Mindshare Web Marketing Mentors

Today was an amazing day down here in the Dominican Republic on many levels.  Although I leave tomorrow to come home, I am not returning alone.  I’ll be bringing  memories of all the kids we had the opportunity to help and meet while we were down here home with me.

I’ve been feeling like I wanted to help others who were less fortunate than myself for the past six months or so.  I didn’t know what I wanted to do, or how I could help, and then this opportunity arose.  I personally believe that everything happens for a reason and I immediately decided I wanted to go.

I purposefully decided to not draw any preconceived notions of what it was going to be like.  I’ve seen presentations from people who have attended mission trips in the past, so I had an idea of what it MIGHT be like, but I decided to just go and let the experience happen.  WOW am I glad I did.  I would have never guessed in a million years how powerful it would be!

Today we visited the Sanisi House which is a home for children with AIDS.  The children ranged in ages from six months to around 15 years old.  There were approximately 25 children that live in the home which is a three story house with six bedrooms and lots of bunk beds.

The home is run by a married couple.  Their names are Luis and Rosa.  What an absolutely incredible, selfless couple.  We were talking to them when we first arrived and one of the team members mentioned how much respect we have for them.  Luis became overcome with emotion and left the room to regain his composure and returned a few seconds later.  This couple is so passionate about those children and they treat every single one of them as if they are their own.  They do it all by themselves with the assistance of the older children.

While we were there we noticed there wasn’t any electricity.  We found out the government doesn’t turn it on for them except for random times.  They don’t have any idea of when and they aren’t notified.  It was off the entire day and all of a sudden around 3:00pm I heard the kids cheering as it came on.  They could then do Karaoke on the TV and listen to CD’s in their stereo.  All of us here in the United States, regardless of our political affilliation should thank our lucky stars that we don’t have such an insensitive government.

We spent the day building shelves in the children’s bedroom closets.  The walls are made of concrete and we had to rely on a generator to power the drills.  While some of our team built the shelves, others played games with and did arts and crafts with the children.  The kids would just walk up and give you hugs randomly and CONSTANTLY smile.  Again, although there was a huge language barrier, it seemed as though we all spoke the same language.

When it was time to leave for the day my heart broke.  I didn’t want to say goodbye because although I am absolutely going back, I am not sure if those beautiful little children will still be with us when I do return.  What a horrible reality.  As we were leaving those little cuties were standing at the gate with their huge smiles waving goodbye to us.  That was one of the most difficult moments of my life.

Although I came to the Dominican Republic hoping to help others who were less fortunate than myself, they ended up helping me and giving me far more than I could ever have done or could give them.  If you have never been on a mission trip before, or if you find yourself at the same spot in your life that I found myself, do something about it!  If you don’t know who to contact you can always contact Vision Trust which is the organization that hosted us, or you can contact me and I’ll put you in touch with the right people.

I know there are a million opportunities around the world to help, but I would love for you to go see the amazing children I spent the last four days of my life with.  Thank you for allowing me to share this incredible journey with you, and thank you for all the very kind words.  I’ve added some more photos from today to my Facebook page. Go check them out if you get a chance.

I know I typically use this blog to write about Internet marketing strategies, web marketing tactics, and basically whatever it takes to be successful online.

Well, in my opinion there is no reason to do all the hard work to become successful online if you don’t GIVE BACK!  Call it good karma, call it blessings, call it whatever you want.

We are all human beings  inhabiting the same planet and it’s very easy to get caught up in ourselves and forget there are many less fortunate people who could use our help.

I personally have never either had the opportunity, or found the motivation to make the decision to pitch in to help make the world a better place.  Until now!

We made a decision as a company to donate a website to The James Fund last summer.  I found out this spring that due to our donation, we had the opportunity to send two people on a mission trip to the Dominican Republic.  I made the decision to come along and bring my mom and I am VERY happy I did.

