I just watched the brand new ”United Breaks Guitars” video thanks to a tweet from @cassi_hl. The song and video are funny and well done, but it got me thinking about bad publicity on the Internet and what to do about it. The video is about four minutes long, but I thought it was worth it. Heck, it will probably take less time to watch then reading my typically long winded blog posts. Enjoy:
The United Airlines baggage guys threw the guitars around, broke one of their acoustic guitars, and after a year long battle . . . United refused to do anything about it.
Welcome to the year 2009, where the customer service stakes are much higher. If you don’t provide good customer service, you can end up all over the Internet. Companies pay Internet Marketing guys like me to bury the ripoff.com reports that appear on the first page of Google when searching for their company name. It is that serious.
Starting today, I think United Airlines will realize how serious it is and someone is going to get yelled at. Maybe multiple people. The “United Breaks Guitars” video was uploaded just yesterday, but already has 3,500 views. It should become pretty popular . . . so what should United do?
The First Blog I Started Five Years Ago
In: Blogging
7 Jul 2009
I work with a guy who likes to say I’ve been blogging longer than anyone. That’s obviously not anywhere close to being true, but I did start my first Wordpress blog in 2004. (No, it wasn’t this newly created site with twenty posts.) Five years of blogging is a long time for the Internet world, especially for Indianapolis bloggers. So what did I do and how did I do it?
I wanted a website of my own. At work I had started creating micro sites, ecommerce sites, and continuing to develop our main website; but, it was for work. I wanted to start a website for myself. It couldn’t be a regular static HTML website, it had to be something cool and dynamic so I could easily update it and impress myself. I tried Joomla, Drupal and then chose Wordpress.
But what would the website be about? What topic, niche or interest would I write about? I have tons of interests and could have talked about everything, but I wanted to focus on something that I was interested in and that could possibly make money. I decided to create a community website for the town I live in, Fishers, Indiana.
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- Tags: Blog, Blogging, Community Website
The Easiest Way to Fail at Social Media for Business
In: Social Media
6 Jul 2009What we’ve got here is . . . failure to communicate. One of the easiest things to do, but one of the most often overlooked aspects of using social media sites like Twitter and Facebook, is replying to followers and fans. Reply, reply, reply . . . it really is that easy.
Imagine if I was talking with you and kept telling you story after story. Then you would respond to one of my stories with a similar story, but I didn’t seem like I was listening and never even commented about your story. I just kept talking about my stories. No two-way communication, just me talking to you.
That’s how a follower or fan of your business feels when they don’t hear from you. They retweet your updates, or ask a question on your Facebook page, but never hear anything back. It’s like they don’t even matter to you. Is that how you want your fans, followers or potential clients to feel about you and your business? You don’t care about them?!?
I thought about this problem yesterday while checking out The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis Facebook page. A fan had asked how they could sign up for the Dino Dig next year, and I’ll admit that I didn’t think she would receive a reply. But, lo and behold, I just checked out their Facebook page today and there are two replies from The Children’s Museum answering both questions! That, my Facebook friends, is how you do it.
So don’t ignore your friends, fans and followers . . . give them some comment love. Thank them for their retweets on Twitter, respond to comments on your blogs and answer questions on your Facebook page. Listening and conversing with others on social media sites is the best way to split up all of the sales pitches you are throwing at them, and the main reason why you are using social media. Look, listen, communicate, make relationships and get more business. If all you do is talk about yourself, people will stop listening. Two-way communication folks . . . it really is that easy.
Look & Listen – who ever thought Mister Rogers could teach us about social media?
My last post, How the Indiana Pacers Can Improve Their Internet Marketing, highlighted just a few of my many Internet Marketing ideas for the Pacers. Although I listed the billions of examples that they are currently using, I didn’t come out and say how I really felt . . . the Indiana Pacers are doing an excellent job with Internet Marketing. As a huge Pacers fan who went to about 30 home games last year, and one away game in Washington D.C. where I was constantly mocked by the Wizards mascot, it gives me great pride to proclaim the Pacers’ prowess with Internet Marketing and Social Media in Indiana. You can always do more, do things different, and do things better . . . no matter how good you’re currently playing the game or using the Internet, so maybe I’ll share a Pacers Part Two in the future. That is, if the Pacers get Boomer more popular in search results than the Wizards mascot G-WIZ. Maybe I’ll help push that alien wizard down in the search engines . . .
After I published my Pacers blog post, I also sent a tweet on Twitter with the title to the blog post, a link to the blog post, the tags #Pacers and #Indy, and also used “@indianapacers” so it would hopefully get their attention.
