Office Depot and AOL, Xerox, Demandline.com, OpenAir

MarketingToSmallBiz.com
Practical News & Tips for
Marketing to SOHOs on the Internet
May 17, 2000 - Vol. I, Issue 1

IN THIS ISSUE: Office Depot and AOL, Xerox,
Demandline.com, OpenAir

Please forward to your friends & colleagues. We depend
on you to grow our circulation!

1. NEWS: Office Depot & America Online, Xerox,
Demandline.com

2. CASE STUDY: OpenAir, Inc.

3. PRACTICAL KNOW-HOW: Find Out Who’s Linking To Your
Site And Bringing Traffic

4. JOBS: ChamberBiz, LiveCapital, eLance

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NEWS: Office Depot & AOL, Xerox, Demandline.com
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--Office Depot and AOL: Calling All SOHOs

Office Depot and AOL have put $44 million on the table
in order to compete for that elusive position as the
one-stop SOHO shop. The new five-year co-branding
relationship promises to create some major AOL mindshare
across Office Depot sales channels and in turn, feature
Office Depot's products across several targeted AOL
brands. Netscape is a major player in the deal as well.
Office Depot and AOL hope to "provide millions of small
businesses with streamlined access to the tools and
resources they need to remain competitive, while
offering all consumers a broad array of office supplies,
furniture and more."

--Are Lazy Xerox Employees At Fault?

Xerox, a SOHO supplier which has been losing
marketshare, is experiencing heartburn as its top job
changes hands. President and CEO G. Richard Thoman
recently said goodbye after his failed attempts to turn
a profit forced him to consider another career path.
But Thoman doesn’t blame himself. His resignation
letter to employees berated them for their slothful
nature in winning market share and improving sales!

"Management changes do not alter the company's strategy
in SOHO, marketing or any area of the business. Same
strategy, new leadership," says Christa Carone, Manager,
Media Relations, Corporate Public Relations.
http://www.xerox.com

-- Yea/Nay: Demandline.com’s Logo

We were checking out who’s buying space on the small
business sections of major portals the other day when we
were stopped dead in our tracks -- lost in admiration
for Demandline.com’s logo, a simple graphic of a little
fish about to bite the tail of a big fish. It’s scalable
from tiny button ad size to giant poster-size (in fact
we’d love a poster of it!); only two color (which lowers
offline print collateral costs); and it clearly
communicates to the true heart and soul of the small
business owner. Graphics fans, check out the button
version at Lycos’ small business page today for
inspiration. This one is a “Yea!”
http://www.lycos.com/business/
http://www.demandline.com

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CASE STUDY: OpenAir, Inc.
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--Keep it Simple for SOHOs: OpenAir.Com

The Offering: OpenAir.com (formerly TimeBills.com)
markets Web-based services for time tracking, expense
reporting, and client invoicing and billing.

Target Audience: The company already serves 25,000 small
businesses and solo practitioners looking for better
ways to manage adminis-trivia, but marketing VP Jeffrey
S. Hunt says, "we don't serve everyone's needs." Hunt
believes that the SOHO market is definitely fragmented
and that a boilerplate marketing approach won't net good
results. "We are providing services geared toward the
service professional," says Hunt.

Traffic Generation: OpenAir concentrates most its
efforts online. The site's direct marketing efforts have
included opt-in email lists and banner ad placements to
drive traffic. "We're willing to test just about any of
the [list rental] companies," comments Hunt. They've
used Postmaster Direct with positive results plus
experimented with YesMail and 24/7 media.

Strategic Alliances: OpenAir.com looks for partnerships
with sites that have similar audiences. For example, one
of its partners is Inc.com, which is trying to create a
one-stop shop for small businesses. Hunt sees Inc.com as
one of the better brands in the SOHO space. So far, the
Inc.com partnership has been helpful in driving traffic
to OpenAir.com. In return, Inc.com can offer its
services to OpenAir's members. Other partners include
SirSpeedy (printing/copying) and McAfee (most noted for
anti-virus software).

