flyte blog: small business web marketing blog

Should You Charge for Your Webinars?

At flyte, we put on monthly Web marketing Webinars that cover everything from search engine optimization to Google Analytics to promoting a business blog. We actually put them on twice.

The first one is free, and available only to our clients as a value-added service/thank you for doing business with us. The second is a paid one available to anyone (with an Internet connection, a phone line and the cost of entry.)

I've definitely heard some good arguments for not charging for Webinars; however, whether you should charge or not should be based on what your goals are.

When You Should Give Your Webinars Away For Free:

• You have a product or service that can be enjoyed by the masses. Think Ben & Jerry's vs. Red's (which sells ice cream in South Portland, Maine, and is only open when the weather is good.)
• You have the bandwidth to distribute your product or services to the masses. For example, if you're a solopreneur photographer, you're not going to be able to do the amount of business that Sears Portrait Studio can, regardless of how much better your product may be.
• Your goal is to build up your business. If you don't have a following already, and if you don't have  a proven track record, it's difficult to get people to pay for your Webinar when there is so much free information out there.
• You are rewarding behavior. As in, we give our clients free Webinars because we want to thank them for choosing and sticking with flyte.
• You want to get an important message out. If you're not a for-profit business, or if you have an important cause and want to get your message out as far and wide as possible, a free Webinar is (probably) the way to go.

When You Should Charge for Your Webinars:

• When you want to qualify your audience. I found this when I first started giving presentations: when you don't charge for them you often get a room full of tire-kickers, people who don't have anywhere better to be, and people who don't appreciate the value of what you're providing.
• When you want people to show up. Another lesson I learned from presentations: when a seminar or webinar is free, something more urgent invariably comes up. Case in point: our most recent free webinar had 14 people sign up, but only 4 got on the call. The paid webinar also had 14 people sign up, and approximately 16 got on the call. Hmmm...will have to look into that.
• When you don't have the bandwidth to work with everyone. One of issues with being a small botique Web design and Internet marketing company is that you can't work with everyone. I like the fact that through our webinars we can help a lot more small businesses and entrepreneurs than I could ever work with.
• When you want to establish your value. Whether real or not, a paid event is perceived as having more value. Even if people can't attend (whether due to time or money), your value and the value of your material goes up in their eyes.
• When you want to make money. It's nice to get paid for your hard work and your expertise. If you're providing value that helps another person accomplish their goals or helps another business grow and expand, there's nothing wrong with getting paid for it.

So, before you decide whether or not to charge for your next Webinar (or seminar), review your personal and business goals...and then set your price.

Rich Brooks
That Webinar is How Much?!

Web Marketing Course for Small Business

It's hard to think about school starting up while classic rock stations still have Alice Cooper's anthem on heavy rotation.

Even if you're not quite ready to shop for back-to-school fashions, it's never too early to register for Web Marketing for Small Business, the four-week, eight-hour course I teach at the University of Southern Maine through their Center for Continuing Education.

If you're a small business owner, marketer, or thinking about starting your own business, you can't go wrong with this course. We'll review:

• Search engine optimization
• Email marketing
• Blogging
• Social media (Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, etc.)
• E-commerce tips
• Web site analytics and
• How to build a Web site that sells

If you're wondering why your competitors rank higher than you, or how you can leverage your Web site to grow your business, than you should register for Web Marketing for Small Business.

Just remember to bring your teacher an apple.

Rich Brooks
Checking My Seat for Tacks as We Speak

TV Segment on Web Resources for Startups

With the downturn in the economy many people are thinking of starting their own business but not sure where to start. This was the idea behind a recent segment I recorded for 207, Maine's evening news program.

In preparation for the 207 segment I generated a wide variety of Maine-centric startup business resources that you can see here. A few people suggested their own resources in the comments.

The segment aired earlier this week, and although I'm out of town, due to the magic of the Internet, I was able to catch the segment online.

You can watch the segment at WCSH's Web site, or below on the flyte blog.

Maine Business Resources Online

Recently I pitched a story to 207, the evening news program up here in Maine, on Web-based resources for entrepreneurs.

Due to the economic downturn, many people are thinking about (or forced into) striking it out on their own. This can be a scary thing, especially if you've been working in a cubicle most of your life, or even in a corner office.

