History is repeating itself as the powerhouse known as Facebook is now the virtual social club and Internet hub that AOL once was.

In 1993, I received my first email address during my time as an undergraduate student at McGill University. At the time, the Internet was just beginning to flourish as individuals like myself were drawn to this new form of communication. I often used a web browser called Mosaic which was out long before the first version of Internet Explorer was released. It was easy to use and laid the groundwork for what was to come.

One common problem that people had back then was finding ways to connect to the Internet. I had the University’s tech department to offer some support in getting my computer hooked up but as a commercial entity, the Internet still had a long way to go. The average potential Internet user, that is, consumers who owned computers, didn’t have an easy way to access this emerging technology called the “world wide web.”  These users would often get their local phone company to explain to them how to connect a modem and fill in the appropriate form fields in the network settings on their computers. I assure you that most people had no clue how to do this, even the tech support people. This lead to a lot of frustration back then.

Enter: CompuServe

CompuServe was the first major commercial service to provide easy access to the Internet. They made a valiant effort to let consumers connect to the Internet in a more intuitive, or at least automatic way. The system’s ease-of-use helped the company gain massive numbers of clients.

CompuServe Becomes America Online

America Online (later shortened to “AOL” in their branding and marketing) purchased CompuServe to rapidly increase its market share and all of the perks that came with such a maneuver.

At its peak, over 30 million people had subscriptions to AOL. It was used for email, as a social tool, and as a massive marketplace. The e-commerce aspect of AOL became a large part of its usefulness. Users would log in, check their email, play in chat rooms, get personal one-on-one advice, and then use the marketplace to make purchases (or at the very least, use AOL to search for reviews and e-commerce websites to buy products).

AOL as a Social Club

AOL allowed people – friends, relatives, strangers, ex-girlfriends, classmates, work colleagues, you name it – to socialize. The exponential growth of chat rooms probably would not have happened if it weren’t for AOL’s massive influence, ubiquitous nature, and ease of use. The same could be said for instant messaging. The ability to easily send private messages to your friends was incredibly useful. Each AOL user was allowed to create a profile, not unlike current profiles, but in a much more basic way. People would announce their statuses by continually editing their profiles. As an AOL user at the time, I can assure you that the first thing people did when they came across your name in a chatroom or an email was to look at your profile.

The Shift to Facebook

I’m jumping ahead somewhat and leaving parts of this story out, such as the rise and fall of Friendster (Facebook’s predecessor), for the sake of brevity.

In 2004, Facebook started as a way to let college students (the consumers) socialize online. The website eventually grew beyond its initial boundaries and allowed individuals in from all walks of life to use it. The site currently has several hundred million users.

Similar Concepts

AOL was meant to be a closed system that would make it easy for people to access the Internet. Facebook assumes you have access to the Internet to take advantage of its service. Although the origins are different, their end product are very similar. You can think of AOL is a generation one and Facebook as generation two. Nonetheless, the parallels between AOL and Facebook are noteworthy. Conceptually and functionally, both systems grew to become extremely influential.

• Rapid growth in the millions of users (I believe that Facebook has many more users than AOL in large part because it’s free, as opposed to AOL which carried a monthly fee)
• User-centric concept
• Very easy to use
• Helps to initiate relationships and socializing
• Functions encourage relationship building and maintenance
• Clean, user-friendly design and layout
• Status/profile changes
• E-commerce (AOL shopping vs. emerging Facebook stores – many people want to make purchases right from their Facebook accounts)

One difference between the two systems is that Facebook makes it easier to have a “closed” circle of friends. You can limit who sees what you write, your photos, and videos, likes and dislikes. With AOL, you could simply ignore people you didn’t care about but it wasn’t possible to have a long lasting “club” of your friends.

Downfall

As with all things Internet, AOL feel and Facebook will eventually tumble as well. Facebook is still in growth mode so it obviously remains to be seen how long it will take for it to be toppled by the next “big thing” that emerges thanks to our rapidly evolving Internet and digital communications world. Make no mistake – Facebook will cede its reign to another entity, it’s just a matter of time, although I do recognize that the longer one stays with it, the harder it is to migrate to a new system (consider your photo uploads, established social network and overall investment of your time). With 400 million users, it is now 10 times the size of AOL at its peak so don’t expect a rapid change away from Facebook in the near future.

What’s Next?

Facebook has had many issues with privacy and  as such, a number of Facebook alternatives (such as Disapora) have been launched or are in the making that do no intend to have similar issues.

If you’re searching for a company to create a website for your business, shopping by price is the dumbest thing you can do. Keep reading to find out why that statement is true while simultaneously letting this article make you money.

For the purposes of this article, I’m going to use the blanket term “web design” to mean the design of a website (graphic work), and to a lesser extent custom programming, and a touch of Internet marketing.

Hot Web Design + Great Internet Marketing = Your Website Makes You Money

I honestly do not believe that most businesses realize how much work goes into building a high quality website that makes them money.

Why bother having a company website if you don’t let it present you as an outstanding company to do business with? Serious companies should take their websites (and Internet presence) seriously. I frequently field inquiries from a range of people who either get it or don’t.

