IMG June 2015 Newsletter

NEWS ISSUE 08/ JUNE 2015

Setting the Standard

ALL ABOARD

AMERICA! FEATURE IMG COMPANY

New Rule for CMV drivers with Diabetes

Senator Urges FMCSA to Remove

‘Inaccurate’ CSA Scores from App DOT to Audit FMCSA High-Risk

Investigative Practices

6 Strategies Buyers Use

to Negotiate Price

SEN. DEB FISCHER URGES FMCSA TO REMOVE ‘INACCURATE’ CSA SCORES FROM APP, PROVIDE DISCLAIMERS/ DOT TO AUDIT FMCSA HIGH-RISK INVESTIGATIVE PRACTICES/

The Department of Transportation’s Office of Inspector General has....

7 THINGS YOU DON’T REALIZE YOU’RE DOING THAT DEMOTIVATE YOUR TEAM/

If you’re making any of these seven unconscious moves, you could be disappointing your...

THE ULTIMATE GUIDE TO PROSPECTING: HOW MANY TOUCHPOINTS, WHEN, AND WHAT TYPE/

It’s incredibly rare that a prospect responds to a salesperson’s first outreach...

In a letter to Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx, Sen. Deb Fischer expressed hope...

RULE WOULD EASE EXEMPTION REQUIREMENTS FOR CMV DRIVERS WITH CONTROLLED DIABETES/

A new proposed rule aims to reduce some of the red tape for commercial motor vehicle...

EMAIL IS STILL RELEVANT! ARE YOU GETTING THE MOST FROM YOUR EMAIL MARKETING?/

6 STRATEGIES BUYERS USE TO NEGOTIATE PRICE/ Some buyers are conditioned to try certain tactics to lower your price. Maybe they’ve read about...

8 WAYS TO IMPROVE SMALL BUSINESS WIFI SECURITY/

Is your small business Wi-Fi network as secure as it should be?

If you’re not sure quite sure,...

DETAILED ANALYSIS OF TURNOVER CAN HELP EMPLOYERS RETAIN TOP TALENT, CONSULTANTS SAY/

In an era of mobile this and social media that, it’s easy to think that email....

Employers need to rethink the way they look at turnover y considering not only how many employees....

FIELD SALES IS DEAD; LONG LIVE INSIDE SALES/

5 WAYS TO MAKE YOUR WEBSITE FRIENDLY TO SEARCH ENGINES/

Field sales has been dying for years. In fact, it’s been ailing for so long that no one noticed...

Most business owners want to improve their company’s website ranking in search engine results...

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President ’s Message As we head into summer, the focus for many is tours and taking intrepid travelers to the far corners of North America. Recently we celebrated Earth day and we are reminded how motorcoach transportation is not only one of the safest modes of transport but also: More passenger miles per gallon are travelled in motorcoaches than planes, trains even hybrid cars Is 7 times safer than driving your own car Reduces our carbon footprint With the continued sophistication of motorcoaches, the luxury and facilities they provide remind us why motorcoach touring, remains such a popular activity for not only locals but many internationals. Sit back relax, let someone else take care of the driving and travel arrangements and simply enjoy what both the United States and Canada has to offer – simply fantastic sightseeing and experiences.

IMG will be talking to many of the companies that put together these vacations, when at IPW in Orlando, one of North America’s major travel shows. Knowing that so many visitors will take motorcoaches to explore this country, has IMG carrier’s front and center as the transportation providers. We look forward to meeting current and new partners from all over the world – it

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always reminds us how small the world is and how travelling the world helps us to appreciate so much.

Over recent months, many of the IMG companies have continued to add new vehicles to their fleets.

These new vehicles are sleek and continue to evolve with features that help our customers and also to run vehicles more efficiently and safely. But we are reminded that well maintained vehicles, supported by pro-active maintenance teams, have a long life. We encourage our customers and partners to visit our IMG facilities and look at all vehicles – you will be very surprised at the quality, the look and the consistent performance some of our older vehicles provide.

Enjoy the summer, your travels and experiencing the great sights of North America with IMG.

Bronwyn Wilson President, IMG

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Don’t be fooled by its pretty face

Once again, Setra has raised the benchmark in the North American luxury motorcoach segment, with over 30 innovations in design, passenger and driver comfort, safety and environmental efficiencies. Daimler’s new, unique Front Collision Guard (FCG), for instance, is a passive safety system engineered to protect the driver and tour guide in the case of a frontal impact. Experience the all-new Setra TopClass S 417. From Daimler Buses North America, the worldwide leading manufacturer of buses and motorcoaches.

Motor Coach Industries 1700 East Golf Road, Suite 300 · Schaumburg, Illinois 60173 · Phone 866-624-2622 Distributor of EvoBus GmbH for Setra buses and Setra parts in the United States and Canada

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IMG Feature Company ALL ABOARD AMERICA The roots of ALL ABOARD AMERICA! are not in the fertile backdrop of a scenic wonderland or the fluid nature of a major metropolitan area. Instead they are found in the deserts of west Texas and southern New Mexico. These are the locations where travelers needed to go just a bit farther west in Texas and miners needed to make the daily trek to the potash mines in New Mexico. Back then, pot belly stoves in the bus kept miners warm but it also may have risked a week’s wages as they gathered around for a card game. Or in the wide open remoteness of the desert, a parts inventory consisted of key replacement parts strategically hidden at locations along the road only known by the driver. We still run many of our miles in the same places we did starting in 1936 but today our commuter passengers hardly flinch when a quick winter storm encroaches on their ride into Santa Fe and we certainly don’t have any A/C compressors carefully hidden in the desert for our drivers.

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Today In creating today’s transportation solutions, we are more apt to use our fleet of over 100 coaches, fully equipped with the newest features available, to make our guests comfortable despite the conditions outside or the length of the road ahead. Today, our guests are more likely to be board members gathered around flat screens in the coach for a laptop presentation of their company’s latest venture. The WiFi now keeping them in touch with their home office while travelling through the desert to their newly completed solar farm!

Today’s competitive battleground is in finding ways to exceed our customers’ expectations of Safety and therein build a high level of trust, confidence and a recognition of our ability to provide a consistently elevated level of customer service. Our family of 232

employees recognizes their roles and contributions in this process and work hard to do their part in creating a successful customer experience that brings our customers back time and again.

Family Business Jack Wigley is a third-generation family member at the helm of ALL ABOARD AMERICA! along with his brother Jayson. He is proceeded in the company by his father, Jack L. Wigley and his mother, Coradene.

