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Is your Business on Google?

Have you claimed your Google Places Yet?
Well if you haven’t, What are you waiting for?
More People search for businesses online than anywhere else. Claiming your business with online search engines can help you win the local search. It can show off all of your great reviews from your loyal customers. Did I mention it is FREE. Google Places even makes it easy to track who is visiting your listings.  How do I sign up? Easy go to www.google.com/placesforbusiness.
If you want more you can create a Bing business Places at http://www.bing.com/businessportal
Even more you say! Get your business listed with Yahoo Business Places at http://local.yahoo.com
Tips and Tricks
Make sure to input your Business Information with the exact same Business Name, Company Logo, Address, Phone Number, and Contact Info for each site.
To add just that extra bit of sparkle add photos and videos to your Google Places.
If you are thinking to yourself, When am I going to have time to mess with this stuff? Don’t worry. AIMS can do it for you. Just call us at 401-400-2467. They can help you create and impute your company’s data for only $75.95. 

Signed Yours Truly, Facebook.

We are all trying to improve our businesses social networking online. With Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Blogging we are constantly directing people to our websites and sharing industry information. One easy way to get your business community connected is to add social media buttons to your email signature. I know all of us have seen the buttons on the bottom of a signature but many of you have not taken the time to add this to your own signature. It is a simple and easy way to create connections. 
Here are some step by step instructions on how to add a Facebook and Twitter Icon to your email signature.
1.      Find images from the site listed below.

  http://www.iconarchive.com/category/socialnetwork/web-2-icons-by-fasticon.html

  1.  Save these photos on your desktop or another easy to find location.
a.      Outlook 2003
                                                    i.     In Outlook go to tools
                                                  ii.     Go to options
                                                iii.     Mail Format
                                                iv.     Signatures
b.     Outlook 2010
                                                    i.     In Outlook go to New Email
                                                  ii.     Signature button drop down
                                                iii.     Highlight and click Signatures

          2.    Create a new signature or click on the edit or signature box being used. 
          3.     Click Picture, browse to the icon you saved in step 1, click to select it, and then click OK. Repeat for each icon you want to add. Or right click the location you want to add the button and select import image. 
          4.     Click one of the icons you added in step 3, and then click Hyperlink.
          5.     In the Address box, type the URL or web address for your Facebook, Twitter, or social media account that corresponds to the icon. 
          6.     Click OK to save.

8.     Always check your links by sending an email to yourself first 🙂
A good site to find icon buttons is:
Need more Help? Finding more step by step instructions is simple and easy. Here are some sites to get you started.

When are Your Customers on Facebook?

When are your customers or leads most likely to be on Facebook? A recent study by Frank N. Magid Associates Generational Strategies study surveyed consumers of various ages about their media usage throughout the day.  The Baby boomers ages 47-65 where the most likely to be on Facebook between 9am-5 pm during the work day. The Gen X generation tended to view Facebook the most between 5pm-11pm. The Adult Millennials ages 18-34 were on Facebook most of the day between 9am to 8pm making them the most likely group to be on Facebook and use Facebook. The Teen Millennials and iGen the younger generations tended to visit Facebook the most between 5pm-8pm.  Finding the best time to post and be seen on your social networks can depend on what generation you are trying to target. This survey is just one thing to think about as you market to Niches and different age groups on Facebook.

Lead Generation in a New Generation

Generating leads is more than just having a few advertisements. Lead generation has come into a new generation of defining a brand. Allowing prospects and customers to view a business from multiple view points and receiving a fuller vision of what your business does and its values and ethics. The ability to use SEO to be found, create engagement and socialize using social media all contribute to driving leads. John Jantsch the author of Duct Tape Marketing says it best, “In a way social media has become the ultimate referral vehicle. Throw ratings and reviews into the social mix and you’ve pretty much round out the new face of lead generation.” Once you start to see the possibilities of lead generation in this new platform the opportunities are endless. Using the internet with classical advertising, social media, SEO, and other marketing material is a job in itself. If you need help or just have a few questions don’t hesitate to contact AIMS. This is what AIMS is here for, to create solid lead generating programs using multiple facets of marketing. Check us out online at www.implmentnow.org, Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