Clients Who Don’t Get It

Unfortunately, I get many calls from people who just want to have a website to check it off of their list of things to do. These individuals often treat it like a chore, don’t really want to learn about the possibilities that await them in the Internet world, and yet expect results beyond reason. These people are often in a rush and don’t realize what it takes to professionally achieve what they want.

A typical “rush” call goes like this:

Potential Client: “I need to launch a website that has to have full e-commerce capabilities, a little flash, and [insert 1990s-style, gimmicky item here]. I need it by next week.”
Me: “No problem! Call my competitors. I’m sure they’ll be more than happy to help you!”

At which point they’re blown away that I’m not jumping all over the project. Why would I be? The person has made it clear that he doesn’t know what he wants, doesn’t appreciate what it will take to get the job done, wants it done in a week, and lacks the understanding that without an Internet marketing component, the website isn’t going anywhere. I’ve been down that road. I’ve been doing what I do since the 1990s and I can tell that without these points, within a few months of launch, the client would cancel the project anyways seeing as how they didn’t get a return on their investment.

Not to mention that clients in a rush are often the worst to deal with because their disorganization somehow becomes your emergency and stress levels go through the roof. Who needs that?! I want to sleep at night, stress-free.

Clients Who Do Get It

I work with many companies (of all sizes) and organizations who understand their business, truly want to make a profit and recognize that the Internet is an advertising source that does not offer guarantees but can be extremely lucrative. The ones who listen to my team’s advice typically generate the greatest return on their investments. Coincidentally, these same clients are those who have a viable business model and are ready to work on and invest in something of high quality.

In other words, these clients understand that working with a team of professionals who are open-minded, very experienced, and can answer difficult questions with honest, detailed answers on the spot and/or make corrections and adjustments quickly, is invaluable.

Working WITH Clients

On the other hand, I also get calls from many excellent companies who are very professional and working together, we get the job done to everyone’s satisfaction. That’s why I do what I do.  I’m not here to nickle and dime every last cent out of my clients for the services they don’t need. Rather, I’m here to do what I enjoy doing, excel at it, and help clients get the most out of their Internet marketing investment. A large, important, yet far too often overlooked part of that is the design of the client’s website.

My services are specialized. Rushing and bargaining only serves to demonstrate that as a potential client, you do not see the inherent value that I bring to the table. As one of my clients, Gerard Nierenberg (Forbes calls him The Father of Negotiation) has taught me, business relationships can be about everyone winning. They don’t have to be a one-up scenario. I have adopted this attitude into my company policies. I work with clients on a win-win basis. If you want a cut above and see the value in it, you should be prepared to pay for it. If you want the lowest price for any garbage that can be produced, go to my competitors.

Web Design is Not a Chocolate Bar

The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines a commodity as “a good or service whose wide availability typically leads to smaller profit margins and diminishes the importance of factors (as brand name) other than price.”

As a serious company, you can’t treat web design like a chocolate bar.

Web design is not:

• A low investment (of time, finances, etc)
• An easily bought and sold item
• Decided through spontaneity and whims
• Something you ask your cousin’s friend to do for your business for $100 because he knows how to use MySpace

Web design is:

• A process that involves a strategy (if you intend to make money with your website, directly or indirectly)
• A talent that requires experience
• A demonstration of true understanding of your goals (when done properly)
• An important part of persuading clients to buy from you
• An understanding of themes, colours, fonts, screen sizes, browser compatibility, usability, function, coding, and more

While surfing the Internet, every single day you land on websites that are either ugly, difficult to use, don’t appear trustworthy, make it difficult to find what you’re looking for, and generally make the process unpleasant and frustrating. Further, in many cases your searches require a lot of digging through search engine results pages to get what you want. That’s because far too many web designers miss the mark. In fact, most don’t even know where the mark is. Instead they shoot in the dark and hope it works.

For example, a website that is designed for a cosmetic plastic surgeon should be “soft” in feel whereas a machinery parts manufacturing plant website will likely have a “rougher” feel to it. It typically takes experience to get the balance right but either way, launching a random website where the generic design could represent any business by simply changing the logo isn’t necessarily the best way to go.

These Can’t Easily Be Bought & Sold With High ROI Potential

Strategy
A professional will take the time to listen to your needs, generate ideas that you haven’t thought of, and provide a cohesive plan of action.

Skill Type
Your friend’s daughter who completed her degree in fashion design should be able to design your website because she knows about design, right? Wrong. The smartest clients understand that designing for a website is nothing like any other form of design. You may be great at designing dresses, houses, hotel rooms, brochures, or even logos, but that doesn’t automatically qualify you as a competent web designer.

Skill Level
Let’s face it. The majority of websites have a dated, ugly design to them. Yes, I’m a bit of a design snob but even looking conservatively, most websites don’t work nearly as well as they should to sell your brand, products, and services. Quality web design is typically produced by quality web designers. People with real skills charge real prices. If your budget is a few hundred dollars, hire a freelancer and don’t expect an experienced company to do the job for you.

Analysis of the Big Picture
The ability to look at the big picture is invaluable. Your neighbour’s son, a high school student who dabbles in “web design” doesn’t even come close to understanding what your short- and long-term business needs are.

Answer Questions
Do you want your questions answered? Do you want to wait for that answer? It takes a LOT of time to learn about and experience all of the issues that arise when developing a website. Years, in fact. A real business will be ready to pay for instant access to answers to important web design questions.

