Influential Marketing Blog

How Pita Chips Can Change Your Marketing In 2011

This post is republished from my original article on the Amex Open Forum website. It is part of "Small Business Friday" on this blog, where I share ideas and marketing techniques specifically to help small businesses stand out. To read more articles like this, visit the "Small Business Friday" category on this blog.

Stacy's Pita Chips had an unlikely beginning as a business. Starting out as a street vendor in a sandwich cart in Boston, Stacy had a predictable problem. If you sell food on the street and winter in Boston comes around, how do you keep people lined up waiting for their sandwiches instead of skipping the line for a faster option? You can't really serve the food any faster once you get to a certain point of efficiency, so you have to think of something else. Stacy decided to hand out pita chips to her customers as they waited in line to keep them fed and more importantly, to keep them waiting.

It wasn't long before the customer feedback prompted Stacy to just focus on making the pita chips and close the sandwich cart, and most of you reading probably know how that story turned out ... with Stacy eventually selling her business to Frito-Lay. So what is the lesson in Stacy's story for any small business, aside from the fact that pita chips can be a surprisingly great business choice? Sometimes your biggest opportunities can come from the smallest things.

The real question you need to ask is whether you are doing enough of the small things to keep your customers engaged and happy, and which of those things you might be able to better leverage for your business. The most common form of this is the free gift with purchase. This is a time honored marketing tactic and the classic example of this is the toy that comes with the Happy Meal.

I recently purchased a printer that had an extra ink cartridge inside as a bonus. It was not advertised on the box and was unexpected, yet finding it somehow made me feel much better about the purchase I had just made. Free gifts are like that - whether expected or unexpected, they offer an emotional surprise that can increase the positive feeling someone has as part of their purchase cycle with your business.

Why is that positive feeling so important? Because once you have made a sale your challenge is not only to make sure that the customer you sold to comes back again and again, but also that they share the experience with others. It is not the sandwich, but the pita chips that Stacy’s first customers talked about. After any kid goes to get a haircut, it is the lollipop that they wait for. Without the lollipop, no parents would bring their kids to get haircuts in your salon.

When it comes to changing your business in the new year, it might be the smallest things you do every day that have the biggest impact – so pay attention to them like Stacy did, and never minimize their impact. You never know where they may lead you.

Marketing Secrets From The World’s Smallest Jewelry Store

This post is republished from my original article on the Amex Open Forum website. It is part of "Small Business Friday" on this blog, where I share ideas and marketing techniques specifically to help small businesses stand out. To read more articles like this, visit the "Small Business Friday" category on this blog.

If you have ever driven during rush hour in the Philadelphia area, you might have noticed a rather curious billboard. This billboard is in attention-avoiding black with no images or color. Instead in a slightly weird font is the URL to a single website: I Hate Steven Singer dot com. While driving by the billboard, you may also hear the same Mr. Singer on the radio - talking about the many reasons to hate him. Getting home, and logging onto the Internet, if you happen to visit the website you would find what may be the most irreverent jewelry store homepage ever created. On the right hand side is the simple question "Is she pushing for the ring?" Underneath, Steven Singer offer his "guide to buying you some more time."

Most jewelry stores are all about pushing the engagement ring. Steven Singer has a page full of bracelets, earrings and necklaces you can get for your girlfriend to buy yourself more time without having to buy a ring. Clearly this is not your average jewelry buying experience. Looking at the history of this store - you would learn that in 1980 at the age of 22 a guy named Steven Singer opened what was once the smallest jewelry store (8 ft long by 8 ft deep) in heart of Philadelphia Jewerly Row, the country's oldest (and second largest) jewelry district. How did Steven Singer take his jewelry shop from its humble beginnings to being an award winning destination? Here are a few lessons:

