June 28, 2019

7 Tips to Improve Your Branding (That You Can Start Today)

Branding can sound scary, especially to those who don’t fully understand what all goes into it. But improving your branding can be as simple as making sure everything is consistent, all the way up to making sure your voice, colors, logo, and look all tell the story of your business.

JSL Marketing & Web Design loves finding the unique ‘why’ of our clients, which is why we love branding so much! It is one of the ways you can show the world who you are, what you do, and (most importantly) why.

Need a shortened version of the above? Here’s a simple definition of ‘branding’ by Entrepreneur.com and Google’s dropdown feature snippet.

Now, let’s find out how we can improve your branding with just a few steps – steps you can even start today!

1. Your Logos

First, you need to decide on a logo design, one you absolutely love and will never part from (at least, until you rebrand/redesign your style). After you’ve designed and fully committed – you need to stick to it.

Now, this isn’t to say you cannot have a couple of slight variations (inverted colors, emblem or abbreviation vs full name) but it does mean you can’t have a different logo in every location on every page and on every platform. This will confuse customers at best and make you seem unpolished or unprofessional at worst. Branding is all about building trust, and trust comes from consistency.

Remember ‘close enough’ is only for horseshoes and hand grenades.

Check out our logo variations below for a visual example of what we mean:

2. Your Colors

Of course, you probably noticed that all of the JSL Marketing & Web Design logos are in a similar color scheme – that is completely intentional. Because if you suddenly saw our logo in red, it would seem wrong, off, and other.

That is all because of our branding.

We consistently use the same colors, the same fonts, and the same logos to build trust, feelings of dependability, and a professional image.

Now just because you mainly see our green, blue, and white doesn’t mean you have to choose 3 colors and exclusively stick to those, instead, consider having one or two primary colors, a couple secondary ones, and even a couple tertiary ones to use for pops of color or CTAs (calls to action).

See our full color-scheme below:

3. Your Voice

Voice is incredibly important in building your brand online, because one of the main communication forms online is through writing. This means you need a strong angle or a strong ‘style’ of how you write in order to portray your voice through your words, through the screen.

Take the ‘voice’ of three huge digital marketing and SEO teachers of our time – Backlinko, Neil Patel, and Search Engine Journal.

Each is personal to varying degrees, each is educational, and each talk about similar subjects, but there are hard and fast differences between their voices, or, the style in which they speak.

This is important to remember when you are researching your ideal client or customer. Think of how they want to be spoken to, and then make sure your voice matches that demographics needs and wants.

4. Your Look

We’ve talked about the importance of web design before, but it must be mentioned within the realm of branding as well – make your site look nice and function well.

Because no matter your consistency, color scheme or voice – if your site is a flop, then your business will be a flop.

Most online users judge your company from your website, so make sure you aren’t losing their business from an aesthetic standpoint before you ever get the chance to win it.

5. Your Content Plan

Your visibility is important, and one of the best ways to ‘get out there’ is with a content plan. This can include updates to your website’s copy, blogs, email marketing, eBooks, white pages, fact sheets, infographics, and more.

But what’s most important to remember is that content is king and putting out quality content will show you as a thought leader, and a brand that gives value through its content and knowledge.

An innovative brand that writes worth-while content? That will certainty breed some serious trust in your customer base.

6. Your Social Media

This is actually a subsection of content marketing, but it deserves its own spot due to its importance. Make sure your social media’s branding is just as polished as your website’s and make sure you are consistent in voice, logo, colors, style, and even posting schedule.

Social media is a great way to get your brand out there and increase your brand awareness. If you are a new company, then consider starting off with some paid ads to get in front of your customer base. This can be especially great if you are just starting an SEO strategy and need leads fast, since SEO can take more time to see results than PPC ads.

7. And (Of Course) SEO

We’ve been dancing around it for the last few tips, so surely you knew we’d end up here. But it is true – branding needs SEO to truly thrive.

From content marketing to web design that converts, to social media posts and blogs that are targeted and optimized, you need SEO if you’re online.

If branding interests you (or content marketing, web design, or simply SEO in general) then contact JSL Marketing & Web Design today!

We have created in-depth brand books for clients, logo designs, website, and social media plans that perfectly mesh with their desired tone, voice, and company culture.

Give us a try and see what we can do for your company and brand!

