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As we complete  our 6th year in business, I want to take a few minutes to reflect on our experiences.  It has been a very exciting time for me.  We've had the pleasure of working with some of the best and brightest busiensses and people in our community.  Every relationship that we've established is incredibly valuable to us, and it is the people that have made this posible.   People tell me that passing the 5 year mark is an important milestone for business.  Most businesses don't survive this long.  To me 5 years doesn't feel like we've made it, just the first leg on an epic journey.   

The City of Woodstock, located in the north west coridor of Atlanta Georgia, is home to a growing number of businesses and professionals.  With lots of green space and a growing number of parks and recreational activities, it is easy to understand why it is such an attractive area for families.   For years, Towne Lake has offered great amenities to attract families, and with the revitalization of the Woodstock Main Street area, more businesses have moved in to serve these customers.  

This post is about how to NOT use social media. For some tips on how to best use social media for business, please read, How to use Twitter for Business.

 Atlanta's small businesses are going back to the old way of doing business, with people they know.  Some of the most recent work we've received, the owners told me the fact that I am local had a big part in their decision.  The fact is, most people prefer doing business with people, not faceless corporations.  This helps explain the social media boom over the last couple of years.

Twitter, Vital for Business?

It seems everyone is talking about Twitter, and you keep hearing about how businesses need to be involved in social media, and no social media campaign is complete without Twitter.  With nearly 200 MILLION users, Twitter is a huge opportunity for businesses to engage customers and communicate with peers.  But, you don't have time to learn a new Web site, and you don't get why anyone cares about what you ate for lunch. 

Over the past couple of years, Google Analytics has risen to the top of of the Site Traffic Tracking game.  There have always been several ways to track your Web site traffic, ranging from the basic statistical data provided by most Web hosts and hit counters to more advanced server side software such as Urchin.  But Google Analytics brings some new features and advantages to this space.

A couple of advantages of Google Analytics over most Site Traffic reporting toools:

Why Use Social Media?

The hottest topic on the Web today is social media.  Popularity of sites such as Twitter and Facebook have captured the imagination of traditional media and marketers alike.  With Facebook's claimed 500+ million users and more daily page views than Google, it is a compelling platform for businesses to communicate with customers and attract new customers.

 Today's market place is more demanding than ever.  Customers expect more from their service providers.  Let's face it, being all things to all people is a difficult task.  Most of the business advisors I have spoken with tell us, "do one thing, and do it to perfection."  Being a "Jack-of-all-trades, expert at none" is not a recipe for success.  The best companies I know do one thing, and do it perfectly.  Think Coca Cola, what do they do?  They make some of the best beverages that are loved world wide!

  Pricing is always a sensitive question, and is not always what it seems.  More important than what a particular firm charges is what you get for that price.  There are a lot of different strategies for pricing, often it is the goal to ofescate what a project will end up costing.  Sometimes, there is hidden pricing, sometimes, there are ten thousand different prices for what may seem like the same thing (read a credit card bill!).  Always, pricing is a factor of how much profit a firm wants to make verses what the market will bare.

    A company's phone number is a treasured piece of property. We work hard to make sure everyone who needs to contact us has it. We work hard to promote it. So when a company changes their phone number, they don't do it lightly, there had better be a good reason.

    This is our current dilemma, our old phone number just wasn't going to keep up with our needs. Not that there was anything wrong with the number. In fact, we had done a great job of getting that number out to everyone, and our call volume is up significantly.