I miss eating dinner outside in the Sun!!  Ok sorry about that, back to my report now.

SEO has changed a lot in the last 12 months, not at all surprising as people are becoming more educated about how the internet, and particularly the Big Search Engines: Google, Amazon, YouTube and Facebook.

Just to illustrate the fact: 42% of people will look no further than the top ranked webpage on Google; 26% will click down as far as the second entry and a mere 13% will check out the 3rd or 4th lines, but only 5% of people even see the paid for ads on the right of the screen, ‘what? . . . there’s stuff on the right of the screen!?’ Which also means only 14% of people scroll down the page at all!!

I know Numbers are not exciting to read about – USUALLY….

So in a Google world that is constantly changing how can we keep up?  We can think like Google.

Key Message to ALL Business Owners with Websites:

Google ‘Ranks Pages not Websites’
Google likes long term, well developed, planned and thought out sites, the more pages the better!  So register your domains for 5 years, you could even consider aged domains that are no longer in use. . . they already have the authority that you need, a quick way to get some Google Love.

Bill Glazer, formerly of Glazer Kennedy

Learn to LOVE Linking…
Who are you linking to? And who is linking to you? Almost sounds like dating!  The key to using this powerful strategy is to use trusted authority sites to link to your pages, (eg. ‘.org’ / educational establishments if you can). But only use relevant links which should go straight to relevant articles on your pages, or you risk the Google Slap for Link Spamming! It’s not just other peoples pages you can link to: use quality links from your sub pages to your main pages. . . Google loves that! Check your pages are well indexed with lots of inbound links to Pull as much traffic as you can into your website.

You probably know the key words your customers are searching for and use them on your home page, but remember to use them on the pages behind or sub pages, which are also good. Make sure they link to articles and videos etc are also key word search terms and that you use both naked links (where you can see the name of the link) and anchor texts which means you hide the links behind your word or phase text.

70% of links should be ‘anchor’ text and 30% should be naked links. . . is a good balance!

Remember to name your relevant images and videos the same name as your key word searches. . . and of course update content daily, write blogs for others and have them point to your site.

In between Learning and Networking in the Bar….Sue and I bumped into one of Paul’s coaching clients – Daniel Wagner & James Watson, of Wagner Watson Fame.  They were raving about the Marketing Session from the Legend that is Bill Glazer, formerly of Glazer Kennedy.

We took loads of notes from this section as well although Paul has been to several of his 4 day Super Conferences so many of the key points we already teach at Wealth Club Workshops.

We still have loads of note still to write up so who knows there may be an update 3 in the next issue….wouldn’t you just LOVE that!

Angela

As is normal with this kind of show, the program started by showing us what the business looked like before the entrance of it’s potential savior – Alex Polizzi of the Hilton family dynasty. As the camera panned around room after room of acres of beige geriatric furniture crammed into the uninspiring dingy shop – I was amazed that this family, these Business Owners, hadn’t seen for themselves years ago that their product was old fashioned and frankly had become irrelevant in todays market place!!

But I had to stop myself.

This kind of stagnation doesn’t happen overnight. So often when Paul first starts Coaching a Business Owner or a Guest visits one of our Clubs – they are so busy doing what they have always done, it doesn’t even occur to them to lift their heads up from the grind-stone long enough to even ask the question “is what we do still working?….Is it still what the market wants?”.

Of course this was a Classic case of Business Owners who had just fallen into the habit of working 100% “IN” the Business and had not worked “On” if for Years!

So back to the Kettleys Team. As seems to be the norm for The Fixer series – communication was again a major contributing factor to the disfunction of this Business, but this week it went a little deeper. There were four partners in the Business – and fundamentally, three were keen and excited to evolve the Business whilst one wanted to keep things just the same as they had always been (even down to hanging onto the most bizarre range of china and stuffed ornaments ever to have been assembled under one roof!).

When Paul or one of the Mentors of The Business Wealth Club starts Coaching a new Business 1-2-1, they will always begin the relationship with a Strategy Session.

