Wednesday, May 12, 2010

YARD CARD COMPANY RECOGNITION

How do YOU get noticed on the Internet? With so many websites on so many different subjects and with numerous search terms, it seems an impossible endeavor.


Check common search terms for your industry in the search bar. The Lawn Display industry would have search terms such as: yard cards, lawn displays, yard displays, stork signs, lawn flamingoes —the list goes on. Look up the ones that you think customers use most.  If you have an analytics program it will also give you this information. With Google or Bing, you will find that National Directories come up for most of these terms.

You will find that some Directories are Free to Join, some charge a Fee. What is important is which ones come up for the relevant search terms you think your potential customers use! Even if there is a Fee and the website is reputable, just one rental would pay for Joining that Directory. My experience is that you should be on ALL Directories but definitely on the ones that come up high. The 2 highest Directories are typically (on Google’s 1st page) http://www.flamingoed.com/ and http://www.yardcarddirectory.com/ . Your company should be on both of these Directories and often it will also pull your website up higher in the search engines.

If you want business, you need to pay attention to what is happening in the over-all Industry. Just waiting for rentals or referrals does not work that well.

"Doing business without advertising is like winking at a someone in the dark. YOU know what you are doing, but no one else does." Stewart Britt

Comments ALWAYS welcome!

Marty Miller

Tuesday, May 4, 2010

GRADUATION YARD CARDS

Remember your Graduate with a Large Card in the Yard or Lawn Display on his/her Graduation Day!  If you are having a party it helps those attending find your home.

Your Graduate will be so surprised and pleased with a Grad Display!

Check out companies in your state at www.yardcarddirectory.com/

Marty Miller

Saturday, May 1, 2010

LIFE CAN CHANGE--Accidents Happen

Live Each Day--Accidents Happen

So where have I been since March? Life can change in an instant and mine did. We were in MI on March 25th for a Surprise party for my sister. I got to a relative's home and opened a door that I thought was the bathroom. The door opened in and I had stepped into a stairwell to a basement. My last memory was “Oh my God,what can I hold unto”.
 Family heard what sounded like a 20 lb. sack of potatoes going down the 14 stairs, no utterance from me. They immediately came down to find me knocked out in an increasing pool of blood from a head wound. (As my niece descibed it--A CSI moment).

I was whisked off by ambulance to a great hospital (so thankful for that) where I spent 2 solid weeks, with 10 rib breaks, a shattered left wrist and forearm, head laceration and a dislocated and fractured clavicle. Head was stitched during surgery to operate on wrist/arm. A fixator was put on my wrist with pins down into my wrist.  2nd surgery was a chest tube for fluid in the lung. I had much therapy. You never go to a hospital for rest as someone is checking you every hour or 2, even at night.
Here is the miracle---neither knee replacement was damaged, my neck was not broken and my spinal fusion from my teen years, remained intact.
We remained in MI for 1 month and returned home to CO on 4/21. I was back in hospital here for Vertigo on 4/23-24.

Things can happen in life that change our focus and slow us down—obviously there was no business done on my part, for the month of April. I am starting slowly to get back to business in May. I have one more surgery to remove the fixator and pins from my wrist. I will remain on oxygen for a few weeks--remember this is higher altitude.
Never take Life for Granted! Following are a couple of quotes worth thinking about!
If you have a life changing event, please share it with us!

Being alive is loving being alive!   Judith Alligim
 Things turn out best for the people who make the best of the way things turn out."
Art Linkletter

Your outcome has much to do with your attitude.

Life is made up of many changes; and no state, be it bright or clouded , will always continue. Spurgeon

OK –now it is back to business. Don’t forget those Lawn Displays for Graduation.

Have a Good Spring!

Marty Miller, business owner, author, artist  
http://www.yardcarddirectory.com/   http://www.lawnexpressions.com/