I met Danielle Deramo, the owner of Just Say It, at a couple of business networking events. What a lovely and outgoing person. Danielle’s business is about Message Crafting for businesses. It’s all about words, branding, and marketing for businesses.

When I saw her photograph on Linked In and on another web site, I mentioned that her photos were not doing her any favors. I told her that I could show her outgoing personality in a casual business portrait that she could use on Facebook, Linked In, and her web site to enhance her presence on those forums. You’ve heard the old saying a million times. “A picture can say a thousand words.”

Well, you tell me. I think these portraits say a thousand wards about Danielle. If you would like to complement Danielle or connect with her for her outstanding knowledge of marketing and branding for businesses feel free to send her a note at danielle.deramo@gmail.com

Is it time for you to have casual business portraits made for online social media? Find out more on my photography website here:

http://www.photosbypdemott.com/lifestyle-portrait-session-pricing/businessprofilefacebook/

“I was against getting a professional portrait. I didn’t want to take the time out of a busy work day. Peter arrived promptly and got to work making sure the lighting was perfect. Within 45 minutes we were finished with the shoot.
I was able to view the proofs on-line the same day and download my selections within minutes.
As soon as I posted new profile pics on my social media sites the compliments started rolling in!
Peter DeMott is an excellent photographer who I highly recommend.”

Danielle Deramo
Just Say It!

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But, first, are you putting all your internet marketing efforts into something you have no controls over?

If you think that Facebook is a great social internet networking tool for your business, I think that is great. But, here is the big rub. You have no control over changes that may occur from one day to the next which may totally change the value of the work that you have put into Facebook for your business. It is not YOUR platform. It belongs to Facebook and as you can see, right now, they are making changes that you may or may not like. Something that you have been doing up to now that may have been effective for building your business may be changed tomorrow in a way that suddenly makes all that effort and time flush down the toilet.

Alternatively, if you have a self hosted WordPress blog and web site, you can make changes, add content, and build a reputation that bring people to your site…. and it is YOURS. The changes and the content that you add build SEO (organic search results through SEO) over time. Along with that, your information here can be automatically fed into your Twitter feed, and your Facebook profile and Facebook Page. If one of those is suddenly changed (remember, since you do not own them, they could change completely overnight) to where it is no longer effective to bring in new clients and customers, you have still built something that will continue to grow your business.

Here are the changes that are rolling out right now – click on link or picture

http://blog.involver.com/2011/09/22/facebook-releases-new-timeline-profile-at-f8/

Mashable also has a presentation of the changes that are rolling out – click link below

http://mashable.com/2011/09/22/facebook-changes-roundup/

Fast Company has a quick review of how it might effect businesses

http://www.fastcompany.com/1782173/what-the-new-facebook-changes-mean-for-businesses

Peter DeMott • REACH Magazine, Dayton’s favorite coupon magazine • pdemott@reachusa.com • peter@photosbypdemott.com • 937-478-6222

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QR Code Marketing: 5 Tips for a Successful Campign by Laura Marriott

One bad example on TV

One of my networking friends told me about a TV commercial that had a QR code as part of the commercial. The problem was that you would have to be a quick draw with your phone and be holding your phone ready focused on the screen as the QR code was only on screen for 5-6 seconds. Obviously if your phone was lying on the table in front of you you would not have time to pick it up, find the QR code scanning APP and scan the code (scanning itself usually takes 5-10 seconds) and see what was on the code. In all likelihood it would take the entire 5-6 seconds just to pick up your phone. This is not an example of an effective QR code implementation in marketing.

Local Examples of good implementations

I liked what she had to say about putting the QR Code everywhere. When I stopped by Michael’s Salon at Cross Pointe Centre the other day there were QR codes on their windows, near some displays, and on their business cards. Of course REACH Magazine is also a prime place to put well thought out QR Code marketing. In the upcoming September 2011 REACH Magazine here in Dayton, Ohio, check out several ads with QR Codes. Check out the one on Granite Transformations and also Papa Johns Pizza to see effective buy completely different usage of the QR Code. Also check out American Carpet Masters.

QR Code ideas for the Holidays

QR Codes would be perfect in our Holiday Gift Guide in the December issue of REACH magazine. Logo, web site, QR Code linked to a video clip walk through of a small boutique gift shop would work great. Or perhaps link it to your TV commercial online or a mobile friendly page with additional photographs of some popular products. Of course QR code usage is growing, but it is still small here in Dayton, Ohio. But now is the time to be experimenting and perfecting your usage. Just like the other things on the internet, early adopters can have the advantage when things get going.