Coradene’s father, Henry T. Page, founded Page Way Stage Lines and the Potash Mines Transportation companies in 1936. While Jack tells stories of starting out washing buses, we do know that his father started with the company driving to potash mines in 1957 and his mother ordered one of the first new buses for the company after the war, a GM TGH3102.

Today, we have locations throughout 3 states with offices in Santa Fe, Midland, El Paso and Phoenix.

Between locations, our diverse business segments include servicing: over the road tours, corporate groups, churches, schools, commuter routes, university intercampus shuttles, local and regional charters, scheduled casino routes, custom tours and military moves to name a few.

Management Keys Jack says “Our success is the result of assembling a very dedicated group of professionals, in all levels of the company, who have continued to build on the foundation of previous generations” “Our key managers are accountable to their departments and areas of responsibility. They also

serve on our Management Board weekly, to ensure effective communication between departments.”

“Having high quality decision makers in various positions of the company is an absolute necessity and making decisions is the key. A decision is better than no decision always, make 80% of them right and admit to and fix the 20% that may be wrong.”

Diversification Expanding our contract business over the years has always been a top priority as we diversify our company. Our contract renewal rate is extremely high, mainly due to the responsiveness of our team and their commitment to a high level of customer service. Our customer service feedback consistently receives 99% satisfaction. Our current standing with Federal Motor Carrier and Better Business Bureau reflect our overall dedication to our business. We do what we say we will do!

Values from the Past; Vision for the Future In the early years, the challenge may have been to just get from A to B. Today, it is the complete experience.

It now includes a balance of old-fashioned person to person contact on the one hand and technology on the other. It is a live person on the telephone and the genuine smile of the driver as they greet the group as well as social media, smart phones and collision avoidance systems.

ALL ABOARD AMERICA!’s emphasis on Customer Service, Safety and Maintenance paves the way for our customers to worry less about getting there and focus on the experiences along the way. www.greenazine.com

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IMG News Anderson Coach & Travel

Peoria Charter Coach

Grayline of Tennessee

Congratulations to Anderson’s Danielle Powell for being recognized as one of the top achievers under Forty in Mercer and Lawrence counties!

Recently purchased some brand new MCI J4500 – looking very sleek.

Expands their fleet with 10 new vehicles – Volvo’s and Prevost’s to serve the Nashville market and beyond.

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Starline Luxury Coaches

For the second year in a row, Starline owners Gladys Gillis and Becky Pritchett were recognized as the 17th largest woman owned business in Washington State by the Puget Sound Business Journal. Well done!

IMG at IPW Orlando

Come see the IMG team at IPW in Orlando, May 30-June 3 at booth 1043.

Arrow Stage Lines

Arrow Stage Lines accepted the delivery of an additional five new MCI J4500 adding to their fleet.

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DOT to Audit FMCSA

DOT to Audit FMCSA High-Risk Investigative Practices The Department of Transportation’s Office of Inspector General has announced it will audit the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s investigative practices for high-risk motor carriers.

The audit was prompted by Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL). He had called for such an investigation over a year ago after the Chicago Tribune reported that FMCSA had ordered but never initiated an investigation into the negative driver-related safety record of a Napier, Ill., carrier involved in a January, 2014, crash.

In that incident, DND driver Renato Velasquez crashed into parked cars on I-88, causing the death of Tollway worker Vincent Petrella and injuring State Trooper Douglas Balder.

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The agency had taken a brief enforcement action against the company, DND International, in early 2011, but ultimately did not force the carrier to resolve numerous safety deficiencies, reported the Tribune, based on records the newspaper obtained under the Freedom of Information Act. DND International’s recurring violations cited by the news report include instances of drivers falsifying duty logbooks and violating hours-of-service rules.

According to Durbin’s office, on April 9, 2014, the Senator had asked the DOT Inspector General to audit the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s investigative practices.

A S C M F

Then, in June, Durbin included a provision in the 2015 funding bill that directed the department’s IG to conduct that audit and to “recommend ways to ensure that the agency does not miss opportunities to take dangerous drivers or motor carriers off the road before accidents happen.”

In a May 5 memo to FMCSA Administrator Scott Darling, DOT Assistant Inspector General for Surface Transportation Audits Mitchell Behm advised that “our audit objective is to assess FMCSA’s processes for ensuring that reviews of motor carriers flagged

for investigation are timely and adequate.” He noted that the audit will begin immediately.

“The crash last year took the life of a Tollway worker who was stopped on the side of the road assisting a driver and his broken down truck,” said Sen. Durbin in a statement. “We owe it to his family and the State Police Trooper who was injured in the accident to fully review why this high-risk trucking company was allowed to remain on the road.

“More importantly,” he added, “I hope this Inspector General investigation will give FMCSA guidance on how to identify warning signs earlier in order to avoid a tragedy like this in the future.”

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Don’t Demotivate Your Team

7 Things You Don’t Rea Demotivate Your Team 14 www.greenazine.com

alize You’re Doing That www.greenazine.com

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If you’re making any of these seven unconscious moves, you could be disappointing your employees and inspiring them to look for another job.

1. You don’t give them enough face time.

“A lack of real-time, face-to-face communication among teams and with managers can leave employees feeling less connected,” says Dan Schoenbaum, CEO of Redbooth, an online collaboration platform.

In today’s mobile workplace, managers must make sure all employees — especially those who work remotely — are engaged. Employees should have frequent feedback and be made to feel as if their opinions are valued and struggles respected.

When managers don’t have regular conversations with employees, it can slow down projects and affect morale, says Adam Ochstein, founder and chief executive of StratEx, a Chicago human resources and software firm.

“If a manager reviews a completed assignment and either marks it entirely in red with errors or decides to take it in a completely new direction, morale can take a steep dive,” he says.

When an employee misses a goal, some managers address that the target was missed and reset the deadline. Unfortunately, many fail to ask what the problem or hold-up really was.

“Managers have to ask why. It’s the follow-up that helps dig up bigger issues,” Ochstein says.

2. You haven’t given them clearly defined roles.

“As a manager, I believe it’s important to build a collaborative atmosphere where individual team members feel comfortable contributing insight and picking up slack,” Schoenbaum says.

“However, not clearly defining team members’ individual roles and responsibilities can leave them feeling directionless and demotivated.”

While managers may want to be known as the “laid-back, democratic boss,” if tasks and goals are not in place, projects can flounder and ultimately

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fail, he cautions.

