I have never spoken with someone who has been happy with their experience buying SEO services from Network Solutions. I have not hired them myself. So, I have no first hand experience. And I welcome them to defend themselves in my comments. However, I've had a handful of clients who had negative experiences with them.

This is from a colleague:

They hired Network Solutions to do some SEO work and it did not yield more traffic and leads.

This is from a client:

"Network Solutions and [my business] were not a good match. Their communications were not timely and their reports were not user friendly."

The interesting part is that I am sure Network Solutions knows what they're doing. Here's a video with an exec at Network Solutions. She knows SEO and has good advice:

Here's the problems I have with Network Solutions:

• SEO is rarely successful, where success is defined by a measurable marketing ROI, if it is a one time outsourced task. Network Solutions sells it as a one time outsourced task. SEO requires a collaborative effort between an SEO expert and the subject matter expert who is creating compelling content. In house subject matter experts can be trained to do the basics and be successful if they're blogging and doing keyword research. But, if you're going to outsource SEO, you need a long term partner. It's not like buying advertising. It's more like hiring a salesperson who focusses on lead generation/lead qualification.
• It is extremely difficult to guarantee results. I've helped 50+ clients rank for their keywords and I rarely ever guarantee a ranking for a specific keyword. In other words, I know what it takes, but I don't make specific guarantees. My guarantee is that if you do what we tell you, you will generate more traffic and leads within a few months. Network Solutions guarantees top 10 results in one of a few top search engines. This is sneaky and doesn't necessarily translate into results. Surprisingly, or not, many small business owners fall for the guarantee. I'm reminded of the scene from Tommy Boy when he suggests crapping in a box and putting a guarantee on it - in order to battle a sales objection. I might start using that line.

I'm fine with Network Solutions selling SEO services. They just need to start doing it right. There are enough fly-by-night operations selling SEO shams, that make it harder for the good guys doing the right things for their clients.

Not only do they have a reputation to protect of their own. They shouldn't be doing the internet marketing industry a disservice.

Network Solutions should be taking the high road. They should be selling SEO results and delivering an iterative SEO process. Not selling a few promises and a few hours of "SEO work".

1. When & why did you start your current business? I worked as in-house counsel for a real estate developer in Concord, MA. He did projects in New Mexico, Florida, the United States Virgin Islands and Martha's Vineyard. In addition to doing his legal work I acted as his office manager. In 1992 he told me he planned to retire in 2 years and I should plan for that. I decided to open my own practice with a law school room mate. He did workers comp and personal injury. I did real estate, bankruptcy, and family law.
2. What was the smartest business decision you've made in your current business? Using the Hubspot marketing software. It's already produced 3 new bankruptcy clients and 1 divorce client since May. Much more than the yellow pages EVER did.
3. If you had one piece of internet marketing advice for another business owner, what would it be? Put the time in and follow a plan. Create the content. Then optimize for key words. Then build links. Most importantly blog, blog, blog!
   

1. What is your unique selling proposition? Our business is one of the few practices that specializes in Asian Cosmetic Facial Surgery.
   
2. What was the smartest business decision you've made in your current business? First and foremost was incorporating an effective and targeted internet marketing strategy.
3. What do you like most about internet marketing? What I find most rewarding is the immediate and direct changes you can make on your business plans. If done right, the impact can be significant and immediate.

Trish Bertuzzi has published the results of a inside sales training benchmark survey of 63 technology companies regarding their inside sales practices.

You should read the full report. But, it shows some interesting results:

1. Most inside sales training is focussed on product knowledge instead of sales skills.
   
2. Most training is delivered by in-house resources.
3. Most firms are unhappy with their sale training process.
4. Most firms are not willing to invest more than $2k/year in training an individual inside sales rep.
   

What's wrong with this picture? I can imagine it's difficult to examine your own sales operations critically. I imagine most sales organizations just focus on seeing what they do right and doing more of that.

But, it's pretty glaringly obvious to me that most organizations are satisfied with mediocre.

I'm not sure what the average tech inside sales person makes, but I'd imagine it hovers between $80-200k. And organizations aren't willing to invest more than $2K to help someone improve?

Why?

