Newsletter – October 2008

Welcome to the Future of Funeral Service Newsletter!

The October 2008 newsletter is here. Since we are in the Thanksgiving Season (between the Canadian and American Thanksgiving Holidays), I want to show my appreciation and thanks to you! I have a ton of free tutorials and videos for you for this edition.

If you feel that someone else could benefit for this information, please feel free to forward it to them. If you are not a subscriber, get your own copy: Sign Up Today!

Don’t forget to check out the free teleseminar that I am hosting with Mike Kubasak this Thursday (October 23). Mike is going to share the 10 Biggest Mistakes Funeral Directors make when dealing with Price Shoppers.

>>>Register Today <<<

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Mistakes Made with Price Shoppers – I hope you don’t make them – Free Teleseminar
Winning or losing price shoppers can found a profound effect on your firm – the more you win, the more profitable you will be AND at the same time, you are weakening the competition!

Mike Kubasak and I held a teleseminar in August about Price Shoppers: “Handling Price Shoppers is Easier When You Differentiate Yourself” – over 400 funeral professionals registered! Read More

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5 Reasons to have Careers on your Funeral Home Website
Recently, I created a “Help Wanted Ad” for some a support position to help me with the growth of my business and posted it to my website. Instead of the old way of posting ads with newspapers and then sifting through a stack of job-seeking-tire-kickers, I wanted to elevate the relationship level to one of someone who was familiar with my work (via my website) or at least to get a referral – friend of a friend.

So why I am telling you this story? Well it seems to be a topic of interest lately – getting good caliber staff – and we seem to turn to our traveling sales reps and ask them if they know of anyone looking. As funeral directors, we forget that we have a large volume of “eyeballs” checking out obituaries on our websites and leaving condolences. Why not have a “Careers” or “Job Opportunities” section on your website? Read More

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Wanted: Entrepreneurial Support
Although I have posted this under the “Careers” category, it probably should be called “Opportunities” or “Internet Apprenticeship” but at least with “Careers” you will know that I am looking for some help.

You see, there are a lot of things happening behind the scenes as Web 2.0 and the funeral industry collide – actually “mesh” together – all of it beneficial to the funeral profession! But to make sure that I play my part in the most efficient manner, I need some help. Read More

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Part 1 – Intro: Relationship Marketing for Funeral Homes
This is the follow-up presentation to my live presentation at the Selected Independent Convention in Washington, DC. I have decided to break up this presentation into 5 parts as the recording of the web seminar was almost 2 hours long. I would strongly suggest that you watch them in order. Please provide your feedback and also – PLEASE – if you do apply any of these strategies, please let me know – I love it when people take action! Read More

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Video Tributes & YouTube Web Seminar

As a follow up to two of my presentations at the New York State Funeral Directors Convention, I am hosting a web seminar today. This online seminar will be a step by step demonstration that will show you how to create a Video using a commercial software program. This process will be applicable to creating Video Tributes for your families or also to create an infomercial for your firm.

Then once the video is created, we will go through the steps to upload the video to YouTube. I will also field any questions that you have during the presentation… Read More

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Viral Marketing for Funeral Homes

I know that I have preaching this for some time, but besides the mere act of putting obituaries on your website, doing this will drive very targeted traffic – and they are the exact people who will want to by flowers, memorial jewelry and other remembrance items. Watch the video and you will see what I mean. Read More

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Thanks again for subscribing to my newsletter – I hope that you find the information helpful. I would love to hear your feedback, so if you have any suggestions or comments (or even testimonials), please just fill in the comment box below and let me know – Thank you!
…Hep

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Mistakes Made with Price Shoppers – I hope you don’t make them – Free Teleseminar

Winning or losing price shoppers can found a profound effect on your firm – the more you win, the more profitable you will be AND at the same time, you are weakening the competition!

Mike Kubasak and I held a teleseminar in August about Price Shoppers: “Handling Price Shoppers is Easier When You Differentiate Yourself” – over 400 funeral professionals registered!

At the end of the call we said that we would address this issue again. So Mike suggested that we tackle some of the mistakes that he has observed over the years. So this Thursday, we are going to have another telesemar…

10 Biggest Mistakes Funeral Directors Make on the

Phone when Dealing with Price Shoppers Teleseminar

Date: Thursday, October 23, 2008

Time: 2 PM Eastern / 11 AM Pacific

Register for the Teleseminar Now!

Also, if you cannot make it on Thursday, make sure that you register anyway so that I can can get a link to you for the replay. From some of the feedback we received from the summer teleseminar, we heard that many firms used the recordings for staff meetings and training – Great Idea!

Register now at: Price Shopper Biggest Mistakes Teleseminar <=== Don’t miss this!

I hope that you can join us on the call on Thursday! I’m sure that this will be an entertaining session as well.

…Hepp

Part 1 – Intro: Relationship Marketing for Funeral Homes

This is the follow-up presentation to my live presentation at the Selected Independent Convention in Washington, DC. I have decided to break up this presentation into 5 parts as the recording of the web seminar was almost 2 hours long.  I would strongly suggest that you watch them in order.  Please provide your feedback and also – PLEASE – if you do apply any of these strategies, please let me know – I love it when people take action!

Please give me your feedback below…

Part 2 – Social Networks: Relationship Marketing for Funeral Homes

This is the 1st section of the presentation where we talk about Social Networks like Facebook, MySpace, and LinkedIn.  This video is XX minutes long.  See the text below the video for links to the “Letter to Families” mentioned in the video as well as a link to all of my Social Networks.

Resources:

• Letter To Bereaved Families
• Hep’s Social Network Links

Please give me your feedback below…

Part 3 – Written Word: Relationship Marketing for Funeral Homes

In this section we key on the written word, whether it is by email, blog post, RSS, auto responder or email newsletter. Email is still the # 1 use of the Internet – watch this 20:40 minute video to see how you can apply these relationship building strategies.

Resources:

• Aweber – auto responder and email newsletter program
• Google Reader – saves time, aggregates RSS subscriptions into one place

Please give me your feedback below…

Part 4 – Online Video: Relationship Marketing for Funeral Homes

In this section we talk about the power of online video and how it can help you get higher (and more) Search Engine Results. This section is 26:21 minutes.

Resources:

• Traffic Geyser – Upload videos to multiple sites
  

Please give me your feedback below…