Wouldn’t it be nice not to have sticky notes with important passwords scribbled on them lying by your desk or hanging on your monitor in plain sight? Wouldn’t it be convenient to have access to your documents or reports or messages from clients without having to traverse through your infinitely long email folders?

Similarly, wouldn’t it be fantastic to be able to work from your office, your comfy couch at home, or a nearby coffee shop, or better yet, your daughter’s ballet class?

The Good Old Days

Coming from an academic background, I was used to having to carry around passwords in a KeePass folder or remembering to upload the latest version of the MS Project folder if I needed to work from home. Or, uploading all working documents to the intranet before logging out for the day.

In the last few months I have been at Pure Visibility, my routines and processes have changed quite drastically. And, for the better, I must say.

Now: Pure Visibility Project Management

At Pure Visibility, we use a variety of different cloud computing tools on a daily basis. Here are our favorites.

Basecamp

Even though it initially felt like several things to recall every time I did my project management tasks, now it is like second nature and I wonder if I know any other way at all! Messages from team members and clients are safely stored on Basecamp, a convenient tool that helps me sift through my emails and ensures that our team has one place to access message threads, reports, documents, milestones, or you name it, pertaining to client requests.

MailManagr

Do you have really long message threads with attachments that need to be distributed to your team as well as archived? No worries – use MailManagr, and it doesn’t mess up the file formats and the syntax is quite intuitive.

Socialtext

Our wiki, Socialtext, is where we store our internal procedures, policies, operations information, and everything else useful to us in our daily work. Having a wiki keeps everything centrally located and it’s very easy to add, edit, and delete information; and, to train new team members!

LastPass

Passwords, as we all know, are not only sensitive data but ever-changing to ensure the continued security of systems. The latter making it quite taxing for teams to keep in sync with the IT folks, and may result in major inconveniences at off-site meetings if a system is not available as soon as the password is changed. LastPass to the rescue – not only can you access this without having to carry a jump-drive with KeePass or other local programs, now, we can use the cloud to distribute it on the fly.

Harvest

Need to log billable time on a daily basis, Harvest, an online time tracking and invoicing system helps us switch from projects/tasks with an easy to use interface and multiple customizable options. Indeed, creating projects and sub-projects along with discipline tasks is a breeze, thus helping us keep this application in sync with our internal Basecamp and Wiki.

Expensify

Meeting your clients in person at their office or stepping out for a quick coffee to catch up with your team? You know these expenses add up and at the end of the month filling out expense reports to get reimbursed can be cumbersome, and quite frankly, off-putting. Well, it’s not if you have Expensify, this nifty program is available online bundled with a convenient app for smartphones.

Click a photo of the receipt and upload it using your phone, or scan and upload receipts to the website. It’s even conveniently linked up to our company credit cards and assembles our credit charges, too. Our set-up is quite fancy, in that managers can approve team members’ expenses online as well. Better yet, it will send reminders to managers for approvals to ensure we meet our company deadlines. No more excuses to submit or approve expense reports now, is there?

Salesforce.com

To acquaint myself with our clients, I used the Wiki, Basecamp, project documentation, and reports but another invaluable resource is our CRM, Salesforce.com. It gives me on-the-fly access to ever-changing client details like contact information, titles, and accounts information. And, it is a great way to log information on our prospective clients as well, such as emails, phone calls, and sales details. So, the communication thread is easily available and sorted to help any (new) team member catch up at any time during the sales cycle.

Google Documents

Google Documents is a wonderful collaborative tool that we use not only internally to share documents or spreadsheets by multiple team members; but it has become a lifesaver for client collaboration tasks as well. Whether sharing budget forecasts, time planning, tasks distribution, and even for social purposes like emergency phone numbers to go out for a cup of coffee!

WebEx

Another neat program I’m familiar with these days is WebEx, which is an online web conferencing solution. Ideally, we’d love to be able to meet in person every time but we all know how difficult that can be, however with Webex’s phone and chat options as well as the ability to share screens among participants, we are a step closer to achieving the face-to-face time.

All I can say is: at the end of the day, I don’t carry a bunch of paper documents; or a special drive with passwords; or slips of paper with my daily time sheet; or wads of receipts to submit my expenses. I just pack up my laptop and I am off to continue work wherever I please.

