We Lost...But Really We Won

At the Mesa Chamber of Commerce's Annual Luncheon, AlphaGraphics Mesa was one of the finalist for Mid-Sized Business of the Year. We did not win. Yes, I was nervous, yes I was disappointed, yes I was a little angry for a little bit.  However, as I thought about the whole experience, I believe that when we consider the entire event, we were a winner.  Let me explain.

I have spent a considerable amount of time and effort over the last few months promoting my business with SEO efforts.  I have worked on optimizing my website with the right keyword presentation, I have started a blog, I am doing press releases online so that they are picked up by Google, I am writing online articles with Ezinearticles.com, we are distributing a monthly email newsletters, we have done a couple of 3-dimensional mailing pieces to select customers and prospects and I continue to look at other opportunities to promote my business outside of the internet, such as sponsorships and networking.

So how does the Mesa Chamber experience fit into all of this? 

Well, a few months ago, I was asked by a staff person at the Chamber to "self-nominate" myself because they had not received enough nominations from the business community.  After a little thought, I did. I then learned that I was one of two finalists in the Mid-Sized category.  This was my start of a big SEO effort. I updated my status on Facebook and Twitter several times that we had been nominated. I wrote about it on my blog. (I guess this post qualifies also). I issued a couple of press releases, one with PRWeb.com, and one with Grassroots PR.  I was interviewed by a reporter with the Arizona Republic, which was published online and in print.

I received a few benefits also. 

My new picture that I am now using in my social media efforts was donated by a Chamber member (Steve Nissle).  The Chamber did a great video on my business. I will be receiving a copy of this video which I am going to upload to YouTube and embed it into my next blog, our AlphaGraphics websites, our Google Maps site and where ever else I can put it. I have been trying to figure out how to put a video on my websites for quite some time.  Google loves videos when evaluating the rankings of a website.

In addition to the SEO activities associated with this nomination, I received some RLO (Real Life Optimization) benefits. Even though the nomination had been made public by various means, most people did not know of the nomination until the event.  I had many businesses in the area congratulate me on the nomination and comment about how well I must be doing to be nominated (I do not bring up the fact that it was a self-nomination). I had a lot of people say they wish I had won for one reason or another and our new video was played to a room full of Mesa businesses.  What can be better than that?

So here come the sour grapes. 

The difference between winning and losing was that I did not receive a framed picture of my building (which I already have). I guess I will not be able to wear the tiara, to go to grocery store grand openings or to work for world peace, but I will survive. Instead of having more material for another press release on this nomination, I will work on a press release about our new FSC Certification.

I want to thank the staff of the Mesa Chamber for allowing me to be a part of the process and I sincerely want to congratulate Invision Auto Body for winning the category. Maybe we will try again in a few years.


You can always contact us at the following websites:

AlphaGraphics Mesa on Baseline - Printing and Marketing
AlphaGraphics Tempe on Elliot - Printing and Marketing
AlphaGraphics Phoenix - Northwest Valley - Printing and Marketing

Follow me on twitter: @steveadams291

How We Use Twitter in Our Printing Business

In conversations that I have with business associates and my fellow AlphaGraphics owners, we frequently start discussing what each of us is doing in the Social Media area.  As most of my followers know, I am very active with postings to my blogs, Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter.  I have just started experimenting with Namyz, but that is really a job search site and I am not actively looking for a job.  When we start talking about Twitter, I get a lot of questions about how Twitter could possibly benefit my business.

How can posting a 140 character status update a few times a day possibly benefit my business.  In one of my older blog postings, I referred to Twitter as the "Standing on the corner in Winslow, Arizona" application.  Most people have this impression of Twitter.  I'm at the coffee shop. I am having a bad week. I can't sleep. My flight is delayed.  I'll be glad when my kids are back in school.  I think I have seen almost all of these status updates on Twitter over the last several months.

So, how do I use Twitter? First, I use it as a resource tool.  I am immersing myself in the marketing and social media areas of my business.  I have started following many experts in this field, both their blogs and their Twitter accounts. By following these people on Twitter, I get a sense of what they are reading, thinking and saying at all times.  Some of the people I am following in this regard are John Jantsch, David Meerman Scott, Chris Brogan, Lisa Barone, Matt Cheuvront, Lee Odden and Seth Godin.  Every day I find someone else I should follow in order to learn more in this area. When these people post, they often give a URL link to either their latest blog post or to an interesting blog post that they just read that is informative and educational. I especially like following Lisa Barone on Twitter because she not only has a lot of insightful things to say, but she also is very entertaining.

The second way I use this tool is to keep up with what is happening in our communities.  Following entities such as the local chambers, the united ways, various city departments, certain news reporters and politicians. Following these sources on Twitter allows me to keep current with what is happening without having to refer to their specific websites for my information.

The third way I use Twitter is to promote my AlphaGraphics websites, my blog postings (this may be the way you got to this posting) and various aspects of what is happening in our business.  Since our business is mainly business-to-business, I do not use Twitter to broadcast any promotional offerings because I believe that the fastest way to lose followers on Twitter is to start promoting specific services. The hardest thing I found to do with Twitter is to grow a following of local businesses and customers.  I do spend some time searching for companies that have a Twitter account in the areas where by printing businesses are located.  I then start to follow them with the hopes that they will someday start following me.  I have had some recent success of growing my local business contacts on Twitter but this is a big work in process for me.

