Revenue Journal®

Email has become the message medium of our age. Just as we learned how to address and stamp an envelope, just as we learned how to fill out a FedEx form, we are now - still - learning how to use email effectively to run our businesses, and to buy and sell products and services.

I'm not going to spend a lot of time this week talking about how frustrating it is when someone doesn't do what I'm about to recommend. Suffice it to say that stream-of-consciousness, flaky subject lines don't help you manage your business or increase your revenues.

What is really happening - and we all know this, because we are experiencing it every day - is all activities, and all communication about activities, happen via email. It's become the central communication tool for all projects.

The better your content, the more you will sell.

A pretty simple concept to grasp, especially when we think of the buying process from the buyer's point of view. Most people who are buying something for the first time go straight to Google. They type in the search phrase they think will give them the right result, refine it if needed, and then start drilling down - mostly on the sites that come up "above the fold" on the screen. We all know this.

And yet, as I work with clients to improve content, and as I see content from the buyer's point of view, I am dismayed by how un-seriously managers take their own content.

When you run a business - no matter how large or small it is - you have a certain amount of energy available to apply to the long list of things you must get done. How you apply that energy will determine how successful you are.

I have been watching companies invest that energy for years. One conclusion I came to early on was that management fads were very distracting and expensive. They seldom, if ever, result in tangible, positive results.

We recently moved the Revenue Journal from Blogware to Movable Type. Our experience will help you if you're considering a blogging platform, or if you're providing some kind of online tool or service.

Movable Type is a packaged software program sold to end-users (bloggers and website managers). On the other hand, Blogware is part of a package offered by Tucows to its ISP customers - which, in turn, offer the web-based blog platform program to their own customers. In other words, the customer of Blogware is really the ISP, not the blogger. This is key. When the end-user of your program is not your primary customer, trouble is sure to follow.

Why did I make the switch from Blogware to Movable type? We'll start with the white screen of death:

Your website is a building with many rooms, and each room has a door. Each door has a sign on it, supposedly identifying what's behind the door.

Let's assume a visitor in your building is looking for the restroom. He's in a hurry. But some self-important people have been naming the rooms in your building. As your visitor attempts to find the restroom, he whizzes right past a door labeled "Executive Corporate Relief Center.

"If the door had simply said "restroom," your visitor would have gone right in.

Our first Revenue Journal podcast, in which I interview Brian Livingston, President/Editor of WindowsSecrets.com, who was just named Entrepreneur of the Year by MarketingSherpa.

Your website is one of the most important "employees" in your company. It is your company's most important salesperson and service person.

What kind of employee is it? Is it friendly, helpful, and knowledgeable? Or snarly and surly, thwarting the customer (and sabotaging the sale) at every turn?

I just bought a new laptop and its associated software and accessories. As I purchased and configured the computer, I was reminded again how stark the difference is between companies with a helpful website and companies with an obstructive website.

On the good side of the equation, we have CDW, the large computer company based in Illinois. I was considering buying my new laptop from them, but became convinced it was a good idea after talking to Jim Sterne. He told me he had gotten a cold call from them one day, which quickly turned into a warm call, which caused him to go to their website, and actually buy something. He has continued buying from CDW, over and over. Having now gone through a very pleasant and successful buying experience with them, I can understand his enthusiastic loyalty. More on CDW in a moment.

I started using WYSIWYG Web Builder recently. It's an intuitive, non-irritating web page mockup tool that makes it easy for text approvers to work with the files.

You can quickly create website pages, in a matter of minutes, placing text, links, and graphics exactly where you want them on the page. The underlying HTML code is generated automatically, as you lay out the page and make changes.

Web Builder can be downloaded (for a free 30-day trial) from the company that created it (Pablo Software Solutions). I found it through a great site called SnapFiles, a site that showcases downloadable tools.

I'm currently helping several clients redesign their websites. I sent the marketing guy at one company a link to the Web Builder software. A couple of minutes later, I got this email: "This is a gas!"

New marketing vehicles rise up, get overused, and fall out of favor faster than ever. Email has been through all those phases. Pay-per-click is currently in the falling-out-of-favor phase. Blogging is still on the rise. Blogging is being touted as...