Final Piece Consulting, LLC

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Working for a variety of Public Relations and Marketing firms I saw firsthand how clients were either chosen or accepted.

These are two very different things.

If you choose a client it means you either feel you can offer value to their business or you like that they have deep pockets. Hopefully for the sake of your business it is the former and not the latter.

If you accept a client it means you aren’t sure if you can offer value to their business but you like that they have deep pockets or that that they simply have pockets.

In my opinion, accepting a client is unethical, bad for your business and bad for their business.

A lose-lose-lose you might say.

Now that I have been in business for almost 2 1/2 years,  I feel like I have a pretty good grasp on how to choose the right clients. This came from experience at other firms prior to Final Piece (as mentioned above) and from having to deal with the difficult decisions of selecting clients on my own.

Hopefully my history will help with your future.

End up with Jordan – not Bowie.

Choosing the Right Clients

1) Don’t Accept Business because it’s Business  – If you have someone call you that is dead set on spending $10,000 on local advertising and you either A) don’t believe that is going to help their business or B) don’t have the right experience to match the job – send them on their way.

2) Personalities Matter -When you meet with a potential client you need to really focus on getting a feel for the type of person they are. This person is going to be spending their money on your services and will expect you to be at their beck and call. Make sure you will be able to handle those calls with energy and enthusiasm. If you think they aren’t a match for your personality – don’t take the business.

3) Believe in What They’re Selling – If you simply feel that their product or service isn’t one that will be successful you need to tell them so. It will likely upset them, but you will avoid taking a considerable portion of the blame when the ship goes down.

4) Make Sure the Enthusiasm is There - I can tell you right now that if you aren’t excited about the client then you won’t do a good job for them. They want to trust you with increasing their bottom line and are willing to pay for your expertise. If you can’t get excited about that -  move along.

5) Don’t Be Afraid to Send Them Elsewhere- Their business may seem amazing but you think your acquaintances at [INSERT FIRM] would be a much better fit. Tell them that and then contact that firm and let them know you set one up for them. Good will always comes back around. At some point, that firm will do the same.

Some folks might find it difficult to pass up business and the dollars that follow because they need money. I get that. The economy has been bad, jobs of been scarce, et. al.

But I beg you. Pass it up.

Wait until the right fit comes along.

I assure you it will.

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How to Avoid Shiny Object Syndrome (SOS) in Social Media

It’s partly human nature.  We want to be associated with what’s new, what’s up and coming, what’s next.  This is especially true when it comes to social media.  Everyone is talking about Pinterest, Path or Google Plus.  It seems as though everyone has written a blog post titled something like “10 Ways to Use Pinterest for Business”.  All of these conversations about the up & coming social networks are a good thing, but it doesn’t mean these new social networks are right for your business.

Too often I’ve heard, “Everyone’s on Facebook & Twitter; we need to be on these networks!”  Your company may be successful by jumping on the social media bandwagon but I’d highly recommend doing a bit of research before jumping into your first social network as an company.  A little research goes a long way & will help your organization avoid SOS.

Questions to Ask Before Choosing a Social Network

Is it right for your company?  Does your target audience, or your potential clients, hang out on this social network?  What are my goals? (ex: leads/sale, branding/awareness, etc.)  These are the questions to ask before you decide on a social network.  I like to look back at the Conversation Prism (by Brian Solis & JESS3) every time I’m building a social campaign to remind myself of the sheer number & diversity of social networks.

Final Piece took this approach recently with a paint manufacturing client.  Facebook & Twitter were involved heavily in their product launch campaign (mainly for channel marketing/referral purposes) but the bulk of our social time was spent in a discussion board for paint & coating professionals.  A discussion board is not one of the new, sexy social networks but the audience was perfect.

After several months on the boards, we ran a promotion giving away the new product & garnering hundreds of quality leads from this relatively small corner of the Internet.  Why did the discussion board work?  It turns out that folks who own their own their own painting contractor companies don’t spend a lot of time on Facebook or Twitter.  So how did we find this discussion board?  Where should you go to find your audience online?