However, there are a lot of online resources out there. I reached out to some fellow entrepreneurs and got a huge amount of online resources...more than would be useful for a five minute segment. To that end, I've created a list below of all the sites that had been submitted. In no particular order:

• Maine.gov: Starting a Business: Information and specifics about what you need to start a business in Maine.
• SCORE Maine: SCORE, the Service Corps of Retired Executives, offers free counseling and workshops to businesses. Chapters exist throughout the country,and this site lists all the chapters in Maine.
• Score Maine (Portland chapter): If you're living in the Greater Portland area, this is the chapter for you. Bonus Points: I occasionally speak there. Double Bonus Points: flyte designed it. :)
• Maine Center for Enterprise Development: Business incubator providing low cost services to start ups. They are also running a "Top Gun" applied entrepreneurship program.
• Maine Technology Institute: Offers early stage capital and commercialization assistance for R&D of innovative, technology-based projects.
• Maine & Company: Help on growing or moving your business to Maine.
• Maine Angels: Providing investments to promising, early-stage companies.
• Maine Small Business Development Centers: Help on starting a business, and many online courses entrepreneurs can take.
• Realize! Maine: Focused on encouraging young entrepreneurs to stay in Maine and grow their business here.
• Maine Development Foundation: Dedicated to sustainable, long-term economic growth for Maine. Offers programs on leadership, building downtowns and more.
• TechMaine: Focused on technology companies in Maine, including startups. Have an Entrepreneur Handbook.
• MEBSR: Not a startup resource per se, but helping Maine entrepreneurs build (and grow) sustainable businesses.
• flyte new media: The place small businesses turn to for Web sites and Internet marketing such as search engine visibility, email marketing, blogging, and social media. Oops, may have gotten a little self-serving there. ;)

In addition, there are a number of LinkedIn Groups that are Maine-centric. Some of my personal favorites:

• Maine Entrepreneurs: Discussions around entrepreneurship, small business and startups.
• Living and Working in the State of Maine: Slightly broader topics for anyone who works, lives or even plays here.
• MaineBiz: Maine Business topics sponsored by MaineBiz.
• Maine Marketing Association: Marketing-focused conversations.
• Maine Tweetup: Primarily announcements about Maine-based Tweetups.
• TechMaine: The group for TechMaine.

Do you have any other Web-based resources for Maine startups and entrepreneurs? Let us know!   

Putting Almost No-Cost Web-based Tools to Work for Small Business

Last week I put on a presentation for the Small Business Development Center counselors located here in New England. The event was hosted at the beautiful Mt. Washington Resort in the White Mountains of New Hampshire.

(I'm not saying that the place is haunted, but I'm pretty sure I saw a kid going around in circles on his Big Wheel saying "redrum".)

The presentation was entitled Putting Almost No-cost Web-based Tools to Work for Small Business. I talked about one-to-one communication tools like VoIP and Skype, one-to-many communication tools like social media, software to put on teleclasses and Webinars, as well as free alternatives to Microsoft Office and more. I also showed off Basecamp (for project management) and Highrise (for customer relationship management), two apps from 37 Signals that I couldn't live without.

I uploaded the slides to Slideshare (think YouTube for PowerPoint--or in this case Apple's Keynote) and then embedded them here at the flyte blog. Enjoy!

Putting Almost No-cost Web-based Tools to Work for Small Business

Rich Brooks
Slide Share and Share Alike

Small Business Twitter Success Stories: Got One?

I'm putting together an article on how small businesses are using Twitter to grow their business, attract employees, market themselves, find vendors and contractors, make sales...whatever!

There have been a number of success stories that keep on being repeated, so I'm trying to dig a little deeper. If you, or someone you know has a success story about how their small business (no matter how small) leveraged Twitter, tell them to come here and fill out this short form.

I'll be dropping names and including links from the article, so there's something in it for you as well.

How to Send Branded Domain Emails from Gmail

There's a number of reasons small business owners and entrepreneurs should consider Gmail as their primary email tool:

1. Great spam filters (the best I've used)
2. Your email is synced whether you're using the office computer, your home computer, a computer at the Internet café in Brussels, or from your iPhone
3. Insanely fast search
4. It's free
5. The threading of messages is fantastic (90% of the time)

However, the default setting of Gmail is to send your emails from [email protected]. That's not so good for a small business (or any business) that's trying to brand itself. You want all of your emails to come from [email protected].

(For those of you who still have your AOL email address on your business card it's time to step up. Your email scribbled on a cocktail napkin has a more professional feel.)

