Category

Communications

Jun 24
Love0

Summer Fridays, Vacations, and Preserving your Sanity, Improving your Health

By Communications

I always ask clients if they’re planning on taking any time off this summer. I’m delighted when they tell me yes. I admonish them when they say they haven’t taken a vacation in years. I have seen the value of time off for every single person I’ve worked with. Getting away from the stress, the colleagues, the commute, the office, and the work itself just has to happen once in awhile. It’s good for you; and if you’re the boss who wants your people to work constantly — know that it’s good for your staff, as well.

Here’s where I really push the envelope. Not only do I think people should take vacations, I think for some people, working more than eight hours a day can be really damaging. A new article in Forbes says there’s evidence that working long hours may kill you. It’s not hard to believe, if you’ve known anyone or been the person who is at a desk all day, never finding time for exercise, eating right, managing stress, and having healthy relationships outside of work. Work less. Live more.

The last firm I worked for before starting my own introduced the concept of “Summer Fridays” to me. Every Friday from Memorial Day to Labor Day the office shut down at noon. It was glorious. It was hard, sometimes, to get organized enough to finish the necessary work to get out on time on  Friday, but the goal was certainly there. I’ve committed to the practice in my own firm and while I’m always connected (unless I’m truly on vacation) by phone, text, e-mail, etc. just in case, it’s important to me to have that weekday time to recover and refresh. (Anyone who thinks  weekends are for that either doesn’t have kids or doesn’t have friends. My weekends are often way more exhausting than the Monday-Friday week.)

So how about you? Will you be taking any time off this summer? 

Jun 23
Love0

How, and Why, to Use LinkedIn Projects

By Communications

There was much discussion at a client’s office last week about the use of projects on LinkedIn profiles. It started, because the client has clients of its own. For purposes of sales, lead generation, and peer-to-peer relationship building, they wanted to create a profile for a team member that made sure it was clear there was a relationship with the firm’s customer.

It’s not appropriate to create a profile that shows that customer as the team member’s employer — that’s just not true. Any time you include a client in Experience it’s going to look like you were an employee there — even if it’s simultaneous with your current work experience.

Enter “Projects” as the solution to this problem.

When you add Projects to your LinkedIn profile, they are listed underneath the employer that managed that work. You can list a client company name in the project, and even tag other project team members, but it doesn’t make it look like you had a desk, a parking spot, and a 401k there.

If you need guidance on how to add projects, just follow the instructions here.

Apr 01
Love0

A Rewarding Moment — Getting Mad Props on a Client’s Facebook Page

By Communications, Marketing, Social Media

We work with the team at The C’ville Market; we help them with branding, their social media presence, their marketing, and their public relations. We love getting to know them and helping share their stories with customers and with the community at large.

Today we had a gratifying moment because a customer commented on the Facebook page the following:

Dear C’ville Market. You are doing such an incredible job with your postings. I look forward almost every day to see if you have a sale, a recipe, info on your staff and insight into what’s happening around town. Just want to say Thank You! Your effort keeps me shopping there.

Facebook comment

 

That’s just the kind of reaction we were hoping for! If you’d like to see what The C’ville Market is doing online, you can follow their blog, http://cvillemarket.com/blog/ be a fan on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/cvillemarket  or watch what they do on Twitter https://twitter.com/cvillemarket

 

Mar 24
Love0

Six Things Every Business Owner Should Know about their Website

By Communications, Social Media

We’re way past the late nineties, when business owners were just beginning to realize they needed a website for their business, and yet, some know as much about how their website is doing as they did when they first launched their online information. That’s bad, and irresponsible. A hands-off approach to this critical calling card for your business is dangerous. At a minimum, every business leader should know the following about their company’s website:

  1. What is the typical traffic to the website? Do you get 10,000 visitors or 50? Is the traffic steady; are there predictable peaks and valleys?
  2. If you own multiple domains, do they all redirect to a single, main domain URL where you track your statistics?
  3. How high is your bounce rate? This statistic tells you whether visitors to your site are finding what they seek. If they don’t they “bounce” right off, moving on to another resource. (In general, lower is better. Bounce rates over 60% may indicate a problem with your content or the site display.)
  4. Does your website publish an RSS feed and is there an easy way for visitors to subscribe to updates?
  5. What is your website built in? (Many people have no idea. If the answer is “Dreamweaver” it’s time for a new website.)
  6. What is the most popular content on your website? A quick look at Google Analytics (you DO have Google Analytics for your website, don’t you?) can tell you the most visited pages/most compelling information your visitors want to know.

It’s easy to learn all of this, and someone in your organization or the vendor who helps manage your website should quickly and easily be able to catch you up to speed on all six items.