Debbie Mayo Smith - December 2012 - Four smart ways to use Gigaalert

There is a great website, that used cleverly can help you find more clients and improve your customer service. It's one of my favourite sites and I use it all the time. It's www.gigaalert.com and it sends you web search results which you can use in a number of ways.

It looks for the new items in topics/searches you have specified and sends you a daily (or weekly) update of them by email. The beauty of this is you never have to go back and troll through material you've read online before. Please don't think "what's the big deal." Here are several ideas to get you started.

1. New business
Do you respond to RFP's? Do you look for business activity that you can fit into, such as what congresses are coming to Australia in 2014? Or annual conferences that will be held in Tasmania in 2013? Have Gigaalert send the search to you, then decide if you want to investigate. I use it to help look for speaking opportunities. One of my alerts is to search for words "conference 2013" in a website ending in .com.au and where the word scientific does not appear.

2. Help your clients
In this economy great customer service will shine brightly. Don't you agree? Let Gigaalert help you to help your clients. If you know their interests, their industry problems, what their roles and responsibilities are, you can sift through the alerts for relevant material and then via email send the information to them.

One of my very clever clients, Leisa Donlan of the Rotational Moulders Association Australasia has been doing this for years. In her words "Our customers (members) operate in a constantly changing market. Information is vital.  We use Google Alerts for daily updates on new articles on the internet relative to our customers' interests.  That's great on its own, but often not all is pertinent. 

We personally sort out the stories that are specifically relevant to our members interest (Eg Water Tanks) and then send a weekly "Media Update" tailored to suit them, which includes just a few sentences on the story and the hyperlink to the rest.  If they want to continue reading, it's just a click. Our members love it!"

3. Check your competition
Why not keep an eye on what your competition is doing? Set an alert with an individual's name, the company name or a conference name as the search term. You might want to hone it to exclude their website to ascertain what is happening outside of their company.

4. Social media reporting

Have searched looking for your name, your company name appearing online. Suggestion. Use the qualifier to exclude when it appears in your website. You'll know about that already.

Debbie Mayo-Smith is one of the most in-demand international speakers in Australasia as well as a bestselling author and media columnist.  Debbie helps businesses to save time and boost revenues. Sign up to her quick tip newsletter for ideas and ways to save time and boost business results.