1. Use a permanent campaign. Part of the reason that Steven Singer's marketing works is because people who live in the Philly area have been seeing it for years. His presence is more than just a fleeting campaign - he is part of the community and people consistently know and recognize him through his marketing.
2. Fuel natural human curiosity. If you saw that billboard, you would wonder why people hate Steven Singer. Posing a challenge in that way causes people to want to learn more and visit the website as I did. On the site, he tells a story about how the company started, offers valuable information about diamonds and content that you would easily tell a friend about if they happen to be in the Philadelphia area and seeking jewelry or diamonds.
3. Own your region. The store advertising is a local retail store. Too often small businesses try to grow outside of a core area of business. Steven Singer's model seems to be to work very hard at owning his local market, and then letting word of mouth cary his business online or beyond.
4. Focus on a different audience than your competitors. Much of the jewelry advertising that you see is focused on women who tend to be either the influencers or direct purchasers. Everything about Steven Singer's brand, on the other hand, seems to be more male focused. The tutorials on the site are filmed from a guy's point of view and the content is written for males much more than females. The underlying message for guys seems to be: "we understand you."
5. Have a personality to lead your efforts. Steven Singer is a real guy and his presence offers a strong personality for the brand to build all their promotions around. In a business that is dominated by families and generations, this store was a first generation effort that grew in part because of the involvement of the founder in the local community and willingness to create a conversation through advertising on his name.
6. Create a signature event. Every year, Steven Singer jewelers creates the World's Largest Bubble Bath. Though obviously a media stunt in somewhat poor taste targeted at single guys, it underscores the understanding that the brand has of their audience and offers something memorable that brings new and old consumers back to the store annually and reminds them of the tradition that they may already (or soon could be) part of.

5 Crowdsourced Consumer Trends To Watch In 2011

Almost anyone you meet in marketing will usually be a fan of getting their data and insights about major trends in consumer behaviour from research reports. After all, we generally pay a lot of money for them, and (ironically) many of the most authoritative are BRANDED either by a research organization, or by an authoritative institution such as a renowned business school. To some degree, this is valuable and much needed ... since anyone can publish the results of any unscientific poll or survey done hastily on Twitter and more weight to the "data" produced than they should. Yet you don't need an MBA in analytics to have a voice in spotting hot trends.

For those of you who actively read and digest information about the world around you - Trendhunter.com has a home for your thoughts. Whether you happen to write your own blog or prefer to remain a participant instead of a creator, the site has built a platform for what they call "Crowdsourced Consumer Insight." Last week they released a sneak peek at their 2011 Trend Report which takes individual examples of interesting trends and applies a filter to identify some top level trends that they may point towards. 

The team at TrendHunter was kind enough to share an exclusive link to a sample of the report with the TOP 20 TRENDS and lots of great insights for FREE and you can get the 35 page report right here.

As I read it this weekend, there were a few trends in particular that caught my eye and will definitely be useful for me in the coming months as I help several of our clients with building and executing their own marketing strategies for 2011. Here are a few standouts:

1. Charitable Deviance. As I read this report about how charitable organizations are using more attention grabbing methods to capture attention, I thought of the recent Digital Death campaign that I profiled on this blog. Getting people to pay attention to world changing ideas is (and has always been) a marketing challenge. Finding a solution to these challenges through creativity is something every marketer should find some time in the new year to participate in ... even if it lands outside of your day job.
2. Brand Reversion. I have a live example of this in my own home, as my six year old son has become a huge fan of He-man - an animated series that was popular when I was a kid in the late 80s. This larger trend is about the return of the old, in many categories from fashion to art. Nostalgia will always be a part of us, but as social tools allow us to reconnect with our pasts in ways such as rediscovering lost grade school friends and purchasing those toys we used to play with on eBay - this trend will only continue to rise. Super Mario Brothers anyone?
3. Next Besting. One of the more brilliant terms to come out of TrendHunter back in 2008 was this term which described the consumer behaviour of finding slightly cheaper, but still good alternatives. Being number 1, in this world, can be a big liability because consumers may be more willing to trade down for your next best competitor. I agree with the report's assessment that this trend is on the rise again and will likely show no signs of slowing down in 2011.
4. Democratic Selling. A term that they assign to the process of consumers voting for products to get made - I think this trend speaks to something that is even larger, beyond selling to donations, or content creation, or even advertising. Consumer creation or co-creation as it is often called is extending into unexpected areas and I think we will continue to be surprised each time it creeps into a new area of the world we didn't expect.
5. Discreet Consumerism. I have a theory about this particular one in the sample report, and why it is placed last. If you happen to work in marketing, you will probably have the same reaction I had right after you read this trend ... that you need to get the rest of the report. Discreet Consumerism speaks to the idea that there may be a backlash growing against brands and our overly branded world. This is something I have been thinking about for some time as well, and the reason for this rebellion comes down to distrust. The challenge for marketing is how to regain that trust without relying to gimmicks or luck to do it.

