About James Ball

Digital Footprint – This is pretty much exactly what you’d imagine it to be, an indelible and permanent digital impression that exists on the Internet that represents you and your company. The mere mention of the word “permanent” should be enough to warrant your pro-active participation in the management of your digital footprint. Unfortunately, for most businesses there is little understanding and many choose to remain ignorant about the importance of a strong and well managed digital footprint.

It’s probably a safe assumption that most small businesses are at least starting to realize the importance of managing their web presence. Once a mere buzzword, social media has settled nicely into an accepted norm of doing business online. Search engine optimization (SEO) is no longer thought of as an event based practice, but as an ongoing and fluid best practice. Blogging as a way to establish authority and to form more lasting and solid relationships with customers and would be customers is not as feared as it once was. Altogether, these tactics and disciplines form the imprint that make up your digital footprint.

Participating on different and relevant social networks is good…taking control of your story and your client-facing content is also good. Being proactive online is widely accepted and for the most part, business owners understand that without it they fall behind competitors. If being progressive and innovative is a must for your business, then lack of participation is no longer an option.

I think that what many people fail to realize is that their digital footprint is made up of MANY different parts, and that many of these pieces fall outside of any proactive behavior and good intentions one might cast in the absolute right direction. Also a safe assumption is that businesses put their best foot forward and that any part of their created digital footprint will leave a good impression on those who find you while searching the web for products and services.

But what about what others might say about you online? This too occupies the same space as all that you have done proactively and with a positive slant. I’m talking about review sites like Yelp, Trip Advisor, Angie’s List, Google+, and literally dozens more. While much of what is being said about you may be positive and quite supportive, sometimes what is said is far from the savory morsel that you might hope a prospective client might happen upon. I’m talking about that part of your digital footprint and your online reputation that falls outside of your control. I’d bet that this is something that you have considered at length and that you are avoiding the topic out of fear if nothing else. After all, if we’re going to play the game, we’d all like to be in control and not at the mercy of people we don’t know and can’t control. If this post is resonating with you, then it’s probably a good time to talk about reputation management.

“Reputation management is the understanding or influencing of an individual’s or business’s reputation. It was originally coined as a public relations term, but advancement in computing, the internet and social media made it primarily an issue of search results.” – Wikipedia

Ignoring reputation management is fast becoming a non-option for most small businesses in today’s online environment. Just because you refuse to acknowledge that Yelp exists won’t stop people from leaving reviews there about your business. Furthermore, if you don’t claim and take control of your businesses profile on sites like Yelp, the basic information on the profile may not even be correct. If there are in fact some negative reviews and you are unaware of them, then these publically visible comments go completely unanswered and unchecked by you…and the public sees this. Think about that, the review sites are highly regarded and show up very high in search results. It is a VERY good possibility that a review site may be the front door to your business and the first impression that many internet searches will find as they do their homework (You do know that more people than not actually research goods and services online prior to buying than ever before, right?) before they spend their money.

Let’s consider that bad review…just sitting there…week after week, month after month. How many people do you think it will impact? Consider the same bad review with a response from you, something along the lines of “I’m terribly sorry that you had a bad experience at our establishment. My name is James and I am the owner here. I want to assure you that this is absolutely not the norm here at our establishment and we strive to deliver excellence at all times. My personal email/number is me@me.com 800-555-1212. I would appreciate it if you would contact me directly as I welcome the opportunity to learn how we can better serve our patrons. Your insight and opinion are very valuable to us here at our establishment. I look forward to hearing from you soon.” Now, how many people do you think that will impact?

You see, the choice to be proactive is still yours. I should also state that in most cases, these unhappy customers often become some of the strongest advocates for the business that reaches out and makes contact. Oftentimes they also add an amendment to their original bad review. The public sees this.

Taking control of your reputation management is like many things before it that you’ve decided to embrace. It will take time and energy and you’ll have to get involved to get past the minimal learning curve of navigating the review sites. There are profiles to claim and/or create, information and bios need to be created, and you’ll need to monitor the most important of these sites that are the most relevant to your business. In the online world today this is the price we pay to stay ahead.

There are any number of sites, products, and services available to you that are designed to monitor your online reputation. Most are fairly affordable and do a decent job to aid you as you undertake reputation management for your business. For those of you who are TrustWorkz® clients, we have some good news.

We now provide reputation management as a service and an added value to our clients. We will monitor the review sites and notify you of any negative reviews. We will also suggest an appropriate response and guide you through the process of replying. We’ll even handle the response for you if you so desire.

If having TrustWorks® handle your reputation management interests you or if you’d like more information, please contact us or give us a call at 770-615-3275

If I told you that TrustWorkz® is successful because of the dynamic and incredible individuals that we employ, this statement would be 100% true. If I told you that TrustWorkz® is successful because we have an extremely supportive and collaborative culture, this would also be 100% true. We are very much a team. We are a team that thrives on the relationships that we have, not only with our clients, but with each other.