June 28, 2019

How I Deal with Success & Imposter Syndrome [5 Tactics]

Did you know that Psychology Today’s very first tip in achieving and dealing with success has to do exclusively with imposter syndrome?

That’s because people often feel that they do not deserve the success they have received – this usually goes one of three ways:

They fight the undeserving feeling so hard they ultimately reverse it, becoming big-headed. This leads them to feel that they deserve every bit of success they have, and that success is owed to them. This isn’t an ideal situation, as it breeds arrogance, egotism, and entitlement.
They fully fall into imposter syndrome and feel that they are not worthy of their success, have not done enough, and become afraid that others will realize they are ‘a fraud’. Their fear of being found out and the guilt that the carry wears them down and ultimately leads to poor decisions and poor self-esteem. This is also not ideal, as it goes far too far in the opposite direction.
They accept that their success is a mix of their hard work and luck, or, both their efforts (which they fully control) and opportunity (which is less controlled). This leads to a healthy balance between owning your success and being grateful for it. This is the ideal, as it breeds a heart of gratitude, giving, but still leaves room to be proud of your hard work and its ultimate payoff.

But how do you become that third type? How do you make sure that neither arrogance nor imposter syndrome takes hold?

Well, for starters, you can follow the same five tips that I did when my company skyrocketed to the forefront of the DFW digital marketing and web design industry – a hugely competitive market that JSL Marketing & Web Design has been dominating for years.

1. Remember Your Failures – They Can Teach You

Remember that one failure that really sticks with you. Maybe you tried to start a business and it flopped. Maybe you tried to get a big sale and you lost them. Maybe you tried to learn a new skill just to discover it was much harder than you expected. Maybe you even worked for a company and it ultimately wasn’t a good fit – whatever your ‘failure’ was – hang onto that memory.

You can use this as a way to stay humble, as well as a lesson. There is something to learn from every situation, whether it be a win or a loss, and remembering to always look for that lesson is the first step in becoming successful (and ultimately, dealing with that success).

2. Remember Your Wins, Too – They Can Motivate You

The inverse of the above tip is true too – your successes are great lessons and great motivators as well. Make sure you don’t ruminate on your failures so much you forget about your big wins.

Remember, in order to be ‘type number three’ from above, it’s all about balance. Balancing your hard work with gratitude, and your acknowledgment of failures with successes!

3. Comparing Helps No One – So, Don’t Do It

You will probably never be Bill Gates or Steve Jobs – and that’s okay.

But comparing yourself (to those above or below) isn’t healthy and helps no one. Comparing yourself to those less successful will simply inflate your ego and comparing yourself to those more successful will dishearten you.

The only person you should ever compare yourself to – is your past self. And make sure you blow them out of the water!

4. Don’t Advertise Your Success (& Don’t Hide It)

Here is yet another tip that directly related to balance – don’t shout your success, and don’t hide it. Your success isn’t the entirety of you, which is why you shouldn’t advertise it as if it was, but it is still a part of you, which means you shouldn’t hide it.

Instead of taking one of these two extremes, let your success be a small part of your overall self. Meaning, it can come up at times, it can be acknowledged at times, but it isn’t the only conversation piece or tried-and-true small talk topic you have in your arsenal.

Lucky & Grateful VS Undeserving & Pretending

This is where it all comes to a head, isn’t it?

Ultimately, you should feel lucky and grateful for your success, not undeserving and pretending, or arrogant and entitled. If you focus on having a grateful heart and a thankful outlook, then you will be able to avoid both imposter syndrome and the possibility of straining your neck by how large your head gets.

Find the Healthy Balance Between Owning Your Success & Being Grateful for it

If you want to learn more about my company, myself, or read more articles written by me, stay tuned as my personal website www.JamesLeff.com will be launching soon.

Want to jump right into Sales Coaching or Business Consulting? Contact me here!

June 21, 2019

Beat Your Competition with These 7 SEO Strategies [Outrank, Outlast, Outsmart]

Beating the competition is the name of the game in SEO, and luckily, JSL Marketing & Web Design has a great track record for doing just that.

In fact, why don’t you think back to when you first found us. How did it happen? Most likely, you searched something like ‘Dallas SEO’ or ‘SEO company Dallas’ or even ‘Dallas digital marketing agency’.

Do you know what all of those SERPs have in common?