To download the full 35 page PDF sample report, use this exclusive link for Influential Marketing Blog Readers. Also, stay tuned as the rest of this week I will be exploring a few other interesting trends not included on that report which I think will be worth watching in 2011.

5 Great Questions To Ask Anyone Selling You Anything

This post is republished from my original article on the Amex Open Forum website. It is part of "Small Business Friday" on this blog, where I share ideas and marketing techniques specifically to help small businesses stand out. To read more articles like this, visit the "Small Business Friday" category on this blog.

How easy are you to fool? Most of us tend to consider ourselves savvy professionals. After all, if you have your own business you clearly have some level of aptitude when it comes to the business world around you. Yet there are still situations where we may end up taken in, tricked, misled, or just plain romanced. The problem is, all around in the world there will always be some new technology or feature that could help change your business.

If you are smart, you at least take the time to listen to new ideas ... but the downside of that openness is that you might unintentionally open yourself up to being the victim of a scam of some sort. Not every scam stinks the first moment you see it, because not every one is malicious in nature. But your time and money are valuable and you need to be able to protect yourself from those who might waste one or both - whether they realize they are about to do it or not.

Here are 5 questions you should ask anyone who might be selling you something to test whether they will be a good partner to work with or if they might just be full of hot air:

1. How will you measure if our partnership is successful? Most people will be ready to answer a question of how to measure success for you and your business - or at least they should. The more challenging question is about what makes entering a relationship with your business successful for THEM. The answer they give you to that question will tell you a lot about how they see the relationship they are about to enter with you.
2. What else will I need to budget for next year? Many technology buyers are familiar with a concept commonly abbreviated as TCO - or the Total Cost Of Ownership. This simply refers to your overall cost of buying something over a span of time. Asking the question about budgeting for the next year, though, can get a sales person to open up about ongoing costs in a way that asking about ongoing costs might not - because they can see dollar signs for future money. And the upside is that you will get real info on what your total cost of ownership will be.
3. Who else will I be working with (or what other products will I need to buy)? One of the oldest tricks in selling services professions is bringing the "A-team" to a first meeting with you and getting you to fall in love with the stars on the team (who you may not necessarily work with). To make sure you are not getting romanced by one superstar, insist on meeting more of the team members and individuals who will actually work on your business. If you are buying a product, make sure you see the other products in the range that you may need or want to purchase at some point in the future.
4. Where will I be in your range of customers? It is a fair question to ask to find out how important your business is likely to be to a new company that you will be working with. This does not, however, mean that you always need to find a company as a partner where you will be a big part of their customer list ... it will just give you a sense of what you might expect and also help you to ensure that you are not paying a premium for service when you know you are just a small part of the overall portfolio of customers for someone you decide to purchase from.
5. What do I need to do to get a better deal in the future? Once you understand the costs that are involved in whatever you are purchasing, you should also get an answer for the future on how you might be able to negotiate a better deal. This will be valuable to know because if your business increases and you end up purchasing more, you need to know the thresholds to get more prefential pricing or how else you can improve your contract moving forwards.

Asking these questions will help you not only to make sure you are getting the best possible deal, but also to see your way through any unscrupulous marketing or exaggeration that you may encounter. If you have other tips that have worked for you in the past, please share them in a comment on this post as well.

