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Can't Get a Real Person on the Phone?

I'm sure you've been in this scenario - on the phone - pushing buttons - slogging through an interactive voice response system - waiting for the voice prompts to finish - not knowing exactly which buttons to push - feeling frustrated and at times mad - and all you want is a human being to talk with, to help you out.

For a cheat sheet on how to bypass the IVR and reach a human at specific companies in the U.S., check out http://paulenglish.com/ivr/. You can even add your own tips.

And for a rather fun treat check out Paul's blog at http://www.paulenglish.com - he's quite a geek and I find his blog entries fun, interesting and informative. Very short too. You'll also find the link here to the U.K. reach-a-human cheat sheet.

Why do I mention this on my SEO blog? One thing I'm starting to see again is prospects calling and wanting more search engine visibility. However, they haven't fully thought through the impact of doubling or tripling their traffic -- which results in more calls or emails and/or sales.

When businesses are unprepared, the same scenario happens. A person is looking for something - service or product. They find a web site that appears to have an answer and they want to speak with someone, to get answers to their questions or place an order. It's frustrating when they cannot get through.

Now, I'm not going to call the kettle black here. Mea culpa! One of the issues I have with my business right now is being responsive to calls and emails from prospects wanting to speak with me. I'm at a point where I have a major client that needs all my attention. So how do I train others to help me, while handling my client responsibilities and still being responsive to the calls and emails? It's a challenge and I am working on this issue. Luckily, I have a very magical person, Jenny Meadows, who assists with all my editing and some project administration.

For business-to-business SEO opportunities, I've teamed up with John Rasco at RefreshWeb.com. Truth is, we've worked selected B2B opportunities together for the last couple of years.

And Sue Foss at www.CedarValleyGroup.com is someone I've trained to do SEO work. I'm very proud of the projects she's completed, and she's taking on more work with me. I'm hoping to add additional help in the area of bookkeeping and Plone Project management. So, 2006 should be an exciting year.

My number is 512.646.0817. If I don't answer, I will call back. My email is tom (at) 4webresults.com, so contact me directly. Be patient ... I will get back to you.

All the best
Tom