Business Madness in March

Keeping in tradition with alerting SmallBusinessNewz readers of upcoming events, I’d like to mention a webinar series coming up from InfusionSoft called March Madness. I spoke a little about it and other business topics with Tyler Garns, the company’s Director of Marketing. The following is our little Q&A.

Chris Crum: I’ve talked a little before on SmallBusinessNewz.com about incorporating holidays/events into marketing efforts. You’ve kind of done this with March Madness. How do you think doing this benefits your marketing of the event?

Tyler Garns: Getting attention is really difficult these days. People are bombarded with thousands of marketing messages every hour. So, the easiest way to get their attention is to mention something they’re already thinking about.  This, combined with the fact that March Madness is a catchy name anyway, is getting us a ton of attention and people are registering by the thousands. My biggest concern now is that the lines will fill up and we won’t be able to accommodate everyone. So, be sure to join the webinars early.

Chris Crum: I see one topic the webinars will cover is becoming a social media expert. Will they display specific examples of what businesses are doing in this area?

Tyler Garns: Yes. We’re going to talk mostly about blogging and Twitter and how to use them to drive targeted traffic to your website. We’ll show some examples of how we’ve used both of those methods very successfully and how other small businesses are leveraging social media.

Chris Crum: How important is it for a small business to be on the web?

Tyler Garns: My feeling is that if you’re not on the web, you don’t exist. I know that sounds harsh, but think about it. People rarely use phone books anymore. People throw out their junk mail. And telemarketing is the most annoying thing around. The consumer is now in control and he goes looking for what he wants on the web. If you want to grow your business and have sustained growth, you must have an active web presence. Putting up a static, brochure-like site that doesn’t get updated for months does not constitute "being on the web."

Chris Crum: How important is it for a business to have a blog?

Tyler Garns: Having a blog is important for two reasons. The first is that blogs are content and linking machines and search engines love content and links. If you’re continually producing content on your blog, you’ll get more search engine traffic. The second reason is because the Internet initially made business very impersonal. People crave personal connections and they find those connections with blogs.  If I can get to know a person or a business through a blog, I’m much more likely to do business with them.

Chris Crum: If a business owner is just starting out on the web and only has time for one of the webinars, which one should they attend?

Tyler Garns: That sounds like a trick question to me.  They’re all equally important. I would tell those people to get on the first one. They’ll walk away with a few easy-to-implement tactics to get traffic to their website. Once they see immediate results and value, they’ll realize why they need to be on the other webinars as well.

Fair enough. I’d like to thank Tyler for taking the time to answer my questions. The March Madness Webinar Series takes place on Tuesdays starting March 10th at 1pm Pacific Time. More information including topics to be discussed can be found here.