As the wind blows through the dry leaves and sage, my ear catches the eerie squeak of an old Dr’s. sign swinging from a porch gable. Mesmerized by the surrounding sounds, the scent of dust, dry vegetation, and years of weathered decay, I became uniquely entrenched by the simple Dr.’s shingle, still hanging after many years.

The letters on the old wood sign were barely readable. As the sign hung tilted, hanging now by only one chain, I allowed my mind to journey back to a distant day when a proud young Doctor first hung this emblem of future hopes and aspirations.

As I watched that old sign swing, I began to realize how in life today--decades later—many of us still hang our future hopes and aspirations on a shingle often to leave it swinging in the wind.

A few weeks ago while in a meeting with the senior partner of a major law firm, the senior partner looked at me while sitting back and in a tone of frustration began to complain about his internet presence. The firm had a great website, but something had lead the senior partner to believe, his website was not properly optimized. Their website, or electronic shingle, was out on the World Wide Web, swinging in the wind of internet traffic, but not providing much in the way of tangible results.

This week while meeting a successful banker, our conversation turned to the subject of personal belief systems which all of us have in life. Some might refer to these areas as “comfort zones”. I began to make this banker uncomfortable when I leaned forward toward her and quietly said, “I’m sure if I dug hard enough, I would discover in your own life private personal areas that you protect from anyone discovering. If I challenged those areas, I have no doubt, it would make you extremely uncomfortable or even feel quite rattled.” Sometimes the shingles we hang in life are inner, emotional shingles, meant only for our own inner sight to discover. Signs which could read, “This is my comfort zone. I don’t want you to disturb it…STAY OUT!”

Time often brings to life repetition in principles. Principles which carry with them, the full realization of cause and effect. Often we place our full hopes and aspirations on the simple exercise of posting a sign, failing to realize, the sign itself--unless seen--is nothing more than clutter.

A sign, a website, or even our inner comfort zones are nothing more than a declaration. A declaration of who you are, what you do, and what you are about? Declarations left unseen, are an investment in energy, void of results. The power lays in the arena of PRESENCE.

Presence is not wrapped up in arrogance or false claims of grandeur. Presence is an end result whereby all are aware of the existence of your shingle, having been informed of it, and as a result discovering it for ones self.

A dominating presence, a presence where the masses learn of your shingle requires forethought and strategy. How will you get your message out? How will you attract people to your website? How will you make people aware of your personal or business existence?

For the lawyer, his website challenge was not in the area of search engine optimization. The challenge for this law firm was the lack of an effective plan or strategy to make people aware of the website. His shingle (website) was simply left to hang and swing in the wind.

Many readers know I have a great history working with horses. Fall round-ups remain to this day an incredibly valuable life lesson. In range country, every fall horsemen will gather in the early morning hours to spread out individually over a large perimeter which may span miles of range country. The plan is simple. A rider and his horse will seek out lone steers, or perhaps a cow-calf unit, and upon discovery, push or herd those animals, while picking up other stragglers, down from the high country into a central holding area. Holding areas which are quite often a meadow or section of land used as a sorting pen.

In the early morning hours, the meadow or sorting pen lays totally empty, but by nightfall, hundreds of cattle can fill this area, as several riders bring their small collection of animals together to create a massive herd of cattle.

Let’s look at this analogy. What would happen if in the early morning hours, a group of horsemen gathered in the empty meadow or sorting pens, and simply called out “Here cow”? The answer is simple as absolutely nothing would happen. It requires sending out line riders, to make contact with the individual animals and draw them together into a greater collection.

Marketing on today’s internet is identical to herding cattle. The challenge remains that many of us come to our sorting pens (website) and wait there while calling out “Here cow!”

If we are going to establish a dominating presence on today’s internet, we must…ABSOLUTELY MUST…learn to release our “line riders” who can circulate through the maze on the internet, collecting and redirecting cattle (unique website visitor traffic) to our sorting pen (website).

On June 16^th, 2008 I’ll be releasing online a new publication called “Secret Magnetic Internet Marketing Strategies” . The primary focus of this new publication is to teach people how to effectively “herd cattle” online. How to effectively and properly create a dominating online presence, where you can properly move (herd) large pools of traffic to your website, blog, or personal profiles.

Today’s internet has millions upon millions of web pages listed on it. One source has used a figure of over 4 billion web pages listed on the internet. One quickly begins to realize how by simply adding another website to the internet, is not going to do much good. The reality is, without a strategy to accompany it, a lone website will get lost in the crowd. It will become a squeaky shingle swinging in the wind.

I often think back to that young doctor, and in particular, I wonder as to the nature of his thoughts when he excitedly hung his new shingle on the porch gable. The house is boarded up, the roof collapsed, the porch deck rotted out with weeds growing up from the soil below it. The town around the house, was abandonned long ago, and the dozen or so clapboard buildings, what little was left of them, declared a story of a young doctor’s hopes and aspirations, dashed by the lack of business. A shingle seldom seen.

There’s little value in a shingle that never gets seen. So let me ask you, right now…today…where is your shingle hiding? Is it time to put in place the help of “line riders”?

Grab hold of the excellence life has to offer.

About the Author

Copyright © 2008 James C. Tanner. All Rights Reserved.

James C. Tanner is the Author of the soon to be released “Secret Magnetic Internet Marketing Strategies”. Along with this new release, will be copies of his books (in ebook format), “Let Loose The Promotional Genius In You”, “The Encyclopedia of Traffic Building Tactics”, as well as “Website Monetization and Paid Online Opportunities”. Watch for the June 16, 2008 release at http://www.magneticinternetmarketingstrategies.com .