QR Codes means Quick Response. I’m assuming you already have seen examples on web pages or in magazines, but these tools have yet to meet the mainstream. How can you use QR Codes as part of a viral marketing strategy?

I will show you how we do it.

Small Box had a lead generation tool called the Free SEO Score Card. Over the year that we ran the program, it helped us land many new clients who wanted to use Small Box SEO Services. Let’s say we wanted to take that same service viral using QR Codes for a limited time.

Want it to go viral? Add that same QR Code to your Twitter pictures, your Facebook photos, make it embeddable.

Want to go guerilla? Put it on fliers, stickers, or on the side of a car.

Never done a QR before? Google is your friend, find an app for your smart phone and try it out. And then call Small Box at 317-254-0932 and let’s come up with some ideas on how we can use QR Codes to build your business.

Now if you have a QR Reader for the iPhone or Android platform, take a picture of the above image and it will take you to the Small Box SEO special. For this demonstration there is a limited time offer, but it captures lead information who would be suitable for ongoing marketing and added to our CRM.

If you have been following Small Box and what we do, you are probably aware of Musical Family Tree. Every year South by Southwest (SXSW) holds a festival in three parts. The Interactive sessions focus on all things tech. The Music sessions combine industry conversations with hundreds of musical performances. The Film sessions screen independent movies and hold panels about the developments in the industry.

Well this year PJ Christie (the anchor for Small Box Austin) and Jeb Banner (founder of MFT) are hoping to present New Communities and Influence in the Digital Era.

We could use your help. SXSW is allowing public input via its PanelPicker, so if you would take a moment to sign up, give us a big thumb’s up on the page, and maybe even leave a comment, that would be great. Thanks.

In May of 2010, Small Box was approached by IndyLift, Inc. for help improving search engine ranking and overall visibility for the IndyLift website.  The following is a summary of the IndyLift Case Study which outlines our process and the results achieved.

IndyLift, Inc. is a local Indianapolis forklift dealer, providing material handling equipment, parts, repairs and services.  As seasoned and established experts in the material handling industry, IndyLift focuses on offering personal, high quality service and care.

However, before coming to Small Box, the IndyLift website did not incorporate Search Engine Optimization (SEO) techniques and as a result suffered from poor search engine visibility and only ranked moderately for a small number of keywords.

After a consultation with IndyLift, we were able to identify two goals for the IndyLift website;

1. Increase organic search visibility
2. Increase local maps visibility.

After determining these goals, we then embarked on a 5-phase strategy to meet those goals;

1. Keyword research
2. SEO Audit
3. On-site optimization
4. Off-site optimization
5. Local listing optimization

A few weeks after completing the implementation of our SEO strategy, IndyLift began to see substantial improvement in both organic search rankings and local map inserts.  IndyLift now holds the top position in the Google map insert for ‘indianapolis forklifts’ and two of the top three organic positions.  Anyone searching for forklifts in Indianapolis will find IndyLift quite hard to miss.

To learn more about our process and results for IndyLift, Inc., download the full IndyLift Case Study.

If your business has a physical location where customers can walk in and conduct transactions, you probably already know about the power of Google Local. But April 20th brought the switch from Google Local to Google Places. What does it mean for your business?

If you are doing everything correctly, probably everything will continue to work as normal. But what if you have never really completely implemented your local search optimization? How do you know if you require professional Local SEO Services?

Here is a checklist to make sure your local customers can find you:

step 1 – Search for your service. Most services will show local results complete with map and other important information. If you are not there you might need professional local search services.

step 2 – Search for your competitors. If they appear ahead of you, then you are losing business. Small Box SEO can definitely help with that.

step 3 – Assess your PPC. If you are spending money each month for clicks, and not converting those clicks to paying customers, then Small Box can improve your results, or help you replace that traffic with better converting organic results.

step 4 – Search for your company on a mobile device. Mobile technology is driving business. If mobile devices are sending people to the wrong location, then you have lost a customer. Small Box executes your local strategy completely, with zero problems for you.

step 5 – Understand your audience by viewing your statistics. Your audience is telling you important things about your site. Are you listening?

It makes a lot of sense for any business to try and manage as much as possible in house. But when it comes to connecting locally in your community, why leave loose ends? The businesses that have 100 % of their profile complete are going to win the battle for Local SEO.

Don’t take chances, Contact Small Box in Austin at 512-850-4819 or Indianapolis at 317-254-0932.

People talk a lot about the power of social media. Mostly it’s just talk, no real examples. Here’s one.

The Small Box offices are above Qdoba here in lovely Broad Ripple, Indianapolis. If you step out on our “deck” (aka the roof access we have at Small Box) you have a 25% of chance of being blasted by smoke from their grills. Ah….nothing like chicken grease in the morning!

Up to recently you were also likely to hear their questionable music mix softly blasting through the floorboards of our main room where I happen to sit with 3-4 other team members every weekday.

Everyday…the same songs by Tom Petty…3 Doors Down…Coldplay…The Fray….ugh. It was the bane of our existence. We mockingly sang along in falsettos and I even got a mix CD of Qdoba music for Christmas from Karl Hosttetler (very funny Karl).

(Crazy thing is we continued to routinely order from Qdoba. Hey, it’s good stuff! One visit would be to grab a burrito, another to complain about the noise. Maybe a good thing we can see them make our food!)

