed, be taken seriously and be counted among the top tier in your profession is with content.

Notice I did not give you any facts and figures about how many people use search or how many are on Facebook, read blogs, check email, watch video or consume any other type of content. The statistics are irrelevant to the fact that you need content. The type of content is another matter, but you must be creating content in one form or another, and preferably in multiple forms. I guarantee you there isn’t a profitable business today that doesn’t create content, even if it’s as fundamental as a sales pitch.

Some Basic Content Types And How To Use Them In Your Web, Search and Social Marketing

The good news for anyone still worried that they’re simply not creative is that content takes a multitude of forms and while you may not be a genius with a thesaurus, you may have a keen eye for framing a photo. Here are some examples of content that you may not be considering content right now, but can be incorporated to great effect into your online marketing plan.

A Blog

Now don’t get huffy about not being a writer or having time (there are many excellent copywriting professionals who can assist), and no, blogs are not just for teenagers and cat lovers. They’re serious business. Don’t call it a blog if that bugs you. Think of it as your news report, roundtable, business weekly or industry journal. Blogs themselves can contain a variety of content types, but for now let’s consider a standard, written blog.

How To Use It:

• Write a how-to guide related to your business.
• Provide a product comparison or review.
• Give helpful advice or tips.
• Tell a human interest story about your business.
• Write about (and dispel) common myths related to your business or industry.
• Share a war story or cautionary tale to help your prospects and customers avoid doing business with the wrong kind of people in your industry.
• Share news about innovations or improvements in your own business.
• Conduct an interview with someone interesting, powerful or unique in your business or industry.
• Write a “Top 10″ (or Top-Something) list of tips, statistics, little known facts or other ideas.
• Capitalize on your customers and prospects by inviting them to write guest posts. You don’t have to labor over it, and it still counts as content.

Ask around… you’d be surprised at what people know, don’t know, want to know or *think* they know about your business. Use this as fodder for an article.

A Microblog

Don’t feel like writing (or need to write) feature-length articles? Create a short-form blog with mini updates. Tumblr is a good example of this, and even Twitter is considered a microblog. The difference is that Tumblr gives you the flexibility of using photos, video or text in whatever combination or proportion that you want. Twitter is limited to 140 characters of text.

How To Use It:

• Share photos of you-on-the-job if you have an active profession.
• Share photos of your work.
• Publish quick tips or short snippets of helpful advice.
• Share favorite, inspirational, funny or relevant quotes.
• Share news and articles from other content sources.
• Publish links to your website, Facebook page, promotion, or blog.

It’s all content! Bet you didn’t realize those tweets count. And trust me, sometimes creating the right content to fit into a 140 character space is more challenging that writing an entire feature length blog.

Video

There are two ways to create a video: the professional way and the home-grown way. Professional video can lend authority and create a perception of quality through good camera work, graphics, scripting and composition. If you can budget for it, I suggest you do it. But don’t let budget stop you from taking advantage of video. Even cell phones have decent video cameras in a pinch. The idea is to create interesting, compelling, sharable content.

How To Use It

• Create testimonial videos with clients who can talk about the value of your product or service.
• Record yourself doing your job for a human interest story or to demonstrate expertise.
• Record a screen session as you perform a task on your computer and turn it into a tutorial for a how-to.
• Perform a product demonstration.
• Record a straight-up sales pitch. Speak the benefits of your product or service, with a little personality and enthusiasm.
• Make an offer. Instead of a big “click here” starburst and a long-winded paragraph, create a video of the freebie, deal or promotion you’re offering.
• Tell a story or verbally record a blog post. If you have a great idea that you want to share but aren’t inclined to write it, why not speak it?

Anything you can write, you can show. Video is a great opportunity to inject personality into your content and create a compelling experience for your audience.

