Jerry’s critique of the website concluded:

• Too much contrast
• Lack of focus – where do you look first!?
• Scrolling mania and dancing directories – both vertical and horizontal.

Jerry was correct, but I found a number of other issues that may help our readers better evaluate their own website.

• Our primary issue with this website is Sensory Overload. Too many bells and whistles including: flashing graphics, audio clips, animations, numerous type styles, busy background patterns, and inappropriate use of Flash.
• The contents are not organized sequentially so as to deliver an effective sales message that will involve and persuade the reader.
• Text is set in typefaces that are too small, too bold or too light, too masculine or feminine, too whimsical, too cute, or too powerful.
• Insufficient white space inside the layout making it easier to read.

I am sure you will find your own problems with this website.  Have fun with it, but learn from their mistake.

If you would like some resources on how to evaluate your website and on how to improve it, please check out the three free articles we have posted on the 2nextlevel.net website.

http://www.2nextlevel.net/resources/website-design-and-development-articles

Uncertain economic times provide the perfect opportunity for you to take stock of your existing customers and to leverage those relationships in order to weather the downturn.  Now is the time to access the fundamentals that drive your business; knowing your existing customers; acquiring new customers; connecting with customers in meaningful ways; and delivering the right solutions to meet customer needs.  But do you have the time or staff to consistently reach out to your customers?  We all agree that marketing activities are investments into the future revenues of the company, but with all the other commitments of your sales peoples’ time, it is often hard to provide the consistency in these activities that are required to be successful. What are your options then?  Well you could hire a marketing professional but their salary, benefits, taxes and related costs may not be in the budget, especially when you realize that they will demand a marketing budget on top of this expenditure.  You could do nothing and hope for the best.  Or you could outsource some of these marketing activities to a third party.  This is where Managed Marketing Service providers come in.

What are Managed Marketing Services?
Managed Marketing Services may be a new concept for most small and mid-sized businesses, but it stems from the age-old concept of outsourcing services.   Managed Marketing Services are recurring services provided either on-site or remotely on a contractual basis.  It is the day-to-day marketing related activities that keep the company in front of customers, prospects and referral source partners in a coordinated, effective and brand-supportive manner.  A managed services provider (MSP), is typically a marketing services provider, who manages and assumes responsibility for providing a defined set of services to their customers either proactively or as they (not the customer) determine that the services are needed.    The basic premise is that there are mundane marketing tasks either not being conducted by your company or that are being conducted by salespeople who should be prospecting instead.  Outsourcing these marketing services to a Managed Marketing Services Provider lowers costs and frees up time for your sales people to work on closing more business.

What’s Typically Included?
A Managed Marketing Services program typically includes 1) marketing planning and coordination with sales team activities, 2) print communications  such as newsletters and postcard solicitations, 3) electronic communications such as e-mail campaigns and blog support, and 4) social media such as Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter.  Advertising and search engine optimization can also be included.  As a Marketing Services Provider, Next Level takes the marketing load off you and helps you focus your energies back into the core business issues.  We become your marketing team who THINKS and ACTS as YOUR integrated marketing partner.  We help define and put your business strategy into marketing strategy and execute these actions of your behalf.

What are the Benefits?
The benefits of Managed Marketing Services include:

How Does Pricing Work?

Most MSPs charge a small monthly fee on a 12 month contract with an ability to withdraw from the services if needed.

If you would like to learn more about Managed Marketing Services, give Brett Flickinger a call at 630-665-4440.

Well in today’s blog, we will try to help you maximize your marketing dollars and people by outlining what we believe will be the top 12 trends for small and mid-sized enterprises for 2012.  Our goal is not necessarily to predict the unknown future, but to focus on the trends that will impact small and mid-sized businesses the most.  This list is by no means all inclusive and I would love to hear from others on what they see for 2012.

