Peanuts to Profits With Thor Schrock
Peanuts to Profits With Thor Schrock

This morning Schrock Innovations issued a press release about what the company is doing to help businesses use their websites to weather the Great Recession.

Here is the text of the release:

Schrock Bets on Lincoln’s Digital Recovery With Hire

With the prospect of a double-dip recession looming, Schrock Innovations is betting Lincoln’s businesses will turn to the web

Lincoln, NE, March 29, 2010: Although Lincoln’s economy is the nation’s second best for its size, that doesn’t mean local businesses are escaping the pinch of the Great Recession.

Schrock Innovations, a local Lincoln computer company, has hired Brian Augenstein to captain the company’s Web Development Division as demand for their local web-based services grow in the face of a recessionary business environment.

Thor Schrock owns Schrock Innovations and he believes that businesses are turning to the web because, when used properly, it is less expensive to generate leads, sales, and profits online. Schrock has been buying media in Lincoln for 11 years and he is seeing the signs of a business environment that is scared to take chances.

“When I can buy commercials during the NCAA Final Four for $10 per spot, that speaks toward the business climate,” Schrock said. “Couple advertising cuts with layoffs, outsourcing, and rising taxes and the result is a timid business environment that is fearful for the future.”

For what it would normally cost to run a single television commercial, Schrock Innovations is redesigning websites to make them more efficient at delivering information, generating leads, and bringing shoppers through the doors of Lincoln businesses.

“For many businesses, their website is an afterthought in the marketing budget. With marketing dollars becoming scarce, tweaking a company’s web presence is becoming more attractive because local businesses see immediate returns that go on over time without continued investment.”

Schrock points out that many businesses have all of the information they need right now to boost sales and profitability through their websites, but simply don’t know how to do it. Rather than designing a website for a client and walking away, Schrock Innovations helps its clients see the potential in the present and the future.

“In the past it was enough to know who your customers were,” Schrock said. “In today’s web world you need to know who they are, where they are coming from, how to reach them, and what they want. If you use your website to get that information, sales and profits are a natural conclusion.”

Schrock’s team of internet marketers and designers evaluate a company’s web presence based on three criteria. If a client is missing any of the three, Schrock shows them how to claim the business they are missing out on:

1. You don’t know how many of your customers or clients come from your website. There are numerous free online tools that allow you to track how many customers search for you, find your website, and then what they look at before they leave.
2. Your website has few visitors. Many of the websites designed between the late 1990’s and the mid 2000’s were designed as an online brochure rather than a marketing piece designed to attract visitors and convert them into paying customers. If you didn’t own the company, what is the #1 reason you would go to your website?
3. Your website is not reflective of what you do. Companies are necessarily focused on the day-to-day activities of running a business. Over time, businesses can evolve to offer new products, services, and even change their look. Does your website represent where your brand is today, or where it was 5 years ago?

“If a company’s website has traffic, tracking, and conversion that means they are making money. A website is more than a billboard. It should work for your company day and night. If it is not, your business is missing an opportunity to make money in the toughest of economic times.”

This weekend Schrock Innovations kicked off the 2010 Ultimate Upgrade sale with all of the normal events, plus one new twist.

While I was taping last weekends show in the studio with Chris Goforth the first day of the NCAA Basketball Tournament was under way.

In between each segment Chris was switching between the studio mode and the KLMS 1480 – ESPN Sports Lincoln feed to catch the latest scores.

I am not a huge basketball fan, and while an upset is always interesting something else stood out to me above all else. There were no local commercials in the commercial segments.

Why No Local Commercials?

In just 5 weeks 1480 AM was flipped from a sports station, to an oldies station, and then back to a sports station again just days before the tournament began.

There was simply no time for the sales management to put together commercial packages, get them to the sales people, and then present them to clients.

These situations always interest me because here I saw a great sports product paired with a station with available advertising spots, and a lack of a pre-defined pricing structure.

I was already in the studio, so we cut a quick :30 spot (listen to it here) and I simply asked the station manager if I could advertise during the games. Of course they agreed, so the only thing to work out was the price.