SEO
Hiring someone without proven SEO experience is a big mistake. Do-it-yourself turnkey operations are popping up all over the place promising instant riches and easy money for all. Read some of the truth about SEO and SEO business mistakes.

Code: HTML, PHP, CSS, Jquery, Ajax, APIs, Etc
Is your web designer still building an entire website in HTML tables? That’s old hat. New technologies have emerged and CSS is where it’s at for styling a website. If your website was built in the last couple of years and its basic structure is tables, you’re missing out. You see, it takes time and effort to keep up with the trends in this industry. Most business people aren’t expected to keep up, but we are. Experience and knowledge are easily upgraded.

Ongoing Maintenance
A company that’s been around for years is more likely to be able to manage your website than a freelancers who are often overwhelmed with work or underwhelmed and have to take a second job (meaning no time for you).

Stiffed on Domain Names
Don’t trust the guy in the apartment next door to register your domain name for you. He’ll be gone before you know it and you won’t have any way to contact him. Trust me – I’ve dealt with this exact situation at least a dozen times. Wouldn’t you sleep better at night knowing that you own your domain name and that it’s not at risk?

The best web design companies are businesses just like yours and deserve to be paid accordingly.

Dear Business World: Stop obsessing over Twitter, Facebook, and Blogging. Chances are, it’s not for you and your company loses credibility as you try to keep up with what you don’t understand.

I’m going to tell you what most marketers will NEVER tell you. I do that a lot because I believe in providing the honest truth, with integrity. Here are statements that I hear every single day from clients:

“I need Facebook.”
“I need Twitter.”
“I need a blog.”

You know what I say? No. You. Don’t. Feel free to create an account to show you’re there but understand that maintaining social media accounts is typically very time consuming.

Cheap & Easy

Not only do most companies still not understand what these mean to the expansion of their business, most have no idea how to harness them to increase visibility, branding, leads and sales. So why does this persist? It’s cheap and easy to set up Facebook and Twitter accounts. The thing is, most businesses don’t know what to do with them once they get them started.

High Abandonment Rates

To run a blog, Twitter or Facebook account means you have entered the world of generating new ideas and content creation. That’s right – content creation. After all, nobody cares that you announced on your Twitter account that you now have a Facebook account. Think about that. Who cares? Do YOU care when someone else makes such a banal announcement? Of course not. People want to read fresh, relevant, interesting, educational, and entertaining content. That’s what the merger of social media and business is all about.

For business uses, social media is a relationship-building process tool, not a one-shot deal. Now paying someone to take care of these for you is going to be costly in most cases and the potential return on investment is going to be difficult to measure. There are high abandonment rates because creating compelling content takes time, effort, skill, and consistency which relatively few people have.

Should You Cancel Your Accounts?

Now get real. How much time do you have? Can you really spare your time? I doubt it. Are you creative enough to generate new ideas and keep up seemingly “forever?” Most importantly, do you have something to say? Really – think about. Do you have something to say that will be of interest to people on a consistent basis. And by “something to say” I don’t mean Tweets like “had lunch, have heartburn, damn McD’s,” because nobody cares. Rather, your readers are more likely to want to read “McD’s has a new website that allows them to do XYZ with clients. Here’s my analysis as to why it will work well for the company.”

Attention Business Owners!

Just because people are telling you that you need to be on Facebook, doesn’t mean anything. Facebook is useful as a social tool because people “play” on it all day and build relationships. Most small businesses don’t have time for that and that’s OK. There are much better ways to generate leads and increase sales for many businesses. Besides, the “worst that can happen” is that you look stupid, with that Tweet you sent out 4 months ago (that no one saw because you have 0 followers) that people see when they click on the link from your website that encourages people to “follow us on Twitter!” with no apparent reward for doing so.

I’m sorry for being somewhat blunt on this topic but enough is enough. Stop listening to people who just want your money (bad marketers) and friends who don’t know anything about your marketing strategy or the number of resources you have to maintain what they are suggesting you do.

There is no one size fits all to Internet marketing. There are a number of blog posts and articles giving reasons for using Twitter for business. There are books being written on the subject. I have yet to see any compelling evidence whatsoever that says every business needs this. Does every online business need SEO? Yes. Do they need pay per click (PPC)? Possibly. Do they need an email marketing campaign strategy? Probably. Do they need Twitter? Probably not.

Who is Your Target Market?

I go on and on about this all the time so forgive me if I sound like a broken record. Blanketing the world with “marketing” via Facebook and Twitter isn’t exactly the new way of thinking about ROI-based online marketing. (Trust me – I’m writing a book on the topic!). You need to reach out to where your target market clients are and go after them there. If you’re going to run a blog, you need to make sure that the people you’re writing it for are going to read it.

There Are Ways to Get a Social Media ROI

What should you do with your account? There are ways to make them look busy if you really want to go that route. I’m not going to list them right now, as that’s typically what I get paid to do and it’s not the goal here. In this article, I just want to get the message across so business owners can breathe a sign of relief and focus on running their businesses. Perhaps more in the future. For now, just consider my words of wisdom on the topic and they can help your business not look laughable.