We’ve made it through the first day of the trip which began this morning at 3:30am.  Our flight out here was pretty smooth except for when the plane made a very erratic right turn and the pilot came on and said, “sorry for that move but air traffic control told us to turn immediately because another plane was coming right at us.”  Hmmmm….lucky he didn’t say anything before everything was ok.  :)

Our drive to our hotel was interesting.  It seems although there are stop signs, lights, and even lanes in the road … nobody seems to care.  There is no way I’d ever hop in the driver’s seat of a car in this country.  I have a very difficult time being a passenger with ANYONE, but I’ll happily take that position here.

We’re staying at a very nice hotel by Dominican Republic standards. I’ve included some pictures on my Facebook page which can be found at http://www.facebook.com/petebrand1 .

We had an opportunity to meet with the rest of the mission team to discuss what our itinerary would be for the next five days and then we were off to the Ramar House which is a home for boys ages 10 – 18.  There are 20 boys that live in this house and the majority of them are orphans.  We had an opportunity to hear their stories through a translator since they speak Spanish and, except for a few cases, can’t speak any english.  The stories were amazing and sad.  Most of the kids lived on the streets and found their way to the Ramar house following a stint in a government program.

Despite the difficult circumstances these kids have been through, they have HUGE GOALS and even bigger smiles.

Following dinner we played a game of four on four basketball.  I am proud to say we won three of the five games we played, and even prouder to say I fought off the urge to throw up out of pure exhaustion. 

Man am I out of shape!

Well it’s time to hit the sack since we have to be down to breakfast at 7:00am and we are going to be heading to pour seven cement columns for a Christian school they are building.  The interesting thing is we’ll be on the fifth floor which is the roof.  There is no shade and if you’ve checked the weather down here lately it is going to be in the upper 80’s and humid.  All the better to shrink some of this fat from my midsection.

Oh, also … they don’t have machines for that down here.  We’ll be mixing the cement by hand and hoisting it up by “human powered” pulleys.  I’ll have some pictures of that tomorrow.  Don’t forget to check out the pictures at http://www.facebook.com/petebrand1 .

How many times have you purchased something where you knew you weren’t getting all the benefits that you could?

A perfect example of this is one that all of us in our mid-to-late thirties, and up, can think of.

Remember way back in the old days when they created that thing called a VCR?

I still have one of those prehistoric machines and you know what?  It’s still blinking 12:00 over and over again.

Not only that but I still have no idea of how to program it to record a show at a pre-set time.

Read the instruction manual you say?  Whatever!  I don’t have the time or patience.

This isn’t just a problem with hard products.  It relates to services as well, and it’s even more critical for you to address if it is tied to a membership type product.

If you own a health club for example, you’ll be in a position where you need to add members to your base with more frequency than they are canceling.  I understand you can typically accomplish this with contracts and using the fear of an additional initiation fee if your members choose to discontinue their membership.

I believe you can be different from all the rest of the health clubs and eliminate the need for monthly contracts.

The main reason people cancel their membership is because they don’t use it.  The main reason they don’t use it is because they don’t have the discipline to change their habits on their own.  The reason they don’t change their habits on their own, besides the lack of discipline, is because they don’t have anyone holding them accountable.

You can change all that and become a leader in your industry!

Anyone that studies goal setting or human psychology understands it takes a human 21 days of consistent actions to establish a habit.  With this being said, if you leave it up to someone to change their habits without directing them, you will become frustrated most of the time.

You can use email marketing to communicate directly with your members and guide them through the habit changing behaviors so they can ultimately achieve the benefits they are looking for.

Create a 30 Day Step-by-Step Program

Once someone becomes a new member you can help get them off and running toward establishing their new healthy lifestyle.  You should begin to write a series of emails that are a maximum of between 200-250 words that have a combination of education and action steps the recipient should follow.  You should make sure the content is fun and not stuffy.  They are looking to workout not for a sleep aid.  :)

If you aren’t that good of a writer you can hire one fairly inexpensively to interview you and create the emails for you.