1. Customers and employees will become more involved in marketing decisions as electronic communications and the Internet specifically make direct input easier and less expensive to obtain for SMBs.
2. The power of referrals and recommendations will expand in importance with an ever-increasing social network footprint.
3. Mobile marketing will enter into marketing efforts for the first time for many SMBs in both advertising and in the development of customer-centered apps.
4. Social networks will become a significant source of organic search traffic for SMB websites as more SMBs participate in the low cash required marketing tool afforded by social networking.
5. LinkedIn will become the dominate business networking website granting SMBs access to and identification of important contacts.
6. Customer satisfaction, loyalty and retention strategies will re-emerge as key strategies to measure marketing performance as the drive to keep customers in a slow economy continues.
7. Branding and identity strategies will become more prevalent in small and mid-sized businesses.
8. Marketing automation will grow in importance as SMBs try to leverage limited resources and marketing automation improves.
9. More websites of SMBs will contain more than English language pages as more SMBs cater to growing international sales.
10. Small and mid-sized businesses will utilize virtual events such as webinars, online training, and Skype meetings to be more efficient and effective.
11. Blogging will become more common place with small and mid-sized businesses as they attempt to exhibit industry or product expertise as a marketing differentiation against larger competitors.
12. Original or 2nd generation business websites will be revamped to help SMBs compete, involve customers more, and to take advantage of new web technologies and integration with social media.

I am sure that I have left some items off this list.  Tell me what you think.  2012 is sure to be another exciting year for marketing professionals of small and mid-sized privately-held businesses.  Good luck and give me buzz if I can be of any help.

In all sales processes, regardless of industry, one of the first activities of the salesperson is to discover the needs of the prospective customer.  Khalsa’s premise is that too many salespeople guess on what the prospective customer wants.  They listen only to identify a product or service they sell and not to truly understand the needs and pains of the prospective customer.  In essence they miss the vital criteria the prospective customer has for making the decision.  Why don’t salespeople dig deeper and listen better?  The author says that most people are afraid of failure or the red light.  In the sales process, whenever we hear something that concerns us (something that may reduce the likely success of our sales efforts), instead of slowing down and addressing the “Yellow light”, we ignore it and drive on, hoping that we will get through the light before it turns red.

But if we are going to hit a red light, isn’t it better to hit it as soon as possible and avoid wasting your and the prospect’s time and money? If a yellow light pops up, slow down and get clarity.  Ask more questions and try to mutually work through the issues with the prospective customer.  I like to use the following phrases whenever I hit a yellow light:

• “I have a concern…”
• “I am confused…”
• “Help me better understand..”

The goal is to mutually find the solutions to yellow lights with the prospective customer.  Not only does this activity solve the yellow light but it also helps the prospective customer buy into what you are offering.  Get out all the issues, all the factors for making a decision, and priorities for each person involved in the decision.  In essence find their pain, the implication of the pain on the company and the gain from what you offer.  More information is always better.  Yellow lights, therefore, can actually help you close more deals.

I just love the author’s comment: “A red light is not a failure. Failure is making a red light needlessly more expensive by spending more time and money.”

Contact the Boss Via LinkedIn InMail
One of my personal favorites and most successful tactics is to bypass the Gatekeeper via the social networking service, LinkedIn.  If the boss is on LinkedIn, you can send him/her a direct message via LinkedIn’s InMail feature.  My personal experience is that the Boss opens these messages himself/herself and will respond.   LinkedIn even guarantees that the InMail is opened in 7 days.

Have the Right Paradigm
To get through to the decision maker, you must think like the decision maker.  What is important to them.  A good Gatekeeper will be in touch with what’s important to their boss.  Your conversation with the Gatekeeper must get the Gatekeeper to say “OK, my boss will want to talk with you.”  One way to accomplish this is to focus on business outcomes. Remember WIIFM – What’s In It For Me or in this case What’s In It for My Boss.

Call When The Gatekeeper Is Away
Bypass the Gatekeeper by calling when they are away from the phone.  Calls between 1 and 2 p.m. can be good since many receptionists are at lunch and someone from the administrative staff takes that role. That person is not really focused on being a Gatekeeper as much as making sure they don’t mess up forwarding calls.  They tend to let people through the gate.  You can also try between 7 and 8:30 a.m. before the gatekeeper gets in, but the decision maker is likely already in and they tend to pick up calls.   After 5 p.m. when the gatekeeper has gone home and you reach the automated voice system, which increases your chances of reaching the decision maker directly.

Go through the Sales Department
Go around the Gatekeeper and call the company’s sale department.  Once you have one of their salespeople on the line, tell them what you are trying to do and see if they will privately give you a direct phone number to the boss.  Try the old sale people need to help each other out routine.

