Category: Business

Well, if you remember, I recently got started with Google Adwords.  I thought I was doing ok.  I was getting some clicks, spending some money, but getting no results =(  obviously, this is bad.  I recently talked to a marketing professional, that took a quick look at my site, and hit me with reality.

My landing pages sucked.  He gave me what he called a “$10,000 piece of advise”…  shut Adwords immediately.  He said the way my landing pages were designed doomed me to failure.  I was never gonna get any conversions with the current setup.  He told some simple tricks, that I’ll share with you today.

1.  Tell your visitor what you want them to do in the first page, without any scrolling.  If you want them to sign up for something, contact you, or just click for more information, don’t expect them to scroll and scroll to find that call to action.  You need to show it right up front.

2.  If you’re offering a newsletter, an E-Class, a whitepaper, or whatever, explain why they should sign up right up front.  People aren’t going to sign up for some nebulous offer…  not in today’s world of spam and junk mail.  They need to know why they NEED to sign up for your stuff.

3.  If you have a contact us link at the top of your site…  explain why they want to contact you.  If you’re like me, you’re not offering tech support or something random on your site.  You want them to contact you for more information.  You’re building leads.  Well, the average user needs a reason to click on something.  Be sure to give it to them.

4.  Avoid using stock photos, especially if you can use photos of yourself at work.  If you have pics of you at a client, or on the job, add those instead of some random models in a conference room.  It adds credibility and increases trust.

All that being said, look for some major revamps to the JaveLLInSolutions.com website coming soon.  Anyway, that my learning things the hardway lesson for today (too bad it costed me nearly $1000 in adwords…  but better now than after $5000).  Thanks for reading.

Well, from my previous posts, I’m sure you’ve noticed that I’m splitting up my “free time” between marketing and product development.  Talk about opposite sides of my brain 🙂  Anyway, it struck me today that there is a very distict line for marketing.  There’s physical, which to me is banners, business cards, “swag”, etc…  and there’s digital, white papers, blog posts, Adwords, etc…

It’s funny because I just noticed today that my partner has handled everything physical.  Everything I’ve done has been in the digital world.  So that begs the question…  “How important is physical marketing?”.  Now I ask because obviously trade shows help get your name out there, but in our few appearances, it has generated any rabid fans, must less customers.  We have another show coming up in October, which is just a regional ASUG (come see us in Columbia, SC if you’re in the area).  In these venues, physical stuff is important.  We also plan to hit the big SAP MFG show in the spring…  But how important is it?  I ask because like any newbie marketer, I’m trying to figure out where our dollars need to be focused.  In my mind, it’s been all digital, but maybe you guys can chime in.

To me, physical marketing in general is lost on me.  if i pick up a pen at a tradeshow, I use it till it breaks and then throw it away.  I’ve never looked at the name and then gone on-line to learn more about them.  A business card is just something kept in my pocket/wallet until I move the information into my digital contacts.  Rarely if ever, do I read the details.  And if I pick up a piece of paper from a booth, unless I plan on buying, I usually recycle it before I head home, or it ends up in a filing cabinet never to be looked at again.

BUT…  I know I’m am not at all a typical person.  If you’re read me for any length of time you already know that.  So, here’s where I Need your help.  In your experience, how much attention do you pay to business cards?  how often do you look at a pen, see a company name and wonder what they do…  wonder enough to look them up?  Do you take a paper/brochure from a booth and look at it again?  What makes a company memorable? (besides giving away big ticket items or having models at the booth?).  I’d love to hear from you guys to know what works…

Thanks for reading, and I look forward to your feedback.

On a personal note, my little guy is turning 3 on Saturday.  It’s amazing how fast time flies.  But seeing him grow into a toddler has been an incredible journey for both of us.  I remember when he was first born (well kinda, it was 3 years ago after all.  ha ha ha).  He just kinda laid there, cried a lot, and I wondered what all the fuss was about.  Then he started to move around, interact with things, and before I knew it he wanted to play football with me, or play cars, baseball, hockey, soccer…  and that was all within 10 minutes.

