LocalPinch hits 50!

. . . 50 companies offering gift certificates on LocalPinch, that is!

That may not seem like a large number, but we’re pretty enthused.  Here’s why:

1. All of our partners selling gift certificates on LocalPinch.com are organically-sourced.  We don’t pull deals from big discounters like Groupon, or list coupons we’ve found elsewhere on the web.  All of the gift certificates listed on LocalPinch.com were created and managed by the owners and operators of businesses who want to work with us.
2. Starting out, our mission was to help local small companies find and do business with customers near them.  LocalPinch now offers gift certificates from companies in major cities like New York and Chicago, all the way to small towns like La Vergne, TN, and Gloucester City, NJ.
3. We also wanted to provide a breadth of services for customers to find, and we are affiliated with everyone from piano teachers, to home cleaners, to personal trainers, and more.
4. Finally, we wanted to be flexible in how we provided value to our partners – whether a business had an established web presence already and just wanted another footprint, or wanted a LocalPinch profile to be your entire e-commerce presence, we’ve successfully worked with both types.

While we’re excited to be off on such a good foot, and to have 50 partners at this phase of development is exciting, our real value to you, whether a business owner or customer, comes from volume.   The more businesses we can partner with on our site, the easier it is for us to bring new customers in and offer great products and services.

So if you run a small business, or you know someone who does, we would greatly appreciate you letting them know about us!  Please drop us a line at contact@localpinch.com if you’d like to get in touch!

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Companies need to be willing to train employees again

There was an interesting article in the Wall Street Journal a while ago that put current US jobless rate in perspective, and honed in on a very important change in the way employees are sought.

Essentially, training programs are disappearing, and companies are looking for candidates with the ability to start a job and require no training or additional knowledge.  This is causing a huge disconnect between the employers, who are cited as being unable to find “qualified” candidates, and job seekers, who are seeing record levels of unemployment.

The author correctly points out that the employers’ issue is not one of having a market shortage of qualified employees, but rather an inability to find perfect candidates at prices they are willing to pay.   As the economy slowly comes out of its extended slumber, companies are going to have to re-evaluate they way they source their candidates, and the training they are willing to provide.  The “perfect candidates” are going to be picked up by the employers willing to pay the salaries needed to attract them, and other companies need to be willing to hire smart candidates with the ability to learn a job with proper training.  Otherwise, those candidates will be snatched up by employers willing to offer this.

Going away will be the graduate degree-toting unpaid interns.  Companies that offer the recently forgotten management training and apprenticeship-type programs are the ones who will find the most value from their “un-perfect” (but more affordable) employees.

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Social Media Tips For Small Businesses: YouTube and LinkedIn

Happy Holidays!

Since we took some time off from the blog, we’re coming back with a two-fer, and giving some social media ideas for two different, but important platforms:

YouTube

• Read the comments on your YouTube page (assuming you have one).  As with Facebook and Twitter, customers and viewers can interact with your material on YouTube.  Keep an eye out for, and respond to consumer issues on YouTube as well.
• Use YouTube as an extension of your website.  YouTube pages are customizable, so if you plan to involve YouTube more aggressively in your marketing, it should be customized to match the look and feel of your website.
• Share YouTube content with media and bloggers.  Here the goal is to entice these individuals to distribute your video content as well as the story.
• Hopefully your business won’t come to this, but YouTube is a good addition to a crisis response strategy.  Videos in response to a crisis can help add a human element to a crisis response; answering questions and calming fears.

LinkedIn

• Sync with Twitter/Blog/other posts from SM (You can now post status updates to company pages as an admin).  LinkedIn company pages are good places to cross-post content.  LinkedIn typically attracts a unique subset of visitors, in particular job searchers, who may give a company expanded reach.
• Include a link to your LinkedIn profile in emails, and on your website, etc.
• Encourage visitors to follow your company profile, and leave reviews for products under the product tab, again to reach a different group from the Facebook and Twitter crowd.

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Social Media Tips for Small Businesses: Company Blog

One of the best ways a small business can get itself out there is with a blog.  Unlike Facebook and Twitter, which limit you to small bits of information and links, a blog is a chance to promote your expertise in a more thorough manner.

A few tips:

• Have a blog strategy.  Think: What do we hope to accomplish?  Informing? Entertaining? Covering specific subject areas?  How do we make our blog a valuable read?

• Make a blog impactful and interesting; something that a reader will want to return to day after day.
  Use bookmarking sites such as StumbleUpon, Delicious, etc. to expand distribution.

• Reference the company blog on other SM outlets such as Facebook and Twitter to pull more readers to your “richer” content.

• Consider having an owner/manager blog.  A number of prominent business leaders have blogs, including Mark Cuban, Bob Parsons, Craig Newmark, Dave Sifry, and Marc Andreessen.  This gives a more personal face to the company, and can offer the owners’ individual expertise and perspective.