Photography

I hear you complaining already that you’re not a photographer, certainly no genius with Photoshop and the last photo you took of your cat ended up looking more like a mushroom. So I’ll just go ahead a say it: hire a professional. There’s a place for amateur photography, and if you’re half-decent at it you can get a good amount of mileage out of it. Even cell phone snapshots can be used as content on Facebook or your Tumblr. But sometimes professional photography is called for, so use your judgment. You probably don’t want cell phone shots of the $500 painting you’re selling.

How To Use It

• Use photos to liven up your blog or microblog.
• Create a “photo blog” either as part of or separate from a regular blog.
• Take “behind the scenes” photos to put a friendly face on your company.
• Tell a story in pictures. You can even include your audience in the content creation process by asking for caption submissions!
• Create a how-to guide with photos to illustrate the steps in a process.
• Create a photo gallery using a free service like Flickr and link to interesting and relevant photos from your blog or other social media account.

Photos are a great way to create interest and many people who otherwise don’t seem to be paying attention will like, tweet or share photos.

Other Content Types To Consider

I’ve given you some basics and a place to start. But there are many other types of content and you may or may not want to use them depending on your business, audience and goals. Here are just a few:

• Podcasts
• Webinars
• Infographics
• Ebooks
• Email courses

There is such a plethora of rich media that you can’t say you don’t have options. It’s a matter of choosing the right options for your business and marketing them to your advantage.

Tying It Together

Remember many words ago when I told you that content is not “a thing”? Content comes in many forms, and you should be creating it in many forms. The more types of content you create, the more opportunities you will create for yourself to be found, to be noticed and to build your brand, credibility and expertise.

But be cautious: don’t jump into the content creation pool and start throwing out photos, videos and blog posts however and wherever you can. If you’re planning a blog, plus a photo gallery, and home-grown video, you’ve got to synch those pieces and tie them together cohesively. And you’ve got to market them cohesively. If you’re writing a blog post about a cute cat and publishing a video of a funny dog and tweeting about a silly mouse… well, you get where I’m going with this analogy. Don’t turn your marketing into a menagerie of mayhem.

Focus on your goal and build content around it. And while we haven’t touched on the myriad types of offline content you can create, be sure to integrate it into your total marketing plan so your online and offline efforts are in synch.

Reuse And Repurpose

Market your content across channels – on your blog, website, Facebook, Twitter, email, Tumblr, YouTube channel, whatever. You don’t need to – and certainly shouldn’t!  – create different content for each. Different types of content – yes. Content with different messages and themes  – no. You can publish the same photo to Facebook and Tumblr and your blog and Flickr and link to it from Twitter. You may want to tweak and present it with a slightly different flair, but don’t exhaust yourself by trying to come up with something unique for each channel.

Once you have content, you can use it again and again. People who saw your video today are not the same people who will see it a week or month or year from now. If you’ve got great content, you can use it many ways, in many places and many times over.

Convinced yet that content is your friend? You should be, but if you still doubt or hesitate, I’d love to hear why. Otherwise, get out there and start creating.

Yes, this once awkward speaker was the commanding former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt.

Glenn LeBoeuf, investment advisor for  Freedom Capital Management, whose speaking career I described in Part I of this series, says Eleanor Roosevelt is a striking example of someone whose passion transformed her from a weak speaker to a leading voice who moved audiences.

“She had authority because she never looked down at her notes. She would speak from the heart, make eye contact, and she learned to control her giggling,” LeBoeuf told me. “Her conviction was what made her great.”

I also spoke with DonnaLyn Giegerich, who’s hosting a women’s networking breakfast in Red Bank on Feb. 10th called “Brains & Beauty: Branding Your Bold 2012.” She offered advice for how to create a credible brand through public appearances, even if your topics have nothing to do with what you’re selling.

“Nobody likes to be pitched insurance,” she said. “But everybody wants to know how to be empowered, how to be resilient in life.”

Understanding What Audiences Want

According to both of these practiced orators, public speaking skills don’t necessarily arrive with you in the cradle. Even a poor speaker can become competent, and a proficient speaker can become great. They generously offered their practical tips for getting started.

