I just got back from putting on a workshop in Denver (and being with the most delightful group of students). However, the return trip home was horrendous. Highlights of the trip include:

* Two canceled flights

* One missed flight (due to a delayed flight, but my baggage made it — so much for airline security)

* Got labeled an extra security risk TWICE

* Had to spend the night in Atlanta

I could go on and on but I’m thinking about my audience (YOU) and you don’t care.

On the positive side, I can pass on what I learned about my experience to those of you who have small travel sites who are trying to compete with the large Expedias of the world.

And yes, you CAN compete. How? By offering the personal touch.

Here are my Ten Tips for Making Your Air Travel More Bearable. Travel sites are free to post these tips on your Web sites as additional content. This will help you prove how valuable it is to have a travel agent and not be an impersonal Web site that simply saves clients a few dollars.

1. Get a travel agent. That’s the absolutely smartest thing you can do when you travel. My travel agent is Teresa Smith of Pro Travel (601-582-3300). (If you call Pro Travel, ask for Teresa specifically or leave a message for her. They’re in the process of setting up a Web site, and I’ll post their URL when they get it ready.)

I have two Internet-related companies, but when I travel, I go to Teresa. She can find me the best deal out of the five airports from the many different airlines that could provide airline reservations for me. I could spend hours doing the same thing, but Teresa can get me where I’m going for the best price at the time I need to be there. I may be able to save a little by shopping around for myself, but when time equals money, I save by going to Teresa. I wouldn’t do it any other way. She’s the best.

At times like this past weekend, while I waited in an endless line after my first flight was canceled in Denver, I called Teresa. She found me a return flight with a competing airline for $780. American let me use that flight because they wanted as many happy customers as they could get.

When I got stuck in Atlanta for the night and couldn’t make it home, Teresa found me a hotel room near the airport. Hundreds of travelers couldn’t find a room because of the conventions in town, but Teresa found me a room.

How much is Teresa worth to me? Priceless.

If you have a travel site, offer to be a travel agent for your customers. Be the friendly voice at the other end of the phone. Large sites like Expedia and Priceline will never be able to compete against that kind of customer service.

2. Keep your travel agent’s cell or home phone number with you at all times. This may seem self explanatory, but you don’t want to be stuck in NYC on a Sunday night and only know your agent’s office number.

3. Put all of your gels, lotions, shampoos, etc., in a small plastic bag with a Ziploc top. Security is cracking down on the plastic bags now, so my round lip gloss was in a bag of its own. I’ve often wondered about my lip gloss vs. Bruce Lee IV whose body is a lethal weapon. I’m not criticizing our security measures, because they’re doing everything they can to keep us safe. But I’ve been stopped because of my cat ink pen, my dog-shaped powder, and my bottle of Advil. Bruce Lee IV gets on just fine.

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Let’s take a small drift to the left-side of our brains for a while and look at another slightly abused grammar problem.

who’s vs. whose

If you use who’s, it should always stand for who is or who has.

Example:

Who’s going to the game tomorrow night?

(Who is going to the game tomorrow night?)

It’s really quite simple. Whenever you use who’s, substitute who is or who has in the sentence. If it works, you’re using the word correctly. If it doesn’t work, whose is correct, which is the possessive form.

Example:

Whose coat are you wearing?

Grammar is really very logical if we’ll only give it a chance. The main problem is that it contains all of these twisted words like gerunds and split infinitives that make our teeth hurt.

Think LOGICALLY and you’ll be so much better off than you think as far as grammar is concerned.

Robin

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When you go to a Chinese restaurant, do you read the advice from the fortune cookies? I do (unless the words are too small).

Here’s the advice from my last visit:

Recognition is the greatest motivator.

That advice really made me think. When we recognize the strengths and abilities in others, it motivates them to do better . . . to excel. Whether it’s your family members, peers, or employees, it works the same. Building people up makes them try even harder.

I once worked for a boss who thought just the opposite. He believed in tearing people down. He chewed up all of his employees and spit them out like toothpicks. He wasn’t choosy either. He was an equal opportunity chewer. And he chewed in public, so you felt like someone in front of a firing squad with all eyes upon you as you were being chewed apart by the hungry bullets.

It’s not fun to work with a gun pointed at the back of your head. It doesn’t make you do better; instead, it causes you to make more mistakes because you often feel more nervous about making mistakes. Not a fun position to be in.

So recognize the strengths of the people you work with. Compliment them on their work. Be the one who says they’re doing a good job. Don’t overdo it, because there’s nothing worse than praise that appears to be false. Mean what you say. Everyone has strengths.

Recognition is the greatest motivator can also mean recognizing a new idea and being motivated enough to do something about it. How many people have ideas but don’t do anything about it?

Sometimes I collect ideas. Martin says I can’t have any more ideas until I finish the ones I’ve already started.

Seriously, ideas are wonderful, but you have to act on those ideas for them to work for you. It’s like buying a software program and leaving it in the box, yet expecting it to boost your productivity.

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Who is your target audience? To answer that question, let’s get down to the bottom line: money in your back pocket.

Have the search engines ever bought anything from you? The answer is almost always NO. Therefore, the search engines aren’t your target audience. Quit writing your Web site copy with the search engines in mind. Instead, focus on your “money in their back pocket” customers.

Let’s talk about your boss or the Board of Directors for a minute. This part can get a little sticky. The boss or the Board wants your Web site to be all in Flash. You’ve tried to explain that the search engines aren’t particularly fond of Flash (understatement).  Of course, this doesn’t matter to your boss. HE wants the Flash movie that contains a picture of his son riding a flashy new sports car across the computer screen. (You know the song/dance.) And he wants it as the main page of the site.

Every morning, he rushes to the major engines and searches for the main keyword phrase for the business, and he’s furious that the site is not in the top 5 positions. He’s on page 3, and it’s your fault. You’re working hard on off-page factors to compensate for the Flash.

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Consider your own industry in your own location. What can you do to bring Mardi Gras to your Web site and your physical location?

Here’s your challenge: think of a way or ways to bring Mardi Gras to your Web site and your physical location, and begin making plans NOW for next year.

Here are some questions you are probably asking yourself:

“I sell nuts and bolts in Indiana and on the Web. Mardi Gras has nothing to do with me. Why should I bother?”

You’re thinking too narrowly. Doesn’t everyone love a party? Does the party have to be in the South?

“I have an SEO company without a real physical location. This exercise is ridiculous.”

Start thinking with the right-side of your brain. Think about what Mardi Gras stands for–the last big “hooray” before Ash Wednesday begins and things get serious. What ideas pop into your head now? Write them down. Think about press releases, blog posts, and the publicity you can gain by whatever you do surrounding a Mardi Gras celebration.

“I sell children’s clothing online. Mardi Gras is for adults, so this won’t work for me.”

Does Mardi Gras have to be for adults? Who said? Children love Mardi Gras parades, masks, king cakes, beads, etc.

“I’d rather promote a local celebration rather than Mardi Gras. I think that would go over better for me.”

So do it! We don’t have any “boxes” on this site. You’re on your own with your own creativity.

Your Assignment:

Come up with an idea for your Web site/industry. If you can’t think of one, let me know your industry and I’ll brainstorm with you. Let’s have fun with this one.

Robin

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