We truly enjoy each other’s company and we try to get together as often as possible to spend time together outside of the workplace. On May 22^nd we all spent the day at Turner Field in Atlanta to watch an Atlanta Braves game. It was a beautiful day for an outdoor activity and we were fortunate that most of the company could attend. We also had t-shirts made for the occasion and this was a big hit.

At first I noticed lots of idle chatter about clients and the exchange of different tips and tricks that help us all to do our jobs a little better. I totally expected this. We all work in different locations and so I knew that the WebOps® would use this opportunity to compare notes. What I didn’t expect was that within minutes the conversations turned more personal. Everyone seemed to be aggressively trying to get to know as much about their fellow team members as possible within the allotted nine innings!

So, we have a closer team after the outing…and perhaps this is nothing new or earth-shattering. What is new, and perhaps worth a gold star is that we have an INCREDIBLE team who all understand and appreciate the value of relationships. At our core we are all empathetic individuals who strive to do work that matters for our clients. Also at our core is that same empathy that seems to breed a strong desire to connect with and help other fellow members of the TrustWorkz® team. We are an empowered and edified group because of this.

I am proud of TrustWorkz® and proud of every individual who makes up the collective. Empowered and edified from within…this will come to be known as a paramount ingredient to our success. I know this because we went to a Brave’s game and had a lot of fun together!

 

Lunch & Learn: Web Presence Management and Building Online Dominance

TrustWorkz® is honored to be presenting the “Web Presence Management and Building Online Dominance” << (Please RSVP at the bottom of the page in this link) Lunch & Learn at Roam Atlanta’s Alpharetta location on Wed. 5/15/13. If you are a small business owner, or someone who has the digital marketing role within your organization, this is a “must-attend” for you.

Our intent is for you to more fully understand the convergence of Social Media, Search Engine Optimization (SEO), and Content Marketing and to help you implement the neccessary tactics and disciplines in order to help you to truly benefit from your marketing efforts. This is NOT a hype session.

Valuable real-life examples and lessons will be discussed candidly – you are sure to take away actionable advice and guidance. You’ll learn the exact methodology and tactics that we use every day to help our clients to grow their businesses by leveraging the incredible power of the Internet.

We’ll be covering topics from our white paper, “10 Things Businesses MUST Do To Stay Relevant Online”:

1.  Have A High Performance Website – We discuss the best formats and features to include
2. Create Content Using Blogging – No longer an optional item
3. Content – Must be properly optimized for the search engines to find it
4. Social Media Participation – What that means for your business
5. Email Marketing – Using your collected lists to reach out
6. Facebook – The correct way to engage and build an online community
7. Google + – Unignorabe and how it is integrated with all google products
8. Video – The power of video and how best to use it for marketing
9. Google+ Local – Put yourself on the map and keep it there
10. Analytics – Someone has to watch the numbers

We hope to see you there!

How long has it been since you first started contemplating social media marketing for your business? I only ask because your answer should shed some light on the correlation between when you embraced social media as a marketing platform for your business and your perception of the value and benefits realized to date.

Still, and after however much time has passed, you are likely still puzzled by certain fundamental questions. What escapes even the savviest of marketers is the “magic mix” between application and moderation. How much is enough, and how do you know when you’ve gone too far?

For the sake of the point that I’m trying to make today, it will be necessary for you to take a subjective stance and contemplate what I say with that filter in place.

Enough and Too Much

You can naturally accept that the only results you will ever see from social media will come from the pro-active and intentional use of social media. It also stands to reason that if you were to do more, undertake more, and push harder that the yield would also grow. This is only true up to a point though. Too much is usually quite evident to the casual observer…and to the perpetrator as well. The problem is that the line marked “stop here” is not so clear and is easily stepped over by the zealous as he sows and reaps.

Over-sharing, posting too often, posting and sharing the wrong content, using social media as broadcast platform for your marketing message…this is the type of activity that gets to be too much. It gets there in a big hurry too. Posting interesting and valuable content that is relevant to your audience of customers and your customers-to-be takes finesse and a light hand. KNOWING your audience is paramount as you seed your content to generate interest, awareness, and LEADS.

The more you know your audience and what resonates with them, the better your intuition about how much to push out there and when. You can’t use other people’s standards. Best practices, data, case studies, and the like, these are good things and they do serve as great guideposts. Unfortunately, social media does not lend itself to a one-size-fits-all mentality. It’s going to take a fair amount of good ole’ trial and error before you can hope to find your own magic mix – time begets intuition. Intuition and knowing your audience will dictate the “what” and “how much” you need to share in order to achieve success from your efforts.