30 Second Book Review: Content Rules

Who has time to read books? We all should, but it's tough to know what is worth reading. Each week, this blog will spotlight a new book relevant for marketers or people in business with ideas worth learning and sharing. Through a combination of a personal interview with the Authors, and short review - you'll get the basic premise of the book and why you might want to read it. To recommend a book to be featured, send an email pitch to influentialmarketing@gmail.com.

This week's featured book is Content Rules - How To Create Killer Blogs, Podcasts, Videos, Ebooks, Webinars (and more) That Engage Customers And Ignite Your Business, a thorough and step by step guide to creating effective content online.

THE 30 SECOND REVIEW (Why You Should Read It):

There is a content revolution happening in business and it is based on the surprisingly rare insight that marketing generally works better when you have something to say. Just because you have a good story to tell, however, doesn't mean that you'll always have the right skills to tell it. Luckily, Content Rules is the book that can help you build those skills, even if your experience with social media to date mainly consists of trying to avoid getting overloaded by it. Unlike most other books written about social media or content, the authors of this one are actually good at it. From the quality of the writing to the strength of the ideas, this is a great book for anyone who wants (or needs) to create compelling content online and wants a useful guide book on how to do it. (Review written by Rohit Bhargava)

THE INTERVIEW (Thoughts from Ann Handley):

1. I've been waiting for some time to see a book from you (as I'm sure your other admirers have been) and was thrilled to see the topic and focus. Why did you finally decide to write the book now and what inspired you to begin the project?

Yes - you have been waiting! I remember you asked me, "So when's your book coming out?" just around the time that you published Personality Not Included.

In a larger sense, I wanted to write Content Rules to demystify this whole idea of businesses as so-called publishers. So many marketers know they have to producing content as a cornerstone of their marketing, but it's harder to know how. So the book gives actionable ideas of how we all can make the most of the tremendous, exciting opportunity we all have: To speak directly in very human, engaging terms with a broad number of people we want to do business with, with the goal of furthering our relationships with them and creating momentum for a business.

On a personal level, Content Rules is probably the only marketing book that I feel qualified to write, in part because content is one of the few topics I feel completely versed in. So many others -- including you! -- probably can run circles around me (metaphorically speaking) in dreaming up and executing the specifics of campaigns, and triggering response emails, and developing branding strategies and the like.

I know enough about those topics to know what’s smart thinking and what’s  not, but I also know enough to know what I don’t know.

Content, on the other hand, is something that’s near and dear to my heart. Developing great content that engages audiences and using social tools to build community is a kind of mission that excites me, and all of that passion and energy is what I’ve poured into this book.

2. The power of great content for marketing is a topic close to my heart. What is the big thing that you feel sets Content Rules apart from other books that might talk about this topic?

There are lots of books and resources out there that talk about the role content should play in your marketing mix, and how it should increasingly be a cornerstone of any inbound strategy. There's a lot of talk about the why, in other words, but I couldn't find many good resources that address the how: How do I create content consistently? What's "compelling" mean? Why doesn't my blog have any comments? It's hard work, right?

This book breaks it down, offering how-to, actionable advice. As you know, MarketingProfs is all about the actionable and the how-to, and I wanted people to have similarly clear takeaways on how to implement a content marketing strategy. In fact, I got a note from someone on Twitter the other day who said that the book inspired a content idea for him. He wasn't new to the idea of content -- in fact, he's a long-time podcaster -- and the fact that even he got something from it was pretty gratifying to me.

And finally, one last thing: This book isn't just another boring business book. Some business books really plod along, don't they? So not yours -- but SOME.

As a writer, I couldn't write a book that wasn't fun to read. So, I didn't.

3. Who is the ideal person to read this book - and what is one unexpected group of people who you hope might read it (but probably won't)?

The ideal person is someone who is looking to use content and social tools to grow any kind of organization -- a business, certainly. But also other kinds of entities: Writers who want to sell more books, bands that want to sell more music, churches that want to increase their congregations, as well as B2C companies and B2B companies (we devoted a whole chapter to the special needs of the B2B organization). In essence: Anyone who wants a sustaining, effective, energized and fun content strategy.

