Joe Rossini
Tuesday, February 24, 2015
A day in the life of a salesman
Well most of you will just not care about this post but it will tell you what I go through for my clients on a daily basis. I can tell you that sales is not an easy occupation and it takes constant work and study. I try to read as much as I can about topics and products and it takes up a lot of my time. I try to make at least 30 telephone calls a day. I try to follow up everyday. What I have problems with is the entry in my database it has always been a weakness because I am a go go type of guy and always on the move. I will slow down and enter my leads because they are future potential sales. I submit my clients to the search engines on a daily basis to keep them relevant. I work hard on my three top clients to keep them happy and I find it is taking more and more time to do it right. Sometimes I wish there were two of me:). Today I will make my calls and then actually do some cold calls. At 45 degrees it really will be cold calls. Iwill post on Twitter and Facebook and LinkedIN and then well by then the day is over:) Ok more to come this is a day in the life of a salesman.
Joe Rossini
Joe Rossini
Saturday, February 21, 2015
Interesting info about PR releases
When to write a press release
So, how can you tell if your press release is newsworthy? Here are some examples of great times to write a news release and even put it on the wire:
So, how can you tell if your press release is newsworthy? Here are some examples of great times to write a news release and even put it on the wire:
-
New product niche offerings
-
Industry firsts
-
New products
-
Significant distribution gains and large new accounts
-
Niche new accounts that have significant distribution
-
Availability in a new region
-
National consumer sweepstakes
-
Partnerships
-
Acquisitions
-
New CEO
-
Strategic announcements designed to get ahead of bad news (layoffs, rats in warehouse, etc. etc.)
-
Awards
I have been writing PR releases for some time they are not easy to do because you must do them right and use good grammer :) not always my best:) I use spell check and also my best checker (Brenda). More info:
Just remember that a PR release done on a regular basis can and will increase your brand and ultimately your SEO rankings.
More later.....
Joe Rossini
Tuesday, February 17, 2015
When is SEO considered a success
This is a difficult question because I believe that each customer must answer that question on their own. Some say first page placement of a main keyword in Google is the key. Others just want leads and leads usually turn into sales. Some want their Facebook friend count to spiral ever upward. The bottom line is there is no clear cut answer only if your SEO person fulfills the number one wish that drives you to pay that person.
I believe and will always believe that leads are the key to a business. If I can drive leads to you then I feel I have done my job. First place rankings sometimes are great but do they tell the real story. I feel that through multiple factors, submits to the search engines, directories, social media blogs and more you can attain what you are ultimately looking for.
I dropped by an old customer and it was so nice to shake his hand and see him smile and to hear that business was very good. I am not naive to think I did it all but I believe that I helped at least a bit. The bottom line is that leads that keep coming and lead to sales is all that really my company cares about and that means you have success and thus we do too.
Until next time
Joe Rossini
I believe and will always believe that leads are the key to a business. If I can drive leads to you then I feel I have done my job. First place rankings sometimes are great but do they tell the real story. I feel that through multiple factors, submits to the search engines, directories, social media blogs and more you can attain what you are ultimately looking for.
I dropped by an old customer and it was so nice to shake his hand and see him smile and to hear that business was very good. I am not naive to think I did it all but I believe that I helped at least a bit. The bottom line is that leads that keep coming and lead to sales is all that really my company cares about and that means you have success and thus we do too.
Until next time
Joe Rossini
Monday, February 9, 2015
Digital Dining and Apple Pay
Digital Dining Accepts Apple Pay
Secure payment terminals from FreedomPay allow customers to utilize popular mobile wallet solutionsSpringfield, VA and Radnor, PA – November 18, 2014 – Digital Dining now offers merchants North America’s most complete PCI-Validated P2PE solution with secure payment terminals that accept payment via NFC mobile wallets, such as Apple Pay and Google Wallet, as well as EMV chip-and-PIN cards and traditional credit/debit transactions. Powered by the FreedomPay Commerce Platform, Digital Dining enables merchants to stay ahead of the changing payments landscape and deliver the most secure payment infrastructure in the industry.