Contact the Boss Outside the Company First
Try to meet the boss outside their company.  This could be a industry events or socially in the community.  When you call, tell the Gatekeeper that you were talking to [boss name] at [event] and he/she instructed you to give him/her a call to follow up.  Many Gatekeepers have instruction to allow people from certain organizations they are involved with to get through automatically.

Formal Introduction
In olden times, before you would call upon people of importance, you would first send a formal card of introduction prior to calling upon them.  Create a formal introduction card similar to a small invitation and mail it to the boss.  Make it fancy and make a subtle impression of importance.  More than likely, the Gatekeeper will pass it along to the Boss and be more open to your first call.

Act Important/Act Like the Boss’ Friend
When you call, it’s important to right away ask for the decision maker by first name. Act as if you are a good friend of the decision maker’s. Good friends don’t use Mr. or Mrs. They also don’t usually ask “please.” If you hesitate, they’re going to eat you up.

Become Friends With the Gatekeeper
If after several calls the gatekeeper still won’t let you through, ask her name and make friends with her.   I have gone as far as sending her cookies.  After establishing a friendly relationship, ask her/him “What are the chances you’re going to help me out today?” Address the  individual with respect instead of trying to diminish him/her and make him/her feel inferior.

These are not a complete list of ways to get past the Gatekeepers and one or more of these on any given day will fail.  Keep trying. Good luck!

We always start our sales training classes by asking WIIFM – What’s In It For Me?  The answer is not the features of your product but rather the benefits and reasons to buy.  The old adage is that a customer doesn’t come into a hardware store to buy a drill.  They come to buy something to make a hole.  Always start from the buyer’s perspective.

Next, we look at the cost-benefit ratio.  Since the purchase decision is based upon perceptions of benefits over costs, we focus on this ratio.  Where do we stand verses competitors?  If we are the low cost leader in the industry, we focus on this.  If not, we need to work on all those perceptions of value that the buyer may have.  We need to create as many reasons to buy from us as possible.

As we mentioned, the buying decision is emotional but often the strongest emotions are often based on past negative experiences involving service or quality.  It’s important to identify and draw these emotions out from the buyer. It can help move them off the status quo of staying with the product or service they currently use.  Ask questions to find out your potential buyer’s past dissatisfactions and show, better prove, that you’ll do better.

If your price is higher, help the buyer justify the higher price in terms of the value and benefits offered.  If you are in an acceptable price range, rarely is price the dominate factor.  If you fail to help the customer justify the higher price, price can easily be a dominate excuse they use not to buy from you when really it was the perception of insufficient benefits that was the real cause.

When you sell value – your best combination of quality, service and price – you will have more satisfied buyers than when you sell on price alone.  Even after a rigorous price comparison, buyers will rarely make a buying decision predominately on price.

First, verify that you are talking with the decision maker.  A stall could result by your contact having to go to another person for approval.  In this case, your goal is get to the real decision maker.

If you are talking with the right person, it might help to understand common reasons behind the stalls:

• Stalls often result from the prospect’s sense that they need more justification for the purchase.  Help the prospect justify the purchase.  Show them the benefits, in real terms to their specific situation and company.
• Stalls often result as a defensive measure against a sense of being pressured to buy.  No one likes being sold to.  In this case, back off the on the direct approach and “lead” them to the conclusions you want them to come to.  This indirect approach makes it feel more like their decision and not yours.
• A stall often indicates that the prospect has some negative issues toward making the purchase often unexpressed. Find out what is holding them back and address this negative issues.  If its a red light that you can’t overcome, it’s better for you and the prospect to stop the process and move on.
• If a stall is driven by the desire to shop around, be sure that your position is solid and your personal relationship is strong.

The key is to build up the positive benefits of making the purchase decision in the buyers mind, neutralize any negative issues and remove any blocks that are stalling the selling process.    If the prospect lacks a sense of urgency to buy now, it’s up to you to create that sense of urgency by selling the problem or reasons to buy back to them.  Build the urgency by reminding them of the problems they face and/or the negatives of the status quo.  Get them to agree on how bad the current situation is, build on the positive benefits of changing to your solution, and “lead” them to a decision.