If there is more than one Partner in the Business – the first step is always to make sure that all the decision makers have an aligned Vision for the future of the Business before you can ever get stuck into the tactical strategies for driving growth.

Once you get the whole Team pulling in the same direction….  your half way to achieving your Goals! Or as Jim Collins in Good to Great Says, “get the right people on the bus, in the right seats, traveling in the right direction!”

Alex achieved the same kind of Vision Alignment for the Kettleys Team – although she did have to employ a bit more of an “intervention” style coaching (Good for TV Drama) in a Pub, followed by banning the backward looking Owner from the shop for 2 weeks and insisting that he trust his three Business Partners to pull off a make-over for the shop.

Think about how you would feel being told to stay away from your business and baby for 2 weeks while the team you have not trusted to make small decisions is empowered to change everything! Not easy I would suggest…

To his credit he stayed away for the 5 days and when he came back – he loved the new look shop – and so did I.

By updating the decor and the making the show room more visually appealing, they managed to attract a completely new  market sector – in this case, a younger audience with disposable cash (Key component of business success – your market must have cash and a need for what you offer) – without actually having to change or update their large stock holding.

How great is that! Admittedly Alex had made them dump all the old tacky nicks and nacks that had just been cluttering up the shop for years and years – what a relief.

She also had them Update their Logo and Branding as marketing moves on and you have to look like your business is relevant to todays world. She also revamped their “Negative” poorly photographed adverts and marketing messages so they would appeal to the new market they wanted to attack.

What marketing do you need to revamp or update? Logo? Website? Brochure? Again it’s one of those areas that does not get old over night but creeps up on your over the years. This is why our Club Mentors run regular Marketing training teaching our members the very latest in online and off-line marketing techniques so we ensure they never look out of touch as we know how much money this can cost a business.

The other great lesson for me in this episode was how Alex got the business focused on selling Bigger bundles of furniture rather than just thinking of selling single chairs. She also got them thinking a lot about what else they could Up Sell to customers already in buying mode.

What else can you sell your customers? This is a Key Business Question for Success as it’s easier to sell more to existing customers in buying mode than to keep finding more new ones.

Look forward to the next installment…

Sue Avins

Yes the Godfather of the Business & the UK Personal Development Industry, and long time Mentor of mine has agreed to do this one off 100% Pure Content Webinar as a thank you for me featuring him in my latest book – Secrets of the Wealth Accelerators.

Click here Now to Grab Your seat as places are very limited.

Peter NEVER Speaks at Multi Speaker events any more and rarely does any event out side his own seminars and high priced coaching groups so this is a Huge Bonus.

Why does he rarely do this type of webinar..?Well now he’s a MASTER at getting huge leverage from all the hundreds of information products he’s created over the years he likes to make money and still have time to play.

And isn’t that what we all want for our business lives…?

This Complimentary training will be happening on Wednesday the 22nd at 8pm and Peter will be delivering a highly entertaining and interactive session with me to teach you all his best strategies for Boosting Your Sales and Profits using informational products.

This Webinar WILL fill up fast so grab your place now by clicking here

See you on the call…

From colourful coffee themed e-mails from Accountants, to Heart shaped choc’s from Barry at Camp Energy when I dropped JJ off this morning.  It demonstrates that Marketing and creating a Fun and Engaging Customer experience is possible whatever the economy is doing.

So here are my top 5 Tips to Show Your Customers you care this Valentines Day…

1. Pick up the phone and tell them how much you appreciate their business.

2. Send them a Fun themed thank you gift or card.

3. Send them a Special “Love” Offer valid for 1 day only (See Shell Petrol deal)

4. Pass them a lead for their business

5. Give them a testimonial or recommendation on LinkedIn.

(And if you missed your chance today their’s always Thanks Giving later in the Year!)

If you come across great examples of Lovely Marketing today let us know!

