Are you scared of video for any or all of the following reasons?

Well guess what- you can now throw all of those reasons out the window.  Andy Jenkins shows you how any regular joe can become – A Video Boss.

For Free Tutorials on How to become a Video Boss Click Here

A rockin’ video review of Andy Jenkin’s The Video Boss

Here is a sample of what you will learn

How “Regular Folks” who are NOT professional Video-makers are CLEANING UP using simple video marketing strategies:

* How “James” created a short, 4 minute slide-show video as a gift to his dog, and how it went VIRAL and got over 4,000,000 (That’s Four Million) views.
* How “Robert” used camcorder Video of his wife exercising to ramp up to over 90,000 visitors per month to his YOGA site.
* How “Bill” made short, less than 2-minute long demonstration videos for his Artificial Christmas Trees site that are now 11 of his 12 most powerful converting web pages.
* The CURSE of Online Video Marketing – how to protect yourself and take advantage of what everyone else is afraid of.
* The absolutely fastest way I know how to make a killer sales letter video from SCRATCH, so you could be converting more visitors to sales in just a few hours.
* The most popular and powerful software you should use to make slick, professional looking online video. Some of these applications are so easy to use, you might not even need to read the manual.
* A silly, but hardly ever used trick to make the voice quality of your audio sound like it was recorded on an expensive, professional microphone.
* How to make “Flip-Cam” video look like “TV-Studio” video. This secret is a head-slapper.

I am not sure how long Andys going to have these videos available so get in while you can.

Go here to Become a Video Boss

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Being a media and marketing company I encounter bad websites on a daily basis. Granted there are different levels of bad, and in general your website will never be perfect as technology continues to evolve. Right now someone can point their Iphone at your business and get all the reviews that are posted on yelp and other review sites.

Businesses need to think seriously about hiring a web firm that is not just concerned with building a website for your company. In this day and age just having a website is not enough for most businesses to stay with or ahead of their competition. A good web company will not only build a website for you that will build sales and/ or leads but will also put together a marketing plan to effectively increase the exposure of your brand throughout the web.

I have put together a list of ten things you or your web company can do to increase the effectiveness of your website.

1. Add a blog.
Blogs are an excellent way to communicate with your customers. Believe it or not many business owners struggle with what to blog about. It is one of those things were it is right in front of your face and that is why you don’t see it. Blog about your business. If you sell intrinsic products like wine, blogging about your products should be easy. Gary Vaynerchuk has “Crushed it”  with his vlog  WineLibrary TV by tasting and informing the public about wine. You can also blog about how customers are using your products. Sell cameras or video equipment? ask customers to send you their creations so you can post and discuss them on your blog. Notice I used the word discuss, blogs with there commenting features can foster communities that revolve around your brand.

Their are also a lot of  marketing and search engine optimization benefits to having a blog.  I could go on and on about how much a blog can assist you in building your companies web presence. Their are entire blogs devoted to the art of successful blogging. One that I like is Problogger. Use it as a resource as you grow your companies blog. Last note about blogging is that you must be committed to update it on a consistent basis, having a dormant blog is no better than no blog at all. It can even be detrimental to the growth of your business if you let it sit without new content for too long. Whatever community you had built up will leave and look for other sources “maybe your competitors” to get the information they were seeking.

2. Add an “effective” lead capture element.
The contact form buried on the last page of your site is not an effective lead capture system. Put your website to work. It could turn out to be your best salesman. The best way to capture leads from your website is to offer something of value to your visitors in exchange for as little information as possible,  getting a name and email  is usually all you need. The more information you ask for the less likely that you are going to convert leads. It is important that what you offer is something valuable to your visitors. If you are a fitness trainer offering them a free session would be an excellent offer, not only does it get you a lead, it gets you in front of your prospect to convince them of the value of your service. Brainstorm on your value proposition and place this offer prominently on your website or on a landing page.