Well, almost anywhere I please, that is—as I sit precariously on this particular ledge balancing my laptop on one leg and looking for a wireless signal at my daughter’s dance studio! Nevertheless, I enjoy the convenience of the cloud for project management work, as well as the comfort of knowing I didn’t forget something important on my desk, or worse, somewhere else!

Five Steps to Optimizing Local Search Marketing to Secure and Promote Your Brand

Yesterday we covered the first two steps of what a single location business can do to make their business stand out against a franchise operation with multiple outlets.

3. On Site Optimization

So now you have claimed all your local search listings, and optimized them to take full advantage of how their fields influence the local search results pages in search engines. Great! It’s time to do some high-level optimization to your own web page to appear clear and concise in the organic search results.

Write the homepage <title> and <meta> description so they both appear as complete thoughts instead of being cut off in mid-sentence. If the user is searching with the intent of going to your website, they will skip the local listings completely. In the search results page, your website needs to clear, concise, and grab the attention of the user. Most search engines allow a maximum of 60 characters for the title, and 160 characters for the description.

4. Paid Search and Competitor Terms

Other companies are allowed to bid on your brand name, however, they are not allowed to falsely represent themselves as your company.

Advertisers often use DKI (dynamic keyword insertion) in the titles of their ads as a way to increase the perceived relevance of an ad to the search query. This gets tricky when the search query is a branded term that fits in the ad title parameters.

In the ProFlowers.com AdWords account, a search for “University Flower Shop” would trigger a broad match hit of the keyphrase “Flower Shower”. Using DKI though, University Flower shop would appear as the ad title (because it fits in the 25 character parameter), meaning that people could click the ad wrongly thinking it would direct them to University Flower Shop.

DKI Ad Example: {KeyWord: Flower Shop}

Search Query Example	University Flower Shop	Flowers in Ann Arbor Michigan
Num. of Characters in Query	< 25	> 25
Displayed Ad Title	University Flower Shop	Flower Shop

When it comes to branded terms, competitors are not allowed to use your brand name in their ad title. Because of this, using DKI on competitor terms often gets advertisers into trouble. If you own a business and someone is using your business name in the title of their ad, you can contact the advertiser directly or send a trademark grievance to Google.

But there is more! If your brand name is too vague (as the business name “University Flower Shop” is above), it is okay for a competitor to use your brand name in an ad title. Because there are dozens of stores across the US named University Flower Shop, ProFlowers is not overstepping their bounds.

5. Bonus! Free Listing of Local “Offers” and “Deals” to Stand Out

Especially if your business is in a very competitive market, and everyone has optimized their local pages, it can be difficult to stand out. A new feature in both Google Places and Yelp is the ability to promote offers for (i.e. “Three free balloons with purchase of bouquet!”).

These are free to post, and give your listing more precious real estate on the search results page. And in Google Places & Google Maps, it puts a green star next to your listing which immediately attracts the searcher’s attention and makes you stand out from the others. An example of what the green star looks like next to Paid and Places ads can be seen in the image below.

This makes you more noticeable, attracts attention, and increases your chance of a click (since people love saving money). A definite Win-Win situation.

Five Steps to Optimizing Local Search Marketing to Secure and Promote Your Brand

Running a small business is tough stuff, and complicated even more when large national brands begin throwing their weight around and engage in questionable practices. Small business owners are left wondering what is and is not legal when it comes to aspects of online marketing. If you’re a small business owner, here’s what you can do to protect and promote your brand, and to help you recognize when another business has overstepped their bounds online.

Here’s the kind of thing that could happen. Last week I spoke with University Flower Shop of Ann Arbor, who were vexed that a national competitor of theirs, ProFlowers.com, had done some very questionable and shady marketing tactics to attain new business, at their expense.

ProFlowers.com claimed the Google Places page of UFSAA, and changed the phone number to their own. Because of this, anyone who tried to call UFSAA ended up talking to the customer service department at ProFlowers. This was shady indeed.

ProFlowers was also showing up in the AdWords listings for University Flower Shop terms. Again, UFSAA worried that they were losing business because of unfair advertising methods.

So as a small business, what can you do to protect and promote your brand, and what is unauthorized when it comes to aggressively competing on the search results page?

1. Secure Your Local Listings (Before Others Do)

The easiest way to prevent others from wrongly claiming your local listings is to beat them to it. Google Places makes it difficult to claim a listing that is not yours, however there are loopholes that shady-savvy marketers have discovered, as UFSAA found out.