Us.

And we made it to those top spots because we are good at beating the competition. And now we’ll tell you exactly how we do it.

Look for Longtail Keywords to Target

Though individual keywords still have some place in SEO, it is becoming rarer and rarer for online users to search single words. When is the last time you searched ‘restaurant’? Probably not recently.

So, why are you targeting individual words or short-tail keywords? Instead, search for something that is more meaningful for your business as well as something your ideal consumers are actually searching.

Instead of ‘restaurant’ try ‘tacos in Dallas’ or ‘Mexican food near me’ or ‘best tacos in Dallas near me’. These are all things the JSL team knows people are searching for on a daily basis (mainly, because those are the things we are searching for on a daily basis).

Focus on Your Content

Running right off of #1 – how do you target longtail keywords? Easy, with stellar content.

Google has grown up and learned, meaning it is very hard to trick Google now. So, instead of shady black-hat SEO, do it right – by writing!

Create content that Google and your customers will love, content that has voice, humor, and is informative and comprehensive – dependent on your industry. If you want to be known as the top of your field, then you need to be putting out fresh, valuable content regularly.

This could be blogs, social media, lead magnets, or simply updating your page and the copy on your site frequently.

Read SEO News (& Know About Algorithm Updates)

If you want to beat your competition it will not happen by accident, and that means you need to work hard to be better, to know more, and to implement the things you learn accurately.

You cannot rely on ‘what’s always worked’, instead, be innovative, be creative, and for goodness sake – keep up with the updates, news, and what experts are saying.

The JSL team (while experts in our own right) still spends hours every week on training, research, and learning new techniques. Because if you want to be the best, you have to always keep climbing.

Watch Your Competition’s Backlinks

Backlinks are still incredibly important in SEO and if your competition is gaining backlinks from credible sources – then you can too.

If your online arch-enemy gains a great backlink for their content, or from a guest post, etc, then reach out to that same company for a backlink of your own. Most likely they’ll say yes – after all, they already gave a backlink to another, similar company in your field.

However, if they say no, you need to figure out why. What is the reason that the company who linked to your competition wouldn’t link to you? Do you have thin or cheap content? Less value? Lower domain authority?

Make sure you aren’t just asking for a backlink with nothing in return, but instead, offer their readers or customers something of value from the content you want them to link to.

Watch Their SEO Strategy

Just as you should watch your competitions backlinks, watch their SEO strategy as well. Are they blogging? How often? Posting on social media? How are their engagement numbers? Can you see any jumps or dips when you put their URL into your SEO comparison software?

You can actually use tools to reverse engineer your competition’s SEO strategy, and then see where it might be weaker (or stronger) than your own.

Nothing out there says you have to only learn from SEO gurus like Neil Patel or Brian Dean – you can also learn from your enemies.

Fix Your Errors & Warnings (Every Week)

If you are using an SEO tool like SEMRush, then you will be alerted when your website has any warnings, errors, or misdirects. These can be easy to ignore, or to put off until you have the time to fix them, especially if they aren’t dire – like a warning instead of a full-blown error.

But make no mistake that warnings are noticed, and errors are indexed. Don’t let small things like unresolved broken links, duplicate meta-descriptions or site speed drop you below your competition.

Utilize the awesome SEO tools you have at your disposal and take the time to fix small leaks before they cause your website’s roof to cave in.

Remember, an ounce of prevention is worth a metric ton of cure – or something like that.

Google My Business IS Your Business

GMB, or Google My Business, is a larger deal than you might think. Don’t know if you have it set up? Then simply search your business’ legal name. Is there a box with your information to the right on the SERP?

See our example below:

That box to the right with our picture, location, hours, phone number, reviews and more is our Google My Business, and it is important.

It isn’t enough to just have your analytics set up by your SEO or digital marketing company. The truth is, if your GMB isn’t set up, updated regularly, and healthy, then you are missing out and (most likely) getting beat by your competition, instead of the other way around.

Need SEO help? You aren’t alone! Contact JSL Marketing & Web Design for SEO, Digital Marketing, Web Design, & so much more. If we can beat our SEO & Digital Marketing competition in a pool as saturated as Dallas & Fort Worth, then just imagine what we can do for your business!