Not Enough

Not embracing social media or refusing to participate, for whatever reason, is no longer an option for businesses hoping to market themselves effectively. I’ll just let that statement hang as a simple truth. Today I am speaking to those who really are making a go of it.  If you are like many that fall into this group, you are likely concerned that your efforts don’t seem to add up and produce the same yield that your peers and competitors enjoy. This can be quite frustrating and bothersome indeed.

I mention a “magic mix” that exists, and that mix is different for every business. Put another way, this mix is your social media strategy. A social media strategy speaks to the overarching objectives that you have as a business as well as the goals you set for your use of social media use. Your strategy will also help you stay on tack by defining the tactics you will use to meet your objectives. This strategy should not be static. It is an evolutionary animal and its motivation and parameters are found and reiterated based on the balance that you find as you explore what is too much and what is not enough for YOUR business.

Not enough social media to make it worth your while is a sad place to find yourself. Many a business owner feels that all of their efforts are for naught and that the time invested has been a colossal waste. Enough should FEEL like enough…and it shouldn’t be hard to find and define all of the ways that social media has been a help to your business. An excellent way to determine that you are falling short is by comparing yourself to your business peers and competitors.

Make allowances for competitive research as you execute your strategy. Simply by having a look at what your peers and competitors are doing should help you to define the “not enough” metric. How much do they share? What channels are they using? Which of their efforts seem to be gaining the most traction? What types of content are generating the most engagement within their community? Do they seem to have an evident strategy?

Emulating what your peers and competitors are doing is a very good way to get started, but only inasmuch as you UNDERSTAND what it is you are seeing. As your experience deepens your intuition will grow. Your ability to win and to dominate comes with the wisdom gained as you pay attention to your surroundings online. When you know how to position yourself differently and better than your competitors…you’ve arrived at a very happy place!

Last week Invesp released the infographic below. I include it here today so that you can also assess your efforts from an objective point of view for perspective.

I wish you the best of luck with your pursuits. We’re here to help if you ever decide to hire a professional to help you leverage social media, search engine optimization, and content marketing to help grow your business. We’ll also assess your web presence if you’d like, no strings attached!

TrustWorkz is looking for new talent to add to our dynamic team of WebOps! Do you have what it takes? Read our job description and drop us a line!

WebOp Job Description 

Are you an expert on social media platforms, skilled in the visual arts and excel in written communication? Do you enjoy engaging with online communities and small business owners? If so, you may be the ideal candidate to join our team.

We are TrustWorkz, Inc., the leading provider of web presence management for small business. A WebOp is a creative and motivated individual who creates content across social media platforms for each client, engages with our clients’ communities on a daily basis, measures social media metrics, and creates and executes new social media strategies to increase customer awareness, loyalty, and increase profitable sales.

Summary

• Experience in digital communications or online community building.  Relevant experience is taken into consideration.
• Proficiency on social media platforms (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Google+), content management, measurement tools and analytics.
• Have basic multimedia skills (photo and graphic design) and experience using visual mediums in social media.
• Have blogging experience and excellent written and verbal communication skills.
• Be active and passionate about digital culture: it’s not just something you know, but an integral part of your daily life.
• Demonstrate a strong attention to detail.
• Sense of responsibility for providing excellent service for clients.
• Self-starter requiring little supervision.
• Able to work collaboratively with a group or individually.

Responsibilities include (but are not limited to):

• Interacting with communities across all social media platforms. (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Google+)
• Identifying and developing relationships with clients
• Produce web content for use in social media channels, blogs, contests and marketing campaigns.
• Measure results of social media strategies and promotions.
• Contributing new ideas to ongoing social media strategy.

Extras

• Health benefits
• Flexible work-from-home policy
• The ability to work with a group of quirky, fun-loving, individuals who truly love their job. (Don’t believe us? Check out what one of our employees had to say about working here!)

There’s no doubt about it, many people have a much better understanding of the way things used to be. Personally, I’m old enough to be quite sentimental about a great many things. My desk is currently covered in Post-it notes, and this takes me back to a more familiar time when these were the coolest thing since sliced bread…and they only came in one color. I wanted to share the cartoon below because it really resonated with me on a few different levels. For one, the visual parallels are pretty accurate. I also can’t help but marvel at how young many of the represented social networks are.

 Image Source: John Atkinson

Facebook was launched in February of 2004, Twitter was created in March of 2006, and Pinterest is a mere 3 years old. So how in the world is it that so many of us feel like we’re so behind the eight ball? Put simply, the hunger for technology has created a machine…a technology loop that is all but impossible to keep up with. This phenomenon is not new, with every new advancement there are those of us who are still dependent on the “old” technology. We see no real need to put ourselves through a painful learning curve when what we have is sufficient to meet our needs. What’s more, we’re all too busy doing what we do in order to make a living to keep up with what’s trendy. But therein lays the problem doesn’t it? Running a business requires that we keep up with what’s current in order to stay competitive.