Before her death I would never have said that I was a big fan – but with the radio playing her hits practically back to back, I have realised that nearly every one of her songs reminds me of a certain time or occasion in my life – so maybe I am an admirer after all.

Whitney Houston

When I think back about the news that has been written about Whitney over the last few years, it always seems to be the centered around the turmoil around her private life and personal choices.  But I have been doing some searching before writing this piece, and the constant theme of all the reports from people who really knew her was propensity towards hard work.  So – as the Founder, Chairman and Star of Whitney Houston Inc.  how did she do?

She worked hard for the fame and success she achieved, treating her career path very much like the growth of any rising business with a Business Plan, Goals and Budgets. And once she had it, she worked hard at keeping it. She was constantly evolving and updating her product (herself!) to keep up with the very fical music market… now does that sound familiar to any Business Owners out there?!?

In my opinion, the pinnacle of her success was her performance in The Bodyguard with Kevin Costner. That film was so much “her”.  She owned the screen and she controlled the music – as a customer of her musical and film products, she paid so much into my emotional Bank Account with that movie – I was more than willing to overlook her later so called indiscretions.  Wow, think about that, how much in the black are you with your clients that they would forgive even a minor slip down the road…. something to think about.

The other thing that so many friends and colleagues of hers are talking about is how well she always treated and supported the people who worked with her and for her.  She was never a diva who would stay at a five star hotel and put her team in a flea pit.  They would always know that Whitney would take care of them, she always paid on time – she shared the fruits of her success and she changed a lot of lives.

Do you know what – I would be perfectly happy with my time on this planet if at the end of it I could say that I shared my success and that I changed a lot of lives.  What a legacy.

So thank you Whitney – I enjoyed your music while you were alive, and now you have passed on, I unexpectedly find I am inspired by you.

Sue Avins

One of the Oxford Business Wealth Club Members brilliant use of the Valentines Day message…..

Acacia Accounting Limited's Valentines Day Advert

The second episode had the ever practical Alex Polizzi, Hotel Guru and now TV Business Coach, working with a family run Bakery shop in the foodie mecca of Padstow called The Chough……yes really.

A couple of big issues were crippling the Chough. The first of which this family had in common with last weeks Wedding Dress Business owners… they needed a clear differentiation of job roles and responsibilities. We chatted a little about this last time – so lets look at their second problem, The Chough faced crippling – seasonal down times, a challenge Paul and our Club Mentors often come across as we work with clients and members.

On the surface, it’s very easy to see why a Business like the Chough would be effected so badly by seasonality, but in reality they were suffering from the same blinkers as many Business Owners out there, “buying into” the limiting belief about what’s possible in their industry, town or market.

They relied so heavily on the tourism that Padstow generates, I think they had just gotten lazy. Basically, if people didn’t walk through their door – they didn’t make a sale.  Although the Family were all to aware of the problem – they didn’t seem to have put any thought into how it could be solved – in Business Coaching terms we often refer to this as the business owners being in Denial about what the real problem is.

Interestingly, Paul has Mentored lots of Business Owners over the years with this same issue, although it hasn’t always been “seasonal” downtimes necessarily.  Maybe it was slow times in a day meaning that expensive staff members were standing around one minute and run off their feet another, or I remember one client who’s shop was quiet for 3 weeks of every month and crazy when people got paid in the last week.

No matter how the problem presented itself, the solution was always the same – Great Business Coaching Questions like:

“What else can you sell to a new market?”

“Where do you find them?”

“When else are they buying your product or service?”

This was very much what Alex coached The Chough team through as well.  She steered them towards a new market… wholesale to Hotels and Venues.  But these new customers might need a modified product – no problem, just be flexible enough to look at your current offering  and see how you can tweak it to fit their needs. In the example of The Chough – it was coming up with a frozen product that solved a real issue for the new markets they wanted to move into.

Another great Coaching Question is:

“If the customers aren’t coming to me at certain times of the day, month, year…..  where are they going?”

“How can I go to them, or get back in front of them with a different offer?”