June 20, 2019

7 Tips for Work-Life Balance When You Own Your Own Business (With Family)

Work-life balance is something you hear a lot about in our culture. Whether it be because working from home is becoming increasingly common, or because Americans tend to put work above all else, this balance is a delicate and difficult thing – especially when you own a startup with family.

Not only do you feel like you have to put in 16 hours a day 6 days a week due to starting your own business, but you also have the pressures of working and living with the same group, which can muddy the lines between work hours and ‘life’.

Let’s check out my top 7 tips for how I keep my sanity, relationship, and work healthy!

Play to Your Strengths

Everyone has strengths, and those strengths can help or hurt you depending on the situation. For example, one of my strengths is that I am very driven – this is great for being an entrepreneur but can be a weakness if I let it get out of control when it comes to family and life balance.

Understanding that your strengths are also your weaknesses, and then playing to the advantages (not the disadvantages) is important.

Plan Personal Time & Protect it

Here is where the ‘balance’ part of work-life balance comes in – you need to balance your work hours with your personal hours. This doesn’t mean you have to have 8 work hours and 8 personal hours, but it does mean you have to plan. This is unfortunate if scheduling isn’t your thing, but it’s still necessary.

Make sure you not only plan for personal time but protect it as well – just like you would your scheduled work hours. You wouldn’t skip a meeting with a client for the gym, so don’t skip scheduled family time for work emails either.

Priorities (in Work & in Life)

Make sure you know where your priorities are and communicate them with your family. That way – if they start to sway in the wrong direction, you have others who can hold you accountable as well.

My priorities are always family first, then work second, but sometimes when things get hectic this can be hard to remember. It is nice having another advocate for your priorities, in my case, my wife and co-founder of JSL Marketing & Web Design (she’s the ‘S’).

Have a Workspace

Even if you work from home as we do, make sure your entire home isn’t your office. You need a workspace both for productivities sake, but also so you can shut the door and be done with it after your work-hours are over.

If you have a ‘home office’ but its where you always handout, you need to reevaluate so that your work and your life have some separation, even in the same home.

Make Time for Health (Mental, Physical, & Emotional)

Your health (whether you work from home, in an office, or not at all) is important and should be treated so. Your mental health, physical health, and emotional health all need to be nourished and taken care of.

Making time for your health isn’t a wish, it’s a need. And the best work-life balance is one that gives you ample time for physical health, mental health, and to recharge your emotional might.

Make Work Hours & Stick to Them

Yes, just like with personal time and health, this has to deal with scheduling. I find it helpful to make a schedule each week and stick to it as close as possible. I don’t have a ‘master schedule’ for every week, as things often change in my line of work or things come up – but those are important to schedule for too!

Give yourself wiggle room and plan for the unexpected. For example, if you think a meeting will take 30 minutes, put it in your schedule for 45 minutes – that way you won’t feel pressured, but still be using your time efficiently.

Be Realistic in Your Goals, Time, & Needs

This feeds directly from your work hours and schedule above – make sure you give yourself adequate time to meet your deadlines, goals, and needs. There is no point in trying to cram too much in, then realizing you can’t meet the deadlines or goals you’ve set for yourself, getting overly stressed, overly worked, and letting your work hours bleed over into your family or health time.

Being realistic might sound easy, but when you are ambitious, you will often think things can be done faster or sooner than they really can. Make sure you temper your excitement and drive and bring in a healthy dose of skepticism.

Think that project will take 2 weeks? Maybe write it in for 3. Think you can grow by 10% this quarter? Maybe have scaled goals – saying that growth by 10% is an A, but growth by 8% is still a B+, and so on.

Having realistic goals is where many falter, because if you don’t reach for large goals – you aren’t doing all that you can for your business. But if you reach too far, then your family and work-life balance will suffer.

Make sure you take both pitfalls into consideration and communicate with your work (and family) to keep that teeter-totter as balanced as possible.

Are You Feeling Prepared to Win the Work-Life Battle?

It’s okay if you don’t always nail it, in fact, a big part of work-life balance is knowing that you won’t be perfect in either, and working with that, growing through that, and continuing to improve and try.

Sometimes, the work-life teeter-totter will get grounded, but that’s where you reevaluate, pick yourself back up, and try again.

If you find yourself needing help in business more than in life, then contact me to learn about my digital services, business consulting, sales coaching, or speaking engagements. I’d love to connect.