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Social Media Tips for Small Businesses: Twitter

Part 2!  Here are some best practices for using your company’s Twitter account to encourage engagement:

1. Follow, and be followed by useful and influential people in the industry or area, or within customer groups you seek to engage, or who are going to be interested in your content.
2. Be an expert on something – and link to any publications and videos you may have produced.  There is little point in creating content if it isn’t going to be pushed out.
3. Run deals and promotions – or link to your facebook page if you’re running a deal there.
4. Follow your competition.  Twitter is a great way to keep tabs on competing businesses.  See what they are posting about, what products they are launching, and what their customers are saying.
5. Follow other industry news.  Use Twitter to keep up not only with competitors, but also with general industry goings-on.  Especially useful if material is valuable to your own followers and can be redistributed.

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Social Media Tips For Small Businesses: Facebook

In the spirit of the holidays, LocalPinch will be providing a 3-part series on best practices in using social media.

Every business should have a social media presence, even if just a simple one.  Depending on the resources your small business has available, your ability to follow through with full campaigns may be difficult, so try and maximize the value from your posts, and take advantage of cross-sharing your content throughout your channels, such as blog, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and more.

To kick off, here is a rapid-fire list of tips for using your business’s Facebook page:

1. Encourage interaction with your posts!  Likes and comments will help posts appear in others’ newsfeeds.
2. Each and every post should give fans a reason to engage.
3. Consider having regularly scheduled “themes”.  For example, Bonobos, the men’s clothing site, posts several times a day, focusing on different topics each day of the week.  Monday covers men’s style, Wednesdays are an open forum for questions, etc.
4. Don’t focus on “making a sale” or forcing content down the throat of your audience.  Facebook should be about engagement and conversation.
5. Ensure that the company blog, Twitter, email signature, and even print materials include links and call to actions to join the Facebook page (and the same should be reciprocated with the other platforms).
6. Run contests on your Facebook page.  Great for building customer interaction and return visitors.  Something Orbitz already does a nice job of.
7. Build loyalty to your Facebook fan base through advance access to information or perks, or exclusive specials, contests, or products.  Consider even allowing fans to make insignificant company decisions to feel even more involved.
8. Ask questions.  Facebook users can often be a brand’s most loyal customers, and a company can get valuable feedback simply by asking.
9. Find out what you can measure besides simply the number of “likes” or impressions.  Facebook is about engaging, but WHY are we engaging our fans?

Stay tuned – next we’ll be giving a rundown of how to get the most bang out of Twitter!

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Groupon Review: How much does the web like or dislike Groupon?

UPDATE: After an entire week of scoring and 45 Google Alerts the final score comes in at 23 Good Alerts and 22 Bad Google Alerts. We scored new competitors as bad but we also scored any press about Groupon that was fairly neutral (like just a report about their stock being really active) as good with the thought that any press is good press. I think in the end having an almost 50/50 split in the press with good and bad articles probably means that your company has had some foibles but you are paving a new path. There are bound to be some of those. Expecially with Wall St looking over your shoulder. truth is – I think that Groupon is in it for the long haul. I think we are going to see lots of acquisitions from this company, investments in innovation and new takes on their existing product that are going eventually bring this 23/22 number much more in the positive.

I follow Groupon updates with Google Alerts because the company has always been such an incredible story from the very beginning. It has had a meteoric rise, shunned $6 Billion from Google (No we don’t need it you jerks. Thank you very much!) and now the media and consumers feel sort of hot or cold on Groupon. Their IPO was huge then it sort of tanked and now it is sort of coming back. I think everyone on Wall Street wants to see how they do for the holidays. So for this week I am just going to see how many positive and negative articles are delivered in my Google alerts (choosing to receive only the best updates sends 10 alerts per day) and I am going to make a scorecard. I think this will show at least for this week what the web really thinks of them and if we get a good response we can keep tracking. OK, here goes!

Monday, December 12th, 5 Good / 5 Bad

Tuesday, December 12th, 7 Good/ 3 Bad

Today was mostly good. Lots of news about the stock price but also praise for great deals they have that are original and cool. Some of the articles were not good or bad so we just gae those good ratings because having someone write an article about your business is good in itself.

Wednesday, December 14th 4 Good/5 Bad

Thursday, December 15th 4 Good/ 6 Bad

Friday, December 16th, 2012 3 Good/3 Bad

For Friday I only got 6 relevant Google Alerts. but in general I think that Friday’s news is good for Groupon. They finished the week at $23.04 per share, which is up 15 percent from their IPO of $20. Analyts were waiting to see how they fared for the holidays and it seems they have done really well. I also think we should look at how they do all the way up to the holidays because online gift certificates like Groupons are great last minute gifts.

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120 Years of Vogue Magazine is now online for your viewing pleasure

Vogue Magazine has uploaded their entire catalog of magazines to the web in a searchable index and if you want access to this magum opus of fashion it only costs $1,575.

According to Mashable “It contains every page of every U.S. issue of Vogue published since the magazine launched in 1892, indexed and searchable. A yearly individual subscription is $1,575.”

A little Internet marketing commentary here – why wouldn’t more magazine companies do this? I can think of several titles that would make insta-cash uploading their entire collection of old magazines and sell a subscriptions to the content.

