Mark Murnahan's SEO and Social Media Marketing Blog

Recession Marketing: Choosing Logic Over Emotion

Asserting marketing assets properly in an economic recession can be the making or breaking of a company. When everything on the news and everything you hear around the office sounds gloomy about the economy, you must question whether you are using more logic or emotion in your marketing decisions.

Regardless of the industry, we are all in the people business. When people are involved, it is easy to let emotion cloud logic, and this is very commonly seen in marketing during an economic recession.

Growing Market Share in Recession

Economic recession often provides the clearest path to expanding your market share. When the economy is strong, competitors are strong, too. Being persistent in your marketing is key to making it through a recession and growing your market share while competition is weakened. It is important to remember that you are not alone. You hear all of the miserable failures around you, but do not forget that all of the gloom and doom also includes your competition. Think of it like a staring contest. It is a test of will, and if they blink first, you win.

When people lose their wits to the point of cutting their marketing efforts, it serves only to worsen their market position. Looking back to the Great Depression, there are many lessons to be learned from companies who achieved success by continuing and even expanding their marketing efforts. As an example, Amana Appliances saw huge success coming out of the recession, because they appealed to the American housewife, and gave her something to feel good about even during the worst of times. There is always success in a recession, if you seek it, and if you continue to invite prospective customers to do business with you.

A recession offers much opportunity if you are persistent. You can cut costs in many ways, but if you eliminate your marketing, you eliminate your market. Remember what pays you, and remember why you spend money on marketing in the first place.

Redistribute Your Marketing Efforts

Evaluate your marketing, and redistribute it if needed. Tough times call for smarter marketing. Successful companies are moving their marketing away from television, radio, and print and focusing their efforts on the Internet. Cost per exposure and available customer reach of Internet marketing is far superior to any other marketing. According to widely accepted statistical reports by Nielsen NetRatings, Zenith Optimedia, and others, the Internet accounts for nearly half of the media intake of the average consumer. This quickly growing trend can be seen in many ways, and not the least of which is the 15.2% increase in Internet ad spend in the first half of 2008 while television, radio, and print marketing each took double-digit losses industry-wide.

Cutting Your Marketing Budget

Cutting the marketing budget is a common knee jerk response to economic recession. This reaction to the economy defies logic. After all, if you did not need the marketing, why were you buying it in the first place? Were you spending money on marketing because you had so much business that you just needed an extra tax deduction? Of course not. You invest in marketing because you want more business. For most companies, marketing is the single most important investment they will ever make. Only when the desire for more business subsides should you cut your marketing.

Author Mark Murnahan is the Chairman and CEO of YourNew.com, Inc. and provides SEO consulting services to companies and non-profit organizations. Mark Murnahan may be reached toll free at 866-A-Web-Guy (*REDACTED DUE TO AGING WEBSITE*) for consultation.

Websites and Organic Search Engine Optimization

Without a Website, search engine optimization is worthless, and with very little exception, the reverse is also true. Pay-per-click advertising such as Google AdWords or Facebook advertising can be very helpful, but will never make up for the need of relevance-based “organic” search engine results. Even with a substantial PPC campaign, a Website without proper search engine optimization will simply not have the audience it takes to be competitive in the Internet marketplace. It will also suffer a much lower return on investment (ROI) due to the need to constantly “feed” it with traffic.

An important fact of organic search engine optimization is that once the work is done, the results will generally last a very long time. This is because the basic principles of researching the right keywords, producing quality Website content, proper programming, incoming links from other Websites, and other search engine optimization considerations have been met. This would seem to most of us to be quite elementary, but it is shocking how many potentially useful Websites there are on the Internet that are just wasting away like a billboard in a basement or a retail store stuffed away in a back alley in the wrong part of town.

You understand the importance of search engine traffic for your Website, or you would not be reading my blog. The vast majority of Websites need to be visible in search engine results. Even in the few cases where search engine traffic is unwanted or unnecessary, it is important to adhere to the proper programming and quality Website content practices that lend to the Website’s optimization.

Although most people realize the need for high quality search engine traffic coming to their Websites, the number of people with the necessary search engine optimization talent to achieve this is small. Because of this fact, it is often not as challenging as you may think to be the number one result in a Google search for the product or service that you offer. There are two ways you can achieve this, and that is to do it yourself, or hire a professional SEO to handle it for you.

Can Do-It-Yourself Search Engine Optimization (DIY SEO) Work?

Do-it-yourself search engine optimization (DIY SEO) is possible, and may even bring you to the top of Google search listings for a few of your chosen keyword phrases. If you choose this route, be prepared to lose astonishing amounts of money due to lost opportunities. The opportunity cost of bad Internet marketing efforts will always be much higher than the cost of hiring a professional search engine optimizer.