Who scans QR Codes?

By Christmas 2011 more than 50% of all cell phones in use will be smart phones. Smart phone usage by young adults is very high and younger kids hardly know what the yellow pages are. They can search and research on the web as they walk into Starbuck’s and show the cashier their Starbuck’s membership on the screen of their cell phone, then sign in at Foursquare and tell all their friends where they are after posting to Facebook.

Embrace Technology and stay current as a business owner

Over a year ago I decided that I would “embrace technology” to be able to help my advertising clients to stay current. I participate in Dayton’s NEW MEDIA group which has a LinkedIn group and meets with speakers on timely topics each month. I now have people I recommend for social media consultations and web sites. My clients don’t just learn about REACH Magazine, Dayton’s favorite coupon magazine, but they learn about how everything can work together to help them get seen here in the Dayton market. If a small business in Dayton does not have a web presence, they are far behind and need to catch up. I can help with that.

Peter DeMott • peter@reachusa.com • 937-478-6222 • REACH Magazine Dayton

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Engage with your prospects in their homes

I went to Comtactics and looked at some of the ways that they have used QR codes to help consumers join the conversation or engage. In one example they associated audio presentations with QR codes at each display at the Dayton Art Institute. People could pull out their smart phone, scan the QR code and hear an audio presentation played about that display at the museum.

Fragmented broadcast market

That got me thinking. With the extreme number of choices presented on TV and RADIO these days including internet radio and internet TV it is becoming more and more difficult to get an advertising message out using those forms of media. But with the amazing growth of smart phone usage and bar code scanning by shoppers, more and more people are becoming savy with these devises. People can now scan a bar code at a store and instantly do a price comparison online which shows them where else the product is currently available and at what price. QR code scanning is quickly becoming a way to give more information or engagement with consumers.

Consumer awareness growing fast

Comtactics has Scavenger Hunt which has been used in conjunction with QR code scanning at the GREEN here in Dayton and which is rolling out for other areas as well. Stores that participated put QR codes on their windows and engaged with prospective customers as they participated in Scavenger Hunt on their smart phones.

QR codes with audio/video delivered right into the homes of your best prospects

Here is where it gets interesting for me as a REACH Magazine senior sales executive. I have the ideal way to deliver QR codes to consumers in their homes. What I would like to start with is to find businesses that are willing to or currently have audio or video introductions, testimonials, or additional information about their products or services that we can associate with a QR code on their print ads in REACH magazine.

The QR code would be mailed as part of their regular coupon ad to from 50,000 to 260,000 homes in the greater Dayton advertising area. The QR code would say “play additional audio information” or “play additional video testimonials from your neighbors” or something of that nature. Instead of 60 seconds played on the evening news, a commercial or video testimonial or additional information could be playing all day, every day as people go through the pages of REACH magazine and see and scan QR codes on various ads.

REACH is so well read that it would be an ideal delivery method

According to THE MEDIA AUDIT Reach Magazine has readership well over 95% in the Dayton market. REACH is Dayton’s favorite coupon magazine. Direct mail delivery insures that geographic areas specified by you will receive the ad. By adding QR codes to particular ads (done correctly – There are important aspects of how this works) brand engagement could be increased significantly leading to, of course, more sales.

To keep consumers curious and participating, the QR code could be changed with each issue of the magazine testing various forms of engagement with valuable consumers. If you wanted to test various QR codes, we could mail different ads to different zones in the market. Through Comtactics we can offer QR code tracking as well which will tell you how many people actually engaged through this program.

Please comment. What do you think of this new media opportunity and how do you think that consumers will respond with additional no-pressure opportunities to engage?

Peter DeMott • REACH Magazine • Dayton Ohio • 937-478-6222 • peter@photosbypdemott.com

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Getting people to LIKE your business page is called enchanting.

Guy lists 10 ways to enchant your customers on facebook in this article on the American Express Forum:
http://www.openforum.com/articles/how-to-use-facebook-to-enchant-your-customers

Hope you find it helpful.

Peter DeMott • REACH Magazine • Dayton Ohio • 937-478-6222 • peter@photosbypdemott.com

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That was the name of the presentation, but I was so involved that I did not take good enough notes to list the five ways here.