I was able to get spots during each game for an unbelievable price just because I asked. The price was so good that I asked if I could have 2 spots per game instead of one. They agreed!

What is the Ultimate Upgrade?

The commercial we cut was all about the Ultimate Upgrade sale at Schrock Innovations. During this sale you can trade in an old computer for credit against a new system.

The new computer is only $449 after your trade – $250 off our normal entry level price – and you can trade any old computer working or not!

Its a little early to know how the commercials did, but for the price I paid I would be willing to blindly commit to a regular KLMS schedule no questions asked!

Barack Obama’s health care plan is scheduled for a vote on Sunday, and rather than preach my feelings about this bill and the methods used to pass it, I have decided to simply urge my readers to contact the representatives who are undecided.

The website Barak Hates This has a list of the undecided Congressional representatives and their phone numbers.

Their is still time to make a difference in this vote, but you have to act now.

Regardless of your position (I believe most of the American people are against this) take advantage of your right to influence your Congressmen and Congresswomen.

There are a million posts about how to start an online business on the Internet, but they all have an angle of some kind. They are all pushing a product either directly or indirectly.

I received an email a couple days ago from a woman who had seen me in Next Internet Millionaire and wanted some advice on starting her own home based internet business.

Like many online entrepreneurs she was looking into buying the packages and the programs that promise fast results. She wanted my advice on how to build a real online business that would make money.

I have purposely refrained from posting links to affiliate programs in this post or recommending specific products.

I am also withholding the emailer’s last name so she does not get deluged with offers from TONS of people out there with programs to offer.

With that said, if you genuinely want to help this person, make a comment below and let her know how to get in touch with you. Here is her email:

Hi There Thor,

I found you via multiple internet clicks that ultimately landed me on the Next Internet Millionaire.

I watched a little of one of the episodes and you seemed to me to be the most genuine of the lot. That’s all interesting but you’re probably wondering why I’m writing to you.

I’m not looking to recruit you into any screwball thing, I guess mostly I’m looking for some advise / insight. I have my own home based business and I see lots of internet marketing, attraction marketing, magnetic marketing programs online and they all say they are the best.

They all say they have the “secret”. In fact one of your fellow contestants on the show Steve Shuitt along with a guy named Ryan Dunn are selling a “MLM Biz Builder Course”.

Even the show you were on is selling (and I see posted on your blog a contest to win) “The Secret Classroom” program.

I have purchased some of Tim Sales products and on Facebook I see lots of MLM’ers promoting themselves as ‘experts’ but in reality most of them don’t know any more than I do.

I do like Tim Sales approach and his products but other than just being friendly with strangers I’m not sure of the best way to get people who are looking for and open to a real work from home business in front of my product/opportunity.

Essentially how to drive traffic to a website and if there really is a tried and true way to do it on a budget.

I appreciate your feedback and wish you well.

Warm Regards,

Lanelle -Last Name Withheld-

This is what I told her:

Thanks for your email. Your question sounds easy enough, and if there was an easy answer I would give it to you right here. Unfortunately there is not.

Sometimes people online get so focused on pushing traffic to a site that they are willing do do anything, pay anyone, and believe anything to make it happen.

Most of the programs you buy are simply study at home courses that package and present information that is freely available on the Internet anyway. Don’t get me wrong, these packages can greatly speed up the deployment of your product and even increase its chances of a successful launch, but they are not a silver bullet.

There are three things that every business needs – Time, Money, and Differentiation. If you have any 2 of these in great supply, starting your work-from-home business is a snap. If you don’t have time, you can use money to buy other people’s time. If you don’t have money, you can use your own time. If you have differentiation your product is better than all of its competitors and you have either the time or money to let others know about it.

What happens a lot of time is that people get off the Time, Money, Differentiation track and get focuses on buying tools that allow them to get more Time, Money, or Differentiation. Time and Money spent on tools directly takes away from time and money that can be spent promoting your product.

While many people don’t believe it, there is no silver bullet shortcut to getting traffic. It takes time, content, and sometimes money to get your message out there.