There’s an ongoing debate as to how many years a business should register its domain name. Here is a simple breakdown to use as a guide.

1 Year

A one year domain registration is typical of bloggers, businesses, and private individuals in scenarios such as these:

• You don’t have a lot of money
• You want to try something and see how it goes before making a longterm commitment
• You already own many domain names and you just wanted to get that one extra one

Many SEO experts believe that Google actually factors in the number of years you registered your domain name. There are of course other factors such as visibility of the address and how that address is associated with other domains, and so on. But let’s just consider the number of years for now.

If the number of years of domain name registration is a factor, it would follow that a one year registration is not a good idea for most businesses. How serious can your business be if you only intend for your website to be around for less than a year? In fact, in the past, I have actually stayed away from hosting companies that had domain name registrations that were fairly close to their expiration dates. Yes, I absolutely check that info out before committing to a 2-3 year web hosting plan. If they company doesn’t intend to be around next year, why would I pre-pay for the 3 year plan?!

2 Years

Two years is more of standard among real businesses and I suggest at least a 2 year registration for companies. From an SEO perspective, this is the minimum you should register as far as I’m concerned. It could be that one factor of 200 that helps bring your website to a better ranking.

5 Years

This shows that you plan to be around for some time to come and it represents a good initiative on your part. It’s a good middle ground between one and ten years.

10 Years

The 10-year domain name registration period is indicative of you representing a hardcore company that plans to be in business for a long time. Some people think that paying for so many years in advance is a waste of money because prices may go down, and for other similar reasons. I disagree. If you run a serious business, the cost of a 10 year registration is negligible and you don’t have to worry about it for a long time. Just make sure you keep the contact information up-to-date so that when it does come time to renew, you get the renewal email.

Are oval logos out of style? If you consider social media logos, you don’t see a lot of oval in the designs. These days there are a lot more logos with squares with slightly curved edges. Still, there may yet be hope for the oval-shaped logo.

I was inspired by this post about circular logos to create a similar type of post. When I saw that article, I was surprised by how attractive many of the designs were. I didn’t realize that the circular form for a logo could be so simple yet attractive and iconic. I looked around for a list of oval logos to complement the circular ones but couldn’t find one so I decided to put one together myself.

One point I can make about using the oval concept is that it allows for a lot of flexibility. Unlike circular logos, the oval shape inherently allows you to place it on an angle which can create a sense of dynamism. After searching extensively, I found these 60 logos worth putting up. I find that some are particularly creative while others are very well known but not particularly impressive. This is a sort of study on the shape as the comparison says a lot about the options you have when you design an oval logo.

Do you have others in mind? Mention them in your comments…

Internet Explorer 6 doesn’t even explore anymore. It just kind of stumbles around!  It’s time for IE6 to just die already!If you’re reading this and you’re not sure what IE6 is, are fully aware of what it is, or why I’m calling for the death of something, read on…

What is IE6?

Here’s a summary of the basics:

• IE6 is Internet Explorer version 6
• It’s a web browser that allows you to surf the Internet (just in case there are noobs reading this who don’t realize IE6 is bad for us all)
• It was launched on August 27, 2001
• The next version of Internet Explorer 7 (IE7) was released in October 2006 (5 YEARS after IE6)
• The current version is IE8 which was released in March 2009

In technology terms, IE6 is a dinosaur and it’s time for it to go extinct. It was released before the iPhone, the first season of American Idol, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, and 9-11. Let’s face it, this browser is old!

The Problem

There are several key issues surrounding the IE6 browser. First, a small percentage of people surfing the Internet still use it, most not realizing that it’s completely out of date. These same people visit websites wondering why so many web designs suck but in reality, it’s just their experience using the browser that makes it appear that way. As technology has evolved, so have web design methods and styles, making the user experience more interesting and stimulating, if you’re using an updated browser.

Next, its creator, Microsoft, refuses to end support for it. By continuing to support security updates and adding to it from time to time, and not forcing people to upgrade, the problems will continue indefinitely.

Internet Explorer’s arch enemy is the Mozilla Firefox browser. When Firefox has an update, they operate in the oposite direction, with annoying “update now” messages that appear when you use it. At least, these keep most people up to date. I say most because according to some of the websites I manage, I still see a tiny percentage of people visiting from older versions of Firefox.

Worse for the Web Design Industry

My team and I work very hard to satisfy clients. In doing so, we spend an enormous amount of time getting our “fancy shmancy” websites to look great on many browsers. The problem here is that testing for cross-browser compatibility costs me and you a lot of money. Professional testing for how a website looks in IE6 is extremely time consuming and someone has to pay for that time. Given the browser’s low market share, it’s really not worth it anymore.

Another factor that is an issue for us is that it doesn’t support the many CSS features, making web programming more complex than it needs to be.

Perhaps the worst part is that IE6 does not have the ability to properly display transparet PNG images. As such, IE6 users will see big blocks of blank squares on their pages, rather than attractive images. Without knowing better, they’d sooner blame the designer for their poor experience on a website. This certainly cuts into the persuasive part of my Internet success model.

The Solution

Kill IE6! Microsoft should stop supporting it and force upgrades to the latest version of windows Internet Explorer.