Once you’ve completed the series of emails you’ll need to go sign up for an email marketing program like iContact, Mail Chimp, Constant Contact, or Aweber.  There are a ton of choices out there and they all work fairly similarly.  The only requirements you’ll need is that they have auto-responders and some way to measure how many times people are opening the emails.

Well, you’ll also want to make sure the company is reputable and has a good track record for delivering the emails through the growing list of spam filter programs.  Any of the companies listed above are very good and you’ll be fine.

Once you’ve gone through the process of creating your sequential auto-response series you’ll simply need to add your new member’s names and email addresses and they will begin to receive the emails each day for 30 days.  In my mind this is just the beginning.  There are many preferred activities of choice among your members.  Over time you can create several different 30 day programs so you can offer a multitude of solutions for your members.

This will help keep them from getting bored and will help you relate to the different types of members.

This type of strategy can work for any type of service related company.  All you need to do is spend some time thinking of how you could add value for your customers once they’ve made the decision to purchase from you.  This will help them get more “bang for their buck,” and will help turn them into a raving fan of your company!

It’s amazing how many sites I end up on these days that have still not embraced the interactivity available online.

Wake up people!!!!  It’s 2009 and we’ve already been through web 1.0, web 2.0, and web 3.0 seems to be taking shape.

Ditch your boring, one dimensional website and your “company focused” content and get with the times!

The people who are visiting your website are only looking for “what’s in it for them.”

Sooo…..  What does your site offer?

I understand that you are  an expert in the area of YOUR business and not necessarily in web marketing.  You may not even have an idea of what is possible online.

Alright, enough of the reality check.  :)

The following are some examples of what you could have on your website if your business was a health club.

Don’t stop reading this just because you don’t own a health club.  Put on your thinking cap and see if you can come up with at least two or three ways to modify these tactics to fit your own business.

Create a Community

People who join health clubs are typically looking to either lose weight, gain strength, or just live a healthier lifestyle.  Just joining the club doesn’t mean any of these goals will be hit.  In fact a high percentage of people who join health clubs never go.

Once someone gets in the habit of NOT GOING it’s only a matter of time before the procrastination ends and they cancel their membership.

I don’t think there could possibly be a better retention strategy than using your website to create a community which will help put them in touch with ACTIVE members.

The easiest way to begin this community is to create an intranet on your website.  An intranet is a special section of your website where people cannot access the information unless they enter a username and password.  You should use this section of the website to provide valuable information and tools that ONLY a member can receive.

Educate Your Community

Knowledge is power right?  If that’s the case … make sure you provide valuable information for your community members.  I know it might go against everything your club is about, but what about using video to show your community exercises they can do at home or while they are traveling?

The purpose of running your health club should not only be about collecting membership dues.  Chances are you got into the business because you are passionate about your healthy lifestyle and would like to share that passion.  If your community can tell you care about them and their well being, you will help improve your retention numbers and ultimately create more healthy members.

Provide Tools for Goal Setting / Tracking

Most people don’t just wake up one day and say, “Hmmmm, I think I’ll join a health club today.”  They typically think about it until some life event happens, like a new year or bad news from the doctor helps persuade them.

One fact ALWAYS remains true.  The better you can engage them within the first few days of joining, the better the chance they’ll become an active member.

The best way to get them off and running is to provide a way for them to store their starting weight, measurements, and most importantly their goals.  Additionally you can provide a calendar for them to easily schedule their workout plan.

Providing a personal blog so they could write about how they are feeling will force them to realize how much added benefits they are receiving from their new health plan.

The bottom line is it is your job to make sure your community grows and you provide as much interaction between like minded members as possible.  The universal law of association is real.  The more people you associate with who are in the type of physical shape you’d like to be, the better the chances are that you’ll change your behaviors to reach that point.