From Giegerich, who coaches speakers:

• Define your expertise around your passion. Create a short speaking program highlighting your knowledge on a purposeful topic, e.g. “Four Ways to Improve Your Social Media Prowess” or “Three Ways to Balance Your Life.”
• Generally, audiences want to be entertained first and educated second. You needn’t be a comedian, but enthusiasm and great energy will enliven your presentation and allow you to connect more effectively with your audience. Be authentically you, share your giftedness and knowledge base, and keep your language and commentary positive, forward moving and a value-add.
• Practice, practice, practice. Tape/video your presentation. Speak it in the mirror. Do a trial run with trusted viewers. Hire a speaking coach. Improve your performance in meaningful ways at each engagement and always seek out constructive feedback. It’s how we all improve!

And here’s what LeBoeuf advised:

• Some of the worst talks I’ve seen were Ph.Ds or authors who sat and read their notes. Powerpoint presentations can be deadly. People give too much information. If I use them, every fifth slide will be a cartoon, either funny or something about human nature to lighten things up. Don’t read your slides or your audience will be asleep in ten seconds.
• Most rookie mistakes are trying to cram too much in. Make your outline concise and time it. Pace it to the time allowed.
• Strictly identify your target market. I suggest not charging for your appearances at first. Be purely informative and don’t sell. Libraries are good. Have your picture up for a month. People will see you, and may jot down your name even if they don’t go to see you speak. It’s valuable exposure.
• Pay for a professional photo showing yourself in front of an audience. This lends authority.

With time and practice, you can improve your public speaking skills, and if you do it enough, it’ll become a valuable part of your branding and marketing.

Find Good Tools

Before you think about tweeting, you need a website, or a web destination where you can send people. This could be a catalog page on Amazon or other retail page, your own website, or a combination thereof.

One of the things you’ll be including in some tweets will be links to web pages that have information or products and you need a way to track the clickthroughs on those links, which will help you measure how effective they are. I prefer Bit.ly, but there are other link tracking tools, so play around with them and settle on one that you like. This will be very important as you monitor the effectiveness of your Twitter promotions!

The next thing you need is a better interface than Twitter. I personally prefer Hootsuite, and there are other tools like TweetDeck and Sprout Social. As your Twitter marketing skills grow, these tools will allow you to track multiple streams, searches, and other information in one place. Twitter’s interface is currently not as robust as many of the third-party tools available.

Then we come to what I consider the absolutely most important tool in my promotional toolbox, without which I’d still be stuck at my day job: Tweet Adder. It automates many of the things you’d normally have to do by hand, including finding new followers, following people back, unfollowing people who’ve unfollowed you, sending out tweets automatically, tweeting from RSS feeds, and many other things.

Time is money, and finding a tool that works for you the way Tweet Adder works for me will save you tons of time while expanding your potential reach on Twitter beyond what you’d be able to do manually. Experiment with some of the tools out there to see if they fit your style and needs, but don’t make the mistake of becoming a Twitter tool addict! You need to stay focused on the job, right?

My Strategy

My Twitter strategy is basically broken down like this:

1. Continuously increase the number of followers through targeted searches.
2. Develop a solid foundation of friends and fans through direct interaction.
3. Send automated tweets with links on a 90-120 minute interval.
4. Send automated welcome Direct Messages with a link to a freebie to new followers.
5. Send follow-up Direct Messages to reinforce freebie promotions and to request retweets from core friends & fans.
6. Post blog updates to Twitter, and add those tweets to the list of automatic tweets to provide repeats of value-added content.

Omnibus is a trilogy that includes the first three books in the In Her Name series.

Grow Your Following

Promotion is largely a numbers game, and the larger your following, the greater your overall reach. The caveat is that you want to be followed by “real people” rather than Twitter bots. You want followers who might actually listen to what you have to say!