He’s my constant reminder of why I do what I do.  He’s the reason I spend my time working after he goes to bed, instead of sleeping like I probably should be.  ha ha ha.  I do this business stuff so I can be around to continue to see him grow up.  He’s just about to start soccer, and I’m realizing how great it is to be able to be there for all these moments.  I know I’ll get there with Olivia too…  but for now, Alex is my little man.  If you’re out there trying something similar, remember to truly be with your family.  I know it sounds corny, but forget about work (as much as you can) and just enjoy your family.  For me, it’s why I do it…  ask yourself…  why do you work?  do you love the job?  or does it get you one step closer to more time with the people you love.

Happy 3rd Birthday little man.

I just recently picked up a new trick from my Ad-words book.  I highly recommend Perry Marshall’s book.  It really is worth the money.  Here’s my problem.  I was following the formula, use 2 ads per ad group.  Great.  The problem I was having is that some ads were getting a disproportionate amount of impressions.  In cases, 95%/5%.  This makes it very challenging to determine which ad is truly performing better.  Especially because often I’m getting a great click through rate on the 5%, but far fewer clicks.

What I figured out was that there are advanced settings I wasn’t even aware of.  And unless you click the right buttons, you never see them. See, here’s what I found.  Go to your campaign settings.  Under the general settings, click edit.  Be sure that All Features is selected.  This opens up the advanced configuration I didn’t realize existed.  Once you accept this, you can scroll down to  :Ad delivery: Ad rotation, frequency capping –> Ad rotation.  Change it to:  Rotate evenly: Show ads more evenly for at least 90 days, then optimize.

This will force Google to show both ads on a “close” to even rotation.  There it is.  Another ad-words tip I just learned.

Thanks for reading.

I’ve found that it becomes too easy to get obsessive about my goal.  As a result, often end up too close to burning out.  Like I mentioned in some of my previous posts, I’ve been working with all my extra energy to continue launching the business.  Well, it’s a simple fix (I’m laughing as I write those words).  Taking a break, enjoy the little things, and remember why you’re working so hard…

Now for me, this is always a challenge.  I  have this drive that I have a difficult time turning off.  My aspiration to make the business successful means that I have so much to do, so much to learn and it’s incredibly difficult to turn it off.  As a result, I drive myself beyond the limits I should.  Now, this sounds great…  I get so much done, but then I go too far…  I stress my body beyond my limits, and end up either sick, burned out, or just generally in trouble with my wife =)

Now, like I mentioned, it’s simple.  Take a break.  Make a point of taking at least one night off every week.  Go to bed early, go out with friends, or just read a fun book.  The goal is remind yourself why you’re working so hard.  It gives your brain an opportunity to focus on something else (Often resulting in new ideas or renewed energy), it keeps you healthier… and keeps everyone in your life happier =)  Take it from me… it’s worth the time.

thanks for reading,

I’m sure I’ve mentioned it before, but it is incredibly easy to waste days, weeks, months or even years on a good idea that no one is interested in.  Believe, I know from experience (in case you haven’t noticed the name of my blog.  ha ha ha).  So needless to say, I’m always looking for tricks to make sure I don’t make the same mistakes again.

I recently came across a great idea from my Google Adwords book.  The idea is so simple, that it’s worth all the money spent on the book =)  Here’s the idea…  when you come across that great idea, before you spend 100’s of hours creating it, you go down a different path first.  You spend a couple hours building a web page to “promote” your idea.  You can even sell it like it already exists.  Then, go set yourself up a google adwords campaign (if you haven’t already).  Then, just create some ads for your new idea.  Like every good ad, make it compelling and sell the idea.

Now, you can get real world feedback on your idea.  First check your clicks and see if anyone is interested in the idea.  Then you can see if anyone is willing to take the next step to contact you.  Then you really know you have a winner.  If it doesn’t take on the first try, remember to tweak your ads for a while.  Also, tweak your website for new ideas or variations on the theme.  When your idea is “mature” enough, you’ll be getting clicks in your campaign.  That’s when you know it’s worth investing the time.  If despite all your best efforts, you get few clicks or no interest, you know that idea wasn’t what the market was looking for.  It doesn’t mean it was a dud…  maybe just ahead of it’s time, or maybe just needs a different spin.  Shelf it for a while, and if you still love it, try again.

