Sphinn - A Small Business Marketing Success Story: John Tuggle, Guitar Teacher

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A Small Business Marketing Success Story: John Tuggle, Guitar Teacher

Went Hot: April 12, 2008 - 1:14 am
Posted By: MattMcGee 224 days ago
Topic Type: News Story (Jump to http://searchengineland.com)
Category: Search Marketing

Meet John W. Tuggle, a guitarist living in Athens, Georgia. Thanks to SEO and social media, John was found by Gibson Guitars, uses Skype to give guitar lessons worldwide, and has a waiting list of hopeful students.

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from eMktgStrategist 224 days ago #

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Hey Matt,

This is a really good case study and I'm forwarding it around to some contacts and clients. But, I have a nagging question. A little red flag went up when I searched on Jason van Orden. In your case study, two different products of his are mentioned (one is a podcast and one is a book) but you don’t say they are by the same person.

* "Internet Business Mastery podcast, I heard about people doing marketing through this new media, Web 2.0 age, and I knew I could make it work."

* "I also learned how to promote my podcast from Jason van Orden and his excellent Promote Your Podcast book. After I applied his techniques I saw my subscribers go from five to about 250."

Early in the article you say that you don’t have a professional relationship with John Tuggle but do you have a professional or social relationship with Jason van Orden?

This doesn’t change how I feel about the great content you’ve included, I just want to make sure I know the whole story when I talk to folks about it.

Elge

from MattMcGee 224 days ago #

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Hi Elge - thanks for the kind words.

I'd never heard of Jason Van Orden until John mentioned him in the email. I had to lookup the URL for that Internet Mastery thing when John sent me his replies to my questions. Don't know Jason, never met him.

I do know Miriam, the web designer mentioned; never met her in person, but we are email friends. Miriam responded to my first interview (from March) when I asked at the end for others to share their own small business success stories. And that's how I got connected with John. :-)

Any other questions? Please do fire away. And thx again for the compliments.

from markalves 223 days ago #

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How refreshing to see a social media case study that shows how someone overcame real-world obstacles with persistence and creativity online. It sure beats the common how-I-got-a-bazillion-links-in-a-fortnight posts that often are difficult to replicate for other businesses.

from MattMcGee 223 days ago #

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@markalves -- I agree 100%. Even if you're a solo act, enough hard work and creativity and you can make it work for you. Thx for your kind words.

from earlpearl 223 days ago #

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That is a great story Matt and a nifty use of technology. In fact its an amazing story of using current technology to take a business out of the basement and make it webwide.

Thanks for the report....and congrats to Miriam.

Dave

from MiriamEllis 220 days ago #

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Thanks Dave!

This was such fun, and I am just loving this series of Matt's. What a treat to have a client featured in his column.

Miriam

from clicksharpmarketing 115 days ago #

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Matt -- I still remember this post from when I first read it... it's always one of my go-to's when dealing with skeptical small business owners. Thanks for making my life easier. We just put out a white paper called "Small Business Guide To Web-Based Video Marketing" and we've referenced this article among the additional resources at the end.