Target Audience Research Tools

• Social Mention – A tool for finding out who is saying what & where they are saying it.  Also includes sentiment tools.
• LinkedIn Groups – The new statistics feature allow you to easily see the group’s demographics & if a LinkedIn group is dominated by potential or current clients.
• Addict-o-matic – Primarily a listening tool, it can also be used to find your audience. Bonus points for ease of use.
• Forrester’s Social Technographics Tool – All social media users are not created equally.  Featuring both B2B & B2C tools, Forester helps you break down how your target demographic uses social media.

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Improving Your Visitors to Leads Rate

Does your company make money off of it’s website(s)?  Or is your website simply a line-item cost of doing business in the 21st Century?  One of the tricks to getting a business website to generate revenue (or more revenue) is to make sure your lead capture system is working efficiently & effectively. In other words — what’s happening to your website traffic?  What percentage of overall traffic turns into leads & what percentage of your leads convert into a sale (or better yet, reoccurring sales).

The five tips below are intentionally broad.  There are numerous strategies for improving your lead capture rates & many are industry-specific but the tips below will help any B2B or B2C business improve their lead capture rates:

• A Unique “Thank You” page URL - This is one of the most often overlooked aspects of a business website, the contact form or “Contact Us” page.  Ideally, your contact form will automatically re-direct those who complete your contact form to a unique Thank You page.  This page should ONLY be used for those who fill out your contact form.  Ideally this page will use the “no follow” tag & company website traffic would be filtered out by IP address(es). You can then setup a Google Analytics Goal (see #4 for more on GA Goals & Funnels) using the specific Thank You page URL & even assign a value to each lead/goal completed.  Knowing the value of your average lead (or segmenting your leads so averages work better) is also crucial to making informed decisions about web development work.
• Constantly A/B Test Your Landing Pages - The importance of testing your landing pages (plural) cannot be understated.  Seemingly nonsensical changes can greatly improve lead capture rates. For example, does a bright red call-to-action (CTA) button on your landing page perform better or worse than your existing lime colored CTA?  Before you get into a heated debate with the rest of the web team (or into an “ego-off” with a member of the executive team), A/B test those CTA buttons!  There is no shortcut for testing your landing pages.  Consider also building landing pages for all of your key marketing campaigns that include lead capture.  It’s not draining from a resources standpoint & can often provide near-miraculous results (I’ve seen lead capture rates double from a single change in a sign-up form).
• Identify User Loops & Website Problems with Visitor Flow (new version of GA) - The new version of Google Analytics (you can check it out by clicking on the link in the top right of GA) offers several new features worth knowing about.  The one I like the most is called Visitor Flow (last report under Audience in the new GA) which provides a visual representation of how people are using your website.  Spend some time in this section.  What it’s showing you is how people behave once they visit your website.  Are there any traffic loops that show people are confused on a key page & are hitting the Back button?  What are the typical paths in which visitors that turn into quality leads navigate your website? The Visitor Flow report is excellent at helping to identify visitor behaviors (both positive & negative) on your website.  Be sure to change the Dimensions (the thing being measured) in this section as well.  The default view is Country/Territory.  Try clicking on the green box & searching for dimensions like Source or Keywords for more valuable information.
• Develop GA Goals & Funnels - In the settings section of any GA profile (a little cog icon in the upper right of the new version) you’ll find the ability to add in GA Goals & Funnels (links to a setup guide).  You get a total of 20 goals per website, so in most cases you can setup goals around specific website or business goals (for example, improving your lead capture rates).  This is also the place where you enter in lead value.  GA considers this information optional, but it really is a requirement, even if it’s only an educated guess.  Knowing your average lead value is incredibly important to making informed paid search (AdWords) & web development decisions.  In the case of lead capture goals, you will want to enter in your custom Thank You page URL as the Goal URL & select the proper match type (most likely Exact if you have a static Thank You page URL).  You can also add in Funnels for each goal.  Setting up your preferred funnels (the path you would like visitors to take on your site before signing up) is useful for identifying website behavior.  Funnels can be used in conjunction with the Visitor Flow report to identify how visitors should be using your company’s website (funnels) vs. how they are actually using the website (visitor flow).
• Obtaining Referral URL Information - Some contact forms appear on multiple pages of a business website.  If potential leads can fill out a contact form from any page on your website, it’s essential to also ask the form to provide information on the referral URL or, in other words, which page of your organization’s website is responsible for the lead?  This will go a long way to identifying your best performing pages (they may not be your most trafficked pages) & will provide additional insight on what to A/B test.  If your contact form does not provide referral URL information you can switch to a contact form software that does provide it or contact your friendly neighborhood website developer for a quick & relatively painless addition.