Merchants are facing a growing set of challenges to offer customers a secure and convenient way to pay. Addressing emerging payments technologies like NFC and EMV amid increasing consumer adoption requires merchants to upgrade their point-of-sale equipment or risk alienating consumers. The fully-functional Ingenico payment terminals included with the solution enable merchants to accept NFC, EMV, traditional magnetic stripe credit and PIN-debit transactions.
The integrated Digital Dining–FreedomPay solution has earned the PCI security standards council’s validation for point-to-point encryption. This offers merchants the assurance of third-party scrutiny of the solution, and also reduces the merchant’s scope for PCI compliance. The platform also provides broad processor integration, offering merchants choice and flexibility.
“Apple Pay and EMV are forcing merchants to rethink their POS and payment capabilities,” said Andre Nataf, Senior Business Development Manager at Digital Dining. “With Digital Dining and FreedomPay, we are providing a complete solution to an evolving payments ecosystem.”
FreedomPay earned the coveted PCI Validation for its P2PE solution in August 2014.
The new chip and Pin credit card coming soon!
Until the introduction of Chip and PIN, all face-to-face credit or debit card transactions used a magnetic stripe
or mechanical imprint to read and record account data, and a signature
for verification. Under that system, the customer hands their card to
the clerk at the point of sale,
who either "swipes" the card through a magnetic reader or makes an
imprint from the raised text of the card. In the former case, the system
verifies account details and prints a slip for the customer to sign. In
the case of a mechanical imprint, the transaction details are filled in
and the customer signs the imprinted slip. In either case, the clerk
verifies that the customer's signature matches that on the back of the
card to authenticate the transaction.
This system has a number of security flaws, including the ability to steal a card in the post[citation needed], or to learn to forge the signature on the card. More recently[clarification needed], technology has become available on the black market for both reading and writing the magnetic stripes, making cards easy to clone and use without the owner's knowledge.
Some US banks are now issuing Chip and PIN cards for their more affluent, frequent-travel customers. However, even though these credit cards have chips on board, many are in fact Chip and Signature cards;[1] as they require verification with a signature instead of an encoded PIN.
To solve this, banks and retailers are replacing traditional magnetic stripe equipment with smartcard technology, where credit and debit cards contain an embedded microchip and are authenticated automatically using a personal identification number (PIN). When a customer wishes to pay for goods using this system, the card is placed into a "Point of Sale" (POS) terminal, which connects to the chip on the card. To complete the transaction, the customer enters a PIN. When the POS terminal is connected to the network, the authenticity of the card and chip can be confirmed, along with the PIN, with the bank servers. If the POS terminal is not connected to the network, the chip can confirm to the terminal if PIN was entered correctly.
France has cut card fraud by more than 80% since its introduction in 1992 (see: Carte Bleue).
Chip and PIN is the name given to the initiative in the UK; other countries are launching their own systems based on the EMV standard, which is a group effort between Europay, MasterCard and Visa Inc.
More......
SAN FRANCISCO — That authoritative sstpp sound that comes from swiping a credit card through a reader is going away, to be replaced with the snick-snick of a card dip. It's the aural confirmation that after decades, the United States is entering the 21st century and finally embracing chip and PIN cards.
And that, in turn, means headaches but also, hopefully, security for millions of small businesses.
The new cards encode the user's account information not in the magnetic stripe along the card's back, but in a computer chip embedded in it. The chip generates a unique, one-time code for each sale.
"When chip data is stored in a merchant's system, that data cannot be used to create counterfeit cards," said Stephanie Ericksen, vice president of risk products for Visa.
"That makes merchants less of a target for criminals, because once they've mostly got chip data, there's not a lot the fraudsters can do with it," she said.
The PIN part of "chip and PIN" is something of a misnomer. In the rest of the world, when people buy with a credit card they dip their card in the reader and then input a Personal Identification Number, or PIN, much as Americas do when we use cash machines.
Here, most banks are issuing cards that allow a signature, rather than a PIN, as confirmation. Some banks are requiring PINs right away. Eventually it's expected all will.
The actual name for the new card system is EMV, for Europay, MasterCard and Visa standards. Though most people seem to be settling on "chip cards" as shorthand.
Once
they're in widespread use, big data breaches like those that hit Target
and Home Depot should become less common, because merchants won't be
storing anything useful to thieves in their systems.