The Kill IE6 Movement

Governments and the corporate world are starting to take a stand against the continued use of Internet Explorer 6. Here are some of the highlights:

• In January 2010, Google announced that they would no longer support it.
• YouTube which is owned by Google has announced that their support will end soon as well.
• The governments of France and Germany take the issue seriously and have called for the demise of IE6.

How did Microsoft respnond to all of this? They’ve extended IE6 Support to 2014! Arg!

What it Means to You

Not much aside from the fact that you’ll have a better browsing experience by not using IE6. If you run a very busy website, you need to look at your stats and consider who’s visiting the site. If you still see a large (“large” is a relative term, I know) amount of visitors still using it, you may want to have a pop-up window telling them to update to IE7 or IE8 (or the “latest version”). Otherwise, you could try to account for IE6 but it’s a losing battle in my opinion.

Most importantly, a better browser experience.

As Internet marketers continue to look for novel ways to find new customer for their clients, most are overlooking the obvious: Each of their clients has an established customer base to work with. One of the best ways to keep in contact with these clients is through email marketing. Why not send an email today and see what happens? Here’s guide to why email marketing can work for your business.

Email Marketing, Not Spam Marketing

I have a number of clients who use our email marketing services and oddly enough, while everyone complains about receiving spam, many think that it’s ok to send it. I then make several points including the fact that that makes them no better than the spammers, it is illegal according to the Can Spam Act, and that the method is not targeted, making it a waste of money.

Opt-in is Key

The reason why you can legally send bulk emails (often called “email blasts,” ”mass emails,” or “newsletter emails”) is that companies like MailPrince.com only allow opt-in emails. That means that people have to agree to receive an email from you. This is done in many ways but the most obvious is by placing a “join my mailing list” button with a form field for their email address on your website. By voluntarily sending you their email address, they are agreeing to be sent newsletters and other company updates.

The 2-Step Process

I will explain this more in a future post but in a nutshell, there are 2 parts to email campaigns: Gathering emails and sending emails. This 2-step process can prove to be very powerful to generate new sales fairly quickly.

Target Market is Key

Your clients are your target market. That’s the obvious point. But you can also make use of other target market streams that flow into your website. If you’ve done a great job at SEO or PPC (or both), most of the people who come to your sitey are your target market. Not only is that better for you since you want to sell to them more than anyone else, they are more likely to sign up for your email where you can update them with important news such as new services, discount coupons, and so on.

You can also take advantage of social media and other online sources to gather emails legitimately but if you’re just getting started, search engine optimization and pay per click are the most direct, best ways to get people to your website who would be interested in signing up.

Why This Works

Combining SEO, PPC, and email marketing can become a powerful sales tool for your business. This form of marketing is very strong because you are able to reach target market website visitors who may have been to your website but not contacted you. As such, you gain a competitive advantage.

Example

Suppose your optimized website brings in 1,000 visitors per month. Of those visitors, let’s say that 10% sign up for your newsletter. That’s 100 people. You then decided to use Pay Per Click (PPC) services like Google AdWords. Let’s say that your PPC campaign brings in another 1,000 visitors per month. Of those, another 100 people sign up.

That’s 200 people per month who have signed up for your newsletter. Now, multiply that number by one year (12 months), and you have 2,400 people on your list. That’s 2400 people who might not have contacted you otherwise but were happy just to receive emails with your specials on them.

So now, January comes around and you are looking for leads. What do you do? Send an email blast to the 2,400 opt-in people and give them an offer they can’t refuse! You are bound to generate sales that way.

Keep growing your list and you have tapped into a new way to generate business using customers that you have but also many that may have gone somewhere else, or not engaged your business to begin with.

How to Get Started

You need to find an email marketing provider that suits your needs. If you’re just beginning, stay away from email marketing companies that force you into long-term contracts. You should try a pay-per-send service rather than a forced monthly fixed rate. Since the Mail Prince Email Marketing Service is about to launch its new website, you can contact me to get you started. If you want to send a mass email blast to clients today, I can help you.

(In the interest of transparency, I will point out that I am involved with MailPrince.com and would like very much for it to be successful.)

I’ve been a photographer for most of my life and often get asked to photograph executives, engineers, marketing personnel, and many other individuals for their websites. I’ve witnessed a trend in that not only do companies want photos of their staff, they go so far as to ask for staged shots for their websites. The staged photos are then placed throughout their website to enhance the look and fell. I think that many people just assume that the photos were purchased at stock photography websites although anyone doing business with these companies on a face to face level, either in person or via video conferencing technology would know that they aren’t.

I’d like to focus on the idea of putting individual photos next to an employee’s name (or your own name if you’re the business owner). Business of all sizes are deciding to place staff photos on their profiles (such as on LinkedIn.com) as well as the corporate website. Here are some perspectives to consider:

Pros

• Pursuasion is a big one in my book.  When people visit your website they’ll often check out the company profile page(s). The Internet is a cold place and adding a photo often adds a personal touch. It can help your credibility and transparency which are both parts of the overall pursuasion section of the Internet Success Model™.
• People tend to trust and buy more from attractive people so you’re among that crowd, it could help you.
• People love looking at people. Having your photo displayed may leave a lasting impression.
• If you work in an industry where trust is especially important such as banking, investing, and high end sales, adding a photo can set a client’s mind at ease.
• Photos in social media profiles tend to attract a lot more attention. This can help with branding you as a professional.