Does that sound like a pretty broad group? Yes. But it's intentionally so, because truly there's no one doing business online today who shouldn't be considering content.

4. As you launch and promote the book, what have you seen the most success from in terms of getting people to purchase the book?

Well, it's hard to say what's been MOST effective. I can tell you the combination of things that have been effective, though:

1. Being content creators ourselves. So: having a blog (contentrulesbook.com) as a home base, where C.C. and I have been creating all kinds of content around the writing of the book and the launch, as well as furthering the ideas we lay out in the book. This post I wrote on how painful it is to actually write a book gave us an early boost. http://www.contentrulesbook.com/2010/07/14-stages-of-writing-a-book/ Later, C.C. created a video asking people to define content: What is it? What does it mean? That video, "Content Is......"  http://www.contentrulesbook.com/2010/10/content-is/ -- which C.C. shot at BlogWorld -- helped raise visibility for the book, get people excited about it, and vest them in the project.
2. Connecting with people online and in-person. C.C. and I are both passionate about using social tools to connect with people -- I  mean, that was true before we had a book. I know I sound like a dork when I say that stoking those relationships has been key... and it even makes me cringe a little to hear me say it. (LOL) The reality is that our existing platforms have helped -- but it's not anything we planned or calculated; it's just the only way we know how to be. Of course, no online relationships ever take the place of in-person meetings, and we've done a number of speaking events this past fall to test out the concepts in the book and introduce the ideas. That's helped, too.
3. Finally, I think the reason why this book is doing so well (it's hovering in the top on both Marketing and Web Marketing on Amazon) is because we simply believe sincerely in creating great content, and we feel so lucky to have had an opportunity (thanks to Wiley) to share what we know. That's a pretty awesome thing.  And at the same time, humbling: We feel so grateful to everyone who supports us -- from the folks at Wiley, to our sources who were interviewed for the book, to our families, and to everyone out there who has read the book, saying -- in a small way -- that our content... well, rules!

LINKS AND MORE INFORMATION:

Official Book Website: http://www.contentrulesbook.com/

REVIEW PHILOSOPHY (Why This Review Matters):

All the books that are reviewed in this series are worth your time. That's why you won't find any negative book reviews on this blog. As an Author myself, I have hundreds of book on my shelf and have researched hundreds more. I get many invitations to preview books and choose just one every week to share here on this blog. Read my other book reviews at http://www.rohitbhargava.com/book-reviews/.

How To Talk Business At A Social Event Without Turning People Off

This post is republished from my original article on the Amex Open Forum website. It is part of "Small Business Friday" on this blog, where I share ideas and marketing techniques specifically to help small businesses stand out. To read more articles like this, visit the "Small Business Friday" category on this blog.

When it comes to networking, most of the advice that you see for small business owners is like Nike's great but relatively unhelpful slogan: Just Do It. Sure, networking is great - but how can you "just do it" most effectively? The challenge isn't how you can find more opportunities to network, but how to talk about business in an unobtrusive way. If you can learn to do this, you can turn any social situation into one that can benefit your business.

On the surface, this may seem like somewhat sneaky advice. After all, not every moment should be one in which you are looking to promote your business, should it? Yet when it comes to being a small business owner, you never really "clock out" because your business is a part of who you are. You should feel comfortable to talk about it in every situation, as long you can avoid becoming that blowhard at an event who won't stop trying to sell his or her company at every moment. How can you strike the right balance? Here are a few tips:        