3. Connect your website to where your target demographic lives on the web. (Social Media).
Social media is here to stay and growing at astronomical rates. Let your visitors know that you are connected and participating in social media. Depending on your demographic certain social media sites may make more since than others for your business. Facebook ( 355 million people + and the complete range of demographics) and Twitter  should be used by every business. Once again this is a subject that I could spend a lot of time on. Bottom Line: Integrate your website with social media.

4. Got Analytics?
You need to know where you are to plan where your going. Google Analytics is free and is very comprehensive in its traffic reports. You can use this information to develop a strategy to increase traffic to your website. It will also allow you to track sales and conversions.

5. Video, Video, Video.
Video can accomplish so much for your business. Types of videos you can release : typical TV type commercial (not my favorite for the web) , how tos, demos, creative skits, educational, and the list goes on..
The secret to video on the web is to give value even if it is just the value of entertainment, if you can combine high entertainment value with high content value. You have what I call the peanut butter cup formula. Your video will be just like putting chocolate and peanut butter together =Awesome!

6. Improve the design.
Do an honest evaluation of your website’s design. Is it ugly? You have 10 seconds or less to capture your visitors attention, and the aesthetics of your website are a huge factor on getting visitors to stay longer. Ask those around you that you trust to give you an honest critique of the design of your site. Friends don’t let friends have ugly websites. Make sure that the look of your site is cohesive with the rest of your branding. Many times the best idea is to keep it simple with a nice two color design.
It is also important to make sure the site looks good in all the major browsers (Internet Explore, Firefox, Safari, and Chrome). Unfortunately browsers do not all play by the same rules. Things can look “out of place” on one browser and not another. Also unless you are a musician , Do not have music play automatically on your site, it can distract the visitor away from your core message. I generally feel the same about video that auto plays. One of the exceptions for video would be landing pages, a lot of times the visitor is told specifically that they are going there to view a video.

7. Dumb it down.
The copy on your site should be understandable to the majority of the general public. Unless you are selling only to those within your industry, do not use “industry terms”. Your copy should not focus on  technical specs or even features. Instead it should let the visitor know the benefits of and problems that your product or service will solve.  The user should not need an instruction book to use your website. For some sites it makes sense to  outline the steps you  want your visitors to take while on the website. Navigating your site should not feel like running through a maze.

8. Search Engine Optimize.
Need a better ranking on Google? Search engine optimizing your site is one thing that can give you a huge boost against your competition. This especially true in local markets. In a lot of areas it is a level playing field, most businesses competing in a local market have poorly search engine optimized sites. You should hire a search engine optimization specialist to research where your industry stands as far as the competitiveness for search engine ranking. You may be surprised that there may be a huge opportunity to leapfrog your competition. As the level you want to compete on (local, regional, national) goes up so does the competition. Some industries are easier to compete in than others as well. The cost of Search engine optimization also goes up based on those dynamics. Many search engine optimization specialist will do work on a mix of  results based commission and a flat fee. If you are interested Arcimedia does offer this service and would love to help you get your business a better search engine rank.

9. Sell
Believe it or not I have been to numerous websites that “forgot” to sell me anything or had their pitch buried deep in their website. If I am searching for a new front door, I am inclined to buy a new front door. I will buy from the first site that effectively sells me that front door.  Yes, I want to know more about your business but I came looking first and foremost for a door.  Once again, think benefits and problems solved when creating the copy for your website. Your pitch should be in the main content of your home page. By the way, remember the blog I talked about at the beginning, that is a excellent place to do more “brand building” and share more non-sales information about your business. You can also sell from a blog but that is not its main purpose. Also do not bury your contact information – It should be above the fold and preferably in the very top portion of your site. Also include testimonials on your home page and let other happy customers assist you in creating more happy customers. Note: This list is not in order of importance, if it was selling would be 1 and lead generation 2.

