Kelley Marsh

I make things better. I amuse myself in the meantime.

Category: Thoughts

  • Scarcity and Abundance

    There’s a theory in this book that, while too little of something may be a bad thing, too much of that thing may also be bad. That more is not always better. It’s only better to a point, and then the benefit may not only level off, it may actually decrease. It’s a U shaped…

  • On Motivation

    I have this little cube on my office desk. It’s a timer. You flip the cube over so that a number is on top, and then it beeps after that many minutes have elapsed. This is useful in many ways. Got a meeting in 15 minutes? Flip the timer to 10 min. You can ignore…

  • Is stress time over yet? I feel like it should be over now.

    I think we are defined by who we become in a crisis. When we are under stress, when things go wrong, when you’ve made a mistake, when the unexpected happens. Our reaction in times of trouble can be telling. Do you take action to fix things, or do you just talk about fixing things? Do…

  • Accountability, responsibility, and trust

    One of the fascinating things about agile team structure is the delineation between responsibility and accountability. While I may be in charge of making sure something gets done, I may not actually be the one to perform the work. I am accountable to a task without being responsible for actually doing it. As a scrum…

  • We can’t all possibly be the expert, all the time.

    This video has been making the rounds via social media: It’s painful and hilarious at the same time. The thought that niggles at the back of my brain is how everyone identifies with the expert – and we can’t all possibly be the expert.  Surely, there are times that we play each role in this…

  • Inspiration

    I’ve been wrangling my feed reader today – culling, adding, focusing, absorbing. Admittedly, recently, the only category of feeds that were read with any regularity was the “entertaining” category. Followed by the “crossfit” and “paleo” categories. This may explain my exuberance for my workouts, and my general sense of malaise at work. I’ve been uninspired.…

  • ask not what your website can do for you

    I was talking to an agent friend the other day, and she was asking me about her site analytics, wanting to better understand bounce rate and page views and whatnot.  Like many in the industry that consider themselves tech-savvy, she has a Google Analytics account for her business site and faithfully checks those numbers –…

  • the answer is always more data

    I’m convinced the answer is always in the data.  At least, as far as generating business is concerned. There’s a whole treasure of answers, just sitting there waiting – you just have to have the analysis cycles in place to take advantage of it.  Do you know what people are searching for most often in…

  • how to ensure you’re always worse than you could be

    I’m a little OCD.  I’m a little exacting, and precise. I blame it on my background. I’ve got an engineering degree where I was taught to define and measure systems.  To improve performance, reduce risk, to evaluate alternatives and measure results.  I spent a quarter century in a ballet studio, perfecting the nuances of both…

  • does anyone really get any mobile traffic on their sites?

    I keep hearing how mobile is the next big thing.  And I don’t disagree.  More and more, I do everything I want and/or need from my Blackberry.  So when I hear consistent chatter about an ever increasing wave of mobile users, it makes me think: How do I, as a business, prepare for and capitalize…

  • fun with google analytics

    Two cool things some folks don’t know about You can have Google Analytics email you when you have odd patterns in your analytics You can create advanced segments to look at specific groups of site visitors.   First.  Creating custom email alerts. Ever had a day when your traffic went crazy?  Someone linked to you…

  • your contact form sucks

    I’m tempted to just end this post right here. But let’s dive deeper, just for sport. First of all, I’m probably looking at your contact form because you haven’t published your email addresses in a prominent manner.  I hunted around for your email address.  I tried hard to find it, and I’m good at finding…

  • Tags, Magic, and Hell Bunny

    I was doing some site consulting for a friend of mine today, helping her get more people to the site and purchasing items – it’s a retail clothing store, a basic WordPress site with an eCommerce plugin. In the online store, she had fastidiously added tags to each item for sale because several people had…

  • Rethinking Fancy Flyers

    So I had this idea the other day. Being a data geek, I want to be able to track what does and doesn’t work in my marketing, I want to put as many numbers behind my marketing plan as possible. Take the humble in-home flyer, for instance.  They’re usually a showy display of photos of…

  • Overcoming Fear of the Click – And Learning Curiosity

    I was at a conference last week, participating in a discussion about search engine optimization for real estate agents.  The target was to cover basics – an introduction to the concept of being found online.  It never matters how basic you attempt to make something – there’s always someone who needs it even simpler (and…

  • it’s not about you. it never was.

    An agent emailed me the other day and shared her site with me, frustrated that it didn’t get her any business because – in her mind – it lacked enough information. Her site, in a nutshell: If I were a consumer, a potential client, I’d be gone in a heartbeat too.  I’m sure she’s a…

  • relentless follow-through

    i love this post from The Marketing Minute about relentless follow-through. it is the concept of ‘relentless’ that i appreciate. to do something continuously and conscientiously, in a planned and systematic manner. to demonstrate that you care enough to keep trying, to keep doing what you said you’d do, until a proper end point is…