1. Be a genuine conversationalist. The #1 most important thing to learn is how to be to have a great conversation. Here's a newsflash that might surprise you about this: it is NOT about what you say. Instead, you need to learn to listen intently and share personal stories while asking leading questions (questions that relate to the conversation and require more than just a yes or no response). If you can do these two things well, everyone you speak with will rate you as an amazing conversationalist and rate their conversations with you as among the best they had all night. 
2. Use a talkable nametag. One trick I use at almost every event I go to is that I have little chicken stickers that match the cover of my book and I put those on my nametag. It gives me a chance to add a bit of personality to my nametag but also to have a built in conversation piece. People want to know why I have that sticker there, and it gives me a chance not just to share the story of my book, but also to talk about my philosophy of business - which is that personality matters.
3. Create a non-boring inspiration story. The nice thing about having your own business is that you are likely close enough to it to know the story behind its founding. This story is how you should describe what you do and why you do it. If you can do this in personal terms and offer a non-boring way to tell it, you can essentially talk about what you do and why you do it in a way that is simply letting people get to know you, rather than seeming like a poorly executed sales stunt.
4. Spend time with "introducers." At every event there are people whose primarily skill is helping to connect individuals to others who share their interests or background. These are the people who always come to a moment in their conversations where they say something like "oh, you do _______? You should talk to _____." This moment can come from anyone in any conversation, and usually it is a result of having a great genuine conversation (see #1) and adding enough details about yourself that you can make it likely people will want to connect you with others.
5. Plan to follow up with important connections. When you are at an event, the amount of time you are actually able to spend with the ideal connections for your business will likely be minimal, but that is ok. Your mindset going into the event should be that you want to connect with the right people for your business with the noted promise of following up with them after the event is over. Then make sure to follow up.
6. Respect the event. Every event has a format, whether it has some kind of performance and then time to mingle, or a cocktail hour to start the evening before adjourning to tables for dinner. Be sure to respect the type of event you are at. If it is a networking event, clearly you can talk about your company and what you do right away. At a more personal event, you need to select who you are talking to and adapt how you talk about your company and what you do to the situation.

Why The "Digital Death" Campaign Failed Despite Celebrity Support

Last week on December 1st to support World AIDS Day, a small group of celebrities with millions of fans led by Alicia Keyes decided to sacrifice their digital lives to try and save real ones. The campaign, cleverly called "Digital Death" was supported by posters, online ads and a well branded microsite. The premise was simple: a group of celebrities forego using Twitter or Facebook until $1,000,000 in donations are raised for their cause. Anyone involved with the idea might have guessed that this would last for a day or two before the target was met. It has been five days and the donations still haven't even hit $300,000.

This idea isn't bad. The celebrity support is top notch. And the branding is really strong. So why did a campaign like this which has all the individual pieces it should need for success fall flat? Here are a few reasons:

1. Inherently egotistical idea. The premise of this entire campaign was built on what is a fairly egotistical idea: that fans care so much about the tweets of their favourite celebrities that they would be willing to donate money to a cause in order to get them back. For core fans - this premise likely holds true ... but there are likely many fans of the celebrities who just don't care THAT much.
2. Asking for too much. When I first saw this campaign last week, they had a minimum donation of $10. Immediately that struck me as a huge strategic mistake. Currently it has been reduced to $1, but this choice likely cost them many supporters who might have given a buck or two at the beginning of the campaign when the buzz was highest, but would never give $10. Even the American Red Cross raising money after the Haiti earthquake had a minimum of $5. The initial minimum of $10 was a big hurdle, and even though they corrected it - it likely was too late.
3. Unclear connection to cause. The campaign was understandable for what the celebrities were doing, but the connection between stopping the use (or overuse) of social media and helping keep kids fighting AIDS alive was a very thin one. The best campaigns are ones where the themes work together, and in this case they didn't.
4. Going against cultural trends. There is a big cultural trend today towards feeling overloaded. People are bombarded with marketing messages, tweets, updates, followers and friends. Most of us just want a bit more simplicity, so when a group of relatively prolific celebrity Twitter users decide to "go dark" - more than a few fans likely breathed a sigh of relief. For those folks, paying to bring back the noise would be like writing a check to someone to punch you in the nose. The money might go to a great cause, but I still like my nose too much for that.

How could this campaign have worked and still made a big impact? One core thing I would have changed is to use the power of all these celebrities Twitter accounts for something more than silence. What if they all chose to spend 24 or 48 hours ONLY tweeting about Keep A Child Alive? Or how about donating some of their own money for everyone who asks them to stop their digital death? 