“Building a roadmap for organizing teamwork is essential, and that roadmap must include who is responsible for each checkpoint along the way,” he says.

Of course, clearly defining roles is one thing, but micromanaging is another, Schoenbaum stresses.

Leaders need to strike that balance for employees to feel like they have both direction and freedom.

3. You don’t really understand teamwork.

“I’ve had the occasion to work with leaders who talk a good show but unfortunately don’t follow

through in how they behave,” says Morag Barrett, founder of SkyeTeam, an international leadership development company and author of Cultivate: The Power of Winning Relationships. “There are Leaders who champion a company’s move to ‘teamwork and collaboration,’ but they continue to work in an individual manner and not involve others.”

Managers who bark orders rather than working with their team to accomplish common goals may think they are being decisive and helping move the team to action, but they’re simply earning a reputation as a dictator.

“If all your team hears are orders barked at them,

you may experience a less proactive team and a more reactive approach where ‘Wait until we are told’ becomes the norm,” Barrett cautions. “At the other end of the scale, if you do nothing but ask your team what should be done, you run the risk of being misperceived as not knowing what your are doing. You team may suffer as they feel they are having to do your job and make your decisions for you.”

4. You play favorites.

All organizations need to nurture top talent, but creating an “elite” group of people who are given special development opportunities or the best projects can often backfire. When talented

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individuals who form the backbone of the organization see themselves as having no future, they’re going to look elsewhere, says Jo Clarkson, U.K. operations director for The Alternative Board.

“Managing special programs fairly — perhaps by ensuring selection is objective and open to all — is a key element in minimizing any negative impact,” Clarkson says.

Playing favorites can be a simple as a manager taking one team out to lunch to celebrate some achievement, but not giving other teams the same treatment when they achieve something similar.

Also, never be tempted to pay new employees more to attract them than you’re paying existing staff already doing the job.

“If you’re paying less than the market rate, get everyone up to it — even if it means they need to work a bit harder,” Clarkson says.

5. You don’t understand what really motivates your team.

“You blame your employees without taking a look in the mirror. You fool yourself into thinking that your employee’s lack of motivation is due to anything other than your inability to remove hassles from their work or connect their work with their own internal motivators. It’s not their problem — it’s your challenge as a leader,” says Phillip Wilson, president of the Labor Relations Institute.

Don’t ever think “perks” such as massages or pizza parties will motivate. While these are nice, they don’t really get at the “big three” motivators: having needs met, hassles removed and progress made, he says.

“If you want to start showing appreciation — and you should — thank people personally and regularly. Be specific.”

A big mistake managers often make is thinking they have to do something to motivate employees. It causes them to press, and often “over-manage” a situation.

“That’s just not the way it works,” Wilson says. “People are motivated for their own reasons. The manager’s job is to create an environment where this internal motivation can express itself naturally.”

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6. You don’t give them enough autonomy, which shows you don’t trust them.

Employees want to grow professionally, and one part of that is being able to make decisions on their own, Ochstein says.

“Managers need to give employees the opportunity to do this by encouraging the concept of asking for forgiveness rather than permission … and holding true to it. Managers can’t say it and then scold them for not asking beforehand.”

An employee who doesn’t trust the organization or management will not be as invested in the organization compared with those who do.

“Whether it’s trust in the organization, manager or team, without it there’s a lack of dedication and productivity,” Ochstein cautions.

7. You fail to sufficiently praise or recognize.

It’s easy for managers to become so focused on the end goal that they forget to celebrate accomplishments, says Todd Berger, president and chief executive of Redwood Logistics, a transportation and logistics firm in Chicago.

“Managers are often striving to produce results while helping their staff grow into successful professionals, which means positive reinforcement and praise can sometimes take a back seat,” Berger says. “But praise is essential. Remember to reward staff on the spot, and in front of peers. It’s that type of positive feedback that re-energizes and re-motivates employees.”

Failing to recognize an employee is “by far the fastest way” to demotivate them, Ochstein cautions.

“Whether it’s during a one-on-one meeting, done publicly in a companywide meeting or just passing by their desks, managers have to recognize work when it deserves to be recognized. They need to tell their employees they appreciate their hard work, and that it doesn’t go unnoticed.”

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The Ultimate Guide to Prospecting

The Ultimate Guide to Prospecting: How Many Touchpoints, When, and What Type 20 www.greenazine.com

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It’s incredibly rare that a prospect responds to a salesperson’s first outreach attempt. This necessitates following up … and following up on your follow ups.

But how many prospecting touchpoints should salespeople make before they call it quits? When should they send these messages? And should they email, call, or reach out in another way? The “how,” “when,” and “what” of following up is important to get right if a rep hopes to snag the buyer’s attention and make a sale.

Here’s a guide that can help you optimize your prospecting process and significantly improve your response and connect rates, even with no changes to the content of your messaging.

How Many Touchpoints Are the Right Amount?

First, let’s define “touchpoint.” To me, a touchpoint 22 www.greenazine.com

refers to a voicemail, email, or live conversation. I don’t consider interactions through social media or a call with no voicemail to be touchpoints since there’s little or no proof that these interactions happened.

There’s plenty of evidence that suggests response rates rise with each subsequent outreach attempt. However, when you surpass five touchpoints, the law of diminishing returns comes into play. In other words, a seventh touchpoint is not much more effective than a sixth. With this in mind, I think five touches is a good benchmark.

There are two important caveats to this number. First, every industry and buyer persona is different. While five touches might be the right number for one type of prospect, seven or three might be right for another.

This is why you must test the number and observe your response rates over time.

The second caveat is related to the first. In order to see accurate results from touchpoint testing, you must choose a number and stick to it with each and every single prospect you engage. Most reps vary the number of attempts they make based on the particular buyer, but how will you discover the “magic” number for your territory or situation without consistent data?

If you decide to work a lead, you must commit to making a set amount of touchpoints.

When Should I Make My Attempts?

In my experience, connect rates rise as the day, week, and month advances. According to this maxim, here are the ideal times to reach out:

quite a while after making my first attempt to follow up -- maybe 12 days or two weeks. But then I use a half-life rule with each subsequent attempt.

Here’s what this schedule might look like: First attempt: May 1st Second attempt: May 13th (12 days later) Third attempt: May 19th (six days later) Fourth attempt: May 22nd (three days later) Fifth attempt: May 24th mid-day (one and a half days later)

Time: 3 pm and later local time (call), five minutes before and after the hour (email)

Now the buyer senses that my message is growing in urgency instead of decreasing.