Thanks for reading.

On my vacation, I had a chance to do a lot self reflection.  One of thing I recently learned is that despite my best efforts, I still have a dominating feel of rejection.  Looking at it in an objective light, it’s completely irrational, however logic doesn’t always rule our thoughts, now does it?

I’ve spent nearly 6 years building infrastructure, building my first product, refining my first product…  and NOT selling my first product.  Is there anything wrong with my product, did I not build a good enough item?  or have I subconsciously spent all my time building, rather than marketing?  Now don’t get me wrong, I’m no marketing genius, but I’m realizing that I didn’t invest in marketing my grand idea because I was afraid it wasn’t good enough.  I was afraid people wouldn’t like it, would tell me it looks like crap…  you get the idea =)

What I came to realize is that fear stood in my way for long enough.  Don’t get me wrong.  Development is far easier to me, and more interesting, but development doesn’t pay the bills.  Sales and Marketing is the only way to make my business work.  So now my number one goal needs to be sales and marketing.  The bad news is that means development needs to take a backseat for a while.  So don’t be surprised to see more posts on Adwords, email campaigns, or any other marketing system I can figure out =)

Today’s lesson to walk away with, is believe in yourself.  Believe in your ideas.  Feedback is the best way to improve an idea.  Even “negative” feedback can make your ideas stronger.  Don’t be afraid of it…  seek it out…  It’s what I’m attempting right now =)

Thanks for reading.

Well, it seems like I’m in a touchy feely place after my vacation, so I’m going to talk about another soft skill that I have to improve on.  Making sure you’re on the same page with expectations.  Now, this applies to all aspects of your life, but I’m going to talk about it from the perspective of my business.  If you’ve read my blog for any length of time, you realize that I have two sides of my business.  Paper Street Enterprises, which is my consulting business and JaveLLin Solutions which is my software business.  Right now, 90% of my revenue is from Paper Street.  But my goal is to have 100% from JaveLLin in the next couple of years.  In order to help me achieve that goal, I partnered up with a colleague and friend.

Now, I had been working the software aspect since 2006.  And if you’ve noticed the title, I’ve been learning things the hard way ever since (well, to be honest, I’ve been doing it all my life.  ha ha ha).  When I partnered up, I thought my life would get easier and in certain aspects it has.  For the first time I have someone to bounce ideas off of, someone to validate my crazy ideas and someone to share in the rather large expense of launching this endeavor.  Now, the challenge has been that my partner doesn’t bring in a lot of the skillsets we need, rather he brings a lot of what I already have.  This is a double edged sword.  We are both engineers, so we have a great problem solving mindset, but neither of us have any experience in sales or marketing (with the exception of us both being independent consultants we know how to sell ourselves).

So, what does this mean?  well, if you read my post yesterday, you know that I’m obsessive about this software business.  It also means I expect to everyone to live up to this same ethic.  My partner and I both have a family, both have young kids and both have a lot of stuff going on in life.  So that means we need to use our time wisely.  Any wasted effort can cost us weeks or even months in our dream to do JaveLLin full time.  The problem that I realized is that we’ve been playing it too fast and loose in our scheduling and priorities.

Initially, I thought implementing a CRM system would help…  but it really hasn’t.  So it’s on to the next idea.  I’ll talk again soon about how it’s going.  But phase one will be to document all the irons we currently have in the fire.  Once we have the list, we need to assign priorities, and approximate time/level of effort, and finally we need to divide up those tasks.  I currently am the only developer, so it’s very hard for me to step away from the ABAP side of things, however, I’ve come to realize that we need marketing more than anything.  Without the marketing, we don’t get leads, without leads, no sales, and without sales, all this effort is for nothing.  So…  that’s all for now.  I’m sure I’ll be blogging again soon about this =)