I went to the New Media Dayton meeting today in particular to hear about QR codes and how businesses can us them to promote. The presentation was given by Shawntay Fields of Comtactics Mobile solutions & Interactive Marketing here in Dayton. She did an awesome job presenting and showing us several examples of businesses using QR codes to interact with their customers with calls to action, increased customer loyalty and several other points. She gave us several places (URLs) on the internet to create QR codes free and also explained that various forms of QR code tracking are also available at an additional cost.

http://www.newmediadayton.com/506/june-10-5-ways-to-use-qr-codes-for-small-businesses/

I can immediately see how some of my current REACH Magazine clients could implement a QR code into their print ads and even on window stickers at store locations or job site signs to increase consumer interaction and even give incentives to buy now or learn more about the business.

You can create your own FREE QR codes at one of these web sites:

http://qrcode.kaywa.com

http://weallscan.com

http://scandayton.com

I was impressed with the group New Media Dayton and plan on attending more of their meetings in the future. They have a GROUP on LinkedIn which you can join to learn more.

Julie Wallings was taking pictures which will be up on the New Media Dayton web site within a couple of days.

Getting a QR code scanner for you smart phone is easy

Just go to iTunes and pick up one of the FREE aps for QR code scanning

All you want to know about QR codes to promote your business

Additional reading from Mashable:

QR codes to market your small business

Learn More about creating QR codes

Online marketing is moving to the streets and offline

Example

Here is an example of a very simple QR code. This one will likely appear on the ad on the back cover of REACH magazine promoting the summer Blood Donation drive with the Community Blood Center. In the summer sometimes blood donations drop and each year we help the CBC ramp up donations by promoting them in REACH magazine. This QR code took me about a minute to make using the Kaywa link above.

You could win a brand new JEEP Patriot by signing up to give blood this summer. Scan this QR code to learn more.

More reading:

14 things you need to know to market with QR codes

Peter DeMott • REACH Magazine in Dayton, Ohio • peter@photosbypdemott.com • 937-478-6222

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You can never learn too much about marketing your business:

I have been subscribed to Copyblogger from their website/blog for several months and I have been getting some great information from them. Here is an example of a recent post from Copyblogger:

5 Landing Page Mistakes that Crush Conversion Rates

Podcasts for easy and convenient learning that can help your business:

In addition they recently started a podcast called Internet Marketing for Smart People

I find podcasts a great way to continue learning as I make my way to various meetings and appointments. I can continue my lifelong learning on my way to and from work as well.

Here is a link to Internet Marketing for Smart People on iTunes where you can get a free subscription. Each time a new episode is uploaded you can transfer it to your iPhone or other Mp3 divice automatically.

Link to iTunes Podcast page, click here

Podcast Description: You don’t have to be a genius to master Internet marketing. But you’re not dumb enough to fall for that “get rich quick” hype, either. Internet Marketing for Smart People tells you the straight story about marketing online. The show is hosted by Robert Bruce, and features serial online entrepreneur and Copyblogger Media CEO Brian Clark, Copyblogger Senior Editor and content marketing specialist Sonia Simone, and occasional guests with specific online marketing expertise.

Join me in listening and subscribing to Copyblogger and Internet Marketing for Smart People podcast. We can learn to grow businesses in Dayton together.

Peter DeMott • REACH Magazine Dayton • Dayton’s favorite coupon magazine •

• peter@photosbypdemott.com • 937-478-6222

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http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/facebook-101-business-guide/

Here is another facebook business page guide specifically for photographers, but as I look through it, it has lots of good tips that any business could use. This one is 24 pages with good illustrations and samples throughout, but require that you LIKE their facebook page to download the free e-book. http://blog.photoshelter.com/2011/05/new-free-guide-facebook-fan-pages-for-photographer.html

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7 Website improvements that increase sales NOW is a short and informative article. Ivana Taylor is a marketing strategist.

http://www.openforum.com/idea-hub/topics/technology/article/7-website-improvements-that-will-increase-sales-now-ivana-taylor

Enjoy.

For FACEBOOK, and your web site here is another article to check out:

http://www.openforum.com/idea-hub/topics/marketing/article/5-steps-to-a-landing-page-that-converts-like-crazy-heather-allard

Peter DeMott • REACH Magazine in Dayton, Ohio • peter@photosbypdemott.com • 937-478-6222

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The Simple 5 Step Formula for Effective Online Content

Peter DeMott • REACH Magazine • Advertising in Dayton, Ohio • peter@photosbypdemott.com • 937-478-6222

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