You might be saying, “Come on now!  The only thing social media does is add to my waistline since I spend too much time in front of the computer.”

Well I am here to tell you that’s only because you are using it wrong.

I’m not making that statement in an accusatory way.  I’ve fallen into the same trap (as evidenced by my increasingly large physique).  :)

We’ve all rushed out to purchase the “at home” exercise equipment which we’ve creatively figured out how to use as place to hang our clothes, or as a dust collector.

Come on … you remember.  You decided to purchase the equipment for your home so you could eliminate the recurring fee you paid to the health club.  The crazy thing is you weren’t using the membership anyhow.

If you talk to any health club professional or personal trainer you’ll find the most important ingredient to any weight loss program is accountability.  We all know it is much more difficult to hold yourself accountable than it is to have other people keeping you in check.  The following are seven steps any health club can use to help it’s members lose weight using Twitter or any other social media platform.

Step One – Set up a Twitter Account and Start a Group

The first thing you’ll need to do is go to Twitter.com and set up an account.  This is important for any business since you’ll want to control your brand.  Remember back when the Internet started becoming more and more prominent and you ignored it and neglected to snag your www.yourcompany.com domain name?  Well, don’t let that happen again.

Once you’ve set up your Twitter account you can go to www.twittgroups.com or www.twibes.com and set up your group, otherwise known as a “hash tag.”  You’ll simply choose a word or words and have a “#” sign before it.  This will help keep all related “tweets” categorized and easy to follow.

Step Two – Establish Ground Rules

Common sense tells us that the trick to losing weight is decreasing your intake and increasing your physical activity.  The slightest adjustment in the correct direction for each of these things will result in marked progress if you keep it up for a significant period of time.

It’s important to measure the progress so each of the participants should take measurements, weigh themselves, and even take some before photos.

As a health club you should encourage your “Weight Loss Club Members” to sign up for their own individual Twitter accounts and send out “Tweets” that contain your “hash tag” each time they eat something, and each time they exercise.  If your participants know there are other people who will be reviewing it, they’ll be less apt to fall off the wagon.

Step Three – Give Away a Prize

Although this can definitely be a an ongoing tool that could be used by anyone, set up four 90 day periods and allow a limited number of participants.  This alone will drive participation since nobody wants to be locked out of a contest.

Even though losing weight will be a great benefit to the participants, if they know they could potentially win a free membership for a year, they’ll find added motivation.  I know that may seem like a big prize, but if you limit it to the person who made the best progress throughout the contest period, you’ll only be giving away four memberships each year.  The PR you’ll receive by doing this and the advertising and promotion opportunities will FAR OUTWEIGH this small loss of revenue.

Step Four – Promote the Program

We’ve all heard of “The Biggest Loser” and there are oodles of people who watch that show.  Why not take advantage of the popularity?

Use your online and offline newsletter, your email database, flyers, your personal trainers, and your front desk staff to promote the program.  You can even use Twitter and Facebook to do it as well.  Talk about it as much as possible.  If you do it right you will find people who live beyond your geographic reach may start participating.  If you are creative you can potentially uncover additional revenue opportunities that extend beyond geography and membership based revenue.

Step Five – Monitor Participants Progress

Once the program has begun, spend 5-10 minutes a couple times a day reviewing the progress of your participants.  Take a peak at what food they are consuming and what activities they are participating in.  Compare those actions with the goals they set.

If you happen to find someone who hasn’t “tweeted” in awhile, or seems to be making some poor consumption choices, send them a direct message encouraging them.  This might just be the reminder they need and you could be making a much bigger impact on their health than you even imagine.

Step Six – Send out Motivational “Tweets” EVERY DAY

Most people have a difficult time with self motivation.  Since you know this to be true, take the time every day to send out general motivation “Tweets” to all your participants.  These subtle reminders will help keep them on track and when your contest is complete you’ll have some incredible case studies to share with the people who didn’t decide to participate.  You’ll also increase the credibility of your personal trainers since they are guiding these participants in the right direction.