“Who could I Joint Venture with who IS selling to them while I’m not?”

So for our Bakery friends – rather than waiting for the Summer tourists to re-appear, they went mobile and sought out their customers at Christmas Fayres and year round Markets.  If Mohamed won’t come to the Bakery…..

It was a great turnaround – and from the little glimpse we had into their lives, The Chough looked set to go from strength to strength.

Signing off from our Happy and Harmonious Family Business (well at least we would be if Paul would just make a coffee now and again…)  sorry, where was I – oh yes, goodbye from our Harmonious Family Business!

Sue Avins

The Avins Family at Disney Florida Summer 2011

It’s Theme parks helped drive the increase, with the results boosted by higher ticket prices (Yes even in a recession!) and the opening of Toy Story Land at Hong Kong Disneyland in November last year.

Well we didn’t have to be asked twice! We booked the flights that day and started planning….

What an amazing trip… I think we laughed our way round Austin, ate some amazing food, (still not sure what some of it was!) and Networked with over 550 amazing Internet Marketers, Entrepreneurs and Business Owners from all over the world.

During the intense 3 day workshop with two of the best Digital Marketers alive today, Ryan Diess & Perry Marshall.

We had our brains filled every minute of every day teaching us innovative ways to Partner with  Amazon, Google+, ITunes and You Tube. Add to our Brand credibility and get to the top of Google… including how to get Amazon to pay for your Pay Per Click
ads on Google… that was a mind altering session!

In Part 1 of my Road Tip Report I want to tell you about some of the Key Trends to look out for and to be aware of in 2012…

1).  Competition is out there and margins are shrinking, with traffic getting more expensive and harder to get, because major brands have started consolidating, so expect niches consolidating next.  It is predicted that by the end of 2013 every niche will be dominated by 2 or 3 Brands – Will you be one of them?  Get Big or you may get taken over!

2).  It’s time to work smarter not harder! Using Amazon more is just one example.  In 2010 they had 33% of ecommerce, in 2011 it rose to 41% and now is projected to be responsible for 50% of all internet commerce.  So why are you using your own shopping cart?  At the very least all your products should definitely be sold through Amazon, it’s trusted and it is always among the top search results on Google.

3).  The reality is Shoppers online prefer buying on retail sites that provide video; and it can be proved that video messages generate a much higher click through rate.

In a 2010 Cisco report 30% of internet traffic used video… that’s quite a lot but by 2012 it is predicted that figure will rise to 90%!  In a different session we learned that consumers who watch product videos are 85% more likely to buy your product!  That is HUGE!

Couple that with it being paid for through a trusted supplier such as Amazon and you are on to a winner… I am not a geek, but I am getting excited about the possibilities !!

As we took over 63 pages of notes between us we are still working through them and these are just a few of the key messages so far.  More to follow in the next Newsletter and Blog!

This was exciting for us on many levels as it means we are set to have 10 clubs live by the end of April, further expanding the reach and size of our Business growth community. Not only that but this was important as it was the first training for our first US Club, launching in Scottsdale in March, with an amazing new Mentor Doug Hecker.

“I’ve been part of some of the best Business Masterminds in the US in the last 18 months” said Doug “and I have to tell you this training was World Class! I had no idea just how well put together this business is or what a good trainer Paul is”.  In fairness to Doug he had only ever spent time with Paul in bars at seminars in the US which was where they met and he connected with the Vision.

Here’s the full list of New Mentors and their Clubs so you can arrange to visit them on your travels and build your network even faster.

Marcellus Lindsay – Central Birmingham.
Launching April 2012
Helena Holrick – Croydon.
Launching April 2012
Doug Hecker – Scottsdale Arizona.
Launching March 2012
Nikki Burns – Buckinghamshire
Launching  April/May 2012

If you want to find out about the benefits to being a part time Club Mentor we’ve recorded some new videos explaining what it’s all about and answering some of the top questions we get asked.

Click Here now to Watch the Videos