There are two parts to building a good following. Number one is having well-constructed searches to find people who are interested in what you’re offering and keep to a minimum the number of Twitter bots and spammers. The second, and by far most critical part, is to spend a lot of time on Twitter interacting with people. This is where most people fail on Twitter. It can take a LOT of time. If you spam your followers, the ones who count – the real people – will unfollow you. Ideally, you need to be engaged on Twitter consistently throughout the day. I catch up in the morning before I start writing, when I take breaks, and in the evening after I’ve met my writing goals for the day.

Building up your following also takes time. At the start of 2011, I had about 500 followers. As I write this, I have over 18,000, and get roughly 100 new followers per day. Many of them I’ve never interacted with, but many I have. I no longer worry about trying to weed out the bots and link spammers, because there are lots of people who engage me directly, and I respond back to them. That’s how you make friends and new fans.

Make Friends And Fans

If you invest time in Twitter, you’ll make real friends, and you’ll also find people who are fans of whatever you’re promoting (novels, in my case). These people are willing to help you out by retweeting promotional tweets for you, and you should be willing to do the same for them. You can get a huge amount of leverage out of your friends and fans to create a surge on Twitter. The more people you can get yourself in front of (in a polite, non-aggravating way!) the more influence you’ll have.

It also goes without saying that this is something you don’t want to abuse: if you do, your friends and fans will rapidly disappear. I send out direct messages asking my friends and fans to retweet something maybe once or twice a week, but no more. Remember, they’re generally happy to help you out, but don’t wear out your welcome.

Send Promotional Tweets

I’ve heard and read that you shouldn’t send out promotional tweets, or should only do so rarely. Balderdash. While I don’t have specific numbers to prove it, I’ve repeatedly noted drops in my book sales that corresponded directly to periods when I stopped or cut down the number of promo tweets I sent out. There are, however, a few tricks to doing it without being obnoxious:

• When you’re just starting out and have a small following, send out promo tweets infrequently.
• When you’re up to or beyond 1,000 followers, send out promo tweets at more regular intervals. I normally time mine to go out randomly at intervals of 60-120 minutes (and yes, 24 hour a day, because I’m trying to reach an international audience).
• Make sure you’re also engaging people periodically throughout the day. Otherwise your timeline will show nothing but promo tweets, which annoys people.
• Add in helpful or inspirational tweets. Give people some useful information or tips, not just all “buy me” links.
• Try to not repeat the same tweets more than once every few days or people will just start ignoring them altogether, and keep adding in fresh tweets to your queue.

Remember to track the results of your clickthroughs to see which tweets are working the best. Experiment with tweet formats and messages to see which get the best response. Since you can only send out a limited number of promo tweets per day without annoying people, you want them to be effective. Ditch any that consistently don’t get many clickthroughs. Experiment and tweak!

Send Direct Messages

Some people don’t like automated DMs, but that’s often because many such messages look like they’re written by robots, not people. So keep that in mind if you do this.

I’ve also found it’s very helpful to make the welcome DM beneficial to new followers by offering them something free. In my case, I offer a complete novel in eBook format.

One big key to using this effectively is that if someone responds to your welcome DM, even if only to say they hate automated DMs, make sure you respond back! That shows them that there is, indeed, a real person behind the machine.

Since a lot of folks don’t respond to the welcome DMs or don’t notice them, I also send out DMs to my followers to reinforce the freebie. You’re limited by Twitter to no more than 250 DMs per day, which is fine;  I limit the number I send to roughly the number of new followers I get each day. You don’t want to hammer people with DMs repeatedly.

Another tip is to try and include a URL that isn’t shortened. People are much more likely to click DMs that have recognizable URLs because many DMs contain links to viruses and other junk. But if they see “http://authormichaelhicks.com/free-novel/”, they’re a lot more likely to click.