Step Seven – Track and Publish the Results

If your health club doesn’t have a blog … get one!  You should be tracking the progress of your weight loss club on your blog and showcase the many case studies you create during each of your contests.  Of course you’ll need to get the permission of the people whose story you use, but I am guessing if they’ve made the kind of progress that’s worth sharing, they’ll be more than happy to comply with your request.

Be creative and have fun with this idea.  I believe if you consistently follow these steps and enhance them with your own “club personality” you’ll see an increase in your membership base and you’ll potentially find additional ideas for non-membership revenue generation.  Keep me posted on your progress!

I remember the days before cell phones.  Remember when you needed to wait until your friend returned home from the beach, or from thier cross-town visit with Aunt Bernice?

Those days are long gone!

It seems everyone has cell phones these days.  Everyone from six and seven year olds all the way to 90 year old grannies!  Some of you may be shaking your heads and thinking, “What is this world coming to?  We made it without cell phones, why can’t they?!?”

Guess what?

Every time you make that statement or think that thought you are wasting your time.  Things are NOT going to reverse, and people won’t return those cell phones.  So … accept it!  :)

As business people we need to recognize the tremendous opportunity we are presented with.  With the emergence of text messaging, we now have an opportunity to reach our prospective customers with messages at the exact moment they are looking to buy.

The following are five steps you can use to effectively market your business with the use of text messaging.  For the purpose of this article I’ll use a restaurant as an example.

Step One – Create a Diner’s Club

Humans are born with a NEED to belong.  If you look around you’ll see the most successful companies focus on this need and fill it.  That’s why there are loyalty programs, frequent flyer programs, buying clubs, and an association for any possible niche in the world.  The bottom line is people are natural joiners so give them a way to JOIN and become affiliated with your business.

Step Two – Create an Offer

Don’t be naive and think that just because you started a “Diner’s Club” that everyone will simply join.  Keep in mind that along with emerging technology comes more information than anyone can possibly consume.  This is making your customers think a bit longer about what they sign up for and if there isn’t something valuable for them, they simply won’t join.

Make sure that you specify exactly what they will get.  Will they get a “buy one get one” offer, or a free desert upon joining?  Will they also get a free dinner on their birthday, and a dinner for two on their anniversary?  Will they get “Diner’s Club Members ONLY” special discounts throughout the month?

The what isn’t as important as the value.  Your objective is to motivate them to send a text message to your special number which will automatically enroll them in your “Cell Phone Mailing List,”  so make sure the offer is something you feel has a great enough value that you would sign up for it yourself.

Step Three – Advertise Your Club

Once you’ve created your club, and created an irresistible offer, it’s time to let your customers know about it.  Whether you create table tents, send a mailing to your “snail mail” list, send out an email blast, or have a contest among your waitstaff where you reward the person who gains the most new members for the month.  Just make sure you have a solid advertising plan to get the word out.

Step Four – Send Updates … Not SPAM

Once you’ve followed the previous three steps and have built up your membership base, it’s time to send out your updates.  Make sure you don’t ruin all the hard work you’ve done by spamming your list.  Make sure the updates you send out have valuable offers that are irresistible to your members.

The best way to utilize this list is to send out offers on slower days of the week.  If you happen to live in a climate that has very snowy days, send out an offer where your “Club Members” receive a FREE dinner if they come in that evening.  The nice thing is people don’t normally eat alone.  They’ll probably bring someone with them and it may be their entire family.

Step Five – Engage Your Members

As your membership base grows it will be important to engage your members with contests, and by sending out other useful or entertaining information.  Maybe it’s a joke of the week, a quote of the month, or an occasional link to a funny article you’ve read.  It doesn’t really matter what it is as long as it engages and entertains your members.