The New Secret to Implementing AR or Firefly Campaigns

It has been kept hush-hush in the offices of some of the top insurance agencies all over the US. AR and Firefly customers like you have been waiting for something like this since they purchased their marketing systems.
The new secret to implementing your AR or firefly campaigns can help you control your brand, as well as personalize and test marketing campaigns. It can also be automated to eliminate daily paper pushing in office processing, and because this is an internet based secret it will save you time and money too.
This new opportunity is your new marketing department. It implements all of those campaigns Lucas Jans has been telling you about. Don’t let the opportunity to make money slip through your fingers because you haven’t had time to work on your marketing campaigns. Get all of the Agency Revolution benefits by using the tools offered to you.
What is the big Secret?
AIMS Alternative Insurance Marketing Solutions. AIMS business is to increase the flow of new business into your agency automatically and painlessly. You don’t have to learn new software, or attend training after training sessions. We’ll do it for you saving you time and money.  Let AIMS actively implement your marketing systems for you. Alternative Insurance Marketing Solutions specializes in Insurance agency marketing. They understand Insurance agencies and Insurance Marketing. AIMS is committed to enhancing your agencies experience with Agency Revolution and to make you more money and save you time.
To get in on the Secret go to www.implementnow.orgwww.implementnow.org or call 401-400-AIMS. Stop wasting time and start implementing your marketing campaigns today!

Cheri was instrumental in helping me implement several   marketing campaigns to bring new customers to our business and helping nurture and upsell current customers. I would highly recommend her to anyone who would like to get their marketing programs off and running.

Tammy Lesueur Bancorp Insurance ~ La Pine OR

RIP Steven P. Jobs

I think we can all say thank you to the late Steven P. Jobs who passed away Wednesday at the age of 56. His personal contribution to the world of computing and digital media is staggering. Mr. Jobs helped guide in an era of personal computing, changed the way we listen to music, view movies, and connect with technology and each other with mobile communications. Mr. Jobs was not just a great leader he was a great marketer. Without Mr. Jobs marketing talents we might be living in a world where Apple Co. never left the garage. Selling user friendly interfaces and marketing easy to use technology for everyone he paved the way for how we all market today. He did not wait for the consumer to tell him what they wanted. Mr. Jobs showed them what they wanted and continued to raise the bar of excellence in all of his company’s products. If there is anything we can all learn from Steven P. Jobs is with persistence, drive, and a big dream we can all change the world one sale at a time.  

Benefits of Automated Marketing

Control the Brand – Alternative Insurance Marketing Solutions enables users to customize content and imagery within marketing materials to maintain the company’s brand.
Launch Intelligent Marketing – Intelligent marketing helps produce customized campaigns in an automated approach without lengthy and tedious creative processes. Marketing material can be verified in A B split testing, mass produced for your market or personalized for the ultimate customer experience.
Automate Marketing Processes – Automate in office paper pushing and time consuming prospect/lead/customer processing and nurturing.
Enable Personalization – Improve customer engagement with personalized marketing campaigns that use rules, tasks, and fulfillment’s to deliver content to each recipient. Personalized postcards, emails, or landing page PURL campaigns are sure to drive results.
Reduce Costs – Significantly reduce costs by automating marketing processes, streamlining marketing workflows, and keep personnel overhead at a minimum. The ability to create customized marketing pieces on demand, considerably reduce overall marketing costs.
Decrease Time to Market – Reduce the time to implement marketing materials by allowing AIMS to build and automate processes quickly and efficiently.  

What can Rotary Do for your Business?

Most of you know about Rotary, but what does Rotary do for your business? Rotary is a collective of business leaders within a community who want to make a positive difference at home and abroad. Clubs are nonpolitical, nonreligious, and open to all cultures, races, and creeds. Rotary clubs normally meet once a week to share business news and to give updates on projects the club is working on. Not only is this a great way to volunteer and give back to your community you also get the networking benefits. There are over 33,000 clubs and more than 1.2 million members worldwide making Rotary one of the largest social business networks in the world. Why is Rotary such a big deal? Well similar to many things in life it is not what you know in business it is who you know. Contact a local club and be a guest at a weekly meeting. Remember all clubs are different so check out more than one in your town before deciding which one is right for you. Check out this link to start finding a Rotary Club near you.

Managing Your Sales Team

Managing a sales team is difficult for every small business owner. One way AIMS has supported one small business in managing their sales staff is by creating automatic daily sale call prompts. This simple but effective prompt reminds sales staff to call prospects and sell!  
Daily sale call prompts alerts a sales representative with a prospects name and phone number with a short message informing the sales representative to contact the prospect. After the phone call has been made an easy to use drop down button allows the sales representative to select from a variety of options on the outcome of the phone conversation. This allows for monitoring and measuring how effective each sales associate is at cold calling and collecting information.
One AIMS customer tried this service on one agent within their sales team. It was so effective soon each sales associate on staff had an automatic daily sales call prompt. The small business owner felt the daily sale call prompts gave each staff member a task to be completed immediately. It helped to ensure prospects were not being shoved to the edges of the desk.
If you have more questions about how daily sales call prompts can be used in your business contact AIMS at 401-400-2467.