Below I’ve segmented the local search sites into three levels of decreasing importance. When claiming your local listings, I suggest fully optimizing each tier (see Tip 2, below) before moving on to the next level, as they will have the greatest impact in creating better visibility for your brand on the search results page.

Tier 1: Google Places & Yelp.

Tier 2: Facebook, Yahoo Local, Bing Local

Tier 3: Yellow Pages, Localeze, Superpages, CitySearch, Yellowbook, and MapQuest.

2. Optimize Your Local Listings to Bolster Local SEO

Each interface has different fields to populate. As an example, I am focusing here on the options Google Places provides, and the significance of each.

Very simply, the more complete your Places page is, the more prominently it appears on the search results page, and the more likely the user is to find the information they were seeking. Including all this additional information and claiming your local listings bolsters your local SEO strategy, allowing you to dominate the organic search listings for highly relevant traffic.

Company, Address, Phone: These fields are the essence of local; alerting the search algorithm that you are indeed relevant and within the local radius of the search.
Note: Phone number is especially important in this instance, because local searches are much more likely to be done from a mobile device, and these users have a high propensity to call you.

Email & Website: Not essential, but including these fields allows the user to learn more information about your brand, and gives them an alternate means of contacting you.

Description: 200 characters are given to sum up your business. Depending on how well known your brand is, you may wish to write your slogan, give important details of your company (locally owned since 1985!), or attract users with short marketing copy (Lowest prices on flowers, guaranteed).

Categories: Five categories are given, and I recommend using them all. This helps both the search algorithm and the user understand your expertise better.

Photos & Videos: Boom! One of the biggest things you can do to increase your real estate on the search results page, and attract a users attention is to add photos (up to 10) and videos (up to 5) to the local listings page. Often times businesses do not include any good multimedia with their listings, making those that do stand out amongst the pack.

Hours of Operations: One of the main reasons people use local search is to find out if/when businesses are open. This is an optional field, but a very important one.

Payment Options: Letting the user know ahead of time what is accepted as payment is a good business practice. You’re a restaurant that doesn’t accept American Express? Please let me know so I’m not out of luck after ordering dinner.

Additional Details: This section is reserved for other details customers should know about your business. Do you validate parking? Include that. You have student discounts every Thursday? Include that. Accept competitors’ coupons or interesting trades? Include it!

Stay tuned for the other three tips… coming tomorrow!

It’s not too early to get involved in one of Michigan’s coolest events for passionate people-entrepreneurs, artists, technologists, designers.

• TEDxDetroit, the third annual assembly of sharing positive ideas for the world from Detroit
• Wednesday, September 28, 2011
• 8 a.m. – 6 p.m.
• Orchestra Hall at the Max M Fisher Music Center (3711 Woodward) near the campus of Wayne State
• $26 donation per person, lunch provided

Interested in speaking, sharing your ideas? Speaker Application
Want to attend and see what it’s all about? Attendee Application
Would you like to financially support the event? Sponsor E-mail
Can you support the event with your time? Volunteer Application
Everyone can participate by spreading the word. Share, tweet, blog and update about this event with your network!

Check out Pure Visibility’s own Catherine Juon on YouTube! She recently attended the first ever International Small Giants Community Summit. Hosted in Konstanz, Germany, Catherine was one of 45 attendees from 12 different countries who spent 3 days in 1 room sharing business ideas with like-minded entrepreneurs.

The Small Giants Community is made up of small business leaders who focus on their employees and community, not just the company bottom line. It’s a place where business owners can share their passions with each other and learn about what makes each other thrive.

As part of this community, Catherine strongly believes that this is core to why Pure Visibility has been successful. It’s why clients trust that the tools they employ will help their SEM strategy. And it’s why the staff loves coming to work each day.

This week is Michigan Manufacturing Week, which celebrates the manufacturers in our state. Not only is Pure Visibility excited to see other Michigan businesses thriving, but we are pleased to know that some are using Internet marketing as part of their success strategy.

PV has had the privilege of working with several local manufacturing companies, including a manufacturer and installation service company for custom security systems. Through the use of Google AdWords, online advertising and improved web-copy, this client ranked higher in organic searches and increased online sales by an amazing 900%!