Day of week: Thursday and Friday

What Types of Messages Should I Use?

Date: 28th – 31st

Your prospecting message mix should be just that -a mix. The specific divide between calls and emails should by determined by you and your manager based on what works best in your industry.

Most salespeople make their prospecting calls early in the morning and early in the week. However, this is precisely the time when buyers are planning out their workload and prioritizing their tasks -- they don’t have time for a sales call. You’ll have better success when the day is winding down, and the prospect has more bandwidth for an unexpected request.

In terms of email, you can write messages at any point in the day, but be careful not to send them until five minutes before or five minutes after the hour. Since you want your email to be no lower than 12 messages from the top, you’ll need to send it at the precise moment when the buyer opens their inbox. Five minutes before and after the hour is the span of time when buyers walk to and from meetings, and check their email. Hitting “send” in this 10-minute window dramatically increases your chances of getting a response.

Lastly, how should you distribute your touchpoints?

Over the span of a month, most reps skew early. They might reach out two times the first day, once a few days later, once a week later, and then one final time a few weeks after that.

But this pattern communicates to the buyer that your request isn’t urgent. To express urgency, I recommend skewing your touchpoints the opposite way. I wait

That said, in my experience, leaning on the phone slightly more than email generates the best results.

For that reason, I recommend following a three calls / two emails split, but three emails / two calls is also acceptable.

What I don’t recommend is all emails or no calls, or four calls and one email. Keep it as balanced as possible while playing to the preferences of your buyers.

If you can skew your outreach earlier than later, make at least five attempts with each and every prospect, and mix up your approach, I guarantee your connect rate will climb. Also remember to keep a close eye on how different times of day, types of message, and numbers of touchpoints affects your success, and fine tune your strategy accordingly.

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Remove ‘Inaccurate’ CSA Scores

Sen. Deb Fischer Urges FMCSA to Remove ‘Inaccurate’CSA Scores from App, Provide Disclaimers

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In a letter to Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx, Sen. Deb Fischer expressed hope that the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration would remove from the agency’s QCMobile smartphone application Compliance, Safety, Accountability information that is deemed inaccurate.

The chairwoman of the Surface Transportation and Merchant Marine Infrastructure, Safety and Security panel, which has jurisdiction over trucking policy, said that removing such information would ensure the public is not misinformed about carriers. Fischer also asked that the

agency provide disclaimers that interpret the CSA safety management system, or SMS, scores.

to incorrectly identify carriers as being “at-risk” when they were not subsequently involved in accidents.

“Inaccurate SMS scores cost businesses contracts, encourage litigation and have the potential to negatively impact safety on our nation’s roads,” Fischer wrote April 9.

FMCSA launched the QCMobile app — QC stands for “query central” — on March 17. Law enforcement personnel and people in the insurance and third-party logistics industries are the app’s primary audience. It also is available to the public, according to FMCSA.

An FMCSA spokesman said Foxx would respond directly to Fischer.

The senator noted a Government Accountability Office review which concluded that inaccuracies in SMS methodology led the agency

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New Rule for CMV Drivers with Diabetes

Rule would ease exemption for CMV drivers with contr 26 www.greenazine.com

n requirements rolled diabetes

Washington – A new proposed rule aims to reduce some of the red tape for commercial motor vehicle drivers who have controlled diabetes.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration issued a notice of proposed rulemaking that would eliminate the requirement for drivers with stable, insulin-treated diabetes mellitus to obtain exemptions in order to work. Instead, FMCSA would allow such individuals to drive CMVs as long as the workers were cleared annually by a medical examiner listed in the National Registry of Certified Medical Examiners.

In the proposed rule, the agency claims that the risk posed by drivers with controlled diabetes is “very low in general.” Annual medical appointments would allow doctors to monitor any progressive conditions that were linked with diabetes, as well as promote awareness about hypoglycemia’s effect on safe driving, FMCSA states.

“FMCSA evidence reports, [American Diabetes Association] studies, and [Medical Review Board] conclusions and recommendations indicate that drivers with ITDM are as safe as other drivers when their condition is well-controlled,” FMCSA stated in the executive summary. “The evaluation by the [treating clinician] would ensure that the driver is complying with an appropriate standard of care for individuals with ITDM.” The proposed rule was published in the May 4 Federal Register.

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Email Is Still Relevant

Email Is Still Relevant! Are Yo from Your Email Marketing?

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One study suggested that mobile email will account for 15 to 70 percent of email opens, depending on your target audience, product and type of email.

Email and mobile are a match made in heaven.

ou Getting the Most ? www.greenazine.com

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In an era of mobile this and social media that, it’s easy to think that email — the original online marketing channel — is becoming ineffective. But giving the inbox short shrift is short sighted. After all, approximately 182 billion emails are sent every day, according to The Radicati Group. Clearly, your customers spend tons of time reading their email, so it only makes sense to put your message where their eyes already are.

That’s why, in a June 2014 poll by Internet Retailer, almost 40 percent of respondents said email marketing was their most important investment. Even more compelling: 90 percent indicated that email produces “a positive return” on investment.

Here are some key considerations to help you get the

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most from effective small business email marketing: 1. Know Why You’re Emailing: Retention, engagement and revenue generation are the three most popular reasons business owners use email marketing. “Pick the one or two things you want to focus on first,” says Christopher Lester (no relation to the author), vice president of sales for email marketing company Emma in Nashville, TN. “Instead of a monthly newsletter, spend time creating an incredible three-piece welcome series. Do email marketing, but do it right.”

2. Leverage Existing Relationships: Email marketing is most effective when you use it to stay engaged with customers and clients you already know who have opted in to receive emails, according to Robbin

Block, creative marketing strategist with Block Media & Marketing in Seattle, WA. “That means they’re interested in hearing from you, no matter what the delivery mechanism,” says Block. “Take the time to build a solid list. There are many ways to do that: signups, purchases, registrations, networking, phone calls, trade shows, etc. Otherwise, it’s spam.”

3. Make It Work on Mobile: Data from the Knotice Mobile Email Opens Report show that in 2013, 45 percent of emails were opened on a mobile device, usually a phone. “Marketers that aren’t making sure their email sends are optimized for mobile are really missing out,” says Carrie Hill, co-founder of Ignitor Digital in Glenwood Springs, CO. “One study

suggested that mobile email will account for 15 to 70 percent of email opens, depending on your target audience, product and type of email. Email and mobile are a match made in heaven.”