With that said, the situation most new online entrepreneurs find themselves in is that they have little or no money, need to make money quickly, and they have an untested or unknown product.

Since there is no silver bullet, the best thing you can do as an entrepreneur is arrange the circumstances to give you the best possible chances of success. There are no guarantees, and the odds are 75% against you – but you know that going into it.

Here are the steps that I would do to get a product up and running as quickly as possible with little or no money:

1. You must have a good product. No amount of traffic, money or time can make up for a flawed product. To be a good, your product must fulfill a gaping need that the public has – whether they know they have it or not. Start with a specific problem that your product will resolve and then focus everything around your product from your marketing, design, videos, audio clips, and imagery toward showing people how your product solves their problem. If you find that your product doesn’t really solve a problem, or its a stretch at best to say it does, save your time and look for another problem to solve.

2. Get something online. Anything. Content first, beauty last. Now that you have a product that solves a real problem, start getting ranked in the search results. Use video, audio, images, local business center listings, press releases, blog posts, tweets, facebook posts, MSN spaces blog posts – anything you can do to get your message and backlinks out there without spamming.

As time goes on your talents and abilities will increase with every post, and every video you upload. You will learn the lessons you could have bought in some of the products you have looked into in the school of hard knocks. As your skills increase, your ability to communicate how it solves the specific problem will increase as well.

Traffic is a function of time because the more content you create the more traffic you will get. As time passes, your older content will gain traction and you will begin to see exponential results. Most online entrepreneurs pump out the content and then fizzle out. Those who keep going are the ones who succeed.

3. Stay Open to Opportunity. Best laid plans rarely work. Businesses are all run by people, and people who run successful businesses adapt to changing circumstances. You could build a year of content only to find that search engines changed a math formula and now all of your content has disappeared from search results. Some people faced with this would quit. Others would look back on their old content, revise it, and re-purpose it into new applications.

Time is never wasted. Old spent time can be used again and again to get results in the present. You just have to be loose enough to realize that things are changing so you can get back on top of the game again – and continue solving problems.

4. Look for Force Multipliers. Never stop talking to other people – especially within your industry. The more you stay involved with others the more you will learn about what they need to make their own projects succeed. You may even find that you can provide a resource to them that they need to help reach their goals. Likewise, the odds they can help you are good as well. By working together you can use all of their old time to push your current efforts while leasing your old time to push theirs.

Imagine how much more quickly you would get your product off the ground if you had three friends who instantly would help you by giving you access to their old time?

I hope this helps in some small way. Good luck!

Schrock Innovations successfully hired a new Web Development Director last week thanks to a radio recruitment advertisement we ran on KIBZ-FM, The Blaze.

Brian Augenstein was hired away from Phoenix Computers in Beatrice, NE to head the company’s Web Development Division. Brian is a very promising employee who is laying important groundwork for Schrock’s future expansion into website development, hosting, and application development.

Normally if we would have advertised that position in the paper we would have had to search for the proverbial needle among dozens of applications from unqualified people.

Let’s Do it Again!

The radio recruitment ad worked so well that we decidied to run a second one seeking a Computer Repair Technician. For some inexplicable reason experienced computer break / fix technicians are hard to find in Lincoln Nebraska.

We have had a post up on Craig’s List for weeks, only to get applications from people ranging from auto mechanics to fry cooks. We can’t hire a poorly skilled technician to work on our customers’ computers, so the next step was to drop an ad in the paper – or try the radio again.

I decided to give radio another try.

What Schrock is Looking For

You can listen to the radio recruitment ad we are running the week here.

In the ad we describe the kind of person we are looking for. Schrock technicians are never allowed to give up on a problem. At times this leads us to work directly with developers and engineers at companies like Microsoft or Kingston to resolve problems on the bleeding edge of technical support.

When a Schrock technician is confronted with an un-patched problem, they don’t quit and wait for a patch. They become the catalyst that gets the patch created.

In fact, Schrock is so selective about the kind of person we employ that two of our senior technicians have been courted by Google.