Internet marketing can be an effective way to measure ROI for marketing efforts.  For our custom security systems client, we were able to use analytics and sales tracking to determine the exact ROI; we discovered that this client achieved just under $2 million in online sales by the end of their first full year with the new strategy. This translated to nearly $20 in sales for every dollar spent on advertising. The following year, continuing optimizations allowed for an additional 40% increase in revenue with only a 30% increase in advertising spend.

We’ve seen first hand the difference that online marketing can make to the success of a manufacturing business.  During Michigan Manufacturing Week, we join in celebrating the continued growth of this legacy industry that’s the foundation of our state’s economy.

In a recent interview with Michigan Entrepreneur, Pure Visibility co-founders Linda Girard and Catherine Juon shared their secrets for business success.  Citing a responsibility to both clients and their team as key drivers of continued growth, the Pure Visibility leaders offered a business model that other entrepreneurs could follow.

Girard described the company’s business as focused squarely on Internet search marketing.  As the company has evolved over the past six years, so has its client base from smaller companies to global brands.  In a competitive market, Pure Visibility credits its distinct focus on metrics for helping it stand out from the competition.

“Our responsibility and accountability for our clients’ sales is a key difference between Pure Visibility and others (in the search marketing industry),” said Girard.  “Our attention to metrics makes Pure Visibility stand out.”

Internally, Juon explained that Pure Visibility’s culture is what helps the company attract the best and brightest talent.  From quarterly charity events that serve as a way for the team to celebrate reaching quarterly goals and milestones to daily stand ups where the team shares successes or asks for assistance, Pure Visibility’s culture is another way the company continues to outpace competitors.

Michigan Entrepreneur airs on various channels in Oakland County.  Check the program listings for a program schedule and other info.

At the Inc. Growco conference last week we had many, many conversations about the best ways to set up websites. As a general rule of thumb, here’s a rundown on a few of the platforms commonly mentioned.

WordPress
We love WordPress – it’s easy out-of-the box if you want to start a simple site (with many templates to choose from or buy at a small fee) and upgrade to a custom-designed template later. It’s highly customizable for SEO, and imposes a structure that naturally leads you toward good search engine optimization tactics from the start. It’s flexible enough to manage small and large sites alike, and offers many plug-ins that extend functionality without the need for expensive custom programming. One of the factors that makes WordPress particularly “safe” for entrepreneurs is their large developer community – you will never be at a loss to find someone who can pick up where your last developer left off. Most unbelievably, it’s free – music to the ears of most entrepreneurs!

Drupal
We love Drupal, too! With the launch of Drupal Gardens, you no longer need a hard-core programmer to start using Drupal, making it an option for companies just starting out. We’d generally recommend WordPress unless there was a specific feature of Drupal you needed, just because of the larger development community with WordPress (for now). One of the features that distinguishes Drupal is its ability to manage permissions – giving specific people or departments access to different parts of your website. Along these lines, it also handles workflow management / approvals far more naturally than WordPress. Generally, it’s more extensible than WordPress, making it a great tool to create sophisticated websites while maintaining easy-to-edit content.

Squarespace
Squarespace looks promising, but as a newer entry, it’s unclear what their claim to fame will be. Some of the SEO features require upgrades, and it’s simply too new to have the same kind of following WordPress or Drupal enjoy. However, if you know of a feature that makes Squarespace unique please let us know in the comments – we’d love to hear about it!

Love collaboration? Helping folks gain visibility and clients for their businesses? Love coordination? Love laughter?
Then, you might be right for Pure Visibility’s Relationship Manager position. Please check out our Relationship Manager position opening.

We were excited to see Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson’s Rework. In it they share some of their iconoclastic, iterative, and wholehearted approach to doing business.

The book reflects their clean design sensibility, with pages of drawings interspersed with quick blog-post-like narrative snippets. It is a quick read, but worth contemplating. I’ll summarize the book by sharing some of the subtopics titles within a few key chapters.

Given my day job as a project manager, I particularly value their approach to creative productivity. They’re minimalists. They advocate reducing interruptions “interruption is the enemy of productivity” and reducing time in meetings “meetings are toxic”. Why? Because “inspiration is perishable.” So you have to get the dross out of the way to be able to act.

Other recommendations they emphasize quick iterations “good enough is fine”, “quick wins”, and “make tiny decisions”, and being realistic about your human-ness “go to sleep”, “long lists don’t get done”, and “don’t be a hero”.

Want some quick inspiration? Go get Rework!