They’ll appreciate it if they receive information from you that isn’t ONLY asking them to spend money.

The more technology advances, the more opportunities we’ll have to engage our customers EVERYWHERE!  It’s important as business owners and marketers to stay on top of technology and take advantage of these incredible opportunities.

It doesn’t matter what type of business you have, if you use your imagination you can come up with ways to market your business with text messaging. Just be creative and you will put yourself and your company in a position to win.

Let’s face it, the Internet has changed the world and no matter what type of business you have, YOU NEED to figure out how to use it for your company.

I don’t think there’s a business owner or marketing manager alive who hasn’t realized they need to include the Internet in their marketing efforts.  If there does happen to be one or two left out there who still feel the Internet just doesn’t work for their business, I’m quite sure they are spending their last few days as a relevant business or marketing person.  :)

Since the advent of Web 2.0 all the buzz online is about building community and using the web to engage the visitors who arrive on your website.  Well what about companies that need to get people through their doors in order to provide their products or services to them?

Is there still a way for these offline businesses to capitalize on all this web 2.0 stuff?

YES THERE IS!

Let’s take a restaurant for example.   There is really no substitute to getting your customers inside your doors so they can experience the atmosphere, the service, and taste the delectable delights that your top notch chef prepares each day.

Although this is correct, there are still ways for you to build an online community with these offline customers.

Think about it …

How many times have you wondered what the daily special was on your favorite restaurant’s menu?

Have you ever found yourself trying to find a new place in town to try but you wanted to find out what other people thought of the menu?

What if your favorite restaurant typically has entertainment in the lounge?  Who is performing?

These are just a few different pieces of information a prospective diner might find themselves seeking the answer to.  If you happen to own a restaurant, are you giving your customers an easy way to gain access to these answers?

If you are expecting your customers to simply pick up the phone and give you a call you may be missing the boat.  In fact, how do you know if they even know your phone number?

Let’s just look at the facts …

The last time I checked I found that over 80% of the people in the USA have at least one email address.  I am quite sure the 20% who don’t are probably not in a position to visit your restaurant anyhow!

The following are three steps you can take to begin to build a community for the people who visit your restaurant.

Ask Every Diner for Their Email Address

If you want to improve your chances of gaining this valuable piece of information, you need to make sure you are providing some type of value.  Maybe you can offer a 10% discount on their current bill or maybe a free desert.  It doesn’t need to be a very expensive offering, but it does need to be something that makes it worth them taking the chance that you won’t fill their inbox with a bunch of unwanted garbage.

Start a Diner’s Club (or something named a bit more creatively)

It’s a human need for people to belong.  Why not give your customers something to belong to?  Who wouldn’t be thrilled to receive a free meal on their birthday or a dinner for two on their anniversary?

Remember how you’ve found yourself wondering what specials were being offered at your favorite restaurant?  Well if you were a member of their Diner’s Club and you received an email each week notifying you of those specials you would always be “in the know.”

What if by joining the Diner’s Club you had an opportunity to get preferred seating in the quiet part of the restaurant, right in front of the beautiful field stone fireplace?

Be creative!  The more creative you are, the more successful you’ll be at building your community and ultimately … your sales!

Send Periodic Emails with Valuable Content … DON’T SPAM!

If you are sending one email per week with your weekly specials, why not include a great recipe they can try at home?  If your Diner’s Club members are at all like me, they’d rather visit your restaurant and have you make it for them, but they’d be very pleased that you cared enough to give them the option.

You don’t have to limit it to recipes either.  If your restaurant is known for excellent service, include a series of articles on how to host first class dinner parties in your home.  This type of content shows your “members” that you aren’t just interested in getting them in your restaurant so you can get their cash.  It shows them you care about them as a person, and not just a person with a wallet or purse!

These are just a few steps you can follow to begin to create an online community for your offline customers.  If you aren’t a restaurateur,  use this example to explore your brain for similar ideas in your business.