Of course I have a stake in your choice, so this is admittedly not without bias. Just for a moment, try to give me the benefit of doubt. I am telling you this for your own good, as well as mine. Assuming that you can learn all that I know from my decade in this field, you will still have to implement it better than your competitors. While you are still learning, they are still growing their market share.

Reading a couple blog posts or reading a Wiki definition of SEO will not make up for the mastery of SEO professionals with experience and who do this for a living. If you really love to read, and you can gather enough information, particularly the right information, on this field, you will probably not need the Website you were trying to optimize, because you will likely have a very promising career as an SEO.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) – Art or Science?

Search engine optimization (SEO) is a term that many people may recognize, but seldom clearly understand. Most people exposed to the term grasp the fact that search engine optimization is designed to help bring more traffic to their Website, but that is where their knowledge ends. Without a good understanding what search engine optimization is, many people are destined to either fail in their online marketing pursuits, or alternately throw good money out the window by paying the search engine optimizer with the best sales pitch … the SEO with all hat and no cattle. First things first, I want to address the title of this blog post “Search Engine Optimization (SEO) – Art or Science?”

Is SEO an art? The answer is clearly and undeniably “yes”.
Is SEO a science? The answer is clearly and undeniably “yes”.

If this sounds strange, let us look at each of these aspects of SEO so you can decide for yourself.

Search Engine Optimization as an Art

While you read this article, you can surely see the art. After all, I am writing to you in a conversational form, and the way in which I choose my every word is work that surely does not seem scientific. All the while, I am writing an article that will likely be plucked up by search engine spiders for inclusion in their databases and returned in many search results on this topic.

Search Engine Optimization as a Science

This is an area where many SEO firms will try to sell you. It is the wizardry and hocus pocus of the SEO industry. Some companies will try to tell you that they have special technologies to bring or keep your Website at the top of search engine results. Technology is certainly an important aspect of SEO, and cannot be overlooked. Factors I have written about such as keyword research, keyword proximity, keyword usage, keyword density, and many other search engine optimization technology practices are hugely important to the success of any SEO campaign. We must know what keyword phrases people are actually searching for, how competitive it is, how to format contents of a Website, and much more.

Which is More Important in SEO – Art or Science?

The art and science of SEO are both important for top search engine results, and I mean more than just finding your company name in a search engine. Without the science, you face an uphill battle against huge odds. At the same time, without the artistic part, it is like a house of cards. The truth is that the artistic part is more important to the overall results. I have been writing on the Internet for so many years that I often find that when an article is completed, I have met all of the science of search engine optimization, such as keyword usage, keyword proximity, and programming concerns without even trying. Most important to a search engine is the visible text content of the Website. The information is the most important part of this Information Superhighway. You may have noticed that I am writing about search engine optimization here, and not tractor tires and fishing lures. My content is on-topic and keyword rich.

Medical Consulting Websites by Unskilled Labor

This was just such an absurdity that I had to share it with you. It is a particularly disturbing instance of ignoring good business principles of using the right tool for the job. It is also a perfect instance of gross underestimation of the value and cost of proper Website development and secure Web hosting, especially where it relates to the medical profession.

Let us say that you have a medical consulting business and you need a Website. You provide your medical consulting services with an emphasis on electronic delivery and hosting of the doctors’ Policy and Procedure Manuals. This is a highly important and legally required facet of a medical practice, so common logic would dictate that you want to do things the right way when it comes to your Website. After all, the Internet will be an integral asset to your business model.

Although your Website is highly important to your consultancy, you want to keep as much profit as possible. One way to do this is cut cost. This is fine so far, but here is where the plan shatters to pieces. You assume that Web developers and Web hosts are basically all the same. Your logic and experience has told you that the main difference is in their cost. After all, a Website can be saved from a MS Word document.

Fine, I will continue the humor, for now, that Website developers are the same thing wherever you go, but medical consultant services are different, for certain. I can prove that to you in the next few paragraphs. Let us test this medical consultant agency in Topeka, Kansas.

One may imagine that the medical practice would not think it very responsible for their consultant to cut corners with their data, but some people find saving a dime more important than serving their clients’ needs. In this case, it was so extreme that while sitting at the table with me, he pulled out a Blackberry and took several minutes to try and find the email that another company sent because he thought their Web hosting was a couple dollars cheaper. I tried to explain that the time he spent doing that was more costly than he stood to save. Just my time alone was ringing up at hundreds of dollars per hour, and from the way he talked, his must have been worth thousands, because he towered over me in business savvy.