As mentioned at the beginning of this post, these 5 tips are not a catch-all for improving your website’s revenue.  Leads may go up, but if the sales staff isn’t “on point” & treating each lead as valuable, then you may not see an overall increase in online revenue.  If lead capture rates were improving for your site but overall search traffic for your keywords has been declining than so to will your leads.

There are numerous scenarios & many moving pieces involved in making (more) money off of your company’s website. Improving your lead capture rates is one piece of the puzzle.

Happy with your lead capture rates but can’t find that missing piece to improve online revenues?  Contact Final Piece & let us find the missing lead capture piece for you.  It’s what we do (#shamelessplug)

Photo Source: dougwoods

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I’ll go ahead and admit this is shameless self promotion before I even start. But more than that, it is a man proud of something he has nurtured since inception and seen grow and become something he is supremely proud of.

While I have been working with a bunch of great clients already – this is the first major project under the umbrella of Final Piece to officially launch.

The great people at Mate1.com and I came up with a comedic concept to build their brand online. As everyone in this industry knows, ideas and concepts come and go, so when you get one that sticks and you think it may have legs, there is a certain thrill and excitement to it.

That idea then generated a partnership (with the Weasel Pauly Shore no less), video storyboards, awesome creative,  PR strategy, a website and many late nights at the office.

While the contest has just begun and doesn’t come to a close until 1/15/2011, meaning there is a ton of work to still be done, I thought talking about how proud I am of the launch would not only be therapeutic as I prepare for step 2 but also allow me a second to sit back and make sure I enjoyed what has already been done. Too often we race, race, race and never take a chance to appreciate ourselves and the people around us.

So if there is anything you can do for me – just check out the website and let me know what you think.

At the very least, take this opportunity to appreciate some work you’ve done recently and are proud to have worked on before racing to your next project.

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It’s funny how one of the main social media tools you are an advocate for can fall to the back burner when you get too busy.  Being a business owner is certainly not easy and effective time management is truly the key to success.  But even when you feel great about all the client goals and deadlines you’ve met – you can still forget to look out for your own business.  I’m speaking about blogging of course, and not only its importance, but finding the time to do it for yourself and not just your clients.  I spend a large portion of my time building blogs, creating content for blogs and measuring the success of blogs.  This makes it hard for me to find time to blog for myself anymore.  This poor blog died a quick death almost right after it started and my personal blog hasn’t been updated in months.  I love writing and miss finding the time for it.  I’m hoping this post is therapeutic and I force myself to schedule blogging into my calendar right along with everything else.

I miss blogging.

My website misses the benefits that come from blogging.

My mind misses speaking for the world (or my mother) to hear.

I know and sell to businesses the importance of blogging, social media and really all inbound marketing. I need to get back to it and I hope you can help me. Otherwise I might forget what got me here and turn into one of the morons who responded to the survey below.

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My industry news intake has suffered drastically over the last few weeks thanks to a good deal of new business.  Now don’t get me wrong , new business is a great thing for my livelihood and more specifically my wife’s shopping habits, but it can make it hard to blog when you are a small start-up company. 

I did however have the opportunity to check out a few very intriguing articles and wanted to share them with you in this week’s edition of Monday Links.

1. Google TV Announces Its Programming Partners

Google continues to do everything they possibly can to turn America into 1984. I kid, I kid (kind of).  They plan on launching Google TV in the next few weeks and have signed contracts with HBO, CNBC and Turner Broadcasting (TBS,TNT) to name a few.  As with anything Google does, they hope to be the “leader in the growing industry of Internet-connected television sets, which Forrester Research expects to be in 43 million United States homes by 2015.” What do you think about turning television screens into bonafide web portals?

2. 4 Reasons The Social Media Industry Has a Credibility Problem

We need to stop talking about what we are going to do and actually do it.  We need to stop thinking our time is more valuable than someone else’s. Most of all we need to help others that don’t get social media instead of lashing out at them.  Basically just a great post from a great blog to help put things in perspective.

Just because some of us may be on the right side of a revolution doesn’t mean we are better than anyone else.