Use Your Blog

A blog is extremely useful for many reasons, and you can leverage it with Twitter. You can set up automatic tweets for each new blog post from your site’s RSS feed so you don’t have to manually poke it into Twitter. You can also store a tweet pointing to any of your blog posts, and put it in a queue of automatic tweets. Then it will periodically be sent out to your following again, and your new followers or any of your existing followers who didn’t see it the first time will have the opportunity to read it. You get a lot more views over time and a lot more mileage out of your blog posts.

Obviously, you should only do this with posts that aren’t time sensitive. You don’t want to do this with tweets that are about a sale that’s already over, for instance. But a lot of information can be recycled for the benefit of new followers who otherwise wouldn’t have seen it.

Conclusion

That’s the overview of the strategies I’ve used and they’ve been critical in driving my books to the Amazon bestseller lists and getting me out of my day job. They may work for you and they may not. You need to learn, tweak and experiment like I’ve done.

Remember this: Twitter takes time. Time to build a following, time spent on tweeting every day and talking to people, time spent refining and renewing your tweets. If you have very little time to actively engage people, you won’t see the benefit you could otherwise. You could have 100,000 followers, but if your account is nothing more than a spambot, chances are most of your “followers” are going to be spambots as well, or your information will just be ignored. Also keep in mind that the true power of Twitter lies in the leverage you gain from friends and fans retweeting key information to their followers. You may only have 1,000 followers, but through retweeting you can reach many more than that. And always return the favor! You MUST interact – that’s why it’s called “social media”.

You stress the importance of achieving clarity.  Why is clarity so important and how does a local business owner achieve it?

Clarity is extremely important because if you cannot see where you’re going, how in the world are you going to get there?  One of the very first processes I go through with my clients is to figure out, what is their vision?  What is their mission?  The vision and mission, together with core values, will form the core of the branding message.  It also becomes the rudder for the growth of the business.  Every time you decide to start a new plan or a new program, you have to examine it at the light of that vision and mission.  If your vision and mission are not clear, then you’ve got a real problem.

Over the course of your career, you’ve led multi-million dollar organizations.  When you stepped away and started your own business, what was the biggest challenge you faced and how did you overcome it?

The biggest challenge was that, all of the sudden, everything was resting on my shoulders.  I literally ate what I killed, which meant I had to go out there and get the business one piece at a time.  It was also very much a growth experience, learning what makes people tick, understanding how to meet other people’s needs in an effective manner, understanding that it was no longer about me – that it was never about me – it was always about the needs of the client.

It’s an ongoing experience, something you have to start every morning.  I tell my clients that when you start your day and brush your teeth or take a shower, do some mental hygiene as well.  Clean your mind and take everything out of your head.  Start fresh because you have a spotless future.  That’s one thing I tell myself everyday – you have a spotless future.  Every day is a new page.

From a marketing standpoint, what is the most common mistake made by local businesses?

The most common mistake is probably thinking that the world out there cares about them.  The potential clients out there care only about themselves.  It’s only in as much as your business meets the needs of the client that they will pay attention to you.  It’s never about you.  It’s always about them.  That has, of course, a lot of implications.  You’ve got to go out there and spend more time listening than talking.  You’ve got to go out there and throw out the net, never knowing exactly what kind of catch you’ll reel back in.

Since you launched CHB Associates seven years ago, how has the business climate changed and how has this affected local businesses?

Well, we had a major recession and it has been quite a rollercoaster ride.  Everybody has been trying to reduce costs right and left.  Of course, you don’t conquer glory by simply reducing costs.  You conquer glory by driving your top line.  That has been one of the main challenges for small and large businesses alike.  Therefore, it’s not only a matter of cutting costs, but it’s a matter of finding opportunity in an environment that’s truly challenging.

While many businesses were going belly up, a number of businesses were also thriving.  The key to finding opportunities is focusing on what you can change.  Can you have an impact on the overall economy?  Well, no, you can’t so you shouldn’t worry about it.  But within the parameters that have been given to you, there are always opportunities.  The challenge is to focus on how you can impact the environment rather than how the environment can impact you.

