A 7 Point Checklist for Spring Cleaning Your Website

by Andy Hayes

While I haven’t seen this supposed unseasonably warm weather that is going around, yesterday was officially the beginning of spring.  And with spring comes the big spring clean – dumping out all the stuff we don’t need or use from our closets and kitchens. I love the feeling of clearing out the deadwood, and leaving [...]

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5 Tips for Website Owners Who Aren’t Writers

by Andy Hayes

The Keyboard is your friend, not your foe.

I get a lot of clients who have a really tough time with their sites “because they aren’t writers.”   This is an understandable problem because yes, words are an important part of an effective website. Being a good writer is NOT the same thing as being able to put together a great website. There’s [...]

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Do You Have to Offer Customer Service Via Social Media?

February 20, 2012 Online Marketing Strategy
customer service via social media

One of the questions I get in client projects and consultations is: Do I need to offer customer support via social media? Five years from now, the answer to this question will be such an obvious YES, people won’t be asking it. Hopefully by then, technology will make it a little easier for businesses handle, [...]

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8 Common Mistakes Made When Organizing your Website Menu

February 6, 2012 Website Content & Usability
A bad menu can quickly kill an otherwise good web experience.

What is the one thing that gets overlooked in nearly 99% of the websites we look at in our comprehensive website evaluation?  The website menu. Your website menu is just as important as the content that it is trying to organize. While there’s no one right way to do a menu, here are 8 common mistakes made [...]

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(Google) Analytics Jargon Explained

January 11, 2012 SEO
Google's graphics and dashboards might be easy on the eyes, but they're still filled with jargon-y junk.

I’ve had a lot of thanks for the tips in our email marketing jargon explained piece, so I thought I’d dive right in with some explanations of typical analytics jargon, because sometimes it can feel downright confusing! For the purposes of today’s discussion, I’m mostly referring to Google Analytics, but in fact these terms are [...]

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How to Manage a Community like a Pro

December 30, 2011 Online Marketing Strategy
community management for dummies

Before I get started with this review of Online Community Management for Dummies, I have to provide a hearty disclosure. That’s because one of my best friends wrote it – one of first people I ever met online, Deb Ng. So heck yes, my review is biased, but when your friends do great work, you [...]

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Are you a different person on different social networks?

December 20, 2011 Online Marketing Strategy
faces

Here’s a question I get a lot – I thought I’d just answer Joline’s email today via the blog (thanks Joline!): So, we’re doing the Facebook thing, and the Twitter thing, and we wanna make sure that we’re really being targeted to how users interact on those platforms. I read the recent post on Should [...]

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Promotion Probably Isn’t The Problem…

December 12, 2011 Online Marketing Strategy
no more signs and flags

My good friend Becky McCray from Tourism Currents always is a pithy tweeter, and this weekend was no exception, especially when I saw this gem pop up in my Twitter stream: Promotion Probably Isn’t the Problem I see this a lot – you could easily change the word restaurant to”website” or  ”tour” or  ”bed and [...]

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It’s Time to Get More Focus (Big Biz Changes Inside)

December 5, 2011 Online Marketing Strategy
getting focus

Yup, it’s that time again. It’s time for myself and the TOP team to take some of our own advice. One of my personal pet peeves is when someone tells me “they’ll do anything.” What does that mean? It’s really hard to refer clients to someone who “does anything,” because when you do anything, you [...]

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How far will you go in the name of hospitality?

November 29, 2011 Steal This Marketing Idea
kimpton hotels

Kimpton Hotels is willing to go all out in the name of hospitality and customer satisfaction. This email chain a customer posted online is proof. That’s why Kimpton has experienced significant growth, profits, and heaps of praise from their customers, WHO LOVE THEM SO MUCH. Question is, how far are you willing to go in [...]

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