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Earlier this year, Doodie and I were introduced to this incredibly interesting businessman and writer, James Salter. Long story short, we asked James if he would write a posting for our blog based upon his experiences in writing for the web and give some advice on the challenges it presents to businesses. We found his following thoughts and perspectives spot on!

Thanks to constant changes in technology, the success of web 2.0 tools and social media for communications and collaboration, and the looming presence of the Google search engine, the effectiveness and relevance of your website can shift right under your nose.. If you are not paying attention, you could end up like Yogi Berra said, “We made too many wrong mistakes.”

Given the dynamics of such change, it’s tempting to chase after each technological advancement. After all, Darwin said that change is a condition of survival over the long run. But today’s big hit can too easily be tomorrow’s ho-hum. Here are some suggestions for small business marketers and owners to help you navigate this challenging situation with regard to your website and web marketing efforts:

1.Balance counts, and here’s where: balance between vital constants and necessary flexibility. It’s about maintaining your core competencies while adapting to changing environments in markets and marketing. That means your website has to consistently deliver on key performance criteria such as usability, navigation, accessibility, look, information architecture, and technology. It also has to be monitored in terms of its content relevance to what’s happening in the marketplace.

2. Make sure your web person understands the basics of SEO. It’s true that content is king and just natural writing will catch the spiders’ crawl. But, it’s amazing how many sites today are still not optimized to enhance what the spiders find. Many sites are outdated in terms of their ability to translate any kind of copy into what matters for search engine purposes, and lack the balance between content and keywords. That’s not to say your Webmaster should agonize over esoteric keyword formulas, but this person should at least be current on what Google and Yahoo are doing in terms of the relative importance of backlinks, individual page titles, fewer keywords, and keyword placement in headlines and body copy.

3. Deliver content that your customers are looking for, and in a way that is easy to find. How about a call to action on each page, downloadable useful information offers above the fold on every page, and landing pages for geo-targeting and special promotions?  These aren’t considerations for only the big guys; they’re equally important for SMB marketers. And it’s all relatively easy. It’s the big reason your marketing team needs to communicate effectively with your website resource to ensure that your site infrastructure is consistently delivering the communications output your targeted audience is searching for. That’s the flexibility side of web balance.

If you are interested in understanding some of these concepts further, two of the best books I have come across that are excellent for content and SEO are Search Engine Optimization by Kristopher Jones and Letting Go of the Words by Janice Redish. Both go step by step through what it takes to get the page rank you want.

And as you think about how to take advantage of what’s best in core web competencies and target market flexibility, just be sure to keep your balance on the wonderful web high wire. Falling off could really hurt your business.

Our guest blogger, James Salter, is a freelance business writer and the principal of Business Writing that Works Business Writing that Works.  James has extensive experience in marketing, sales and operations, focusing on objectives and outcomes that help create successful marketplace performance and business results. He has been heavily involved in communications and marketing support implementing processes to identify, measure, and deploy drivers of customer loyalty and retention. James can be contacted through his website at www.businesswriter.us, by email at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address), or we can put you in touch with him.

On a roll with mobile marketing, we decided to push forward and look at innovative ways companies are using mobile to reach and engage their customers. Within a short while, we found ourselves buried in tech words like geotagging, 2D barcodes, QR codes, MMS-enabled, and more. Our heads were spinning!

Last year we were introduced to Princeton-based mobile marketing firm, JAGTAG (www.jagtag.com) and, with everything we knew to date, this seemed like the perfect time to chat with them further about mobile strategies.

JAGTAG has created an easy way for organizations to send marketing messages and content to consumers, via their mobile phones at the moment they want it. It’s a pull approach, using permission-based best practices. No spam. Got to love that!

You can find out more from their website, but briefly JAGTAG creates custom 2D barcodes that can appear on print ads, direct mail, a poster, packaging, a t-shirt, a website, and so on. Responding to an invite, the customer takes a picture of the barcode using their camera phone and sends that picture to a provided text number. Within seconds, the customer will receive a response to their request. It could be a text message, video, audio, or an image, depending on the campaign. JAGTAG is a full service solution where they will help you to develop your campaign, respond on your behalf to the customer-initiated requests, provide analytics and help interpret results, store data safely, and more. While each campaign is different, we were told that a recent campaign saw opt-in percentages of 21%. That’s enough to make any direct marketer smile.