Tell me about one of your favorite client success stories.

My very first coaching client is still with me.  I had done consulting work before, but consulting and coaching are two very different animals, so I had very little experience.  But that person trusted me.

His situation was dire.  He was in the video production business and his revenues were woefully insufficient.  We agreed to a barter arrangement for the first three months and cash after that.  After those first three months, he said, “I can’t afford you but I guess I really can’t afford not to go with you.”  So we kept on going.

First, we discovered what was the vision, the sense of mission, the big picture, the core values that this business wanted to embrace.  Once we had gone through that, we took a look at his situation that day, both on a personal level and a business level, and designed a plan to get from here to there.  After nine months, the client said, “I’m done with you.  I think I’ve learned everything I need to learn and I’m going to go on my own.”  After a long session that day, he changed his mind and we continued.

His business actually doubled the first year and has continued to grow by double digits in every year since. One of the main reasons for that success was the change in the business owner’s attitude from negative talk to positive visualization.  Then, a marketing plan, obviously, was very much needed, sales training, and systems – as the business started growing, making sure all of the systems were in place so that he could hire people to help him get to the next level.  At the end of last year, he said he will never do without a business coach for the rest of his career.

Find out more about Claude Blanc at the CHB Associates website.

This week’s attack on Zappos’ customer database just reinforces the bad news: there’s no way to completely insulate yourself from cyber theft, unless you don’t own a computer or pretty much function at all in the 21^st century. One of the inconveniences of having the world at our fingertips, from desktop to mobile, is that our data can be compromised. Instead of losing sleep, just know that one day, it may happen to you. The best thing you can do is be prepared and be smart. Here are a couple of security measures you can take right now so that if the convenience of being able to buy your favorite lipstick from your iPhone comes back to haunt you, it will be more of a phantom than a full-blown poltergeist.

Use Strong Passwords

But, you may wonder, what’s the good of a strong password if it’s been stolen? Well, in the case of the stolen password, not much. But if you use easily recognizable passwords, it may not be very hard for a thief to figure out other passwords that you use. For example, if you use your dog’s name as your Zappos password, what’s to say you’re not using your cat’s name as your Starbucks password? Your birthday on Amazon.com, and anniversary on Drugstore.com? And so on.

Sometimes breaking into your account is less of a hacking game and more of a guessing game. Making it easy for yourself to remember passwords will only make it easy for the criminals to guess your passwords – especially if they’ve already stolen other personal information.

Use a password management program that remembers passwords for you and stores them locally on your computer. That won’t necessarily help you if you’re trying to log into an account from your cell phone, but it’ll make it a lot harder for your passwords to be compromised. A little inconvenience may be worth the security. If that doesn’t work, devise a system that allows you to create and memorize strong passwords. Use a mnemonic device or some combination of uppercase and lowercase letters, numbers and special characters that you can memorize.

Don’t Use The Same Password For Multiple Accounts

Zappos suggested to its customers that they change the passwords to any other accounts where they used the same password as they did on Zappos. Once a thief has your name, email address and one password, it may not be all that difficult to break into another account using that same email address and password. Think about it: you’ve probably repurposed your dog’s name not only on Amazon.com and Starbucks, but on 1800Flowers, too.

It’s good practice to use different passwords across different accounts, especially if those accounts provide access to sensitive information. It’s not quite as devastating if someone discovers a password that you use on multiple forums or some social sites. Although you may not want someone posting as you, it’s fairly easily remedied (unless you’re a politician) but it can be much more difficult to undo the damage if your banking information or social security number is stolen.

Pay Attention To Small Credit Card Charges

I’m just as guilty of this: you get a credit card statement, and notice a charge here or there that you don’t quite recognize. You ask your spouse/significant other if he recognizes it. You both sort of shrug. It could’ve been that time you went out or that thing you wanted, and wasn’t there a holiday you needed a gift for? In the midst of 46 other charges, you’re pretty sure that $26.09 is legitimate.

