In this interview, Chad discusses the top things to consider before hiring your next web company.
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In this interview, Chad discusses the top things to consider before hiring your next web company.
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When registering your domain name (URL) the one I recommend you secure, that is the most important and popular, is the one that ends with a .com extension. Assuming then that you have secured the .com extension, you are in great shape. However, you may want to also consider registering the following extensions: .net, .org, ,info, .biz and .us if you are in the US.
For example, my blog name is hosted under www.ChadBarr.com which is registered and owned by me. What if someone decides to register one or all of the other extensions, such as the .net which would then make www.ChadBarr.net available for them to populate with their content. This could and would create a situation that when my clients search for me, they would most likely find the other domains that are actually not associated with me and my company.
So the primary reason you want to consider this, is to avoid others from trying to take advantage of your success and then registering and owning the other domains associated with your company name or brand names.
One final point of consideration is that once you have registered and own all these extensions (URLs) is to redirect all of them to your .com domain so when one tries to type the others, they will end up on your main domain.
© Chad Barr 2011. All rights reserved
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Many people spend their resources and energy trying to attract visitors to their sites. That seems reasonable and achievable. However, there are two aspects to “site power” that often defeat site owners who are investing heavily to attract visitors. In fact, we have one word for it: retention.
It’s insufficient to merely attract people, you need to retain them. Not for hours or days, but fore minutes and for repeats visits. We call this a “sticky” web presence, because people don’t want to leave (and, yes, we make it difficult for them to leave—to get rid of us—because we’re offering so much value, so many options, so much interest).
Here are a different type of “sticky keys”:
a. Site must be responsive and quick to load and display pages. Otherwise visitor will quickly grow impatient and leave. We once say a site with the “floating head” of the owner, which took over a minute to make its message and clear!
b. Interesting, fresh and dynamic content, such as diagnostics and self-scoring tests and challenges for the visitor.
c. Make sure the landing page answers what they came there to do with minimal amount of clicks or clutter. In other words, what are the typical results for the client or customer?
d. Reduce stagnation. Three strikes and you are out. Keep it fresh and review your content for timeliness and relevance. If there are three things that are dated, the visitor is probably out.
e. Enable visitor interaction though email, contact forms, comments, sharing with others. Don’t play hide-and-seek, or protect yourself more from prospects than you do from spam. For goodness’ sake, list your physical address in case someone wants to mail you something!
f. Community connections with peers and successful colleagues. Demonstrate that you’re connected to the profession and the community.
g. Others’ recommendations. Include video and print testimonials and not merely on a “testimonial page.”
h. Ability to subscribe to newsletters, email notification alerts and RSS feeds. Allow people to gain a continuous access vial other platforms.
i. Create incentives such as: “You will receive instantly… Let people download text, audio, and video.
j. Promote your best content “The best of …” This can often be a list of Twitter posts you’ve made on common subjects, recycling and repurposing your intellectual property in new ways.
k. Show them additional resources on each page and what other visitors have liked. Amazon is great for this: “Others who read this book have also purchased….”
l. When people leave comments, respond as quickly as possible and also thank them for stopping by and for their feedback. No inquiry should go unanswered for more than 24hours.
m. Create a continuing series (sequels) that builds on interest, suspense, and more intense future knowledge. Such as episode #1, #2, #3 … or Part 1 of 3.
n. Repurpose older content by adding new life to it. Include videos, or graphics, or case studies of how you’ve since applied it.
o. Easy way to access the latest announcements, what’s new and upcoming events. Margin real estate is quite effective for this.
p. Upsell products and services during the checkout process by offering related items and other bundles. This is the checkout line at your local Staples or Best Buy with all kinds of impulse items for sale as you stand on line.
Customer engagement and relationship building should continue long after a site or non-site purchase. Keep them aware of current and future promotions. We capture every single book, video, audio, workshop, and related buyer and mail to them once a month. Here’s an example below.
One of the slippery slope, stickiness removers, is overly complex design and difficult navigation. Also, too many “orphan” pages, which require no action at all, and go nowhere, tend to turn visitors toward the door. Make sure the visitor is compelled to do something. But keep it local. We generally use no links directing the buyer elsewhere (to another site). We want our sites to be cul-de-sacs where the buyer can stay put.
This is an excerpt from my new and upcoming book Million Dollar Web Presence - Leverage technology to build your brand and transform your business, which I am coauthoring with Dr. Alan Weiss and which will be published by Entrepreneur Press.
© Chad Barr 2011. All rights reserved
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Traffic to your site comes from many sources such as when your visitor:
How many of these are you involved in and are there others worth mentioning?
This is an excerpt from my new and upcoming book Million Dollar Web Presence - Leverage technology to build your brand and transform your business, which I am coauthoring with Dr. Alan Weiss and which will be published by Entrepreneur Press.
© Chad Barr 2011. All rights reserved
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In a recent presentation I delivered in Rhode Island I was asked what are the components I consider when reviewing the effectiveness of web sites for my clients and prospective clients. Here is the list I have quickly come up with:
Let me also suggest the following items to consider:
I could just as easily have come up with quite a few other points. Yet if your site and strategy incorporate the list above, I will acknowledge that you are ahead of your colleagues and competitors and are leading towards greater success.
So where are you and how would you rank your site?
© Chad Barr 2011. All rights reserved
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A while back I wanted to check out the newsletter of Jim Cramer of TheStreet.com and the Mad Money TV show on CNBC. Big mistake! I can’t get off his newsletter. I have attempted to unsubscribe by opting-out numerous times as I also emailed his organization directly but no response and to no avail. You must be asking by now: “Chad, why are you not setting up a filter to remove his email into the trash folder?” Well … I did! But this is not the point. I should not be expected to do so from what appears to be a credible individual and company. Yet, after doing a quick search on the net I found out that Jim apparently has been getting quite a few complaints about this practice.
Although I realize that I may be generating free publicity for his organization, my hope is that my readership takes notice and also recognizes the following Lessons:
Below is a snapshot I captured to illustrate my point:
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This is a great podcast interview I just did with David Meerman Scott, author of The New Rules of Marketing & PR and World Wide Rave among other books. In this interview we discussed: Viral marketing and thought leadership strategies, the new / old rules of marketing, best practices for consultants, where do ideas come from, how to best leverage social media and much more.
Click below for podcast to start
http://www.chadbarr.com/chad-barr-interviews-david-meerman-scott/
Click Here for entire podcast series table of contents
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I view the web as an important component of your overall marketing effort and driving interest to your organization. Seldom, would your Internet effort alone drive the proper interest and success to your organization. However, combined with the following list below and you are looking at the recipe to success:
“It’s hard work you say?” Yes, it probably is. Yet there is no short cutting the system. Place these components effectively together and amazing Internet results will come your way.
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I have recently received the catalog from Johnston & Murphy which does have some nice selections I must admit. What also caught my attention was actually the back cover which I scanned below. Notice how they promote their page on facebook with the enticement of finding exclusive offers and news.
Are you leveraging the various aspects of social media such as facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and others to communicate with your clients? You should.
Are you providing exclusive offers and news with these social media tools? You should.
Are you paying attention and taking notes of what others and your competitors are doing with social media and beyond? You should.
Are you offering your own genuine value by exploiting social media concepts? You should.

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Here is Chad’s definition of social media:
The connection of people online to explore mutual interests, share ideas, wisdom and expertise, build relationships, have fun, provide and solicit answers to questions and conduct business.
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