This position pays up-to $30,000 annually plus benefits.

How Can I Apply?

If you are a technician who wants to take the next step in your career, fill out an application on Schrock’s website. Its nice to be part of an award-winning team that will challenge you to rise to the next level of performance.

We will not contact your current employer unless you allow us to do so and we will arrange an interview around your work schedule.

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Last December I attended a seminar about the various ways radio advertising can be used to accomplish goals other than simple product and service marketing.

One of the speakers spoke about using radio to recruit new employees rather than the newspaper or a recruitment service – especially when you are hiring for key positions.

Why Use Radio to Recruit Employees?

For one thing, it can be less expensive than the newspaper and is definitely less expensive than a recruiting service.

Schrock is hiring a Web Development Director, and it would have cost us over $900 to place a classified ad in the Lincoln Journal Star for that position.

A recruiter would have charged a percentage of the employees annual salary – typically 10% – which would have been up to $4,000 for this position.

Second, using radio allows us to do more than just look for an employee with an ad. It also tells all of the station’s listeners that we are hiring, we pay well, and that working at Schrock is a great experience.

While we are reaching out to potential employees, we are also increasing our brand awareness.

Here is the ad we ran for our Web Development Director position.

What Kind of Employees Do You Find With Radio?

The biggest reason to use radio for recruitment is so simple most HR managers miss it.

When you post an ad on Craigslist, in the classifieds, or on Monster you are advertising to the available pool of unemployed workers – or at best un-loyal workers who are always shopping around.

When you think about it, the people you want to reach are the ones that employers have held on to. These key people have the best skill sets, the highest degree of training, and are competent at what they do.

When you hire from the pool of employed people rather than the pool of unemployed people you get fewer applicants, but the applicants you do get are of a much higher caliber.

So How Much Does a Recruitment Ad Cost?

We ran an ad about 60 times on one local station for about $800. We had one very qualified applicant, currently employed with a competitor, on the first day the ad ran. The ad is still running, so I will post about how it comes out.

Schrock Innovations is seeking a Director for our Website Services Division in our Lincoln, NE Service Center. For the right candidate, this is an opportunity to make a real difference in the way business and non-profit organizations operate every day.

This is a description of what you can expect from the position and what we are looking for in a candidate:

Lincoln’s #1 Computer Repair Company is looking for a charismatic, energetic department supervisor to oversee our Web Development Division.

This position requires excellent customer service skills, a genuine desire to help our clients achieve their business goals, and over-the-top communication skills.

Direct responsibilities for this position include:

* Meet with web development clients and potential clients to identify needs and create plans to meet those needs
* Oversee the progress of our coders and ensure their work is meeting the expectations of our clients
* Customer relationship management tasks
* The development of a monthly client newsletter
* Coding minor HTML updates and image changes on client websites
* Prospecting for potential new clients
* Working with our service providers on any issues that arise
* Provide and maintain an organizational framework for the Web Development Division

A qualified candidate must be able to:

* Work in our Service Center in Lincoln, NE (this is not a telecommute position)
* Maintain a pleasant, professional demeanor at all times
* Understand web design business concepts such as hosting, reserving a domain, etc..
* Develop and skillfully present website proposals for clients and potential clients
* Edit existing HTML code with the assistance of Adobe Dreamweaver CS3
* Do basic image manipulation using Adobe Photoshop CS3 (resize an image, change resolution, etc)
* Work a 45-50 hour work week

Requirements for this Position:

* Applicant must have a valid driver’s license and current insurance
* Applicant must pass a thorough background check
* Experience in coding is a considerable plus, but limited training is also available
* Experience in business management, project management, or a similar field is a plus

Additional Responsibilities:

* Applicant will be required to fill in on the Front Desk 1-2 days a week
* Applicant may be required to answer phones, assist customers, or perform other assigned duties

Compensation:

* $30,000 to $40,000 annual salary based upon qualifications and experience
* Bonuses based on achieving specific performance goals
* 401K retirement package with employer match
* Employee Assistance Program
* Discounted products and services

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