And stay tuned, my own site – JamesLeff.com – is launching soon! Check back in a week for my next article.

June 14, 2019

Understanding Your SEO Analytics & Reporting

SEO analytics and reporting forms and statistics can look like a different language to many clients, but JSL Marketing wants to make sure you understand each decimal, each row, and each abbreviation. Which is why we decided to create a quick and dirty guide to your SEO analytics and reporting.

Let’s dive in.

What Are SEO Analytics?

Not to sound too simple, but this is exactly what you would expect – your analytics give you a breakdown of the analysis of your SEO strategy. Or, it is a report that tells you if your SEO work is working or not.

Think of your SEO analytics like the ongoing version of your initial SEO audit (which is an audit, or inspection, of all of your website’s SEO components).

This means your SEO analytics should come monthly (if not more often) and should explain to you how your website and SEO strategy is working thus far. Of course, SEO isn’t an overnight science, so your analytics might not skyrocket you to the first page immediately, especially if your keywords are competitive, but you should see some jumps fairly soon.

Your Analytics & Reporting Have to Begin [& End] with the Numbers

I know that many people didn’t love statistics class, but analytics and SEO reporting is basically all statistics, charts, and numbers. If that is something you are comfortable with, the hurrah, you may stop reading this, but if you need to be walked through your analytics and reporting – that’s okay too.

Hopefully, your SEO partners or digital marketing company will explain anything you need. But just in case they aren’t clear, or they are so deep into SEO that they don’t realize when they are using too much technical jargon, here are a few places you can go to view your analytics on your own:

Understanding Your Ranking Factors

Did you know there are over 200+ (known and speculated) Google ranking factors? Well, there are. Additionally, this is a decent chunk of your analytics, as slow site speed, errors, or duplicate content will drop your ratings.

Make sure you aren’t just looking at your SEO analytics to see where you fall on the search engine’s results page (SERP) but also how your speed is doing, if you have any 404 errors, warnings, duplicate meta descriptions or thin broken internal or external links.

If you want an in-depth list of all the (known) ranking factors and what they mean, we recommend this comprehensive guide by Backlinko.

Understanding Your SEO Reporting Sections

But if you want to know what you should see in your SEO report each month, it should be something like this:

Title tag report
Keyword report
Meta tag report
Content report
Internal link report
External link report
ALT tag report
Page ranking report
Summary

Of course, this is merely a template, and more (or less) can be in your report depending on your preferences, your company, your goals, and more.

Though some of the above are self-explanatory, and others are linked to educational articles and blog posts, let’s run through them quickly to make sure there is no confusion.

Title Tag Reports & Meta Tag Reports

These reports tell you if you have any title tags (names of pages) or meta tags (summaries of pages) that are duplicate, missing, short, long or do not include your keywords.

Keyword Reports & Content Reports

This will tell you if your keyword density is low, high, or just right, as well as if your content is thin compared to others, and how easily readable it is (it’s readability score).

Internal & External Link Reports

Just as the names sound, this will tell you about your internal links (links that lead to another page within your site, like here) and external links (links that lead to an outside source, like when I linked to those 200 ranking factors from Backlinko).

If you have dead (not-working) links anywhere on your site, that can be an indicator to Google that you do not monitor or take care of your site, and your rankings could suffer.

Alt Tag Reports

Essentially an ‘alt tag’ is just how Google can read your images. If you have missing alt tags or poor ones, then Google doesn’t know what your images are and will essentially ignore them. This can seriously hurt your rankings if you have a heavily visual site, are in a visual industry, or are an e-commerce site.

Page Ranking Reports

Finally, we’ve gotten to what most people think is the entire report – the section that shows where your pages rank and where your keywords rank.

Yes – this is the end game, as seeing a bunch of ‘number one spots’ in this section makes you feel great (and probably has increased your traffic and sales considerably, too). But just remember that all of the factors and reports we’ve talked about before here are what got you here.

The Best SEO Report is a Clear SEO Report

The final thing you need from an SEO report is to actually be able to understand it. And from the JSL Marketing team’s experience, the clarity and helpfulness of an SEO report are directly linked to the clarity and helpfulness of the SEO company who designed it.

Find a good company, get a good report, get better results – it’s as simple as that.