According to a report by the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, Mo., the chip cards could reduce credit card fraud by 40% in the United States.
But getting to that happy day will require money, work and expense on merchants' part. And there's a deadline.
Currently, credit card companies and banks bear the liability for fraudulent purchases on credit cards. But beginning in October, merchants who haven't switched to readers that can take the new cards will be liable for fraud if there's a problem.
Though if your bank and credit union hasn't issued you one, they, not the customer or the merchant, are still liable.
Merchants aren't required to make the switch, but the cards are coming and they need to be prepared. While new cards will still have magnetic stripes, businesses are being encouraged to shift over quickly.
That means buying new credit card machines and software capable of reading both chip cards and magnetic stripe cards.
"It's not going to be without cost," said Todd McCracken, president and CEO of the National Small Business Association. "Depending on the size of the establishment, replacing all their card machines is going to cost a pretty penny."
About 30% of credit card terminals on the market today already have the hardware necessary to accept chip cards, though they don't necessarily have the right software, said Visa's Ericksen.
Costs
will vary depending on how big a merchant is. For mom-and-pop
operations, "We're seeing some of the new card readers at the warehouse
buying clubs that are under $100," she said.
Credit card companies plan to spend the first part of the year in an all-out push to get companies to upgrade.
For example, American Express will begin offering $100 in reimbursement to small merchants that switch to the chip card readers in February.
"We've allocated up to $10 million for upgrades," said Anré Williams, president of global merchant services at American Express.
The idea is to give merchants encouragement to make the shift, knowing that, "they're busy; they've got a lot of things going on," Williams said.
Sooner will be better than later because security experts are predicting a wave of data breaches as the window is "closing for hackers to easily profit from point-of-sale attacks on brick-and-mortar retailers," according to Experian's 2015 Data Breach Industry Forecast.
The biggest question for McCracken, with the National Small Business Association, is whether the savings on fraudulent charges the credit card companies will see end up being translated into lower rates for merchants.
"They've been telling us for years that the reason small businesses pay such high fees for taking credit cards is fraud," he said.
If the liability is moving to the merchant, and if the new chip cards are so much more security in the first place, the credit card fees small merchants pay should go down. Those typically run between 0.5% and 2% per transaction.
Remember Oct 15, 2015!!!!
This system has a number of security flaws, including the ability to steal a card in the post[citation needed], or to learn to forge the signature on the card. More recently[clarification needed], technology has become available on the black market for both reading and writing the magnetic stripes, making cards easy to clone and use without the owner's knowledge.
Some US banks are now issuing Chip and PIN cards for their more affluent, frequent-travel customers. However, even though these credit cards have chips on board, many are in fact Chip and Signature cards;[1] as they require verification with a signature instead of an encoded PIN.
To solve this, banks and retailers are replacing traditional magnetic stripe equipment with smartcard technology, where credit and debit cards contain an embedded microchip and are authenticated automatically using a personal identification number (PIN). When a customer wishes to pay for goods using this system, the card is placed into a "Point of Sale" (POS) terminal, which connects to the chip on the card. To complete the transaction, the customer enters a PIN. When the POS terminal is connected to the network, the authenticity of the card and chip can be confirmed, along with the PIN, with the bank servers. If the POS terminal is not connected to the network, the chip can confirm to the terminal if PIN was entered correctly.
France has cut card fraud by more than 80% since its introduction in 1992 (see: Carte Bleue).
Chip and PIN is the name given to the initiative in the UK; other countries are launching their own systems based on the EMV standard, which is a group effort between Europay, MasterCard and Visa Inc.
More......
SAN FRANCISCO — That authoritative sstpp sound that comes from swiping a credit card through a reader is going away, to be replaced with the snick-snick of a card dip. It's the aural confirmation that after decades, the United States is entering the 21st century and finally embracing chip and PIN cards.
And that, in turn, means headaches but also, hopefully, security for millions of small businesses.
The new cards encode the user's account information not in the magnetic stripe along the card's back, but in a computer chip embedded in it. The chip generates a unique, one-time code for each sale.
"When chip data is stored in a merchant's system, that data cannot be used to create counterfeit cards," said Stephanie Ericksen, vice president of risk products for Visa.