4. Personalize It: Use an email marketing service that enables you to add a person’s name to the message, because this kind of personalization makes it more effective. When recipients feel the message is targeted at them, “they’re more likely to engage with the message and click through,” Hill says. Take it a step further by gathering information like birthdays and anniversaries, so you can reach out on those days with a special message. “This is a great way to remind your customers you care about them in their day-to-day lives,” she adds. “I have local REALTOR® clients who watch home-sale transactions and try to gather email addresses of new homeowners via opt-in to market local home improvement products and services to them.”

5. Make and Keep a Schedule: “The biggest mistakes small businesses make are not sticking to a consistent schedule and failing to measure the results of each campaign and apply those learnings to the next one,” says Abigail Stock, founder and chief digital strategist with New York City–based Little Digital Co. “An easy way to ensure you hit send on time — every time — is to create a content calendar and plan ahead for what you want to say to whom and when. A simple spreadsheet will do. If you have some extra time, get two or three emails done in advance and schedule them to go out ahead of time. That way, you don’t have the excuse of being too busy in the future.” Don’t forget to add time to review and analyze each email’s performance, too.

These small business email marketing tips apply whether you’re using email to send a newsletter, a welcome message or deals and surveys.

“Email marketing isn’t a silver bullet — no marketing channel is — but it is one of the best tools in your marketing toolbox,” Lester declares. “I think we’re past the point of convincing people to try email marketing.

It’s not even an option anymore. Everyone is being marketed to via email.”

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31

Field Sales Is Dead

Field Sales Is Dead; Long Live Inside Sales Field sales has been dying for years.

In fact, it’s been ailing for so long that no one noticed its actual time of passing.

Pretty much everyone knows (intuitively, at least) that field sales is dead. But no one’s prepared to acknowledge it.

Not surprisingly, denial is not a winning strategy. Salespeople have adapted to this new reality to the extent that they absolutely must, but few organizations are prepared to explicitly recognize that times have changed. Consequently, few are exploiting the enormous upside that our new reality presents.

Let this article be a stake in the ground!

It’s time to face this new reality and reengineer our sales environments to exploit it. (And it’s probably best we do so before our competitors do.)

Denial The modern salesperson still feels that the field is their rightful place of battle. However, as each year passes, they spend less time there. And, when they do gear up and venture forth, increasingly it’s to perform customer service activities.

The modern salesperson spends the greater proportion of their selling time on the phone, not in the field.

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It’s frustrating -- and a source of great embarrassment -- but there’s nothing the salesperson can do about it.

There are two powerful forces that collude to keep salespeople away from their company cars: 1. Salespeople are significantly more efficient when they are inside.

2. Customers don’t want a salesperson to come visiting unless they conclude that a face-to-face visit is absolutely critical (and they rarely do).

These two forces have converted most field salespeople into reluctant inside salespeople who venture out only occasionally.

Because they are not excited about working inside, they are happy to be distracted from telephone sales by customer service and administrative activities -- meaning that not a lot of selling actually gets done. And because they spend so little time selling face-to-face, many salespeople are either out of practice or simply lacking in skills they’ve had little cause to develop.

Sales Is No Longer an Outside Endeavor Sales used to be something that happened “out there” -- in the field.

And there’s good reason for that.

Fifty years ago, when the modern

sales function evolved, customers were “out there.” This is before PBXs, fax machines, cell phones, websites, email, instant messaging, and web conferencing. If an organization wanted to sell something, it had to send salespeople to where customers were. And if potential customers wanted information to assist in their

quest for new products and services, they had to request that a salesperson bring that information to where they were.

Salespeople were an information conduit. They added significant value by ferrying information back and forth between the organization (inside) and its customers (outside).

Times, of course, have changed.

Today, customers can easily reach a salesperson on their cell phone or via email. And if our customer wants to consume information privately, they can do that too. They can browse our websites, our competitors’ websites, and those of industry commentators.

Outside Sales

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Our customers and prospects are no longer “out there.” Modern technology has broken down the divide and invited our customers into our organizations. And this is an invitation our customers have been happy to accept.

Once inside, our customers have discovered that they no longer need to consume information via just one conduit. They can interact with multiple people in our organization, via multiple channels.

And they like it that way!

Furthermore, customers are no longer dependent upon field salespeople for transactions. They have choices. If they want to purchase, they can do so by phone or online. And woe betide anyone who thinks that they can force customers to transact with salespeople. Increasingly, customers are as loyal to the channel as they are to the brand.

The Inside-Out Sales Function Because today’s environment is so very different from the environment in which the sales function evolved, a radical redesign is required. And when we build this new sales function we need to build it from the inside out -- not from the outside in.

This is in keeping with how our customers like to buy.

Consider yourself, by way of example. If you need to make a purchase -- any purchase -- my guess is that your general preference is to buy online (with no human contact whatsoever). And, if this isn’t practical, you’ll probably seek help from a person via online chat or over the telephone.

Even if you are making a large purchase, I doubt your first instinct is to call and request that a salesperson come visit you in your home or place of business. And if a salesperson does come visit with you, it’s likely that this is after quite a number of email and telephone conversations.

If this is how customers buy (and it surely is), then this is how we must sell.

Let’s try a thought experiment where we rebuild our sales organization from scratch. An insideout approach means that we start with an inside sales nucleus -- as close to Operations as possible -- and then add additional layers only when they are absolutely required.

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Ecommerce and Customer Service Who should your first hires be, in your brand new organization? Web and customer service team members.

Your website should allow those customers who are so inclined to serve themselves: To consume information and to transact. (These customers, it should go without saying, are your very best customers, so it makes sense to look after them.)

Your customer service team is an extension of your web presence. Think of it as a concierge service that sits on top of your website. Regardless

of what you sell, your customer service team should be responsible for processing simple transactions (those where customers know pretty much what they want), generating quotes, and handling issues.

Inside Sales Once you have Customer Service looking after simple transactions, your next step should be to add Sales. And your first sales layer should be an inside one.

Your inside salespeople should have skills and knowledge equivalent (or superior) to your competitors’ field salespeople. Because your

inside salespeople are inside specialists, they will each have 30 meaningful selling interactions a day.

As part of your inside sales team, you’ll need a promotions machine. I say “machine” because those 30 interactions a day will result in an insatiable hunger for sales opportunities. You will need to generate 10 to 20 sales opportunities a day to keep each inside salesperson busy.

Lead generation hires therefore follow inside salespeople.