Put aside any fears about the unknown just for a second and let’s compare ourselves to the rest of the world. Is it really too late to jump in and catch up? Is everyone else really that far ahead of you? Will you continue to ignore what is happening – or is it finally time for you to embrace and learn to leverage social media marketing?

Instead of waxing poetic and trying to boost your confidence enough for you to want to take the plunge, I’d like to share another very powerful image. It’s a living image that simply conveys the truth about how the world has embraced social media.  Of the numbers you see adding up, keep in mind that many of these metrics are being generated by brand new users. Some are people who are for the very first time creating a Facebook page for their business; some are just today buying their first iPad. For all of these that arrived ahead of you, there is an exponential boatload of people coming onboard after you.

 

Every day here at TrustWorkz® we help businesses leverage social media, search engine optimization, and content marketing. As much as it may feel like you are arriving late to the party, the reality is that many small business owners are just now jumping in. Contact us if you would like a candid assessment of your efforts thus far. We’d love to help you to understand the potential and the possibilities that are available to you!

We here at TrustWorkz® spend a great deal of time explaining to our clients (and would-be clients) how social media activity has a direct impact on the Search Engine Optimization (SEO) of your website. There has always been a myriad of tactics that have been utilized to increase your website’s chances of showing up in the search engines:

• Keyword Density – Using keywords on your pages, posts, and in your meta information to help the search engines to find and properly index your content.
• Inbound Links – Making sure that similar sites around the web (preferably those sites that rank higher than your own) are linking to your pages and posts.
• Using “Alt Text” – This is text assigned to the images on your website that helps the search engines to know exactly what the image is about.
• Having Great Titles – Giving your pages and posts compelling, informative, and Keyword-rich titles and headers sends a strong signal to the search engines about your content.

Social media participation is not something to be ignored or taken lightly. Aside from some of the older and more understood tactics and strategies affecting your SEO, great social media activity absolutely begets great SEO. This infographic simply explains several ways that social media has a direct impact on how fast and how effectively your social media activity improves your website’s SEO. Enjoy!

Infographic source: Being Your Brand

 

On Tuesday of this past week TrustWorkz® was honored to present a Webinar to the membership of the Roller Skating Association International (We are members). We were asked to help the members understand what has changed about the Internet lately and how this impacts their entire web presence. The Internet is in a constant state of flux and we spoke about the most important aspects of a business’s web presence that need to be managed and maintained.

This slide deck presented alone doesn’t really deliver the same value outside of the webinar format so please download our “10 Things Businesses MUST Do To Stay Relevant Online” white paper. This white paper is the basis for the spoken script used to accompany this presentation and it contains all of the information you will need to better understand and manage your web presence. Enjoy the slides…and the white paper!

“Web Presence Management” (SEO, SOCIAL MEDIA, CONTENT MARKETING) Webinar Slides from TrustWorkz, Inc.

 

I’m actually not picking on the ladies here today, far from it. Women business owners represent the fastest growing segment of the economy; I personally find it extremely prudent to pay very close attention to this segment. (A humble hat tip to all of my lady friends who are my colleagues and peers, I owe you much!) In doing so I find that my own predictive capabilities are honed and I feel much more confident as we position our clients and our own business in preparation of things to come.

A little over a week ago the 2013 State of Women Owned Businesses Survey results were released by Web.com and the National Association of Women Business Owners (NAWBO). The survey was conducted between 12/14/12 – 1/4/13 and 552 NAWBO members participated. I wanted to point out a few things here today and I also wanted to share an Infographic that was constructed using data from the survey.

I hope that by now, at least for most of you, that you don’t think of Social Media, Search Engine Optimization (SEO), and Content Marketing as mere buzzwords or as some sort of a trend. At this point in our evolution as marketers and business owners this can all safely be lumped together and correctly called a shift…or at the very least a real movement towards mass adoption as a society of these tools, tactics, and behaviors.

The survey (and Infographic) reveals a perception (again, from the fastest growing segment of the economy) about the importance of Social Media, Website Design, Mobile Strategy, and Search Engine Optimization. As far as intent and where efforts and budgets will be spent, Social Media and SEO are considered to be the future of small business marketing. We here at TrustWorkz® couldn’t agree more.

If you haven’t already aligned yourself and your business’ trajectory with the women who participated in this survey, I hope that this finds its way to the very top of your to-do list. We really want to see you at the top of heap when the dust settles!

As you browse through the Infographic, don’t let the pervasive sense of economic optimism be lost on you…for me this was a very important takeaway. Enjoy!