|
|
Ashkenazi the Pretty Good Veteran user Northern California 366 Posts |
Many, many moons ago, I posted here, hoping my manager Kevin (who is really kind of an idiot) would see thoughtful answers that you nice people post.
It has been a long journey, and I'm back where I started: wanting the most EFFICIENT/effortless business system possible for doing the following: * Tracking leads * Putting lead into correct mailing list (soirees get different information than libraries) * Embedded form (such as Wix provides) to get key info about the gig * Sending out boiler-plate based emails to those leads (including visual way to see when they went out/which went out) * Sending out boiler-plate contracts and requests for deposits * Getting pinged when those contracts and requests are done * Being able to MODIFY the agreement (i.e. hour started, number in party, upsells, whatever) when client changes their mind (or maybe this only happens to me?) * Cheat sheet texted or emailed to myself to remind me of that week's/day's gigs with key info in it * Automated follow-up at a set time to market the client I note this is absent here, and yes, I know I could do it with a binder that I carry at all times. But I could also shoot pictures with camera and develop them in a darkroom: I want a system that frees up time for practice and study so I can offer a superior product rather than panic because I think I forgot somebody. Cheers, AtPG p.s. If you do five gigs a year, good for you! But I'm really interested in hearing from the folks that work at least 100 shows a year. p.p.s. Some of my friends have shown me combinations of free systems (for instance gmail) and paid systems. Whatever is working for you/keeping it all straight in your head and your clients happy is fine. I don't work enough to be able to afford a human, which would be my preference.
------------
We could have been practicing! |
lou serrano Special user Los Angeles, CA 671 Posts |
I use a system called Mago
It's designed specifically for magicians. I've been using it for the last year and a half. It's quite robust, automates a lot of business processes, and makes follow up with prospects and clients a breeze. It's not inexpensive, but costs much less than similar CRMs. Check it out: Mago Let me know if you have any questions. Lou Serrano |
Ashkenazi the Pretty Good Veteran user Northern California 366 Posts |
Years ago, learned a great deal from those posting about "business processes," and the importance of having one.
Still hoping some of you will share, but appreciate that some of the most qualified to opine will never see this posting. If a magic buddy of yours is a very busy worker, please nudge them. Thanks in advance for your consideration and time. Respectfully, AtPG
------------
We could have been practicing! |
WDavis Inner circle 1276 Posts |
Atpg,
You said your manager is an idiot... why not replace him with someone competent as a start. Also, systems are designed to fulfill the need of the user, but how that need is met will vary based on your customers and other important requirements. You haven’t provided insight into these key variables so all suggestions you receive will be speculative at best. |
Ashkenazi the Pretty Good Veteran user Northern California 366 Posts |
Try as I might WD, he sticks to me like flies on octopus.
My needs are explicitly outlined in the first posting: most systems I’ve found do not neatly accommodate changes (per my modifications need). About one out of four bookings changes something, and redoing a contract is tedious and time consuming. A web-based agreement would be optimal, and a little surprised that this hasn’t evolved into existence by 2018. Thank you.
------------
We could have been practicing! |
WDavis Inner circle 1276 Posts |
ATPG,
sounds like that’s the source of your problem. If it’s your business and he’s not stepping up AFTER you have clearly laid out your expectations, then you need to be the business owner and remove him from your operations. He’s a drain on your resources if you don’t. That said I will make a couple of assumptions based on your previous postings and reiteration, please correct me if I am wrong. You target the micro/small business and/or families, the consumer market. You are looking for a “black box” setup to get you your requirements posted above. Since the small/micro business and consumer markets are treated by commercial companies as the same, I can understand your interest in boilerplating contracts and processes. What you are looking for is an interface gateway to overlay subsystems to fulfill your requirements. You won’t find a single software that’s does it all so find a programmer with project management experience to build one for you. |
Ashkenazi the Pretty Good Veteran user Northern California 366 Posts |
For various reasons, not in a position to correct you. As for firing my manager, not medically possible, but thanks.
17hats is looking possible, as is HoneyBook, and about three other such SAASes. My need for being able to easily modify has proven to be the sword from the stone test. Funny how a photographer at a Sunday party can happen to know precisely what apparently nobody here either does, or wants to share, or is perhaps too busy to share. :) Happy gigs and making magic. Pax, AtPG
------------
We could have been practicing! |
Cleverpaws Regular user Northern California 156 Posts |
Perhaps you could share what the photographer knows and help everyone.
|
Ashkenazi the Pretty Good Veteran user Northern California 366 Posts |
I did, Cleverpaws.
Perhaps you can share your business practice/system, which will be preserved through your anonymity.
------------
We could have been practicing! |
MikeClay Special user Atlanta GA 761 Posts |
Mago looks nice...