10. Treat your website like a tool and not a billboard!
Your website should encompass most or all of the following things:

1. Capturing Leads
2. Making sales
3. Building your brand
4. Growing – In both traffic and functionality.
5. Using analytics information to test different copy and design ideas and to seek out new traffic and expand on existing traffic.
6. Connecting with your customers -Using  a blog, social media, and if appropriate video.
7. Educating your customers on the benefits  of your product or service (remember to sell first)

For fun check out Web pages that suck.
Looking for inspiration? The following sites are sites that do most or all of the things I described above.

aaronbrothers.com – could expand even further with videos and a blog.
Winelibrary.com – as mentioned earlier Gary V is Crushin It!
beachfitnow.com – a client of Arcimedia who is in the early stages of developing her web presence but already has a great foundation set up.

So now I have given you a “road map” to make your website perform at an optimal level. If you need an experienced team that is dedicated to the success of your business on the web call us 843-200-5034 or visit our website Arcimedia or our blog Superhero Marketing. We are offering a Free website analysis that will let you know what we would do specifically with your site so that it can operate at it’s full potential.( I didn’t forget to sell) If you need a superstar social media consultant and someone to help you get connected with all the right people contact Mary Kurek .

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In episode 9 of The Super Show the Governator stops by to hear about the passion tree principle. Doug and Drew try some burnt cookie beer and discuss data backup and niche content.

Also available at Itunes

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In episode 9 of The Super Show Doug and Andrew try some brew from Sweetwater and discuss how to influence current customers in order to get new customers, unveil the social order of capitalism, and have a rockin time at their Windows 7 launch party.

Click the links below to play.
Also available at Itunes

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Sorry for chopping my head off in this video.
If  you are SERIOUS about creating an online business from your passion get this book.

Crush It!: Why NOW Is the Time to Cash In on Your Passion

http://crushitbook.com/crush-it-the-experience/

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I am going to start this post off with how I feel personally about the enforcement of the no recurring tweet rule from twitter. Last night I went to my Socialoomph account to write up a scheduled tweet. I was alarmed to see a lot of tweets surrounded in a light red box with this message :

This tweet was not published. This recurring tweet has been deactivated. Please see our blog post at http://www.socialoomphblog.com/recurring-tweets/ for more information.

My first reaction was WTF? Then I proceeded to Socialoomph’s blog and read all the comments left on the post. So many people were very upset, like their whole business just collapsed. Given the time of day that I read this (10:30pm) I decided to sleep on it before I posted my feelings to to the world. I am glad that I did. My post if done last night would have come from a selfish perspective. I was able to step back and look at the whole picture. Although I used the recurring tweet feature to make sure all of my followers were kept up to date with our latest blog posts at SuperHero Marketing and to post valuable marketing tips. There were far too many true spammers pushing porn, miracle drugs, and many other no-value products. For the record we have promoted a “product” ourselves recently in twitter. It is for someone selling those “talking models” that hover over your site and deliver a sales or information message. I still think they are really cool. That is the only “product” we have pushed directly with our twitter account and that was as a test.

If you look at this from the perspective of Twitter, they were in serious danger of being overrun by spammers. Too much spam and you lose the people the site was intended for. Plus, Twitter is still looking for a monetization strategy and has investors chomping at the bit for results. They had to do something and stopping recurring tweets certainly puts a damper on spammers. That being said this does put a hurt on true content creators to get there message out. Many of us have many followers around the world and in different time zones. It will be much harder for us to reach as many people as we would like to. One of the most heralded tweeters out @guykawasaki used recurring tweets. I will be interested in his reaction to this if he has one.

So what do I think happens next? Twitter will have less Spam (Yeah!) and the amount of people on twitter may drop. Most of those lost will be spammers but unfortunately many of them could be content creators who do not believe they have the resources (time or money) to get their message out effectively with Twitter without the help of automated recurring tweets.

Now let’s take yet another step back and not forget the world was still spinning before Twitter cut out recurring tweets. As business owners we need to adapt with technology. Twitter is just one of many tools at our disposal. The greatest tool we have is our minds, continue to use that to think of new and creative ways to grow your business. My message to twitter: You broke my heart a little but I still love you! Twitter can still be used effectively to build your brand. SuperHero Marketing’s Top Secret Twitter Traffic Guide is filled with  tips on how to use Twitter to grow your business!

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