If You Need SEO, Digital Marketing, or Reporting Help, Then Contact JSL Marketing & Web Design. We are Clear, Helpful, & Deliver True, Measurable, Growth-Focused Results.

June 13, 2019

5 Proven Ways to Work with Millennials (Whether You Are One or Not)

In 2015 millennials became the largest generation in the workforce and they now represent over 55 million workers in America. But do you know what the most common jobs are for millennials?

Statisticians
Analysts
Advertising Managers
Promotions Managers
Web Developers & Designers
Market Research Analysts
Marketing Specialists

Add to the list bartender, physician’s assistant, and jobs within the emergency medical field and you’ve just rounded out the top ten most common and popular jobs for millennials.

Notice anything there?

Yes, a lot of the above jobs deal heavily with technology, marketing, and digital services – which are all very closely related to the services I provide through the company I manage, JSL Marketing & Web Design.

Therefore, it might be redundant to acknowledge, but yes – most of my team members are millennials. And though millennials get a bad rep by most online articles, I’ve found that working with them isn’t nearly as doom and gloom as old-school businesses or companies make it out to be, though they are different than the generations before them (as will the next generation, Gen Z).

So, in case you are struggling to connect, communicate, motivate, or simply work with your millennial employees, review the 5 tips below, and see how your work environment, productivity, and influence can change the game when working with millennials (especially in technology and advancement fields).

#1. Appreciation & Environment Over All Else

One of the biggest differences between millennials and their older counterparts is their motivation and goals. For the first time in many generations, their main goal actually isn’t about financial compensation.

Millennials have often been polled, and the results state that (within reason) they would rather enjoy their job, enjoy the environment, and be appreciated, than get regular raises, climb the corporate ladder, or constantly seek to be making more money.

Sound strange? It shouldn’t. This generation would rather enjoy what they do and make less for it, than hate their job but be paid more.

This is where the ‘millennials are lazy’ stereotype originally came from. And though this doesn’t make them lazy, it does make their motivation be held elsewhere, which confused older generations for many years.

TL:DR? Millennials care about happiness over salary, and this is the biggest area managers need to understand if they want to keep their millennial workers.

#2. Understand That Tech Isn’t Just Their Toy

A common stereotype is that millennials are in love with their technology, and though trends show that they are (with the rest of the world fast on their heels) they do not simply love their tech because it is entertainment.

As you saw from the list above, technology is the livelihood of many millennials as well, or, at the very least, plays a large role in their professional life as well as their personal life.

And even beyond work or entertainment, millennials have grown up with all the knowledge in the world at their fingertips – which means that tech to them is knowledge as well.

As an example: one of my team members recently went on a vacation where she fully ‘unplugged’ (no internet, no Wi-Fi, no phone service) …

Though she enjoyed the experience and was refreshed when she returned to work, her biggest complaint about her smartphone not being so smart wasn’t that she had missed out on Facebook or Snapchat, but that she couldn’t look anything up, or search for information online.

So, when your millennials are engrossed in technology, do not always think of it as them playing, being antisocial or lazy, but understand that it can be work, play, and education all rolled into one high-priced, hand-held device.

#3. Focus on Results

This might seem counterintuitive to some, as there is another stereotype that millennials expect praise even without earning it (or the ‘everyone gets a trophy’ trope) but in reality, millennials understand that business is based on success and success is based on results.

Focus on results at your job, and make expectations known. At JSL Marketing & Web Design, we offer rewards based on results, as well as praise.

This allows your team to know what is expected of them and also acknowledges and appreciates when those results are positively met – which furthers the connection between meeting results and enjoying the benefits of that goal being met.

#4. Give Feedback on Tasks, Improvements, & Failures

Giving feedback so that your employees or team can improve is a vital part of any company or tech startup, but how you approach it is important.

Regular performance reviews where you can respectfully talk about what the individual is doing well, where they need to improve, and how certain tasks went is important in order to keep everyone accountable and on the same page.

JSL Marketing & Web Design does performance reviews twice a year, and we often follow a template where we talk about the good, the bad, and end with the good again. It’s sort of a ‘review sandwich’ but it helps the team member feel appreciated without having to gloss over any mistakes or areas for improvement.

After all, everyone can improve, and it’s important that your team knows that feedback that isn’t 100% positive doesn’t mean it’s 100% negative either.