At the time of this posting, I am currently following about 300 people and I have approximately 150 followers.  I am finding that following 300 people on Twitter is becoming somewhat overwhelming when it comes to following postings.  Since a lot of people I follow make their livings by posting to Twitter and by blog postings, these people put out a lot a stuff. There will come a time where I will have to stop following the postings of all the people I am following and start to identify only those people that I have an interest in.

So, how are you using Twitter.  I would like to know.  Leave a comment below and give me your thoughts on how Twitter benefits your business or how Twitter seems to be a major waste of time. 

You can always contact us at the following websites:

AlphaGraphics Mesa on Baseline - Printing and Marketing
AlphaGraphics Tempe on Elliot - Printing and Marketing
AlphaGraphics Phoenix - Northwest Valley - Printing and Marketing

Follow me on twitter: @steveadams291

What's Up With The Economy?

Last week I attended a seminar put on by Lee McPheters with the W.P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State. I took this seminar as part of my continuing education to maintain my C.P.A certification. Although he started the session saying that the outlook is not doom and gloom, when I left 2 hours later, I was significantly depressed. As most people know, economists agree that the U.S is now in recovery mode. Here is a graph showing the GDP growth rate for the last several quarters.

So, if our GDP is growing, why the doom and gloom.  Well, to start with his projections show a .5% increase in unemployment for the year in the U.S. (-1.0% in Arizona). So it looks like the recovery is not going to be employment based. His overall GDP growth rate for 2010 for the U.S. is predicted to be about 2.5%.  This tells me that the sales that we experienced in 2009 will repeat, at best, in 2010.  If you are planning on significant growth in 2010, you are fooling yourself.

Lee also discussed the lost decade.

 That's right, the S&P 500 Index is where it was in 1999. All of the stock market gains we experienced in the 2000 decade have all disappeared.

How has employment held up for the last decade?

We have fewer people employed at the end of 2009 when compared to the end of 2000. That's why we feel that we are struggling.

Lee also spoke about the U.S. savings rate.  Our savings rate over the last couple of years has increased to 5.9% of earnings, which sounds great.  However, 70% of our economy is consumer driven.  For each 1% increase in the savings rate, about $100 billion is removed from the economy.  We need the consumer to become comfortable with their position in life and start spending again.

How do you feel about the recovery.  Well, 65% of people who were polled stated that the recession is not over.  In fact, what a lot of economists have stated is that the increases in the GDP that we have seen have been caused by two main reasons.  First, manufacturers have decided to bring their inventory levels back up to pre-recession levels and that is thought to be a temporary measure.  The second reason stated is that the stimulus monies are having a temporary effect on business activity (though you could not tell it by me).

When Will the Full Recovery Happen?

So what is the timeframe for a full recovery?  Can you believe 4-5 years.  2014 is the year we may be able to celebrate and say that everything is back to pre-recession levels.  The official recession lasted 21 months where the average recession in the past has lasted 10 months.

The recession in Arizona has been significantly worse than the rest of the U.S. and the recovery will follow the U.S. In the past, Arizona has shown significantly wider variations in growth and contraction rates and will probably show a higher growth rate when we finally start to come out of this.

My Thoughts

After hearing all of this (and more), I have the following thoughts about going forward as a small business in Arizona:

Everything that you wished you had done to make 2009 a better year, do it in 2010:
If you wished that you had reduced your costs sooner or to a greater extent, make sure you make those reductions now.  2010 will not show a significant increase in revenues and your expenses will continue to grow if you do not take measures to control them.

Hire back slowly:
Be slow to fill new or empty positions with full-time staff.  Now is the time to have a plan on hiring temporary and part-time employees.  Have a good agency ready to fill temporary needs.

Explore alternative financing options:
The availability of conventional credit lines will continue to dry up for small businesses.  Even though there is a great amount of discussion about having the banks open up their lending, they still have to deal with financials that reflect two years of losses and reduced balance sheet health.  It is time to start looking into the SBA programs again and what they may have.

Start innovating again:
It seems that lately, Google and Apple are the only companies that continue to innovate (if you call the iPad an innovation considering it looks like an oversized iPhone without calling capabilities). Its time to look at your business and figure out what it is going to take to make it a profitable enterprise in this next decade. I know its hard to think about the future when you are fighting the current battles, but it is imperative to the future of your business and the economy that we start innovating again.

Make the hard decisions:
You know which ones they are.  From letting people go, to closing down an unprofitable branch, to selling off an unproductive asset or to getting another job.  These are hard times and the people who are able to make the hardest decisions are the people who come out ahead at the finish line.

There you are.  Now doesn't everyone feel better?

You can reach us at AlphaGraphics at the following websites:

AlphaGraphics Mesa on Baseline 480-844-2222
AlphaGraphics Tempe on Elliot 480-413-1900
AlphaGraphics Phoenix - Northwest Valley 602-234-2944

Follow me on Twitter at: Steve's Twitter Account

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