You can do most of the automation you are mentioning with active campaign. Also if your using Wix.. STOP its one of the worst for any form of digital marketing.
its ok.. balloon dogs don't bite
|
Ashkenazi the Pretty Good Veteran user Northern California 366 Posts |
Why precisely are Wix-created web pages inferior to any other CMS, Mr. Clay?
------------
We could have been practicing! |
MikeClay Special user Atlanta GA 761 Posts |
OHHH where to begin...
Wix only has basic SEO abilities, and when I say basic I mean they ONLY have the minimum abilities needed to claim they can do SEO. Wix doesn't allow you to customize your RSS feed so that you can syndicate to all social platforms. Wix isn't set so that you can properly SILO the site to build thematic relevance (the KEY to ranking for anything) Overall it is designed to build pretty websites, not a marketing platform. If you are planning on ranking in non competitive markets or using paid ads to drive traffic.. Wix works for some people. But I find it useless. In the last year we have converted over 50 sites that under performed to wordpress and just with the conversion and setting up proper SEO increased traffic by an average of 200%
its ok.. balloon dogs don't bite
|
Ashkenazi the Pretty Good Veteran user Northern California 366 Posts |
Not sure this is the case about Wix, Mike. If you are curious, Google "magician San Francisco Bay Area," and see in what ranking my two websites come up. (Of course, googling their names would defeat the purpose of determining ranking, and bias your browser's cache).
Also of course, do so in a private window (so it's not influenced by previous searches). Corporate/Big-People is: WhoAteTheRabbit.com Smaller Humans is: Ash4Kids.com One is done in Wix, the other in WordPress. Thanks for the feedback - it is perhaps more difficult to tease out the truth of business practices than execute cleanly a center deal. AtPG
------------
We could have been practicing! |
MikeClay Special user Atlanta GA 761 Posts |
Yeah, it is the case for Wix.
Wix doesn't give you what you need to do REAL SEO. That isn't an opinion. Even a pure HTML site that is SILOed without backlinks build better thematic relevance than a WIX site. The problem with WIX is they don't understand the core of the algorithm, or how thematic relevance is passed within a theme. Also Wordpress out of the box is better with SEO but 95% of people break its true power with how they setup navigation within the site all because they don't understand thematic relevance. So to compare the 2 lets take a step back and look at your 2 sites. Looking at the WP site Domain Strength is 0.61 out of 10 39 indexed pages 31 backlinks off of 5 c-blocks and from 5 domains and less than 100 social signal to build thematic relevance. Its also not using an SSL (which Google added to best practices over a year ago, and is a hit to your SEO at this point) The only thematic relevant SILO in the site is the testimonials-faq (meaning google sees your site being more relevant to the reviews than to what you do) You have many orphaned content segments that lower your overall score (you need to tell WP not to build pages for images, nofollow tags, noindex archives) your RSS feed needs to be syndicated and needs to have schema added to it (buffer or IFTTT can automate syndication, YOU CAN NOT ADD SCHEMA to a WIX rss feed) When we look at the WIX site overall its WEAKER but when you look at how Google Crawls the site it has equal value to the natural indexing to the Testimonials page as the Shows page. Meaning it has more thematic relevance to "Magician" than the WP site If you fix the INURL architecture and plug the huge holes in the wp site you will probably get a good boost in traffic. Not to mention if you increase the content and stem the keywords on your show page and add real schema to the show page in WP and SILO the page, and add a SILO to the blog and syndicate the RSS you would see almost overnight a 200% increase in traffic. and I know you don't really know me, but please don't take this as me being snarky, I am just being analytical and showing you the metric differences. If you work on improving the overall power of the WP site it will slaughter your WIX site. The advantage WIX has at this point is the Wix DA bleeding through the duel indexing (which is the reason WIX sites index), but in any real competitive market that is overpowered with simply building thematic relevance. Which cannot be done with WIX as it flattens silo structure within a website. google crawl for ash4kids https://www.screencast.com/t/YWbDQVkGZ google crawl for who ate the rabbit https://www.screencast.com/t/zU7h4iNsy and then there is this one.. a properly siloed website http://www.screencast.com/users/mike-cdc......a97dfdc1 notice the difference... You can not SILO wix the way the last one is done.
its ok.. balloon dogs don't bite
|
The Magic Cafe Forum Index » » Tricky business » » Soup-to-Nuts Business Process: what do you do/use/pay for? (2 Likes) |
[ Top of Page ] |
All content & postings Copyright © 2001-2024 Steve Brooks. All Rights Reserved. This page was created in 0.05 seconds requiring 5 database queries. |
The views and comments expressed on The Magic Café are not necessarily those of The Magic Café, Steve Brooks, or Steve Brooks Magic. > Privacy Statement < |