the client services blog
I knew the BlogHer folks would get dangerous someday, and now Jory tells us they are actively trying to take over the world… in the nicest way possible, of course.
She and her co-founder Lisa are on a panel (Jory says she is just moderating- we’ll see how well she can keep her mouth shut!) (Just kidding Jory, relax, geeze, I am sure you’ll do fine) at the Web 2.0 Conference. We can only hope she will be posting copious notes on what they all have to say.
Yeah, I know Kristen at BlogHer because of our business relationship- I want to place ads, she does that, so I know her.
And that is enough for a basic level of caring and trust. Yes, I want her to be happy so she places my ads right.
But it is having met her in person at the Blog Business Summit reception, knowing that she is new in her job as am I, knowing her baby’s name and getting to recommend baby books- this is why I care about her.
Every chance you get, turn your clients into people. Turn your vendors into people. Find out what is going on in their life. Ask them about the weather.
It is so much more fun to do business with people I care about than with clients or vendors I don’t know.
Wondering about my blog title, All For You? Here you go- when I know you and care about you, I can say that I will do whatever I can to make you happy. Everything I do- it’s all for you.
Go to crayon’s homepage, and click on ‘people’ in the upper right corner. They end their pitch for new people to join up with “consider yourself essentially hired on the spot. How’s that for a job interview?”
They list the things they want- what is important to them. You need to have been blogging about marketing, and/or podcasting.
Because they base themselves on an island in Second Life, they can say “if you’re right for crayon, you’re right” and don’t worry about that relocation hassle.
I wish every page we built qualified this well for who we want to buy things from our clients. Simple, clear, with a pretty obvious Contact button (call to action).
Contrast this with, oh, say, the GM careers site. First, they call it careers, just like everyone else.
Now go to that page- what are you supposed to do? No clear call to action, and an overwhelming number of choices. Now, GM is huge, but that is no excuse.
I hate to be typical, but compare it to Apple’s career page. Apple says: here are 4 choices. Click one.
Look in the New Grads section (which has the button ’start your career’). It tells you the 3 things that happen next.
So crayon says ‘if you are this kind of person, we want you.’ GM says, well, nothing, because they shove so much information at you that you pass out and die. And Apple says ‘here are the 4 ways you can get in to the company.’
Now apply this to your homepage. Is it easy to buy, easy to know where to go?
Check out the homepage of BlogHer, the women’s blogging community. I am on their case to add three buttons right below the nav bar: Join BlogHer, Find a Blog, and Advertise. Because right now, there is too much information for me to know what to do right away. (Disclosure- we advertise with BlogHer, and we like them, so you should to.)
Check out our client Dessy. The homepage gives you 6 choices in the upper left (where the eye travels to first).
Check out Linda Keith CPA for a speaking business. Do you want to sign up for a class, or sign up for the newsletter? There are more choices on the left nav bar, but these 2 stand out.
In addition to my mutterings, check out Godin’s book The Big Red Fez which basically tells you to make sites really easy where it is super obvious where to click.
If you are not sure that your site does this, and you are not sure how to make it do this, comment here and I will take a glance.
I had great fun last night talking with Jory and crew from BlogHer, the women’s blogging network. They had a get-together after the first main day of the Blog Business Summit.
I got to meet Jory, Elisa, and Kristin, who is new to the team. I also got to meet various of the bloggers.
After drinks and hour d’oeuvres, we had dinner with a whole slew of folks there for the summit. I got to talk a fair amount with a bunch of interesting people. Mark (he is on the left in the picture) had great stories to tell of his 12 businesses he has built.
I didn’t get to here that much about what Anna does as Director of Marketing at GiveMeaning, but we need to get together so I can hear more. And, this tells you how on the ball she is, I got an email from her at 1:59am this morning. So after the last of us left the restaurant around 11:30, she must have went to her hotel and started contacting everyone she had met. As I said, I need to hear more.
I got to talk with Jim who runs an early stage venture capital fund.
I met others as well, and a few people had run out of business cards by the end of that day. I expect I will hear from many of them next week.
Here are the take-homes from this event:
a) Talking with people in other businesses about what they have been through and hearing advice on your own business is really really fun.
b) You don’t have to have a lot of years in business to tell a good story.
c) If you have not checked out BlogHer, then you are missing the boat. So go read about it. Right now.
d) Everyone should be blogging. Really. You don’t know how much it is hurting you that you are not blogging right now. Get started at Blogger.
e) It is fun to work for a company where people are impressed with the clients. I had not heard of our client AmericanStationery.com before I got this job, but everyone else has. And it means something to them.
f) Most of the BlogHer women are married. Tough.
g) I need to be at the BlogHer Business ‘07 in NYC, and probably so do you.
And to get back to the title, thank you to Jory for inviting all those who hang at BlogHer.org. A great night, more good contacts, and probably more than a few good new clients. Thanks!