Less than 24 hours later, I received a direct message from the Indiana Pacers on Twitter. They thanked me for my tweets, and wanted to clarify that they don’t delete comments on their Facebook page unless they contain swear words. I would never use swear words on Facebook, and was pretty sure it got deleted, but replied back explaining that and mentioned they were doing a great job on the Internet.
With the growth of the Interwebs over the past decade, the Indiana Pacers have finally caught on during the last couple of years. About two years ago, the Pacers added a new “highlight section” at the top of the page featuring the most important news. They also started a blog section, written by the great Conrad Brunner, providing many updates with interesting information for Pacers fans. The Pacers took their blogging efforts a step further last year and added blogs by the Pacer players, but also included a local Pacers fan and blogger Indy Cornrows, which was a great move. I receive text messages, emails, Facebook updates, and Tweets from the Indiana Pacers about any important Pacers news. Recently they have had live online video of press conferences, video blogs from players, live chats with new players from the 2009 NBA Draft, different home pages for game nights, separate micro sites, special ticket prices available only online, and even gave away free tickets on Twitter and Facebook. Wow, that was a mouthful.
After reading many of the Internet Marketing tactics the Indiana Pacers are currently using, how could they possibly improve their local Internet Marketing, online presence and ticket sales?
Kevin Hood is on a mission. That’s right, I said Kevin Hood. I must pronounce the word “Hood” with a weird accent, because most of the time that I say my name, people ask me to repeat my last name. I have learned to answer the question with “like Robin Hood,” which usually gets a chuckle and they realize how to spell it. Except the time I signed up for cable television over the phone in college . . . for a year I got a bill addressed to Robin Hood.
Kevin Hood is my name, don’t wear it out.
This is the official Kevin Hood blog post. The reason why I am saying my name a lot is because when I search Google for my name, this guy who shows horses comes up before me. He used to own KevinHood.com, but let it expire several years ago and I snatched it up the second it became available. The other Kevin Hood started a new website about two years ago, with a different domain name, and is still doing the horse thing. His new website has been around longer than mine, so I think that’s why it’s coming up first on Google. Until this official Kevin Hood blog post . . . look out. Get off of me “other Kevin Hood.”
Kevin Hood doesn’t need to remind you that stuffing your posts with keywords is not the ideal way to increase your search engine ranking, but it can’t kill you every once in a while. It won’t kill Kevin Hood . . . I’ll be alive tomorrow. However, therefore, please do note: the search engines can penalize you – so be careful. Do as I say, not as I do.
So what else am I going to do with this official Kevin Hood blog post?
How can I beat the other Kevin Hood in my personal search engine war?
I can remember it like it was just yesterday. Designing a flyer in Corel Draw, taking it to the local print shop to get hundreds of copies, and then plastering them all over the campus of Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana. Who could forget the long trips to Bloomington, Indiana just to hang flyers all over town for our gig the next week at The Bluebird. Or the hour long drive to Indianapolis to hang Cootie Brown flyers for our next show at The Patio. We printed a different flyer for every show, and it had to be unique, colorful and professional. That was the best way to market your band back then, well one of the only ways.
Way back in 1995 we even had a website, but I don’t think many students visited the site unless they were at the computer lab. No one really had computers back then. I was one of the few, and spent late nights designing our site in Notepad, and then Dreamweaver (Version 3.0?) and trying my best to create a good site. Kevin Hood’s first website wasn’t bad considering it was over ten years ago . . .
We even mailed a monthly newsletter to all of the fans that signed up for the mailing list at our shows. I wrote the copy, designed the layout, had them printed, and we all hand folded each one and licked the stamps. I almost forgot about the four page color brochures we had printed and mailed in fancy envelopes with our logo to all of the bars in the Midwest. OK, so I was crazy about marketing even back then, but it was fun and a good experience.
Fast forward to the year 2009 and bands rarely even hang flyers anymore. They definitely don’t mail out a monthly newsletter, and a lot of bands rely on MySpace or Facebook as their only website. Bands didn’t have websites, then they did, and now they don’t again. It’s a lot easier to remind your fans about the next show on a social media site they visit every day.
Having just made some changes, I was in need of some furniture. I think I found “Lizzy” on Craigslist, but can’t really remember. Lizzy has a blog called Lila’s Pockets and updates it with the newest piece of furniture she has for sale. But, like a lot of products, it’s not easy to sell big furniture online so she is marketing herself locally in the Indianapolis area. Fortunately for her, I live in the same town as Lizzy (Fishers, Indiana) so I was a perfect potential client.