Not necessarily. Sometimes criminals will charge small amounts with just that hope in mind – you won’t notice. For those of us who live on plastic, with a number of recurring transactions that often pass by unattended, this can be dangerous. Another red flag comes in the form of even smaller amounts – measured in cents rather than dollars. If you see a charge for 3¢, don’t shrug it off as too small to care about. Criminals will sometimes “ping” your card to see if it’s active. Before you can say “pennies”, that 3¢ could turn into thousands of dollars.

Get A Free Credit Report

The FTC requires that each of the three major credit reporting bureaus provide you with a free credit report once every 12 months. There’s absolutely no reason that you shouldn’t be requesting this. You can request the report from all three bureaus at once, or stagger them throughout the year. They are not guaranteed to be identical because they obtain their information from different sources, but they’ll give you a bird’s-eye on your credit activity.

If you notice anything out of sorts – a credit card you never owned or account you didn’t open – report it immediately. Just because you never noticed any fraud on your accounts doesn’t mean it hasn’t happened. Criminals may silently be using your identity to open accounts and make purchases in your name. That could really come back to haunt you if you fail to take action.

A word of caution: don’t be lured by offers for free credit reports. The FTC has authorized only a single site to provide these reports. Be smart and follow their advice.

Protecting Your Customers

It goes without saying that you should be just as vigilant with your customers’ sensitive information as you are with your own. Here are some basic security measures that you should have in place:

1. Don’t store customer information in an unsecured location. That means no Excel document on your desktop with customer account credentials or heaven forbid on a thumb drive or other removable media. It means ensuring that your site is protected via a firewall and/or security certificate (SSL). Yes, Zappos and other retailers have a slew of security measures in place and hackers still got around them. But failing to take these basic measures is simply asking for trouble.
2. Don’t send sensitive data via email. It is not secure.
3. Require account holders on your website to create a strong password. You can restrict password entries to a minimum number of characters, with requirements for uppercase, lowercase and numbers.
4. Be aware of the security measures in place on servers where your site is hosted. Does your hosting provider monitor and protect against attempted intrusions? Depending on the nature of the data you’re storing, you may want to ensure tighter security controls and monitoring.
5. Don’t ask for more information than you need. It may be convenient to keep credit card numbers, but do you really need to? Go with the bare minimum you need to conduct business.
6. Have a good insurance policy. If you ask for and store sensitive customer information, you should talk to your insurance rep about a good policy that will protect you in the event of a breach.

Theft and intrusions are an unfortunate reality of doing business online. Whether you’re a customer or a business protecting yours, be smart and be vigilant. It could happen to you, so it’s best to be prepared.

It mocks you, all possible 63,206 characters.

But you can barely come up with fifteen (“Good morning” maxes out at thirteen, even with an exclamation point) and even when you do have a brilliant idea, you hear nary a sigh from your fan base. It’s as if you don’t exist at all.

Isn’t the point of a Facebook page to engage? How’s a business person to engage the silent masses? And honestly, you’re not looking to rewrite the Constitution.

Fear not, faithful Facebooker! There are strategies you can use to engage even the most reticent fans. Here are five you can try for yourself. I’ve used these on client pages with fewer than 100 fans and still elicited a response, something many smart marketers will tell you to forget about attempting with fewer than 500.

So put on your creative cap and see how you can make these work for your business.

1. Ask A Question

From “How are you today?” to “What’s your biggest marketing challenge?” a question is like a mini call-to-action. The important thing to remember when you ask a question is that you need to make it short, relevant and easy to answer with only a few words. In fact, if you can make it answerable in one word, all the better. When you compose a question, consider how you might respond if you saw a similar question pop up in your news feed asked by another brand. Is it something you would answer? Would you answer in your head without bothering to put it into the comment box? Is it just too taxing to consider?