Field Sales As you start to scale the inside sales team, you will www.greenazine.com

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experience an increasing requirement for field visits. After all, there are still some activities that genuinely do need to be performed outside.

At this point, it will be tempting to recruit a team of traditional salespeople. But a modicum of caution is advised. If you examine those activities that genuinely do need to be performed in the field, you’ll see that they fall naturally into two categories: Technical activities (e.g. technical requirement discovery and demonstrations) Enterprise sales activities (e.g. running discovery workshops and presenting to executive teams) You’ll also discover, in most environments, that the greatest preponderance of activities lands in that first category. This should give you pause.

Turns out, in most organizations, your initial field hires should be technical specialists (with some sales sensibilities), as opposed to archetypal salespeople. These field specialists will be an invaluable resource for your core inside sales team. When inside salespeople discover a requirement for a field activity, they can push it to a field specialist, who can perform the necessary activity and report back to the inside salesperson who then finalizes the sale.

You will discover that you can build quite a significant sales team before you have a requirement to add true enterprise-class salespeople. In fact, if your organization is generating less than $10 million a year in sales, it’s unlikely that you can justify such a hire. You’ll be better off focusing on building out your core inside sales team and pushing enterprise activities to senior executives.

When you can justify your first enterprise sales hire, it’s wise to make two hires. In addition to the salesperson, employ an executive assistant. The executive assistant can take responsibility for the essential inside activities, leaving your (expensive) new enterprise salesperson free to spend 100% of their time in the field. With this configuration, an enterprise salesperson can easily perform three to four field meetings a day -- which is about 10 times the volume of work they could handle if they worked alone.

Customers don’t want a salesperson to come visiting unless they conclude that a face-to-face visit is absolutely critical (and they rarely do).

Built to Scale You’ll discover that this inside-out approach results in vastly superior interface between you and your customers. And that’s nice. But the better news is that this model is easy and inexpensive to scale. Because almost all of your marketing and sales activity is performed by an inside team, you don’t need regional sales offices, you don’t need layers of management, and you don’t need a team of operations people to process expense reports and adjudicate border skirmishes between over-caffeinated commissioned salespeople.

The death of field sales does not mark the end of field salespeople. They still exist, and they always will. What it does mark is the beginning of a new era, where sales is essentially an inside function.

You’ll come to discover that the inside-out sales model results in happier customers, a lower average cost of sale, and a faster growing business. It’s time to be done with the grieving so we can knuckle down and exploit this exciting new reality.

Do you agree that field sales is dead? Why or why not?

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37

Strategies To Negotiate Price

6 Strategies Buyers Use t

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to Negotiate Price Some buyers are conditioned to try certain tactics to lower your price. Maybe they’ve read about negotiation in books or were trained to use pressuring strategies.

When buyers take this kind of positional and win-lose approach, their goal is generally to gain the most for themselves at the expense of the seller. For example, savvy buyers know that many sellers will be especially vulnerable to manipulation just when a contract is about to be signed. It’s tempting at this point for the seller to give the buyer what they want and lower the price instead of digging deeper to uncover if their concerns are valid, or a bluff.

Here are six common tactics buyers might use to gain a positional advantage, and ideas for how to respond:

Anchoring Buyer says: “We’re looking to spend no more than $500,000 for this.”

With this tactic, the buyer shares a target price, such as a budget cap, to anchor the bargaining range.

How to respond: Ideally, you should be the first to suggest a price. Don’t wait for the buyer to do so. If that doesn’t work out, don’t accept their number at face value. Ask how they came up with their number, and how it fits with their budget. The goal is to uncover whether it’s a real www.greenazine.com

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number or a ploy.

Pencil Sharpening

Whack Back

Buyer says: “You’re going to have to do better than this. We need to get it for less.”

Buyer says: “Your price is too high,” no matter what it is when you tell them for the first time.

This is one of the most common buyer tactics—to ALWAYS push back on the first price offered.

How to respond: Ask why. Listen fully as the buyer explains their objection, and ask permission to completely understand the issue. What they say will dictate your response. For example, if they say, “Well, I’ve bought it before for X!” You can say, “I think the reason I’m here is that you’ve had a lot of problems in the past. We’re different than X.” And so on.

Sticker Shock Buyer says: “It costs how much?!”

The buyer appears to be shocked or stumped by the price you’ve offered. It could be an orchestrated reaction, rather than genuine surprise.

How to respond: Ignore their flinch and wait for any theatrics to die down. Ask why it seems high to them.

Often their reasoning is faulty, and you can open up a conversation based on what you find out.

Cherry Picking Buyer says: “I know I told you our initial order would be 5,000 units with 5 components, but we’ll just need 500 units and 2 components at first. I did the division so the price should be...”

In this scenario, the buyer has tried to unbundle a solution to gain concessions, and assumed the unit price will stay the same.

How to respond: Address the issue head on with a statement such as “I’ll need to review the pricing based on the new scope and terms.” They may make it seem as though these new terms came out of nowhere and nothing can be done, but remember—you don’t have to accept changed terms just because the buyer changed them. Engage in a discussion to work out appropriate pricing.

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This is a common pushback tactic to “get you ready” to drop your price because it’s “expected.”

How to respond: Don’t ask “Well, where do we need to be?” This is a trap. Focus instead on asking questions such as, “Why?” and “What are you comparing us to?”

Hold your ground on differentiating the value you offer. If you probe to create solutions, the buyer will often back down.

Now! Buyer says: “I’m talking to the CEO in 5 minutes. Are you sure I have the best price?” Or, “I will give it to a competitor by noon if you don’t make this concession.”

This tactic uses time pressure to get the seller to lower their price.

How to respond: Don’t panic or reflexively drop the price. Stall for time to think. Ask for a few minutes to disengage, saying something like, “I’m in the middle of something else right now. I can take a look soon and call you back.” Alternatively, you can ask, “So we’ll know one way or another after your meeting?” If the buyer says no, then it could be a bluff. If it’s a yes, take time to think and call back with a bargain you want.

But be aware that this can be a power play on their part. If you cave, they’ll expect it in the future.

Now that you can identify these buyer strategies, prepare for your next negotiation by giving some thought to how you will respond if any arise. It’s your job to dig deeper into the real issues, separating the buyer’s valid concerns from their bluffs and manipulations.

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In regards to the Motorcoach Marketing program, we love it. So far, we have made the 1000 postcards, and we did some full page handouts. We just got a stand up banner.