Keep in mind that Small Box happens to be run by a bunch of music nerds. People that pride themselves on thinking they know a thing or two about music and will probably tell you as much over drinks if you are ever so “lucky”. So this wasn’t just a pet peeve but a serious issue (at least in our snobby minds).

So, we tried to get them to turn down, repeatedly. We went down and talked to them, had the landlord call the owner, called them almost daily “I really do love Tom Petty but I just can’t hear American Girl another time…please turn it down!”. They said it was corporate policy, no dice, had to be this loud.

We even thought about moving and we really love the space. We love being in the middle of Broad Ripple. But the music was driving us crazy. People were working from home to avoid it. Something had to break.

Then it happened.

Jerry Hellmann, one of the guys that was enduring the daily onslaught of Celine Dion, posted a comment on Qdoba’s Central Indiana Facebook Page. Here’s what he posted:

“Qdoba! I have the absolute BEST Christmas gift you could give to your customers!! Please, PLEASE turn down or change that terrible VH1 classic, 10 song muzak playlist that is rumbling my floor! I work above your Broad Ripple office and I’m considering seeing a psychiatrist because of this. A man can only take so mu…ch of hootie’s “i only want to be with you” and the painfully horrible “Rockabye”…..last but not least……the office favorite…..Annie Lennox’s “no more i love you’s”. Please Qdoba, have mercy on us all. Turn down that horrible sound….our ears won’t stop bleeding. NO JOKE – Train’s “Drops of Jupiter” just started playing. GOD HELP US!!!!!!!!!!!“
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/pages/QDOBA-Central-Indiana/189858001092?v=wall&ref=mf

The next day we had a representative from the Qdoba corporate office at our door. She was there to drop off a gift certificate for Jerry who was out at the time. PJ and I had her sit down and listen to the music wafting through the floors. We begged her, please! fix it!

…and they did. We can no longer here Qdoba’s finely tuned, demographically targeted music mix. We can actually sit quietly and think. They have put in new speakers that no longer broadcast into our room. We have been saved!

Thank you Jerry!
Thank you Facebook!
and yes, thank you Qdoba!

The end of 2009 is upon us! What a year, a year that will be measured for many as a consistent gut-check and the impact of some very difficult financial decisions on every level. As we draw to a close, let’s examine some opportunities you might have to share any personal or company income.

Click and Give

Small Box has been fortunate enough to be a part of some really great non-profits. One goal of each of them is to make it easy to donate money through the site, please consider supporting these awesome organizations:

Second Helpings – Food Rescue in Indianapolis
Y-press – Youth Journalism
Keep Indianapolis Beautiful
College Avenue Neighborhood Development Organization – Smart Growth
Cheer Guild – Gifts for Riley Kids
4-H Foundation – Support the Mission in Indiana
Rock for Riley – Riley Children’s Charity

Buy Now

And with the Christmas shopping season upon us, more of you are shifting to online purchases. We’ve worked with several e-tailers on their web and encourage you to visit their sites.

Good Earth – Shoes, Vitamins, Beauty and more
Taste of Indiana – Indiana Gift Baskets
Kipp Toys – Wholesale Party Supplies
All Natural Lip Balm – Chop Saver
Giant Fortune Cookies – Big Cookies, Custom Fortunes
Time Factory Publishing- 2010 Wall Calendars

Planning for 2010

Maybe your business is sitting on big profits for the year and you need to spend it? If so Internet Marketing consistently provides measurable returns on your investment. If you have spent the year cutting budgets for your marketing, let’s get some positive planning for you in 2010.

Whether you are a non-profit, online retailer, or interested in ramping up your web visibility next year, you can e-mail sales@smallboxweb.com or call us at 317-254-0932.

The Small Box and Second Helpings team have just launched the new Second Helpings website! This was an all night, 24 hour job starting at 1pm yesterday. The new website was designed, built, optimized for search and launched in 24 hours! I knew we could do websites quickly but this blew away everything prior. The site looks great, works great, has a customized Small Box Content Management System powering it and should serve this great Indianapolis nonprofit for years and years to come.

Check it out!
www.secondhelpings.org
follow the play by play during development on
www.24hourwebproject.com

Seth Godin writes

It’s a good question, here’s how I would answer:

The web seems really complicated but not to me. I just see it as a series of decisions that require particular expertise to do correctly. The best decision is the one that makes the next one seem more apparent. There is never going to be one person who is right about everything all the time. What’s important in doing a web site, or marketing strategy, or making any series of decisions is to make each one as close to right as you can so the next one is clearer.

We do that by first and foremost attracting the top talent in the region. Then we challenge them to do more, to understand the implications of these important decisions. Then we provide what we hope to be the top level of customer service for our clients.

The results are clear to me, some are big and some are small. I take a small amount of pride in knowing that we are growing while other web companies are going out of business or shrinking. But what I take the most pride above all is the relationships that I have built with those in the box with me, and the way we extend it to our clients. Of the huge number of sites we have helped produce, 99% of them are still online exactly as we launched them.

Key to our growth is the way we have extended our services beyond designing and programming websites. It is a complete array of services our clients need, and some they don’t. That’s the real Small Box difference right there, whatever people think they know about us, there is more.