Today’s post is a guest post from Robert Crabtree. Robert is CEO of Distributor Growth Partners, a full service marketing/design firm and print distribution company. Information about DGP can be found at www.distributorgrowthpartners.com

Today in the PSDA (Print Services & Distribution Association) Listserve, there were questions about SEO (Search Engine Optimization) providers, price ect… This turned into a discussion about many things, but most importantly, does it work and is it for me. Here is my take on SEO and SEM (Search Engine Marketing).

I’d say it does matter but it is not for everyone. It very much depends on the nature of your particular business and the level, at which you want to play. SEO and SEM is much more than just one or two initiatives….as I often say, “You Cannot Bake A Cake With One Ingredient.” Real SEO and SEM will combine multiple efforts and strategies based around a solid plan. It’s not just keywords and pagerank.

I run into competitive firms all the time, that typically don’t know alot, they just throw around a few buzzwords and that’s all. There is no silver bullet and many promise just that. They can’t guarentee anything either but they will claim pretty much anything to get your business. If anyone guarantees ranking for you, they are flat out not telling the truth.

Of course no one understand all the intricacies of the Google algorithm — maybe not even any one person at Google. But someone whose core focus is on what helps a site present a “strong signal” to Google can make a big difference. And a fresh set of eyes alone can be extremely valuable.

What a good seo will do is not talk about Search Engines and lists of keyphrases but will work at understanding your business, identifying your uniqueness, studying your target market(s), your competitors, your market position and your website to ensure that you will end up with not only high solid positioning that’s going to work for the long term – but an excellent increase in business. For this…..you can expect to pay a lot. But then that is not your average seo! You might try looking for a real Internet Marketing Consultant that will care about your business as much as you do.

The bottom line, SEO and SEM make the most sense for companies who have a niche product, solution, industry focus, or companies that have an ecommerce website. If you don’t fall into one of these categories, Organic SEO makes much less sense for you. Don’t try to optimize for “Business cards, full service printing, banners….yada yadda….” You’ll get run over, sped too much and not produce the almighty ROI.

You know your business, but if you do not have the marketing skills and time to get that knowledge out of your brain – then their are folks who can do that and make it all happen for you, but make sure you don’t jump into bed with the first smooth talking Keyword Guy.

This article comes courtesy of Your PR Guy. I found it was great content for learning how to blog as a marketing strategy, so I thought I would pass it on. Enjoy! Thanks Your PR Guy!

I just received this email from Marketing Professionals, and thought it was interesting enough to pass on. You should think about this tactic when you are planning your marketing strategy this year. As printers, we need to step up our creativity in marketing during this down economy. PagePath Technologies (makers of MyOrderDesk) is working hard to provide you with creative ways to increase your business and sales in 2009.

Everyone likes personalized attention, and it seems that a handwritten note might be worth the time it takes to write. A post at the Neuromarketing blog cites an interesting study discussed by Robert Cialdini in the book Yes! 50 Scientifically Proven Ways to Be Persuasive. When researchers sent a survey to busy doctors with three different cover letters, and each produced a dramatically different result:

• A printed letter generated a response rate of 36 percent.
• A printed letter with a handwritten message boosted this by one third to 48 percent.
• A printed letter with a handwritten message on a Post-it note pushed the response rate to 75 percent.

“It seems that what is causing the boost is a ‘reciprocity’ effect,” notes Neuromarketing. “The recipient recognizes that the sender apparently put some personal effort into the mailing, and is more likely to reciprocate with some effort of his own.”

Interestingly, the blog notes, responses to the survey with the personalized Post-it note were also more thorough and prompt.

The Po!nt: “[T]he effects of personalization and apparent effort on the part of the sender have to be weighed against the desired action,” says Neuromarketing. “[But] making even difficult requests in a more personal manner can’t hurt.”

Source: Neuromarketing. Click here for the complete post.

Recently the Monty Python crew got involved with Social Marketing. Yes even the old British comedy troupe from the 70′s has embrace marketing on the web. What’s better is they have done it in Pythonesque style. They have taken a bad situation (people uploading their copyrighted material to YouTube) and made it into a sales opportunity.

For 3 years you YouTubers have been ripping us off, taking tens of thousands of our videos and putting them on YouTube. Now the tables are turned. It’s time for us to take matters into our own hands.
We know who you are, we know where you live and we could come after you in ways too horrible to tell. But being the extraordinarily nice chaps we are, we’ve figured a better way to get our own back: We’ve launched our own Monty Python channel on YouTube.

What can we learn from this?

• Embrace Social Media Marketing.
• Be creative in your marketing/sales attempts
• Provide fun/interesting content for your audience
• Entice them to come back
• Start today while the technology is still somewhat new.

Happy Holidays!