When I get some time, I’ll be making new rack cards for both offices. We made 500 church theme postcards and 500 in the safety theme.

We sent out the church cards through a local mailing company to every church within 50 miles. So far, we have had a great response and 4-5 people booked trips from it. I plan on using the safety ones soon by sending them to our new customers. All of our staff and drivers love the modern design and the finished products. Only one of my staff has watched the videos so far, but we will be working on that next month. So far I’m very happy with the service. It works well and looks great!

Chris Knittel

Owner/General Manager New Mexico Texas Coaches, LLC

We Help Operators Sell More Charters To More People.

Easier. Faster. Far More Effective.

MotorcoachMarketing.org www.greenazine.com

41

Improve Wi-fi Security

8 Ways to Improve Small Busin 42 www.greenazine.com

Placing the router inside a locked room or cabinet is ideal, but if that’s not practical, at least mount it high near the ceiling (or above a drop ceiling if possible) to obscure its presence and thwart the crude but effective “stand on a chair with a paperclip” attack.

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Is your small business Wi-Fi network as secure as it should be?

If you’re not sure quite sure, the following tips—most of which involve minimal effort and cost— can significantly enhance your network’s security. Before we get started, note that throughout the article we’re using the common term Wi-Fi “router” but, depending on your network configuration, your Wi-Fi device may be more aptly described as a “gateway” or an access point. Most of the tips apply regardless of which type of Wi-Fi hardware you use.

Let’s look at eight ways you can improve your small business network security.

8 Wi-Fi Network Security Tips 1. Change the router’s default admin password When you set up your Wi-Fi router and chose your wireless network password, did you also change the router’s default administrative password? If not, do it now.

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Default passwords for countless router makes and models are easy to find on the Web, and with that information it’s simple for someone to take control of your network to use your router (along with many others) to launch a DDoS attack.

A nefarious person can even change your network’s DNS settings in order to redirect your Web traffic to fraudulent lookalike sites designed to fool people into divulging sensitive usernames and passwords. In fact, such an attack was perpetrated recently via spam emails.

2. Update your router’s firmware You probably update your smartphone, your PC, and your apps quite frequently, but when was the last time you updated your Wi-Fi router’s firmware?

Doing so can fix bugs—including security vulnerabilities—and it may even improve your wireless performance.

Many routers will automatically you whether a new firmware version’s available when you log into the administrative console, and some will even download updates for you automatically.

If not, you’ll typically find the firmware update settings under the Administration heading, which is where you’ll usually find the admin password settings we mentioned in the first tip.

3. Protect your Wi-Fi network with a long, strong, passphrase WPA requires a wireless passphrase (also known as the network key/password) to be at least 8 characters, but that doesn’t necessarily make it secure. If your WPA passphrase consists of a dictionary word or a proper name, there are numerous free tools and methods available to crack it— sometimes in matter of hours—by monitoring your wireless traffic.

There’s even a cloud-hosted service to do it. Make your WPA passphrase as long and as random as possible; it’s the best protection against cracking.

4. Disable Wi-Fi Protected Setup (WPS) Wi-Fi Protected Setup (WPS) has been around a long time, and it’s a convenient way to connect a device to a Wi-Fi network by pushing a couple of buttons and/ or entering a simple PIN code instead of having to type in a long and complicated passphrase (see previous tip). But more convenience almost always means less security—and many routers are susceptible to a targeted attack against WPS that can expose your passphrase in short order. There’s no easy way to know whether or not your particular router has the WPS weakness, so your best bet is to shut off the feature.

5. Create a guest Wi-Fi network When you have an office visitor who needs to get on the Internet, do you cheerfully hand over your Wi-Fi network passphrase? If so, big mistake—if that visitor’s laptop turns out to be infected with malware, it could potentially find its way onto your network.

Instead of sharing your company’s wireless network with outsiders, check if your router supports a Guest network (most modern routers do) and if so, activate it. A Guest network provides a secondary wireless network with a dedicated name and password for your visitors, allowing them Internet access while blocking access (inadvertent or otherwise) to devices on your internal network.

6. Switch to WPA Enterprise Consider the above example once again. If you hand out the passphrase for an internal WiFi network to a visitor, nothing prevents her from sharing it with

an unauthorized person. Or, what if an employee who knows the passphrase quits or gets fired?

What’s to stop him from using that passphrase to access your network (perhaps after-hours from a car parked outside the building)?

You don’t even necessarily need to know the passphrase to a WiFi network to use it on another device, because you can easily look it up from within Windows.

To guard against the second scenario in particular, you could change the passphrase each time it occurs, but then you’d also need to update the passphrase on every device that connects to the network (an enormously disruptive and time-consuming process). A far better approach is to configure your router to use WPA Enterprise.

Unlike passphrase-based WPA Personal, WPA Enterprise works in concert with a RADIUS server to authenticate users to a wireless network via user-specific names and passwords, and this makes it easy to terminate access for any individual when necessary. Note: some routers—though not many— have a built-in RADIUS server, but if yours doesn’t you can build your own or get one hosted in the cloud.

7. Reduce output power and/or relocate your router Unless you have an outdoor area where employees frequently work (e.g. a lunch patio) you should keep your Wi-Fi network within the walls of your business as much as possible. But depending on the size of your office and where the router resides within it, your network may have signal leakage.

If so, there’s a good chance that people can access your network

from a parking lot or an adjacent business.

If your Wi-Fi router has an output power setting, you may be able to reduce the signal power just enough to keep it within the confines of your workspace (most routers that support the feature will let you adjust it in small increments). Alternately, if your router resides on the periphery of your office you might consider relocating it more centrally, if possible.

Two caveats—either option may require some trial and error, and both can potentially introduce dead spots within your office.

Walking the boundaries of the office with a smartphone or a laptop to check signal strength will let you know in either case.

8. Physically secure the router It’s important to remember that anyone can circumvent all of the precautions described here by pressing a Wi-Fi router’s reset button, which returns the device to its factory default settings.

That’s why it’s extremely important to physically secure access to the device.

Placing the router inside a locked room or cabinet is ideal, but if that’s not practical, at least mount it high near the ceiling (or above a drop ceiling if possible) to obscure its presence and thwart the crude but effective “stand on a chair with a paperclip” attack.

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45

Retain Top Talent

Detailed Analysis of Turno Employers Retain Top Tale 46 www.greenazine.com

Employers need to rethink the way they look at turnover by considering not only how many employees are leaving the organization, but also specifically which ones, Wells Fargo consultants said at an April 29 Conference Board webinar.