3. Why are Social Behaviors Plateauing?

Are we done acting as creators and instead shifting towards consumers?  And better yet, if we as communications professionals aren’t focused enough on creation – what will there be to consume?  One thing not changing – joiners. Joiners are the people that decide to test the waters with a social network presence meaning there are still more and more engagement opportunities out there.

 Where will the next shift be?

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I’ve been working with a company for the last few months putting together a video contest.  I realize everyone attempts to do video contests nowadays simply in hopes that it will (gulp) – “go viral.”  Truth be told though – it is much more difficult to create a David after Dentist video or an Old Spice Body Wash campaign than you think.

Please, Please, Don’t say “Go Viral” ever again

First things first, stop saying “go viral” and just focus on coming up with a great idea.  Once you have that idea you have gotten to the point where you can flesh out the details and, with a lot of hard work, hopefully create something great.  Whether or not people actually see it is an entirely different story all together, and for the most part, out of your hands.

I could go on and on about the creation and implementation of a video campaign forever (and plan to create a comprehensive case study on this campaign after the fact) but really just wanted to talk specifically about the partner selection process.

Does any care about C-listers?

The company I am working with has a decent sized budget for this project (something similar to this awesome contest maybe?)and is investing the money to build a contest website and pay a C-list celebrity to be involved.

Did you just ask yourself why you would this idiot want to push his client towards this? 

I did somewhat initially, but now firmly, believe that the right relationship between a brand and a celebrity can be very fruitful no matter how large the name of the talent.  AdAge just recently showed us that celebrity endorsements, although sometimes hard to gauge value, are still very important in pushing product and growing brands.

Once my client decided they wanted to share the details of the contest with some comedians, writers and experts I got to work figuring out how to contact their agents and begin negotiations.  Without getting into too much detail, I spoke with an author whose book was made into a movie, a few regulars on Chelsea Lately, a regular on Jersey Shore and some 80s movie stars. 

After a few were taken out of the running based on cost we narrowed it down to about five.  This was when the ball fell squarely in our court. How you ask?  Because it’s impossible to hide what your online influence is.

Online Influence Matters – Even for Jwoww and The Situation

I researched ever corner of the Internet to figure out what kind of following the celebrity had and how often they were spoken about or mentioned by bloggers, media and the general public.  I looked even deeper into their engagement with fans online and how adept they were at working with social networks themselves. Did they have a Twitter and Facebook page? Did they have videos on the web they created? Did they have an interactive website? A cult following with power in a specific market?

After all the questions were answered we narrowed it down to two and then went with a gut decsion based on who we thought would make the most sense for the company’s brand, and more specifically the theme of the contest.

I don’t want to tell any comics, movie stars or reality stars what to do since they make 100 times what I do, BUT, seriously people get someone on your team that understands the power of online influence and next time maybe you’ll get the deal.

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Starting this Monday and running until the end of time I plan on posting 5-10 of my favorite links from the previous week on social media, marketing, public relations and business. Some of this may have already appeared in my Twitter feed, but for those of you who like your coffee served with a nice mix of RSS straight to your Google Reader or inbox - this is for you.

1. Top 11 Free Resources to Improve Your Blog’s Content

Some fantastic links from Harry Hoover that cover the blogging gamete to make sure you are creating compelling content targeted at those people you want to read your blog.

2. There, I Said It: Screw Viral Videos

Although I don’t agree with the overall idea of the post – this is a great read from Jim Louderback.  I personal think the main problem is simply the word – viral.  Great video content is a necessity online it’s just your expectations and initial investment that need to be in check.

3. See How They Did It: 104 Social Media Case Studies

Just like it sounds and just as glorious. The Conversation Agent has used her blog to review 12 case studies specifically and then link to another 92.  Not too shabby. Enjoy.

4. Wake Me Up When Your Press Release is Over

Extremely true take on why boiler plates are so awful and how companies can move away from the traditional way of ending a press release from Jonathan Grieb at CEC Insider.

5. 60 Proven Ways to Increase Your Online Marketing Influence

60 sentences taken from The Influencer Project from the good people at HubSpot.  Special shout out to my buddy Kipp Bodnar who is currently crushing it up in Cambridge!

6. The 10 Worst Business Books of All Time

Great topic and hilarious entry all around from Geoffery James.  Either don’t read these books or read them and decide whether or not they made you dumber

What links did you enjoy last week?  Help me out because I can’t read everything!