Site Design: Despite rapid growth, OpenAir's creators
have taken a "minimalistic approach to the [Web]
interface," making it comparatively easy to use.
According to Hunt, marketers must recognize that easy-
to-use Web features are a big selling point to small
businesses. SOHO owners don't have a lot of time to sift
through a lot of extraneous Web bells and whistles or to
learn how to use wieldy features and functions.

Our Take: OpenAir.com’s a winner because it’s found a
way to offer SOHO’s the ASP-like hosted services that
big corporations are also buying like mad.

http://www.openair.com
http://rentals.postmasterdirect.com/homepage
http://www.yesmail.com/
http://www.247media.com/mail/

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PRACTICAL KNOW-HOW: Link Popularity
----------
--Find Out Who’s Linking To Your Site
By Kim M. Bayne, editor, author of "The Internet
Marketing Plan," 2nd edition.

These days, everyone is fighting for top rankings in
search engines and directories. But spending hours
continually tweaking your site, purchasing hot keywords
and randomly placing ad banners may not always be the
best use of your SOHO marketing dollar...or time.

Did you know that links from other similar Web sites are
an excellent way to increase traffic? These links often
create a third party endorsement that attracts a large
percentage of repeat visitors.

For starters, discover where your online efforts are
best spent by checking out who is pointing to your site.
Web site referral logs can help, but if you don't have
those, visit one or more of the following sites.

Editor's Pick: A good sampling of sites with link
counters that can help you measure and/or improve your
link popularity

http://www.eboz.com/tools/web_tools/link_popularity_finder.shtml
http://www.linkstoyou.com
http://www.linkme.com/
http://www.LinkPopularity.com/
http://www.up4u.com/free/pop.shtml
http://www.datelineterra.com/cgi-bin/link-popularity.cgi
http://www.ineedhits.com/free/popularity
http://www.upromote.com/ftools/linktracker/

Visit our Bookstore to check out Bayne's book:
http://www1.fatbrain.com/FindItNow/Services/home.cl?from=DDH932&store=1

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JOBS: ChamberBiz, LiveCapital, eLance
----------
--ChamberBiz.com Seeks Promotion Director
Responsible for developing and implementing promotional
campaigns, creating and distributing promotional
materials including writing promotional copy, working
with advertising and PR agencies, and developing and
managing promotional budget. Requires 7+ years of
related experience, preferably with a start-up
organization; strong MS Office skills; excellent verbal
and written communication skills; strong organization
and planning skills. Ad agency experience preferred.
jobs@chamberbiz.com

--LiveCapital.com Seeks Marketing Analyst
Responsible for assisting with evaluating, testing and
implementing online acquisition and customer
relationship programs that drive qualified traffic and
cross-sell/upsell opportunities. Programs and campaigns
will include: direct mail and direct TV and radio,
print and other forms of advertising/mass media, email
programs and campaigns, online advertising including the
affiliate program, site partnerships, banner campaigns,
and site submissions to search engines, Site promotions.
Responsible for administering the prospect/customer
database, analyzing acquisition and retention campaigns
for effectiveness, evaluating customer traffic and
behavior throughout the website, reporting on key
business and campaign metrics to senior management, and
making recommendations for optimization.
jobs@livecapital.com

--eLance Seeks Affiliate Program Manager
Responsible for driving the success of eLance's
affiliate program. Build, manage, and promote a world-
class affiliate program to drive transaction volume to
the eLance marketplace, optimize the program process
with changes based on traffic analysis, industry
benchmarks, and usability studies; implement changes by
coordinating with the Creative and Tech Development
teams; maximize adoption with resources from Marketing
and Business Development, including both direct and
traditional promotional efforts, based on usage patterns
and customer segmentation; create administrative
processes to handle billing & payment, and scalable
growth of the entire process; and manage a team as the
above functions scale up. jobs@elance.com

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MarketingToSmallBiz.com INFO
----------
Subscription and Advertising Contact:
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Kim M. Bayne
editor@MarketingToSmallBiz.com

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Felix Gorrio
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202.256.1472

Publisher:
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202.232.6830

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