Jeff's Online Marketing Thoughts

Where I've Been

For those of you still out there that read this blog, I appreciate you hanging with me even though it has been almost a year since I did anything on this site. I appreciate the loyalty and continuing to support me and this site. As to where I've been, I changed jobs one year ago that caused me to re-prioritize and frankly, I lost the desire to keep up this site.

Lately, I've felt the urge to get back in the game so to speak but the topic of this site didn't feel right. It was more job related then based on my passions. So a few more months of searching myself and what I was looking for lead me to launch a new site. You can find it at http://www.jeffruley.com and while the topic has changed, I'm hoping you will join me there as I expect that the style and my personal touch hopefully haven't changed. I'm very excited to hear from you and expand the conversation.

See you at www.jeffruley.com!

Do You Read?

Seth Godin asked the question on his blog, do business books work? I know it is a little off topic for this blog but I think the subject about reading is the more important question that Seth got to in his post; that is the part that I want to talk about. I will also bring it back around in the end to some value for you as online marketers.

I will admit, I am an avid reader. I love getting new ideas about business subjects that I can apply to my work. I have also gotten lots of comments from co-workers who think I'm a little crazy over the number of books that I own and have actually read. Until I read Seth's post, I never figured out that most people are not that different from me, and if they are I doubt I want them on my team. It might not be business books, but I would expect anyone involved in a trade to read about the topic as Seth described. I work with a number of developers and I would be willing to bet the vast majority of them read trade journals or Web sites that share tips and tricks. If you aren't reading and learning how to improve, how good can you actually be at your job?

That is why I read, I have tons to learn and want to be ready with new ideas that help myself, my co-workers and my customers. You are reading this blog, which I truly appreciate, so you are one of the smart ones. What about your co-workers? If they aren't reading, ask them how they stay up on their job. Find out how they keep up on the latest with their job. Maybe they might have some secret that the rest of us have never figured out. I'm willing to bet more read than you think, so you should learn from your co-workers what they read. Your first action item by the end of the week is to find one new source to read for information related to your job from those you work with every day.

I believe we can all learn from each other as well, so your second action item is to add a comment to this post. It should include one source of information on the topic of online marketing and one source of information that you find very valuable, regardless of topic. By sharing we can all make each other better online marketers. See, I told you I'd get back to it.

Improving Customer Service

I discovered this article, Seven steps to remarkable customer service, that is aimed at what great customer service reps should be like. I would encourage you to read it because I feel the takeaways from this article apply to anyone. You don't have to work in a call center to strive for great customer service, it needs to be true in any job. We live in a day where customers are simply counted and viewed as a necessary evil. If we all looked to customers and making them happy, no matter what the costs, went out of our way to make their day; if everyone did that what would this world look like? I am convinced that the companies that are the most successful (not those that are the hot-in-the-moment-successful-in-spite-of-themselves companies) are those that have found a way to make their customers believe they are remarkable, because they truly are remarkable. Companies that have lost their edge are generally the ones that get caught up in their success and lose their focus on the customer. That is what is great about this article, it is a road-map to success. If everyone in your company would live by the principles in the article, since everyone touches the customer whether they realize it or not, how great would your company be?

Web Presence Major Part Of Identity

In an article in Internet Retailer a study showed that 41% of shoppers are less likely to shop in a store if they had a frustrating experience shopping online. Just a reminder on how important your Web site is in the picture customers have of your company.

Are You Ready To Change In 2007?

Well, it is a new year, do you have a plan in place for what you are going to do with your Web site this year? That is a good start, but expect that it will look extremely different at the end of the year then it does right now. What did your plan look like last year; did it change at the end of 2006?

You need to be ready to change. There are lots of books about embracing, accepting, managing and driving change. But change is still viewed as a negative thing by many. People don't like it. It stresses everyone out. It is painful to go through it. But this is a new year. Your New Year's Resolution, is to change how you think about change.

To survive today, you need to go beyond accepting change, but actually liking and forcing change. Creating change will make you successful in the Online Marketing world today. Business moves too fast and customers have shorter attention spans that only the newest and coolest things keep their interest.  If you had success in the past, remember it is the past and does nothing for the future. Everything changes. So rather than trying to catch up to the change your competition or customers are driving you to make, create your own changes. The more you change the more you accept it, the more you don't mind it and start encouraging it.

Change makes you better. Don't just accept it, create it.

Career Manifesto from gapingvoid

Great post at gapingvoid, The Career Manifesto.

They are all great, but if I had to pick one as the best to give you a taste it would be #4:

4. Although your title may be the same, the job that you were hired to do three years ago is probably not the job you have now. When you are just coasting and not thinking several steps ahead of your responsibilities, you are in dinosaur territory and a meteor is coming.

Read the whole thing, then print out a copy and tape it up where you can read it every day. Then send it to 10 friends or co-workers. Everyone should read this and take note, if everyone followed this, imagine what work would be like then?

Are We Too Busy?

If you don't read Kathy Sierra's blog, her posts are great at making you stop and think about the simple things in life that make a big difference. I just read a great post of hers about Twitter, for those that aren't familiar with this site, people basically just post what they are doing every day. Seems stupid to me, yet thousands of people are on this site posting and reading. The connection that people have with wanting to be plugged in is remarkable. Phone isn't fast enough, we have pagers, cell phones, email, IM, and Text Messaging. We have so much going on that we never really reach a productive point in our day.

I think this ties into any type of business, and the example recently where Google shut down their Google Answers project is a good example why. It wasn't working and it caused more of a distraction instead of focusing on what they are really good at. I applaud Google for this because it doesn't happen enough today. Business and life is about making decisions on what you do, because in business you can't be everything to every customer and in life you can't do everything you want, because there are only so many hours in the day.

Two things I want everyone to do on Monday.
1) Pick one thing to stop doing. Is there a product that doesn't perform? A project dragging on? Something you have been wanting to do for a while but just haven't got to it? Stop it today. Quit pretending that it is important yet watch it move down the priority list for everything else going on.
2) Pick one thing and finish it this week. There are some projects that have been dragging on and are still important, but can't seem to get done. Give yourself a deadline, stop checking email every 10 minutes. Don't answer the phone when it rings, in fact turn the ringer off. Give yourself 2-3 periods in the day that you will check email and VM, and get that project done.

Stop using the excuse of interruptions because people don't interrupt you, you allow them to be interruptions.

What Do You Love?

Sorry for the light posting lately, I have been away celebrating and supporting my wife who gave birth to our second child on November 8th. I'm back and ready to dive back into the world of online marketing.

As I get back into work, I think about my two daughters and how much I love them and my wife. I leave them every day to go to work so I can support them. I'm glad that I have a job that I enjoy because it makes it easier. Work does not come before my family, but I have to love the work I do, otherwise it would be impossible to leave them every day.

What do you love? When you go to work every day, do you enjoy work enough that it makes it okay to leave the things you love?