This campaign had a chance to be something great - but now the only thing left for us to see is how the celebrities participating will come "back to life" online and quietly leave this behind them.

Update 12/6/10 4:06pm - Usher breaks his "digital death" pledge prematurely.

Update #2 12/6/10 9:02pm - Looks like the campaign miraculously went viral and raised over $700k in less than 24 hours so they are now at over $1 million raised. Either that or some of the celebs put up some cash to get their own digital lives back.

5 Ways To Accidentally Lose Your Customer’s Trust Online

This post is republished from my original article on the Amex Open Forum website. It is part of "Small Business Friday" on this blog, where I share ideas and marketing techniques specifically to help small businesses stand out. To read more articles like this, visit the "Small Business Friday" category on this blog.

I have often written and spoken about building trust and the importance of doing so for small businesses as a way of promoting your products and services. There are certainly best practices when it comes to building trust online that are worth following - but recently I had a conversation that reminded me of how easy it is to lose trust online as well. The problem is sometimes that you can do everything right, but it is one or two choices that you make online which undermine your efforts and cause everything that you do right to fall on deaf ears. It's akin to giving a great speech naked. No one remembers the speech - they only remember that you were naked while you gave it.

 

Assuming you haven't had the chance to give a speech naked (I haven't either, by the way), hopefully this situation will be unfamiliar to you. Online, however, we often are doing the equivalent without even realizing it. To help you avoid making those mistakes, here are 5 ways that businesses lose consumer trust all the time online. As you read them, think about how YOU can change what you are currently doing online to avoid losing trust inadvertently:

 

1. Asking for too much information or the wrong information. It is tempting when it comes to putting a form on your website to ask for all the information you could possibly need. The only problem with that is that the more you ask for, the more questions you raise in a potential customers mind about how you might be using their personal information. Instead, why not try to reduce what you ask for as much as possible? Or at the very least, to get the most important information as a priority, which might include email address and name.
2. Not listening to what consumers are asking for. If listening to your customers builds trust then it stands to reason that the opposite is likely true. Unfortunately there are many ways to not listen to your customers online. Allowing comments without responding to them is one way. Another is have a website that is difficult to navigate without paying attention to what people are actually doing on it. The solution to either of these problems is relatively simple ... engage your customers by responding to them and actively solicit their feedback on anything you are doing online and actually do something to act on that feedback.
3. Speaking just as a company and not as an individual. A general rule of thumb when it comes to being authentic online is that the more individual personality you can share with your customers, the more authentic you will be able to act as a result. Trying to maintain a corporate voice only is a common mistake because may small business owners believe that speaking like a faceless company will help them appear big and professional. The problem is that you are avoiding one of your biggest potential advantages ... creating a personal relationship with your customers. Instead of hiding your voice, learn to actively use it to give people a direct connection to your business. The end result will be more loyal customers and a deeper insight into your customers because you have a much stronger relationship with them.
4. Appearing too good to be true. Promising a miracle cure or something that seems like the perfect offer is a tempting thing to try and do to drive interest from consumers and traffic to your site. Doing so also undermines the credibility of your organization, though, because people have a much higher radar for detecting outsized claims that we sometimes think. The end result of trying to overpromise isn't consumer interest, it is skepticism.  It is better to stay more real with what you promise to do and be as transparent as you can about what you don't do. Nothing can build more credibility than being open about your shortcomings as well as being realistic about your strong points.
5. Using too many "cookie cutter" online elements. Let's face it, there are tons of ways to create a free website these days. From launching a blog to creating an entire corporate website, you can fairly easily take a template and put a website up in a matter of hours. Chances are, you don't have a website like this for your business ... but there are elements of this type of business that you still might be using. For example, if you are integrating Google keyword ads on your site to try and make some extra money, or using a recognizable template ... you might accidentally be sending the message to your customers that you don't care to invest real effort in having a professional site. As a general rule, if you are selling some kind of product or service, skip the online ads and try to make your site as customized as possible.