We hope you find the following interview with John Cashman, JAGTAG’s VP of Product Development, helpful as you explore mobile marketing as a way to connect with prospects and customers. While the questions center on JAGTAG and their 2D barcode solution, we feel that the answers will give you some insight into the factors to consider in any approach that you are evaluating.

1. Could you give us an example of how a company might use a tactic that combines multimedia messaging (MMS) and 2D barcodes to attract new customers or reward existing ones?

Sure, we had a consumer product company do a guerilla marketing campaign, where they had 15 people walking the streets of 3 major cities wearing t-shirts with a JAGTAG printed on the front. Anyone who took a picture of the JAGTAG and texted it to the number provided had their name entered into a sweepstake. They then received a message on their phones asking if they would like to be added to the database for future promotions. It was a really fun, unique way to get consumers excited about their product.

Some of your clients are institutions of higher education. Imagine being able to send informative, relevant content to prospective students while they are visiting your college.

2. Foursquare, a game designed for smart phones and a social networking site, is getting a lot of attention from the media at this time. What’s the difference between doing a mobile campaign using a web application like foursquare that utilizes location-based technologies/geotagging (e.g. current Starbucks campaign), and a campaign using 2D Barcodes as you would with JAGTAG?

Foursquare is app-based, so the consumer has to download an app onto their smart phone to participate. With JAGTAG, they must take a picture with their camera phone and text it to the number provided to participate. They are very different approaches. 

3. Our clients vary in size and budget. Are 2D barcode solutions an option to consider for small businesses?

Like any marketing campaign, the decision depends on how much you are willing and able to spend. It is expensive to optimize rich content like video, audio and images for mobile phones—this upfront cost could be outside some budgets. We’re in the process of setting up an online version of JAGTAG to make our solution more affordable for small businesses. I think this has great potential for local marketing.

4. If I were looking in my marketing toolbox today, where would a 2D barcode campaign fit in?

We talked about the guerilla campaign earlier. There are so many ways you could use this channel—we have some examples on our website.

2D barcode campaigns are definitely complimentary to any app-based marketing solution. If you have an app to deliver info to your customers, you could use our solution to pique the interest of a potential customer by sending them a sample of the information offered on an app.

Cool stuff, eh!

John recommended a website called Mobile Marketer if you are interested in keeping up with developments in mobile marketing (www.mobilemarketer.com). In the mean time, we need to catch our breath and take a break from all this writing.

Give us a call if you want to chat about your mobile strategy. We’ve got some great resources at hand to help you.

With mobile marketing being lauded as the next big thing, we thought it would be interesting to explore some of the things going on.

We dug up some examples of recent discussions taking place for consideration:

• Latest research from the Institute for Mobile Media Research at Ball State University found that 99.8% of students on campus have a cell phone, and smart phones now account for 49% of mobile communication devices. (Source: Smartphones displace computers for more college students, Ball State University News Center, June 15 2010).
• Some 75% of 12-17 year olds now own cell phones (Source: Teens and Mobile Phones, April 20 2010, Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project). This report includes some very interesting points on texting habits of teens, as well.
• In the comScore’s blog last week, they referred to data from comScore research showing that smartphone penetration in the US market has grown from 11% of mobile subscribers in April 2009 to 20% in April 2010. (Source: blog.comscore.com)
• More than 100 million active users are currently accessing Facebook through their mobile devices (Source: Facebook Press Room, June 15, 2010)

We’re not statisticians and don’t have a crystal ball, but it sure looks to us like we are in the middle of something big, again.  With people relying more and more on their mobile phones as a way to access online information and to manage their professional and personal lives, it’s time to consider the following:

(1) What does your current website look like on a mobile phone? Can people easily navigate information on your site via a mobile device?

(2) If you are going to create a mobile version of your website, what content should you include? Who are your site visitors and what do they want from your site? Think user-centered design.

(3) If you do email marketing, what do your emails look like on a mobile phone?

(4) Early adopters are exploring innovative ways to connect with potential and existing customers via this channel—through online games, apps, location-based technologies, and barcode solutions. Are you keeping up-to-date with these new opportunities?

Tomorrow, we are posting part 2 of The Now Big Thing. We did this great interview with Princeton-based mobile marketing firm, JAGTAG (www.jagtag.com), and can’t wait to share this with you.