And no, Gmail's not perfect and it does take some getting used to; perhaps the topic of another blog post & video.

In the short video below I'll walk you through how to add your domain-branded email to Gmail, and how to make it the default email on your account. Or, you can watch How to Send from Another Email Address Using Gmail at flyte's YouTube channel.

Rich Brooks
Web Design for Small Business

The Trouble with Crowdsourcing

Recently we decided to have some flyte bumper stickers made up. Ryan Goan, our creative director, created a bunch of variations (click on the image to the right for a detailed look) for me to review.

I decided to get some additional feedback, so I crowdsourced the review process. According to wikipedia (aka the Word of God according to many geeks):

Crowdsourcing is a neologism for the act of taking a task traditionally performed by an employee or contractor, and outsourcing it to an undefined, generally large group of people or community in the form of an open call. For example, the public may be invited to develop a new technology, carry out a design task (also known as community-based design^[1] and distributed participatory design), refine or carry out the steps of an algorithm (see Human-based computation), or help capture, systematize or analyze large amounts of data (see also citizen science).

The term has become popular with business authors and journalists as shorthand for the trend of leveraging the mass collaboration enabled by Web 2.0 technologies to achieve business goals. However, both the term and its underlying business models have attracted controversy and criticism.

So I threw it open to my followers on Twitter and my friends on Facebook. When people gave two answers I split the vote. Here are the results:

• 1: 14.5
• 2: 6.0
• 3: 5.0
• 4: 6.0
• 5: 1.5
• 6: 10 

Well, 1, then 6 seems to be the big winners, but there's certainly some variables in there. Personally, I'm not a fan of 6 because the traditional oval bumper stickers have a border. There was also a lot of discussion around whether we could "pull off" a bumper sticker that didn't include our name and had our URL so tiny.

However, I don't think a lot of people make a buying decision based on bumper stickers.

"You know, I was going to vote for Obama, but that 'McCain/Palin 2008' bumper sticker makes a lot of sense. I think I'm voting for them."

I've always felt the plane was a pretty cool icon, and people who see it might be intrested to learn more about the story behind it, a.k.a. flyte.biz.

So, at the end of the day I'm no closer to a decision. I do like #1, although I'm thinking of dropping the www off the URL for additional white space, or even perhaps just leaving ".biz" in small letters below. I also like #3, perhaps with the www-less URL.

Anyway, if you'd like to confuse me further, please feel free to add your own thoughts below. It still hasn't gone to the printer.

Rich Brooks
Consensusless

How to Subscribe to an RSS Feed

Lately I've been doing a number of presentations on blogging and social media, and in these presentations I talk about the power of RSS. You can use RSS to stay on top of your industry, your competition, your clients or simply your interests in a time efficient manner.

However, the idea of RSS is confusing to a lot of people, judging by the number of hands that go up during that part of my presentation.

It's a shame that something that has Simple as its middle name should be so complicated.

To that end I put together this short video to show you the benefits of using RSS and how to subscribe to an RSS feed. Enjoy it here or at YouTube: How to Subscribe to an RSS Feed...the Video!

Rich Brooks
Syndicate Me

Update: Completely forgot to include a great RSS video that came before from the good folks over at Common Craft:

Twitter Webinar: How to Use Twitter for Business

There's no doubt that Twitter is a phenomenon: almost every news and sports program seems to have a Twitter account, and celebrities as diverse as Oprah, Shaquille O'Neal and that guy married to Demi Moore all have accounts.

But how do you use Twitter for business? How do you get started? How do you build an audience? How can create a network that will help you grow your business?

Whether you're new to Twitter or have been using it for a while, this Webinar led by Twitter expert addict Rich Brooks will provide you step-by-step instructions on:

• How to setup your Twitter account for maximum impact
• How to find and follow interesting people
• How to build an audience
• How to engage people for networking and marketing opportunities
• How to use 3rd party applications to connect with local people on Twitter, learn what people are talking about in real time, and become a Twitter power user
• How to integrate Twitter into your overall marketing plan

Plus, the last 30 minutes or so will be question and answer.

Date: 6/18/09
Time: 3pm - 4:30 ET
Place: Your desktop! (Do you need directions?)
Cost: Special Low Price! $15 (That's only 16 cents a minute!)

"Space" is limited, so register now!

Rich Brooks
Now I Gotta Go Tweet This