With a bit of practice, you can learn how to uncover the reasons behind a stall and get the sales process moving again. Good luck.

So Why Should Your Business Blog?

• As mentioned before, blogs can help you get better search engine placements. Search engines like blogs because they are frequently updated, have lots of incoming and outgoing links and are made up of words. Search engines look to match “relevant content” on webpages and blogs to the searches requested.  You can write about a topic on Monday and see it in the top 10 ranking on that subject a couple of days later.
• Blog software is so user-friendly that almost anyone can use them.  With minimal setup work by your marketing consultants at Next Level, you can post content, images, photos, articles and more to the Internet instantly.
• Journalists troll blogs for source material because bloggers often break stories before traditional media do. Posts in your blog can lead to increased publicity for you and your company.
• Blogs can build relationships and help bring in business. Blogs bring you closer to prospects and customers alike, who get to know you through your writing and are therefore one step closer to doing business with you. Most people prefer to do business with people like them.
• A blog can be seamlessly integrated into your web site’s e-commerce. That means you can sell products and services by pointing blog visitors to your site’s sales sections.

So How Have Other Companies Used Blogging?

Intranets
Blogs are great for Intranets that allow sharing of information within a company.

Corporate Newsrooms
Blogs are excellent for getting the official word out about your company, people, products and services.  What’s new?  Where is the company going?

Investor Relations
Blogs can be used to share public information to outside stakeholders.

Market Research
Blogs can be designed to allow for open feedback from and with customers that can lead to improvements in your company, products and services.

Event-Driven
Blogs can be short-termed and uses prior to events to communicate information.  For example, changing information about a nonprofit 10k fundraising race which your company sponsors or a seminar you are conducting.

Developer/Channel Partner Network
Similar to the market research blog mentioned above, blogs can be used to provide feedback from business alliance partners, suppliers and channel partners.

Industry Vision
If your people are leaders in your industry, blogs are an excellent way for them to express their visions for the industry and support that industry leader status.

Information
One of the best uses for a blog is to share information.  In today’s hetic world, finding information is critical.  By sharing information readers can use, you become a resource for them.

The benefits of blogs are many, the cost to set up cheap and the ease of use…easy.  For marketing, you will see improved search rankings, increased web traffic,  and quick adoption into the search engines. In the end, however, don’t forget the customer service benefits—any customer can appreciate honest, open communication.

The is the QR Code for the Next Level Web Site

Have you seen a QR Code and didn’t know it?   QR Code stands for Quick Response (QR) Code.  Similar to a bar code you may already know on consumer packaging, the QR Code is a code to be scanned.  But unlike a simple bar code, a QR Code can do a lot more. It allows Smartphone users do a whole host of things such as be taken to a website, go to a blog, receive contact information or vCard, or be prompted to send an email.   A single QR code is capable of storing over 4000 alphanumeric characters.

QR Codes started in Japan and was created by a Toyota subsidiary Denso-Wave in 1994.    The technology has seen a large uptake in Japan and South Korea. However, in the West there has been a far slower adoption of QR codes.  Although initially used for tracking parts in vehicle manufacturing, QR codes are now used in a much broader context, including both commercial tracking applications and convenience-oriented applications aimed at mobile phone users (termed mobile tagging). Marketing professionals quickly saw the potential QR codes had in our digital world.  QR codes are rapidly tying the digital world to the traditional print world advertising as marketers add them to billboard ads, flyers, brochures, in-store displays, and other promotional materials. Marketers are now attaching them to business cards, advertising or marketing materials to send potential customers your company’s contact info or direct them to a website. For example, some realtors place QR codes on “For Sale” signs on their properties that take prospective buyers to the MLS listing.  Other uses have included guerilla-marketing campaigns, event ticketing, coupons, direct mail campaigns, and more.

Here is An Example of How it Works

A potential customer sees an advertisement while reading the paper at a hotel and is interested in your products.  Instead of waiting to get to a computer and go to your website, they simply scan in the QR Code on your ad with their phone application which launches the web browser on their phone and takes them directly to that product’s web page.  They read more and hopefully follow up with a purchase.

A QR code’s potential for your business is limited only by your imagination.  Take your advertising to the Next Level with QR Codes.