Now, I gave him the benefit of my doubts while he tried to be frugal. Normally, that is a perfect oil and water mix in the medical community, but we are not talking about medicine. We are talking Websites, so pretty much any unskilled labor can handle this … right? Well, that is just how I heard it from the man himself. I will probably be called a bully and put down for this, but it is just exactly how it happened, so I am just the messenger. I am the unskilled labor who wasted a few hundred dollars worth of my consulting time with a guy who had criticized others in my field for misspellings in one breath, but yet wanted to be cheap in the next. Notice his comment about using an “unskilled laborer to continue doing this manually using word” . Below is the verbatim content of the email I received after our meeting. Be sure to read my reply to understand how the cow really eats the cabbage. You are welcome to contact me with your replies before contracting with a medical consulting service in Topeka, Kansas for hosted Policy and Procedures manuals.By the way, the cost two of his brilliant manuals would cover the cost I quoted him for the Website. He expects to sell 6,000 of them!

Mark,

I am quite confident that Phase 1 of this project will consume more than 50MB of space. There is nothing in the contract that says what the price will be if it exceeds that amount. As I stated during our meeting I have no need for search engine optimitization. This is a form bid and in my opinion does not reflect the conversation that we discussed today. Second, if this is cost of the first phase I am quite wary of the second phase you will present. For phase one as a straight informational site I have bids much lower than this from reputatable companies in town. The second phase of this is the only part that I am having difficulty managing virtually and at this expense I am assuming that I will be able to hire a unskilled laborer to continue doing this manually using word. I understand that you are not the loss leader but this is far overpriced for what my needs are.

At this point it is up to you to decide whether or not you are willing to try to gain my business. If not, Thank you for your time.

I am not the vision of the perfect salesman, and I never hope to be. I am, however, at the top of my field in Internet marketing, search engine optimization, and many related technologies. I really wanted to take this on the chin, but I realized that others could benefit from the understanding I share here. My verbatim reply to his email is as follows:

Douglas,

An average disc space estimate for a well produced marketing Website without ecommerce would not be expected to exceed 10Mb, and 50Mb is quite an oversubscription. Otherwise, I would have written it as more space, because space is not a matter of a lot of cost. As a wholesale Web hosting company, we have a quite broad view of this. If you needed 300Mb, I would not flinch to offer it at the same price, so to this, we have an answer. We will host gigs for less than most people will host megs, if that is what is needed.

You are correct in that this is a form bid. That is because it represents an advertised price leader of nearly half of our standard minimum job for custom development. This is also a price dramatically lower than the industry average for the same thing. Perhaps you have found lower offers, but that also comes with its own hazards. I have only encountered one other reputable professional in this field in Topeka, and that is Spinnaker’s Mike Burgess (http://www.spinnakerweb.com) whom I would also recommend visiting with before you make a decision.

I do not believe in delivering a product that is sub-par. I simply will not bastardize my industry or harm my client’s interests with bad results. I gain a lot of business from former clients of developers who do things the wrong way. In an instance of this, I recently had a call from a man with a lawsuit from a rights management company because he could not produce proof of his right to use the images he had on his Website. They were suing him for many times what he paid for his Website. This is the site owner’s responsibility, so be aware of this and other potential liabilities by hiring unskilled labor. If you Google the term “image copyright infringement” you will find my article right about the top of the page … it is a worthwhile read. Unskilled labor produces unskilled results, and you cannot expect professional results by hiring the first kid who raises his hand. That is good for hammers and shovels, but not so good where your business interests are at stake and legalities matter.

My reputation for producing quality results is far more important than my reputation for generosity, or even for being the most likable guy with a great sales pitch. You work with professionals every day, so I hope that you can appreciate my emphasis on quality and professional results. Just as there are people willing to produce Websites for the salary of a store clerk, there are also those of us who do so for a specialized surgeon’s salary. When business results are expected from a hobbyist developer, the aftershock is often similar to hiring the store clerk to perform your surgery. I am a skilled professional, and if or when you ever find yourself in need of such, I will be delighted to assist you. Alternately, we provide do-it-yourself Website templates at no additional charge with any hosting package. I simply had the impression that we were discussing a custom Website solution.

Best regards,

Mark Aaron Murnahan
YourNew.com, Inc.
Direct: *REDACTED DUE TO AGING WEBSITE*
http://www.yournew.com

Let’s call it a lesson learned, Douglas. if you want to sell a hosted policy and procedures manual to the medical field, you may want to take the Website and Web hosting more seriously before you take it to your clients.

For my readers, be very concerned when you go to the doctor. Ask questions! Although there are many laws to protect you, the truth is that medical privacy is limited by the doctor’s office understanding of technology, which too often comes from people like the guy I met today.