#5. Be One of the Good Ones

The final tip I have is for both millennial workers and customers, as it is a huge area of importance in all millennials’ lives – be a good company.

This means you are ethical, transparent, honest, fair, and positive, all the things that JSL Marketing & Web Design strive to be, and all things that every company should strive to be.

From being good to your customers to being good to your employees and even within the industry, it is important to be one of the good ones, no matter what that looks like.

June 06, 2019

The Single Most Important Rule in Business (And it Has Nothing to Do with Your Customers)

No, the customer is not always right (especially in digital marketing and sales coaching, trust me), and no, there aren’t magical words that will make your sales skyrocket, or some step-by-step template that will guarantee your business becomes a success.

But there is a lot of sage business advice out there. In fact, here are a few of my favorite business quotes:

Are you sensing a theme yet? Yes, my single most important rule in business isn’t about your customers nearly as much as it is about your management. After all, management is the driver of the bus, the captain of the ship, and the pilot of the plane, right?

But if my business rule is about management, but isn’t about customers – then what is it about?

Let me say this again just to make sure it truly sinks in – treat your employees how you want them to treat your customers.

The JSL management team truly believes that if we treat our employees with respect, listen to them, engage with them, and educate them, then they will do the same for our clients. And because managers cannot be everywhere with every client in every meeting at all times, we need to be able to delegate to our team and trust that they are treating our clients as well as we would.

How do we do that? Now, here is a subject that can be broken down into a simple step-by-step template.

Educate Your Employees (So They Will Educate Your Clients)

If you actively encourage your employees to seek out knowledge, to be forever learners in their field, and to have ‘fail-spaces’ where they can try new things (AKA learning spaces instead of only performing spaces) then you will have a workforce that can explain the value of your business’ services to potential clients, answer questions to current clients, and learn from mistakes with past clients.

Now, you can educate your employees in a number of ways – from compensating them for continued education classes or even new degrees, to encouraging them to have training seminars and hours set aside in their quarterly, monthly, or weekly schedules. But it is also important to cultivate a culture of learning, growing, trying, and adapting.

When you learn something new in your field, share it with your team (and encourage them to do the same with you and others). We should all be sharing our new discoveries in our fields or areas of expertise, because if we’re constantly learning, then we’ll constantly be able to improve our practices and services – which directly helps our customers, reputation, and therefore, sales.

Listen to Your Employees (So They Will Listen to Your Clients)

This one is big – listen to your employees.

Maybe they are on the ground floor and you are in a high-rise. Maybe they deal day-to-day with clients and you haven’t had a meeting with a client in years. Maybe they know the pitfalls of the product because they work in customer service, and you rarely use the product, if at all. All these scenarios mean that your employees know better than you do in certain areas.

But even if they don’t know better, listening doesn’t hurt. Listening shows them, first, that they can share their opinions, and second, that they are valued.

Now, do you want an employee who feels undervalued helping your client through the sales flywheel, or do you want one who feels heard, valued, and appreciated helping that client? It’s an easy choice, and an easy solution.

If you treat your team with respect, they will treat your clients with respect. If you listen to your team, you might learn something – and you will, in turn, teach them to listen to your clients. And, lastly, if you make your team feel valued and heard, then they will make your clients feel valued and heard.

Lead by example, but not just the example of how to treat your clients – lead by treating your team how you want to be treated, how they want to be treated, and how your clients want to be treated.

It Really Isn’t Rocket Science, Is It?

Sometimes your employees need a little help, whether that be with scheduling, practice, education, or something else related to their skills. And helping your employees is good for your entire business in the long run. It might take some of your time now, and I know that management’s time is scarce and valuable – but think of the message it sends your workforce when you listen to them or when you make time in meetings for someone to share what they’ve learned.

In management, you want to motivate your company and your employees to always try to be better, to provide better services, better products, or better customer care. One of the best ways I’ve found to do this is by encouraging your team to always reach, learn, try, and speak.

In some ways, this goes back to the JSL company culture, but in other ways, it speaks to a new kind of management style. And that is a management style where you lead by example and show your workforce exactly how they should treat clients, regardless of how much contact you actually have with the clients.

Whether you are a team of 6 or 600, this business rule stands true – treat your employees how you want them to treat your customers; educate them, listen to them, and then let them improve your business and care for your clients with the confidence and skills you’ve given them.