The traditional definition of employee turnover rate is the number of workers who left an organization in a given time period divided by the average number of employees. But while this formula is endorsed by the Society for Human Resource Management, it has two major problems, Camden Lee, vice president and senior analytics consultant in the Community Banking HR Insights & Analysis Group at Wells Fargo, said: it assumes that all jobs are the same, and that everyone who left the organization was performing at the same level.

That isn’t the case. “People are not your most important asset—the right people are,” Leslie Golay, assistant vice president and senior analytics consultant in the Community Banking HR Insights & Analysis Group at Wells Fargo, commented during the webinar. “There’s an amount of turnover that is healthy and necessary.”

Three-Tiered Model For a more sophisticated analysis of turnover, Golay and Lee offered a three-tiered pyramidal model, building up from a “descriptive” base wherein one answers such questions as, “Was it regrettable? How does this compare to others? What was their performance rating? Where did they leave from? How quickly did they leave? How many left?”

The next layer is predictive: “Who is most at risk? What factors impact turnover the most? What happens if we decrease turnover? How does it impact staffing/recruiting?

What if the trend continues?”

At the peak is a prescriptive layer: “What policies promote our best people to stay? What is the optimal amount?”

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Some Turnover More Costly Measuring the wrong thing can provide incentives for the wrong behavior, Lee warned. Thus, the loss of “high-impact talent goes unnoticed,” as does the fact that the employees who don’t leave may be underperforming. If managers are rated the same on their retention rate, regardless of whether they lose high- or low-performing employees, “you may be keeping the wrong people,” he said.

In reality, a group that loses a greater proportion of high-skilled employees loses intellectual property, faces higher costs in replacing them and faces a long “ramp-up” time for their replacements, Golay noted.

So if there are two groups of 100 employees each, and they both lose 10 employees, but in the first group only two of the departing employees were highly skilled while in the second group five were, it’s the second group that has bigger problems, she indicated.

Measuring Employee Value Building a weighted turnover model requires first building a model of each employee’s worth to the company, which in the Wells Fargo schema starts with “objective” factors like market value and production performance, but including “subjective” factors Golay detailed, noting that some employees are high performers “although they are only average at whatever our measuring widget is.” Thus, performance reviews, recognition awards and whether an employee is viewed as “high potential” need to be taken into account, along with the person’s “fit” within the organization and other factors such as whether he or she contributes to desired organizational diversity.

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Measuring the wrong thing can provide incentives for the wrong behavior, Lee warned. Thus, the loss of “high-impact talent goes unnoticed,” Golay said the weighted individual scores are useful in many more areas than just turnover. On the individual level, they can be used to identify highpotential employees and standardize what that term means across different regions, compare employees, develop succession planning, and contribute to recognition programs or coaching opportunities.

On a group level, the individual scores can be used “to identify leaders who are really good at retaining talent,” she said.

Lee and Golay also said the scores can be used for risk modeling of turnover, “understand[ing] the likelihood and severity of impact to the organization if turnover occurs in key groups” and “determin[ing] groups that may need intervention.” Managers who are losing key talent can be retrained, they added.

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Make Your Site Google Friendly

5 ways to make your website friendly to search engines Most business owners want to improve their company’s website ranking in search engine results but assume that they first need to understand the complicated algorithms that Google, Bing, Yahoo and other search engines use to filter information.

If a company’s website doesn’t pop up on the first page when someone

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searches for its products or services, the company is probably losing business to whichever websites do show up among the top search results.

Most business owners want to improve their company’s website ranking in search engine results — a process called search engine optimization (SEO) — but assume

they first need to understand the complicated algorithms that Google, Bing, Yahoo and other search engines use to filter information. But search engines change their algorithms constantly, making it nearly impossible to “game the system.”

Rather than try to beat an algorithm, business owners can optimize their websites by thinking of search

engines as customers. Because search engines are designed to predict users’ behavior, the same elements that make a website customer-friendly also make it friendlier to search engines.

Here are some strategies that make a company’s website friendly to both its customers and search engines:

1. Write content

fresh,

informative

Customers are more likely to visit a company’s website multiple times if it is a source of helpful, up-todate information, both about the company’s products or services and the company’s general industry.

Search engines likewise favor websites that have been updated recently and contain a lot of written information. Companies should focus on updating their sites regularly with new content (such as blog posts) that is grammatically correct, easy to understand and informative.

2. Make it easy to navigate Customers want to be able to find the information they need quickly and easily on a website. Wellplanned websites typically follow a “breadcrumbs” format, which logically guides users from general information about the company to more specific information about its products and services. If a website is easy for customers to navigate, it’s also easy for a search engine to crawl. The easier it is to navigate the website, the higher it will rank on search engine results.

3. Include key search terms People use key search terms to find relevant information, and search engines return websites that contain those exact phrases higher on the list. To ensure that both users and search engines know that the website

has relevant information related to key search terms, companies should embed those terms directly within the text of the website. For example, a law firm might discover that people not only search for “divorce lawyer,” but also terms such as “trusted attorney” or “experienced attorney child custody.” The law firm should incorporate those phrases within the website text to increase the likelihood that customers and search engines will find the website.

4. Generate referrals Just as customers are more likely to visit a website if a friend recommends it, search engines rank pages higher if they can find “referrals” to the page, known as backlinks, from other websites. The best way to build backlinks is to convince reputable blogs and websites to link to the company’s website. For example, a company may ask a vendor to list it as one of its customers with a link to the company’s website. Businesses should also register the website with well-known online directories, such as local business directories and professional organization directories.

5. Be mobile-friendly Many people are increasingly using mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets to search the Internet.

To appeal to these customers, business owners should make sure that their developers format the company website to be mobilefriendly, meaning that the website’s content automatically adapts so that users can view it clearly on differently sized devices. Not only will a mobile-friendly website help businesses please their customers who use mobile devices, but it will also help them show up higher on search engine results. Recently, Google announced a big change that its search methods will strongly favor

Just as customers are more likely to visit a website if a friend recommends it, search engines rank pages higher if they can find “referrals” to the page, known as backlinks, from other websites. websites that are mobile-friendly, and other search engines are likely following suit. To find out if their site is mobile-friendly, business owners can type in the address of their website into Google’s “mobilefriendly test” online tool.

For most businesses, a smart, longterm SEO strategy doesn’t require keeping up on the latest changes to search engine algorithms. Instead, companies should think about what customers want from their websites, and assume that search engines look for the same things.

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