"That makes merchants less of a target for criminals, because once they've mostly got chip data, there's not a lot the fraudsters can do with it," she said.
The PIN part of "chip and PIN" is something of a misnomer. In the rest of the world, when people buy with a credit card they dip their card in the reader and then input a Personal Identification Number, or PIN, much as Americas do when we use cash machines.
Here, most banks are issuing cards that allow a signature, rather than a PIN, as confirmation. Some banks are requiring PINs right away. Eventually it's expected all will.
The actual name for the new card system is EMV, for Europay, MasterCard and Visa standards. Though most people seem to be settling on "chip cards" as shorthand.
According to a report by the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, Mo., the chip cards could reduce credit card fraud by 40% in the United States.
But getting to that happy day will require money, work and expense on merchants' part. And there's a deadline.
Currently, credit card companies and banks bear the liability for fraudulent purchases on credit cards. But beginning in October, merchants who haven't switched to readers that can take the new cards will be liable for fraud if there's a problem.
Though if your bank and credit union hasn't issued you one, they, not the customer or the merchant, are still liable.
Merchants aren't required to make the switch, but the cards are coming and they need to be prepared. While new cards will still have magnetic stripes, businesses are being encouraged to shift over quickly.
That means buying new credit card machines and software capable of reading both chip cards and magnetic stripe cards.
"It's not going to be without cost," said Todd McCracken, president and CEO of the National Small Business Association. "Depending on the size of the establishment, replacing all their card machines is going to cost a pretty penny."
About 30% of credit card terminals on the market today already have the hardware necessary to accept chip cards, though they don't necessarily have the right software, said Visa's Ericksen.
Credit card companies plan to spend the first part of the year in an all-out push to get companies to upgrade.
For example, American Express will begin offering $100 in reimbursement to small merchants that switch to the chip card readers in February.
"We've allocated up to $10 million for upgrades," said Anré Williams, president of global merchant services at American Express.
The idea is to give merchants encouragement to make the shift, knowing that, "they're busy; they've got a lot of things going on," Williams said.
Sooner will be better than later because security experts are predicting a wave of data breaches as the window is "closing for hackers to easily profit from point-of-sale attacks on brick-and-mortar retailers," according to Experian's 2015 Data Breach Industry Forecast.
The biggest question for McCracken, with the National Small Business Association, is whether the savings on fraudulent charges the credit card companies will see end up being translated into lower rates for merchants.
"They've been telling us for years that the reason small businesses pay such high fees for taking credit cards is fraud," he said.
If the liability is moving to the merchant, and if the new chip cards are so much more security in the first place, the credit card fees small merchants pay should go down. Those typically run between 0.5% and 2% per transaction.
Remember Oct 15, 2015!!!!
Thursday, February 5, 2015
About blogging
Neat piece from brick Marketing about blogging:
When developing your blogging strategy, it's important to understand the purpose of your business blog. A business blog should be designed to lure target audience members to your content and as a result, to your business website. You may think of bait as what we put on the hook to attract and catch fish. We know it's something that they want so we dangle it right in front of them and wait for them to latch on. Business blogging should be viewed the same way. Blog content is the bait that we use to get target audience members to latch on to our brand.
Of course, fish aren’t just going to latch on to anything and the same goes for your target audience members. Blog content is only bait if it’s something that your target audience is interested in. To start, we’ll tell you what they definitely aren’t interested in. Your target audience members will not latch on to blog posts that are promotional in nature. If your target audience smells a sales pitch, at best they’ll just ignore it and at worst they’ll be completely turned off by it (and your brand).
So what are target audience members interested in? What’s going to “hook” them? The best blog posts take two things into consideration:
#1 Target audience interests
First and foremost, a blog post needs to provide your target audience with good information that they are interested in. It should provide tips, tricks, lessons learned, or other insights that are going to help your target audience in some way and also position your business as an industry thought leader. Don’t overthink it. Any nugget of useful information can be turned into a blog post. If you’re stuck, don’t be afraid to reach out and ask current customers or prospects what kind of information they’d be interested in. Your customers service and sales teams can be great resources when deciding on blog post topic ideas. What questions come up again and again? Turn these questions into blog posts and you’ll have an evergreen resource that you can point to whenever the question comes up the next time.