Cons

• Privacy is rapidly growing into a major issue. Putting your photo online can be seen as an invasion of privacy.
• Knowing about how attractive people generate more sales and the Halo Effect, I’ve seen some companies use stock photos to represent actual employees or as made-up people in their testimonials.
• Staff come and go frequently and so adding and removing photos on a regular basis can be time consuming and a general pain.
• Small businesses often consider the hiring of a professional photographer to get a real headshot as a waste of money.
• Some people simply aren’t photogenic and placing their photo may turn people off.
• It could be dangerous (especially for women) to show what you look like.
• You may want to appear younger than you are (that’s what Photoshop is for!!).

Where Should it Go?

In most cases, I don’t advise placing a large photo of you on the homepage of your business website. If you rely on the Internet for the bulk of your business, you may simply want to place a photo on the about us page and leave it off of the homepage.

What Should It Look Like?

In most cases I suggest leaving your wife, kids, dog, and material goods such as a high end car out of the photo. One reason for this suggestion is that people like to work with others who they feel are similar to them. By adding those items, it sets you apart and fills in the gaps of differences in their minds where they would otherwise have filled them in on their own, possibly in a more connected light. Secondly, you want to come across as professional, not overly casual.

I recommend keeping your Internet presence as primarily business-focussed,  avoiding posting all of the personal details of your life. (I’ll blog about that another time.)

Placing your photo on your website (and social media profile) may or may not work for you. It could be that your business niche isn’t one to do that kind of thing. Or, you could be a pioneer when it comes to taking the next step toward pursuading people to buy from you.

Consider your own situation. What do you do and why?

I attended WordCamp Montreal, where WordPress creator Matt Mullenweg was the keynote speaker. His talk was interesting and speaking with him afterwards was equally so. He mentioned that a WordPress installation on its own is good but what makes it so special is that there’s such a large dedicated community behind it that helps each other out, particularly with plug-ins. He then encouraged everyone to thank people who create the plug-ins which make our lives as WordPress customizers easier.

My own team has developed several complex plug-ins which we use in-house and I can certainly appreciate the time, ingenuity, and effort that goes into making them.

On the Internet, far too much time is spent complaining and not enough time is devoted to giving credit where it’s due. The individuals and companies who have developed plug-ins for WordPress have made it much easier for the rest of us to get our work done. I consider some of these to be among the best WordPress plug-ins while others are just generally helpful. Either way, here’s a thank you to some of the people whose plug-ins we’ve used.

Thank You!

Akismet by Matt Mullenweg
More Fields by Henrik Melin & Kal Ström
Custom Permalinks by Michael Tyson
Enhanced Recent Posts by Vincent Prat
NextGEN Gallery by Alex Rabe
Post-Plugin Library by Rob Marsh, SJ
Recent Posts by Rob Marsh, SJ
Redirection by John Godley
Report Comments by Dagon Design
WP-PageNavi by Lester ‘GaMerZ’ Chan
WP Super Cache by Donncha O Caoimh
AdSense Manager by  Martin Fitzpatrick

 If you’re thankful for plug-ins, feel free to say it in a comment below!

We’re in the midst of a recession and many people are looking to join business groups to try and drum up sales. But with all of the Internet’s business networking opportunities, are offline business networking organizations still needed?

The world’s largest business networking organization is the famous Business Network International (BNI). BNI groups are everywhere. Pick up a newspaper in any major city and you will find invitations to join these groups in your local community. Use a search engine with “your location” and “bni” as search terms and you will probably find one nearby.

A second offline, real world business networking type of group is your local or regional Chamber of Commerce. These groups are similar to BNI groups in that they are meant to promote local businesses. They are also commonly referred to as a local Board of Trade.

A third type of business group is the private business networking group. These are run by companies and they often search for business people with specific criteria (such as executives with higher salaries, companies that reach minimal financial brackets, sales representatives who bring in over a million dollars in sales per year, and so on). In the next part of this article, I will focus on this type of offline business networking group.

Let’s Get Going! (or Not)

I was called by Marcie Balaban, a “qualified motivational sales expert” (as stated on her website) . She runs a company in Montreal called Let’s Get Going. This was a cold call and while I usually get rid of telemarketers within seconds of answering the phone, I was struck by her enthusiasm. She told me that there were many people in her business group who were either looking to buy into my services or had many connections to people who would be interested. I have to re-iterate that her enthusiasm got the best of me and so within a few days I met with her and paid the fee (about $1,000, although now it’s much higher), and I was ready to roll.

The Gamble

It’s important to note that this was the first time that I ever paid anything to anyone to generate leads. Read that last sentence again. I didn’t need this service. I’m an accomplished, effective SEO and Internet marketing expert, and I’ve been able to keep my companies very busy for years. Based on what was promised, I figured that it would be easy to make back the fee as well as the time it would take out of my schedule to network through this organization. However, I do recognize that it was a gamble.

Networking Group Review

Here’s my experience from the Marcie Balaban Let’s Get Going business networking group. Please note that this was heavily edited as I do not intend for this to be a “trash the organization” type of blog post. Take this part as a case study based on my experience.