Asking your fans to “Share their favorite childhood memory” is more worthy of a blog post than a comment. “Did you play dodge ball as a kid?” is harder to ignore than answer. Of course you did! You remember with a cringe every time you got smacked dead in the face. The latter question can be answered with a simple “yes” or “ouch” or even a click of the Like button (akin to a “yes”).

A question that’s easy to answer and appeals to someone personally and emotionally is far more likely to get a response than one that’s vague, requires an explanation or is overused or dull.

Try it now: come up with a question you can ask your fans. It doesn’t necessarily need to be related to your business, as long as it’s relevant to your audience. In other words, don’t ask your young teen audience how their kids are today.

2. Fill-In-The-Blank

The human brain doesn’t like unfinished business. Think “closure” and the angst we experience until we get it. A blank space is almost cruel. It compels the obsessive in us to answer. You can use this to your advantage. Come up with a sentence and leave a blank space, preferably at the beginning or the end. “Today I feel _____.” Doesn’t your brain automatically come up with something, whether happy, tired, or you-must-be-joking-what-a-crappy-day?

A good fill-in-the-blank also appeals to the clever in us. Who doesn’t want to come up with the most interesting, unique, funny thing? The same rules apply as they do to questions: make it easy to answer and emotionally, personally relevant.

Try it now: compose a fill-in-the-blank that would get your audience thinking (and answering). Keep it short and simple and make sure you can answer in one or two words. More than that and you lose the point.

3. Click The Like Button

A super easy way to get your fans to respond is simply to ask them to click the Like button. Make an if-then statement and ask your fans to click. “Click Like if you want a chocolate chip cookie.” No thought required. You’re practically eliciting a Pavlovian response. The important thing is that you’re getting a response. It may not seem like much at first, but you’re building a relationship and ultimately a habit. People will start to expect interesting and interactive content from you and clicking Like will become part of their routine.

Try it now: think of something that would be interesting to your fan base and generate at least a few clicks.

4. State The Obvious

I’m always amazed by how willing people are to engage on the most mundane topics. Inevitably, someone will say “What a beautiful day!” and 435 people will click Like, 10 will say, “Sure is!” and a few more will add, “And I saw a rainbow, too!” Mundane or not, it’s something you can use to your advantage. Comment on the beautiful weather if you must, or come up with another innocuous statement. They key is to keep it positive. Nobody wants to click Like if you complain about the pain in your left pinky knuckle.

Try it now: think of something simple but universally relatable. It’s just as easy to make this business-related by saying, “Looking forward to the three-day weekend!”

5. Make A Happy Statement

Although mass media (namely television and newspapers) would have us believe otherwise, people are not in a constant state of road rage, domestic unrest or existential angst.  People like to be happy and they like to be around other happy people. Much like the Obvious statement, the Happy statement generates a slew of Likes, agreement, well-wishes and support. “Great day at the office today. Joe brought in six boxes of chocolate donuts!” People who don’t know you, have never been to your office and don’t know Joe from a blue sock will click Like in affirmation of your happy donut day.

Try it now: think of something that happened recently and turn it into a positive statement. Sound excited when you write it. In this case, an exclamation point won’t hurt.

Disclaimers, Cautions And Admonitions

Please don’t open up your Facebook page right now and start asking how everyone likes the weather. Plan first, post later. Consider what’s interesting and relevant to your audience, your business and your industry. If you run off helter skelter talking about cookies and rainbows you’re just going to raise eyebrows. Know who you’re speaking to before typing a single character in that status box.

Remember that it’s only engagement if you’re involved, too. You don’t get to throw a question out and leave. If someone answers, that’s your cue to talk back. If three people click Like, that’s your cue to comment on it. Especially if you’re just starting out or have a small fan base, it’s crucial that you nurture and coddle your newfound engagement.

Finally, try not to be random and flippant. Unless there’s a good rationale for asking your fans if they want a cookie… don’t. Not every question or comment has to be about your business, product or industry, but remember why you’re on Facebook in the first place. You should have fun with your fans, as long as you can also do business with them.