# 2 Target audience attention spans
Everyone browsing the web has come to expect information instantaneously. If you market to a B2B audience, there’s a good chance that decision makers are continually being asked to do more with less time. The likelihood that someone is going to read a blog post word for word is slim. Instead, write posts that break the content up into pieces that are easier to digest. For example, instead of one long blog posts break it up into a series. Or, if you plan to publish a webinar, break it up into 5 minute chunks. Depending on your niche, your target audience might not be deskbound. They may be on the move throughout the day. Make sure to keep this in mind. There’s no way they’ll be reading anything long or complex, but they may be willing to give you a few minutes. Make those few minutes count.
More to come on this important topic but what is most important is have a blog it can work!
More next time
Joe
When developing your blogging strategy, it's important to understand the purpose of your business blog. A business blog should be designed to lure target audience members to your content and as a result, to your business website. You may think of bait as what we put on the hook to attract and catch fish. We know it's something that they want so we dangle it right in front of them and wait for them to latch on. Business blogging should be viewed the same way. Blog content is the bait that we use to get target audience members to latch on to our brand.
Of course, fish aren’t just going to latch on to anything and the same goes for your target audience members. Blog content is only bait if it’s something that your target audience is interested in. To start, we’ll tell you what they definitely aren’t interested in. Your target audience members will not latch on to blog posts that are promotional in nature. If your target audience smells a sales pitch, at best they’ll just ignore it and at worst they’ll be completely turned off by it (and your brand).
So what are target audience members interested in? What’s going to “hook” them? The best blog posts take two things into consideration:
#1 Target audience interests
First and foremost, a blog post needs to provide your target audience with good information that they are interested in. It should provide tips, tricks, lessons learned, or other insights that are going to help your target audience in some way and also position your business as an industry thought leader. Don’t overthink it. Any nugget of useful information can be turned into a blog post. If you’re stuck, don’t be afraid to reach out and ask current customers or prospects what kind of information they’d be interested in. Your customers service and sales teams can be great resources when deciding on blog post topic ideas. What questions come up again and again? Turn these questions into blog posts and you’ll have an evergreen resource that you can point to whenever the question comes up the next time.
# 2 Target audience attention spans
Everyone browsing the web has come to expect information instantaneously. If you market to a B2B audience, there’s a good chance that decision makers are continually being asked to do more with less time. The likelihood that someone is going to read a blog post word for word is slim. Instead, write posts that break the content up into pieces that are easier to digest. For example, instead of one long blog posts break it up into a series. Or, if you plan to publish a webinar, break it up into 5 minute chunks. Depending on your niche, your target audience might not be deskbound. They may be on the move throughout the day. Make sure to keep this in mind. There’s no way they’ll be reading anything long or complex, but they may be willing to give you a few minutes. Make those few minutes count.
More to come on this important topic but what is most important is have a blog it can work!
More next time
Joe
Wednesday, February 4, 2015
Not Just For English Sites
RMS worked hard on http://www.resursescolare.com/index.html - it was created in Romanian, with some German. Diana is a family friend and teacher, who sings to her students and leads them in songs with her flute with German grammar lessons. Romania is a dual language country - Romanian and German. Usually a child's first language is Romanian, but it is considered essential by many for children to speak German as well.
This site sells grammar lesson books that First through Fourth grade students can use to learn German. She created all of these books through her experience as a German teacher over her career. The books are offered for sale as an aid to tutoring or as practice for students of German.
Monday, February 2, 2015
Color selector program
If you want to see a program that we wrote that works neat and gives a customer an edge go look at the color selector: http://www.worldwidesteelbuildings.com/steel-buildings/color-picker.php
or look at http://www.kysteel.com/uploads/color-selector4_edit.html
OK just for more info:
to follow are two links to active web sites that use our color selector. Should you have an interest please feel free to contact me by e-mail or call me at 913-244-6132.
http://www.kysteel.com/uploads/color-selector4_edit.html
http://www.worldwidesteelbuildings.com/steel-buildings/color-picker.php
More info about us:
It was a pleasure talking to you on the phone. To follow is some basic information about us.
http://www.rossini.com/pdf/rossini_total.pdf
http://www.rossini.com/pdf/company_history.pdf
http://www.rossini.com/pdf/products.pdf
http://www.rossini.com/pdf/reasons.pdf
http://www.rossini.com/pdf/staff_qualifications.pdf
Some examples of our work:
http://missbscafe.com/
http://resursescolare.com/
http://beltonvetcenter.com/
http://www.cooladhandles.com/
http://www.adamsonbros.com/
www.marketyourbusinessnow.com
and much more.......