Business advice from Sanjib Sarkar 

1. What is your company's unique selling proposition? We sell homeopathic medicine products online.  Our company also sells other natural products to consumers such as Poison Ivy Lotion, Poison Ivy Pills, Natural Pet Meds, Sun Block and other products.   
2. When & why did you start your current business/take your current position? Our website started in March 2001.  I basically saw a need to provide homeopathic medicine on the Internet.  We were the first company to offer this type of service.  Now many other companies are started to offer similar services.  I have been president of Hmedicine.com since 2001.
3. What was the smartest business decision you've made in your current business/current position?  Drop shipping products.  We carry quite a bit of products so our company is not a 100% drop ship company.  However, we specialize in selling hard to find homeopathic medicine.  These are great items to drop ship because consumers have a difficult time finding them.  Also, they make poor items to stock because a few select people are looking for these homeopathic medicines.  We were able to create a niche market because of this.
4. What person has had the most impact on the success of your business/career? It has been a host of partners and people helping with the business.  I could not name just one.  It really takes a team effort to be successful.
5. What do you like most about internet marketing?  The challenge of dealing with Google.  Your site can be ranked in the top 10 one day and you may be in the top 100 the next day.  This makes Internet marketing very challenging but at the same time very interesting.
6. If you had one piece of internet marketing advice for another business owner, what would it be?  Patiently create great content.  The website rankings will take care of themselves if you create the great content.  You need to have some patience because it may take search engines and people longer than 6 months to start responding and sending you traffic and sales.

I'm starting a business advice interview series, mostly small and mid sized business owners, who are willing to share some advice with my readers.

Business Advice from Dave Kurlan:

1. When & why did you start your current business? Sales development was a calling - destiny - what I simply must do in this lifetime.
2. What was the smartest business decision you've made in your current business?  A 1992 decision to have PENTA Communications handle marketing and public relations.  By 1994 I was playing to national audiences.
3. What do you like most about internet marketing?  Internet marketing includes writing, blogging, emailing, connecting and reading... activities that I enjoy but don't have any time for during regular business hours when the greatest impact I can have on my business takes the forms of selling, managing, coaching or training. That forces me to perform internet marketing either at night or early in the morning, where it doesn't interfere with the more profitable activities.  I don't have time to conduct traditional marketing activities during the day and they can't be performed outside of regular business hours so the intersection of after hours availability and internet marketing make a nice couple.

Betsy Davison has a great article on the benefits of using a community site to market art online.  ArtId (a client) has a nice set of capabilities for artists.

As I mentioned before, I'm intrigued by the value of vertically focussed online marketing platforms. There are nice network effects that kick in that help both the community and the platform provider - as the network grows.

I wrote a guest post over on Aaron Ross's blog titled, How to Generate a Steady Flow of Inbound Sales Leads.

I summarized a few points on the HubSpot blog and there are a few relevant comments over there too.

Via VentureBeat, Seth Goldstein's Social Media has created an advertising system that allows you to customize ads that your friends see, enabling individuals to interact through advertisements.

Here's a great example from the social media blog

 Below is a concrete example of a social banner. It's an ad, presumably sponsorable by a company seeking to spread the word about its new-found greenness. So, without further ado, here's a our user violating, privacy busting, all your data in a social banner, banner!

Blog Reader: "Umm...wait. Is this a trick? My data has to be in here somewhere. I know! It's hiding under the alien! Oh, no. That's silly. Wait! You pulled my facebook interests to stereotype me as a certain type of user, thereby populating the buttons with choices that would appeal to me, thus increasing ad CTR!"

As Winnie the Pooh would say, "Oh bother."

Your data isn't in there. Not at all. But, let's say you do opt to share why you're green with your friends by clicking on a button. This is what your friends would see, except replace this dude's picture with yours.

Blog Reader: "OMG I'M IN THE AD! You mean when I choose to share why I'm green with my friends, my friends will actually see it?"

It's rather difficult to share something with your friends when we can't tell your friends the thing you wanted to share. So, yes, that's precisely what we did.

It's almost what John Battelle has been talking about and playing with - with his conversational marketing.

As you all know, I'm a big beliver in putting the "social" in marketing. In fact, my own blog has evolved to mostly a networking tool where I'm highlighting my clients great writing and the activities of other people that interest me.

This is the first time I've seen "social" applied to the advertising unit. And I think it's very significant. And almost genius in its simplicity and obviousness.

I'm working on improving my sales presentation skills, specifically my demos.

Here's two blog posts about product demos.

1. Customize-ing them. Tailoring them to the prospect's need. I do good here.
2. I need to be better about structuring a demo.