Fortunately for me, Lizzy has some really cool stuff. She finds old furniture like coffee tables, end tables and mirrors at garage sales or elsewhere, and refinishes them with a simple vintage look that I like.
Several items that I liked sold pretty quickly, but then I saw a new item in my RSS feed that caught my eye. And then another one. I emailed Lizzy and asked to buy the items, and then picked them up the next day. It was that easy. No auctions, no shipping costs, no weird phone calls for her . . . just a visit from a fellow resident who likes her work.
With such an easy and great potential at-home business, how could Lizzy expand her local online presence?
Google just announced a new analytics-type dashboard for small businesses. The dashboard provides statistics for your business on Google Local pages. Stats such as Google Map impressions, clicks on the map, requests for driving directions, and clicks directly to your website are monitored. It also features the top number of search queries used to find your business, and even what locations driving direction requests come from.
This is a pretty big deal. I’ve always wondered how many times my business was clicked on when looking at the Google Local map. Now I know much more and can improve my listing, advertise locally with Google Adwords and even create free coupons with the new dashboard.
Eventually this will probably integrate with Google Analytics and Adwords, but for now it’s a great idea from Google to get local businesses interested in their directory listing. A lot of people use Google Maps, so get your business on the map today.
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- Tags: Google Local
Email Marketing Mistakes Part Deux
In: Email Marketing
22 May 2009
In my last email marketing post, I highlighted several email mistakes that companies can make. I ran into my newspaper reporter friend tonight and his story inspired me to write part two: Email Marketing – The Emails Strike Back.
A long time ago (meaning tonight), in an establishment not far away, I listened to the reporter’s story. We’ll call him Jerry. The newspapers are hurting as we all know, but some of us saw this four or five years ago and don’t feel very sorry for their inability to adapt (OK, I’ll save that for another post.) Jerry lost his job last year when the local newspaper closed. What a terrible field to be in right now, huh?
The story started out talking about someone we both knew, a friend named Bill. Jerry ran into Bill and reminisced about the email disaster they had received while looking for employment. Bill and Jerry both applied for the same government position. The online process to apply for the position was long and tedious, as you can imagine for a government job. After spending hours filling out the application form and expecting to never hear back . . . they both received an email about a month later.
It was the classic “your application was denied” story, but this email was much better. The intern, or senior manager, who sent the email put all of the applicants’ emails in the TO field. All denied applicants could see the email addresses of other denied applicants, and Bill and Jerry realized they applied for the same job. Both emailed each other with confusion, the federal government would send an email like that to everyone?
Quickly the “reply all” emails started spreading, with disappointed and frustrated applicants complaining, laughing, and noting: “Only the federal goverment!”
My friend Jerry thinks he got about 400 – 500 emails from everyone before it was all over, and it must have been a nightmare for the government agency. Who would have thought the big boys needed help with sending email? A simple email marketing mistake can happen to all of us, no matter how big or small.
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- Tags: Email Marketing
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- Happy New Year Dead Blog!
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- daltonsbriefs: All very funny! I would add that 2010 will be the year that every unemployed person with a computer [...]
- Ian Rhodes: Absolutely right Kevin - I've had the same conversations - the term 'blogging' is syn [...]
- Kevin Hood : Kevin, I am the horse guy Kevin Hood wasn't aware of any competition between the two of us. [...]
- Kati Davis: I've been suggesting to University's for a while that they use a blog format for their new [...]
- Justin Harter: I best be getting myself busy with this new fangled-technique! [...]
Twitter: KevinHood
- Sleep is for people like @derekmcclain RT @JustinBryant: @KevinHood you don't sleep ever do you...?
- @jamespaden yes, but that's my corny movie joke.
- @kmullett @jamespaden I haven't seen Inception either. Last movie I saw in a theater was "Hoosiers" - great movie.
- Ecommerce Abandonment 1. Shipping cost 2. Not ready to buy 3. Want to compare prices 4. Price too high 5. Save product in cart for later
- RT @ScottLeamon: I didn't follow u on Twitter to only know where you are every moment of the day. Foursquare is killing Twitter experience.
- Product Review thank you email has 2nd highest conversion next to Abandon Cart email #swca
- @silverpop finally providing useful info #swca - Love the "You may also like" product column in Receipt Email.
- I've listened to 30 minutes of common sense! #swca
- Checking out Conversion Leaders Summit presentation thingy #swca
- The Bronx comic on Last Comic Standing is today's Colin Quinn. Rachel Feinstein should have made it over him.