• Sports Illustrated – for sports buffs? they can download the content and print it out. They would love it.
• Sexy mags – Playboy, Penthouse etc. I guarantee if these magazines were to upload their “vintage” content for the world to access for a fee they would see added revenue.
• Trade magazines – create searchable content that is accessed for a fee.
• Golf magazines – all those old tutorials. Guys can comb the archives for tips from their favorite pros.
• WSJ and NYtimes – easy to access research

As the (printed) magazine industry starts to decline magazine titles need to find new ways to distribute their content. Other than new issues for Ipads, and phones etc. why not monetize the old content for avid readers.

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Blagojevich Sentencing – too harsh or just right?

There is a big debate in Chicago these days about the Rod Blagojevich sentencing that went down yesterday. Some people think that he got what he deserved while others think it was too much. So that made me think – what are some of the sentences for other major crimes compared to what Blago got?

First of all – lets review what he was convicted of. “Over the course of two trials, Blagojevich was convicted of 18 criminal counts involving the attempted sale of the U.S. Senate seat vacated by Barack Obama, illegal shakedowns for campaign cash and lying to federal agents.” Basically this all adds up to Corruption which is a no no when you are a governor.

Here are some of the crimes happening in your neighborhood everyday and the typical sentences

Sex Crimes like Rape and assault get about 6 to 7 years.

Burglary -” approximately one third of all defendants convicted in state courts are sentenced to probation” according to a leading law website I researched.”

Arson – “It is estimated that property losses due to arson exceed $2 billion each year. In the federal criminal system, the average sentence for arson is just over 7 years.”

Bank Robbery – bank robberies tend to be all over the place but it looks like the sentence is about 30 years.

It all depends on US Federal Sentencing Guidelines but it seems to me that 14 years a bit much for someone that didn’t really DO anything. He never actually got the money for Obama’s seat, but he did talk about getting that money. I definitely think he should have been impeached and probably fined and most likely sentenced for some time. But 14 years (in my opinion) is a little severe.

Federal Prosecutor Pat Fitzgerald wants to “make an example” of Blago but I don’t think you can do that with someone’s life.  Other opinions please comment.

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Albert Pujols to Angels for $250 Million: Bad for Everyone Involved

Good gravy.

As a Cubs fan, I can’t say I’m not happy Albert Pujols will no longer be terrorizing the NL Central.  I can’t say I’m not happy that Cardinals fans feel hurt, betrayed, and rejected.  However, this deal is no good for anyone involved.

Here’s why it’s bad for the Cubs:

1.  The Cardinals were good enough to win the World Series last year with Pujols hurt for a stretch, their best starting pitcher (Adam Wainwright) out for the season, key position players out for various parts of the year with injuries, and a retread bullpen that went through about four different closers who were all fired for being completely inept until getting to Jason Motte at the end of the season.  This means the Cardinals are probably still going to be pretty good this season.

2.  And now the Cardinals have money to spend.  Is getting a Kendrys Morales, Prince Fielder, or Carlos Pena really that much different than having Fat Albert manning 1st base?  Well, yes, but now they have the opportunity to go solidify every other position on their field.

3.  It makes the price for Prince Fielder even higher.  With Pujols out of the picture, Fielder is the last elite free agent left, and the Cubs really need to grab him.  Unfortunately, if I were Fielder, I’d be looking at that fat contract for Fat Albert and thinking, “hmm. . .he’s a lot older than me, and starting to get injured, and he got $250 MM?  Yeah, that sounds about right for me too”.

Here’s why it’s bad for the Angels:

1.  He might be several years older than his purported 31.  Let’s say he’s 34 in real life.  Do you really want to pay this guy $25 million a year from ages 40-44?  He’ll be swinging at the ball with his cane!

2.  Uh, you’ve already got two good first basemen.  Kendrys Morales, when healthy, can be one of the top 1st basemen in the league.  When he’s not, Mark Trumbo can fill in and give you 25 HR and 100 RBI.

3.  It’s the other parts of your lineup that need improving.  Vernon Wells is terrible, Alberto Callaspo had a lucky year, and the bullpen other than rookie Jordan Walden and Scott Downs is pretty bad.  In the same vein, the Angels picked up CJ Wilson to make their already great starting pitching even better.  The Angels might have to field a team of all starting pitchers and first basemen at this rate.

4.  The price tag.  We’ve seen what happens when players get paid too much:  A-Rod with Texas – team goes bankrupt, Soriano with the Cubs – team’s hands are tied for years, Barry Zito with the Giants – pitched so poorly and inconsistently he actually brought more value to the team on the frequent occasions he was injured.

Here’s why it’s bad for the Cardinals:

1.  Yes, you now have a lot of free-agent cash to blow, but other than Fielder, you’ll be settling for a downgrade at 1st base.

2. Duh.  You lost Albert Pujols.  Unlike, say, Stan Musial, who became a Cardinals legend not only for his great play but also his tenure and loyalty, Pujols pulled a LeBron James and jumped ship to the highest bidder.  Fans will be upset – this is thousands of jerseys they’ll have to burn.

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