Should you have an interest please do not hesitate to get in touch with me.
Respectfully Yours
Joe Rossini Jr.
913-244-6132
or look at http://www.kysteel.com/uploads/color-selector4_edit.html
OK just for more info:
to follow are two links to active web sites that use our color selector. Should you have an interest please feel free to contact me by e-mail or call me at 913-244-6132.
http://www.kysteel.com/uploads/color-selector4_edit.html
http://www.worldwidesteelbuildings.com/steel-buildings/color-picker.php
More info about us:
It was a pleasure talking to you on the phone. To follow is some basic information about us.
http://www.rossini.com/pdf/rossini_total.pdf
http://www.rossini.com/pdf/company_history.pdf
http://www.rossini.com/pdf/products.pdf
http://www.rossini.com/pdf/reasons.pdf
http://www.rossini.com/pdf/staff_qualifications.pdf
Some examples of our work:
http://missbscafe.com/
http://resursescolare.com/
http://beltonvetcenter.com/
http://www.cooladhandles.com/
http://www.adamsonbros.com/
www.marketyourbusinessnow.com
and much more.......
Should you have an interest please do not hesitate to get in touch with me.
Respectfully Yours
Joe Rossini Jr.
913-244-6132
The time is now to expand your website to do more..
When I started this long journey twenty years ago, there was not much to talk about except blinking text and Yahoo, Netscape and AOL search engines. Wow things have changed, now you get video, you get audio, you get databases, you get interactive everything so how can you make your web site work better. I say you make it work in stages but first upgrading the web site to the latest web standards. Make sure your web site can work on a I phone or Android phone. How about on a tablet device. Once your website has the latest internal programming make sure you have new keywords and titles and descriptions. Now that your website is updated, make sure that the big boys know it is there and that can be done by telling the directories to look for you.
Ok you have done the basics now lets add some nice pictures and graphics with internal descriptions. How about making your site do something to draw customers. We offer a color selector for metal building companies that allows for potential customers to make color selections and see how their new building will look. This makes you look a bit different than other vendors.
How about adding a zip code finder for land or a favored business. I want to find the best web site company in 66085 (me) find it for me. Again you are a bit different.
One that is often asked is can I sell from my web site? of course you can by adding an e-commerce shopping cart and let those hot leads turn into new customers. E-commerce continues to grow and soon very soon maybe in the next four to five years on line sales will surpass brick and mortar sales. You must be there if you sell items to customers.
Social media well it was not around twenty years ago but now Facebook is actually old!! You should be there, you should have a Facebook, twitter and LinkedIn presence. I believe ti is important to be there.
How about a blog? Oh yes talk, talk, talk about things you like or can do and people will follow you. I like talking and so will you.
Ok more next time and remember we can help you with all of the above if you want it.
Talk soon
Joe 913-244-6132
Ok you have done the basics now lets add some nice pictures and graphics with internal descriptions. How about making your site do something to draw customers. We offer a color selector for metal building companies that allows for potential customers to make color selections and see how their new building will look. This makes you look a bit different than other vendors.
How about adding a zip code finder for land or a favored business. I want to find the best web site company in 66085 (me) find it for me. Again you are a bit different.
One that is often asked is can I sell from my web site? of course you can by adding an e-commerce shopping cart and let those hot leads turn into new customers. E-commerce continues to grow and soon very soon maybe in the next four to five years on line sales will surpass brick and mortar sales. You must be there if you sell items to customers.
Social media well it was not around twenty years ago but now Facebook is actually old!! You should be there, you should have a Facebook, twitter and LinkedIn presence. I believe ti is important to be there.
How about a blog? Oh yes talk, talk, talk about things you like or can do and people will follow you. I like talking and so will you.
Ok more next time and remember we can help you with all of the above if you want it.
Talk soon
Joe 913-244-6132
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)