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Private Duty Today
Welcome to Private Duty Today,
the bi-weekly electronic newsletter for Private Duty Home Care Leaders
from Leading Home Care ...a Tweed Jeffries company.
I'm Jason Tweed, Director of Business Development for
Leading Home Care, and Editor of Private
Duty Today.
Private Duty Today is published every
other Wednesday, and currently goes to over 7000 subscribers.
Private Duty Today is
a permission-based newsletter.
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In the old days of the Internet (18 months ago) we had the
Web. Businesses built websites. Google, Yahoo, and
Microsoft discover the website. Business makes money.
Simple... right?
Enter the new Web. The hip techie types call it Web 2.0.
It's the new Internet, where individual opinion is replacing search
engines. A basic website is no longer a brochure, but now a tool
for customer service, employee recruitment and direct sales. In
this new Web, perception and opinion become more important than search
algorithms.
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The second generation of the Internet is one of social
interaction by average users. In the beginning you had to be a
computer geek to build a website and most websites were built for other
computer geeks. Later, software such as Dreamweaver and FrontPage
gave more people the ability to create websites and help create broad
appeal. Easy access to free e-mail made the Web a communication
tool.
Today the Web is far more interactive than ever before. Almost
all websites enable two-way communication between the website and their
users. Many of the most popular websites also offer user-to-user
communication.
Web 2.0 is a collection of websites specifically designed around the
concept of user-to-user communication. Generally speaking there
are three broad categories; social media, social networking and social
bookmarking.
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The most basic example of social media is YouTube. This
website gives amateur videographers, web cam personalities, and wannabe
TV stars an outlet to show off their skills. Millions upon
millions of users tune into these short videos.
Today there are literally dozens of sites that host audio and video blogs
known collectively as podcasts.
How can social media affect home care? Today it is cheaper and
easier than ever to produce videos that act as commercials on your web
pages. As your website becomes more important in your business,
staying current with the technology also becomes more important.
I'm still convinced that words sell, however video and audio messages
will likely grow in importance to establishing credibility and making
sales. One word of warning, however, poorly produced video and audio
could actually reduce your credibility. If you're going to
utilize social media, I encourage you to educate yourself or outsource
before displaying content on your website.
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What is Social Networking?
You've probably heard of MySpace and/or Facebook.
These are the most popular social networks on the planet. These
two companies focused heavily on students in high school and
colleges. Four years later most of these students are now adults,
but still utilize their social network. Additionally the appeal
to companies who want to market to these individuals is growing.
Social networking is growing exponentially. I began utilizing
Facebook about 18 months ago when it was just passing 20 million users;
today it has over 200 million worldwide. This exponential growth
means that the traditional college student makes up only a fraction of
the body of users. They've enlisted family members, friends,
employers, coworkers, and distant relatives to create networks of
users, known as friends.
How does social networking affect home care? Social networking is
beginning to affect all business because the ease of networking with
individuals that you trust is improving. While we trust Google,
Yahoo and the other search engines we still prefer to get advice from
people we know. You will find social networking becoming
increasingly critical to word-of-mouth marketing. Establishing a
presence in social networking is going to help your company grow by
giving you access to these networks of friends. Additionally, you
can gain credibility among these ever-growing networks of tech savvy
individuals.
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What is Social Bookmarking?
Social bookmarking is a way for individuals to recommend
websites to others. There are literally dozens of social
bookmarking websites. Some of the most prominent are Digg, Mixx,
del.icio.us, Reddit and Technorati. These services allow you to
post links to individual blog entries, videos, websites and more.
Then other users can see your site and vote up or down. The more
positive votes the page gets the more prominent is the exposure on this
site.
Social bookmarking doesn't impact home care company websites directly,
however, if you're using a blog to post information about your
organization on a regular basis social bookmarking can be
influential. Directing traffic to individual posts will often
create traffic to your website that wouldn't normally find you using
search engines.
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How is Web 2.0 Supported?
Most of Web 2.0 is available free and supported by
advertising revenue. This is important because as the prevalence
of social media, networking, and bookmarking grows it may become as
important as mass media marketing. If your company is utilizing
mass media marketing you will see increasing pressure to begin to use
online advertising such as pay-per-click ads or banner ads. Only
a few of our clients are using pay-per-click ads, but those that have
are finding high degrees of success. If you're not using them,
chances are one of your competitors is.
Today most of your referrals probably come from networking in the
community, advertising and word-of-mouth. Web 2.0 is a natural
fit with these business models. Creating and participating in
networks is critical in these virtual communities. Pay-per-click
and banner advertising are the billboards lining the streets of these
communities. Finally, Web 2.0 is all about credibility and
reputation. Your customers will be able to communicate with
greater ease in the future, and word-of-mouth will travel at the speed
of light.
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Unfortunately, there is a learning curve when it comes to
the new Web. If you've never experienced these websites I
encourage you to check them out. Get a free account and simply
experiment. Throughout the summer I will periodically post
suggestions on our blog as well as in this newsletter to take those
baby steps from experimentation to true marketing.
I recommend you check out the following websites and set up an
account. All you need is an e-mail address.
After you set up these accounts, connect with Stephen and
Jason Tweed. The following links will help you get started.
http://twitter.com/sctweed
Enjoy exploring the new Web.
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Only Two
Weeks to register for our Private Duty Business Builders Strategy
RetreatTM
 We hope you'll join us on Wednesday, June 3, 2009 in
Columbia, Maryland as we join with Maryland National Capital Home Care
Association for a one day focused strategy session to help you develop
a business growth plan for your company.
We'll share with you the best practices and proven
techniques to grow your private pay business. We'll show you how to
recruit and select the caregivers you need to take on more clients. And
we'll give you specific tips to increase the profitability of your
business.
Join with America's leading expert on Private Duty Home
Care, Stephen Tweed, to learn about the 27 elements of a
successful private duty business, and have an opportunity to focus
on those elements that are most important to you. See you there!
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