PROS

• Sales: There were clearly some people who made sales and hence the ever-important return on investment (ROI).
• Meeting New People: It felt good to meet new people outside of the office. Many of the people were generally friendly.
• Longevity: Some people had been with the group (or at least a business associate of Marcie’s) for a long time which indicated some stability.
• Quality of People: I found that some of the people I met were very good at what they did. A small handful were the equivalent of me in the sense that they really knew their stuff within their industry or specialty. I liked that a lot.
• Clicking: I clicked very well with one person who was in my industry but not a direct competitor.
• Location: The meetings took place in offices that were fairly close to my own office which meant I could save travel time.

CONS

• Quality of Businesses: Most of the people I met were “one-man shows” and small mom-and-pop type shops with little money to spend on Internet marketing and few connections to people that did have money.
• Lack of People: Aside from a few new people coming in from time to time and aside from the first couple of weeks of membership, the entire Let’s Get Going process was to get me to meetings every 2 months or so, where I would meet the same people over and over. Approximately 80% of people at a given meeting were the same ones I had met at previous meetings, and most were very small businesses with little money and fewer connections.
• No ROI: I did not close one deal with a member of the group but spent a significant amount of time giving a lot of free advice to people who would never pay my consulting rate, or who asked me to spend time writing a detailed proposal and then never returned my calls or emails after I sent it (or worse, would tell me at meetings that they were going to approve it soon and then never did).
• That Suckered Feeling: In the end, when I had a more clear view of what had happened to me, I saw it as essentially being the equivalent of a telemarketing company that gets people to join, with not much to offer me. At the last meeting I attended, a handful of new members were attending their first meeting and I couldn’t help but feel sorry for them. It was like I was stuck in this dead-end business group and I had a feeling of “oh look at these new suckers… too bad they are probably going to learn the hard way like I did.”
• Lack of Internet Use: Aside from poorly written emails (often full of errors such as my name and companies being misspelled, dates/location/time errors, etc), there was no clear attempt to use the Internet that I could see.
• No Infrastructure: I got the overall impression that this business group primarily focused on Let’s Get Going making money, with no visible investment in infrastructure. The lack of Internet use is part of that, as are the fulfilment issues noted below.
• Complaint Sessions: I didn’t enjoy the complaint sessions. After a while, there were many people who expressed their disillusionment with the lack of success in the group and they would whine about how they weren’t meeting the people they were told they would, making the sales they were lead to believe would happen, and how they felt they were ripped off. While I may have felt the same, I didn’t enjoy coming from my positive thinking and upbeat office to an atmosphere of negativity.
• Lack of Fulfilment: This is posssibly the worst part of my business networking experience. I can’t say for sure but this probably wouldn’t happen in a Chamber of Commerce or a BNI meeting. So here it is, in addition to the fee, I was asked to sign a contract. The contract stated that I would receive a number of features. Unfortunately, almost none of the features that were listed in the contract were fulfilled.

The following is a brief summary based on the Let’s Get Going contract:

1. Weekly call or email with a lead: I received 2-3 right in the beginning (out of a possible 52 total for the year).
2. Weekly follow-up: This happened once or twice (out of a possible 52).
3. Weekly calls logged: None (out of a possible 52).
4. 52 minimum planned introductions: Based on business cards gathered, I met about 35-40 people over the year.
5. Company goals sent out: No.
6. “Monthly meetings to build longterm relationships”: I had 7 meetings (out of a possible 12 for the year). That comes to about $160/meeting. (Basically, I paid about $100/hour to sit and listen to small business owners give their pitch over and over.)
7. Group meetings with presidents: This happened once in a while if you really stretch it and mostly include the very small business owners who attended the “monthly meetings.”
8. “Extensive follow-up” for these meetings: Not even one follow-up.
9. Sales coaching: I specifically requested this right from the start and it never happened. To me this was a great aspect of the contract and it was something I really wanted. I asked about setting it up on 3 occassions but there was never any sales coaching. That alone could have been worth the price but I didn’t get any whatsoever.
10. Company profile emailed to at least 100 companies: No.
11. Telephone tips (“How to speak better on the telephone”): No.
12. A Copy of “Marketing Your Greatest Asset… You” written by Marcie herself: Despite repeated requests for a copy, I was never given one. When I pointed that out one final time at the end of my year, Marcie refused to give me a copy since it was the end of my membership and I wasn’t renewing.
13. The list goes on…

As can be seen from the above, almost every item in the contractual obligations list was not fulfilled. This left me with a feeling of being ripped off (among other negative feelings…).

Questions to Ask Before Joining a BNI Type of Group

Does your business website or Internet presence reflect what you do?
Ultimately you join business networking groups (online and offline) for a source of referrals. If your website isn’t up to the standard it should be, then you should take action to get it there before joining a group. It is naive to think that the first thing people will do after they meet you is call. Before they do, they will look you up online to see how legitimate your company and its reputation appear. If you’re going to join a networking group, make sure you are well represented online. A lot of people will go back to the office and talk about you with their boss. Their boss will then want to see your website. Make sure yours reflects your company.

What do you sell?
If you sell support products like printing and promotional products, I don’t see how you can make much money in these groups. There are so many of those types of businesses in these groups. I came across far too many printers in the group I joined and from speaking with various printers who compete with each other in other offline business networking groups, I can’t see the ROI potential.

Is the investment justified?
Think about what return on investment you can reasonably anticipate based on the fees for joining. If you sell products that cost very little, you will have to sell a lot. For example, if you sell pencils, it will take you a lot longer to make your money back than say, if you sell photography equipment.

Do you have the time?
Consider how much your time is worth. A time commitment plays a large role in these groups. If you’re already very busy and you can’t send a sales rep, it may not be ideal for you. Some groups make attendance mandatory. Others make it compulsory to have a new lead each week, meaning that you need to spend time speaking to contacts and seeing if they are interested in being pitched.

Who do you need to meet?
Think about your target market. From my own experience and after speaking to a number of people who are BNI and Chamber of Commerce members, there seems to be a consensus that you are going to meet mostly the same people all the time with new faces showing up from time to time. That means you will hear the same information pitched over and over again. Will these people be offering services that you and your business associates need?

Can you speak to current members?
Ask to speak to several members before joining. Perhaps a mix of someone who has been in it for 3-6 months and another individual who’s been involved for a year or more. Additionally, consider what industry they are in and ask whether or not they believe your industry could benefit in that particular group.

Will someone help me with my pitch?
In my business networking meetings, I found that most of the people in the group give poor quality pitches. I found it rare that anyone’s pitch clearly explained what they did, much less compel people to hire them or tell their friends and business associates about them. If you’re going to join a business group, make sure someone is there to coach you on how to give better pitches. In my experience, many group members didn’t even understand what other people are pitching. I know that for a fact since they would often lean over and ask me “what is that guy selling…?” It’s just like what I always say about having a persuasive website, that is, clearly explain what you do and how you can add value to others.

Can you attend a complimentary meeting?
Attend a meeting before you join. See what it’s like. What kinds of industries are represented at the meeting. Consider how it feels to be in attendance. Friend and fellow marketer Jeff Shore recently commented that he stays away from any business group that feels cult-like. I would tend to agree.

Networking & The Internet

From my perspective, joining a privately run business networking group was beyond a complete waste of time. I began thinking about what could have been done to bring people together using the Internet and digital methods to get more out of such an organizations.

One of the main drawbacks in the group that I joined was based on a lack of communication tools. I don’t know a lot about how these groups are typically run but what I don’t understand is why there wasn’t more use of the Internet and website? I think that there should be a username and password assigned to each member where people could see who else is in the group and what services they offer.

Aside from this type of directory, there should be a members-only message board and forum on the website that contains a list of all 5 à 7 parties, upcoming meetings, and so on. Social networking and business networking has moved online and the failure to take advantage of that as the organization grows is simultaneously short-sighted and almost a disservice to members.

Many small business owners feel out of touch with technology and online social networking opportunities such as using LinkedIn. I could have given a talk to educate members on how they could use social media to their advantage.

Will Business Networking Groups Fail?

If networking groups are going to continue to be useful, they need to adapt. Businesses no longer operate in a vacuum. If you want to see who the competition is in just about any industry, it doesn’t take long to find out who’s out there thanks to the Internet. One can no longer assume that if they attend a meeting that they will be viewed as the best game in town and people will automatically buy from them just because they’re in the same group.

What People Want
Just like sales everywhere else, supply, demand, and pricepoint will remain major determining factors as to  whether or not people will buy from you in these groups. If you’re selling an inexpensive service, it will probably be easier to make the sale. On the other hand, there may be multiple people selling the same service in the group. Remove the risk, make it cheap and people will be interested.

Adapting to Technology
Internet technology makes it significantly easier to network in a controlled situation. By controlled I mean that you can look for whatever is useful to you whenever you want and reach out to people as needed. Contrast this with the more contrived, forced meeting of people at networking group meetings.

Awkward Feelings
At least initially, the Internet also cuts done on obvious uncomfortable feelings you may experience when being in the group. For example, one person in my group did a particular type of work that someone else did and essentially asked for a job. When the person looked into the work, he found that it was far below the standard that he was accustomed to. This lead to “all kinds” of awkward feelings when they would meet. Someone else pointed out that they felt awkward knowing that they generated far more income and that their business was much more successful and stable than some of the other members. The Internet removes that degree of awkwardness to some extent. As more people realize that, they may be more likely to stick to Internet networking.

How to Network Online

This is far more complex than what I will write here but simple ideas can go a long way in some cases. Get your website optimized for search engines and make sure it’s useful to visitors, then join LinkedIn, start a blog, comment on other people’s blogs, join Twitter, and become active at these activities on a continual basis. I know that most people won’t have time do get heavily involved but if you do have some time to spare, I suggest at least reading what’s out there and make connections as needed. By targetting your connections, you may get more out of the Internet than you could from offline networking.

Concluding Remarks

In sum, business networking groups are moving online and failure to take advantage of that fact may prove harmful in the long run. I joined a business group with the best of intentions and to my surprise, it became a very disappointing experience. Based on my experience, the group I joined was experiencing rapid growth but the lack of investment in appropriate support, clearly defined goals, use of the Internet, and unfulfilled features were all cause for leaving the group. I’ll have to chalk this one up to experience.