Alexander and Associates Inc.

Last week, I had the displeasure of speaking with Dan Johns, supervisor of tax policy at the Idaho State Tax Commission. Like many citizens, I’m pretty upset to hear the Commission has been giving some politically well-connected taxpayers sweetheart deals, costing the state $75 million in revenue. I called the Tax Commission asking for an explanation and the employees referred me to Johns, who did return my call.

That’s about the best I can say, though. As a newspaper reporter and editorial writer for 12 years, mostly in Idaho, I dealt with hundreds of officials at the state, federal and local levels. I can honestly say that after a 10-minute conversation, Johns exemplified to me the worst in aloof, cover-your-ass bureaucratic arrogance I have ever observed as a journalist or citizen. If saying this brings official scrutiny and an audit on me, then so be it.

The abuses at the Tax Commission came to light several years ago, after five former Tax Commission employees told of corruption. Now, another three current employees say the handouts have gotten even worse. After hearing another report on Boise State Public Radio this morning about the abuses, I am compelled to blog about it.

For background, I’m $1,500 behind in my 2009 Idaho taxes. I’m paying it off at $500 a month. It’s been a learning experience and needless to say, I am current in this year’s tax obligations. As a citizen, I am happy to pay my taxes; it is the duty of every American. I expect no favors and will accept none. I do, however, I expect the process to be open and transparent and fair. When it isn’t, I get eye-poppingly mad. It doesn’t help that schools, transportation, public safety and other urgent needs are taking a hit because of reduced revenues, yet a few people who know how to game the system are, in effect, cheating us out of funding for needed services.

When I asked more about how these selected taxpayers could have had their taxes reduced so much, and how the secrecy serves the public interest, Johns repeatedly told me “I can’t help you,” “I can’t answer your questions,” and even “Is there any point in us continuing this conversation?” Never, at any point, did Johns say anything remotely along the lines of “Taxpayer confidence in the system is important to us” or “We think all taxpayers should be treated fairly” or “We know paying taxes is an important obligation, we appreciate hearing your concerns and we are committed to doing the right thing.” At every turn, he hid behind the legislative and court process as a way of ducking my questions. As a result, I have concluded the Idaho Tax Commission cares about none of these things.

I can’t help but saying this is bad PR. As a public relations and social media consultant in Boise, I know it’s vital to acknowledge legitimate concerns and complaints about your business, or you will destroy your brand. Clearly, at least one leader at the Idaho State Tax Commission has no interest in protecting the image of his institution, or of bolstering public faith and trust in it. Johns’ lack of interest in the image of his own employer is troubling.

The current and former employees submitted sworn affidavits detailing abuse, which Johns dismissed to me as “allegations.” Yes, from his perspective, they are mere allegations, but they are also sworn statements from people willing to put their reputations and careers on the line to blow the whistle on abusive behavior – for no apparent gain and some risk to themselves.

In my opinion, these people are the ones who should be serving on the Tax Commission and administering its affairs, not the present gang.

I see it as a sign of acceptance and maturity when we can discuss the plusses and minuses of a proposal. But Rocky Barker’s Aug. 25 story about wind development in Idaho was fairly boosterish and carefully avoided mention of the tradeoffs of the energy source he was writing about.

Before anyone labels me as anti-wind, I’d like to clarify that, like the majority of Americans, I’m an “all-of-the-abover.” Our country needs niche sources such as wind, solar and biomass, as well as baseload power (power that is predictable and reliable, which includes fossil, nuclear and, sometimes, hydro). Everything has a role and deserves our support. Since April 2007, our PR firm has been a public relations consultant for Alternate Energy Holdings Inc. , giving us the opportunity to intensively research different energy types.

In the public policy area, however, support needs to follow careful consideration of the tradeoffs of each source – and each source has tradeoffs. Fortunately, we are well-informed about the tradeoffs of traditional power sources, but here are some for wind that may come as a surprise:

• According to Wikipedia, 60 to 80 percent of the time, wind farms produce little or no power (tinyurl.com/windoutput). They may provide power when it’s not needed and not provide when it is needed, making wind difficult to integrate into a power grid that demands reliability. Barker’s story mentioned the new wind farms will power for 40,000 homes, but should have added, when the wind blows enough.
• Wind farms need huge areas; about a tenth of a square mile per megawatt, according to the American Wind Energy Association (tinyurl.com/windareas). A 600 megawatt farm would need about 60 square miles but if it produces power just 25 percent of the time, you would really need four times that area (240 square miles) to produce 600 mw with any reliability. A typical baseload plant reliably produces that much in a couple of square miles.
• According to many news reports worldwide, wind turbine neighbors, mostly farmers, report sleeplessness, irritability and depression due to infrasound and light flicker (windturbinesyndrome.com).
• Industrial wind turbines may be 450 feet tall and 650-foot models exist. By comparison, the tallest building in Idaho (U.S. Bank Plaza) is 267 feet. Barker’s Aug. 25 story didn’t mention the acreage of the project or the heights of the 122 towers.
• According to the National Academy of Engineering, wind farms require high energy input, 11 times the steel and 5 times the concrete of a comparable nuclear plant, as well and hundreds of miles of access roads and transmission lines (tinyurl.com/windinputs).
• According to the American Bird Conservancy, each wind turbine kills up to 7.5 birds per year, or 40,000 nationally, mostly songbirds and raptors. (tinyurl.com/birdkills)
• According to the Caithness Wind Farm Information Forum, wind energy has killed 63 people due to blade and ice throws, turbine fires and accidents (tinyurl.com/winddeaths); by comparison, dam collapses have killed about 75,000.
• According to the National Academy of Sciences, renewables receive much more subsidy than baseload sources (tinyurl.com/energysubsidies), given the amount energy produced.
• Wind energy often faces strong opposition from citizens and environmentalists. To his credit, Barker has reported on this. The Snake River Alliance, for example, is famous for spouting its would-support of wind development, but it is too timid to testify at local meetings in support of embattled wind developers.

Balanced reporting should consider these facts alongside the great advantages of wind power, as it will result in a better-informed public. We can’t rely exclusively on renewables to power our civilization. Intermittent sources have an important role to play, but we need baseload to back them up. We really need it all.

As wind becomes less exotic, news stories will report the full picture, as it should with any legitimate and useful energy source. Our support for wind will become stronger when we fully understand its limits as well as its tremendous benefits.

Like everyone else, I get a lot of emails from people in my industry offering advice on public relations, social media, search engine optimization and Internet marketing. Every now and then, one of them stands out. This is a great list to follow when setting up or improving your Web site. Thanks to www.internetmarketingforbusinessowners.com for the timesless list of tips, relevant to those of us in Boise and beyond:

Here is a checklist of common issues, problems, ideas, and improvements that are often overlooked.

Testimonials-don’t leave home without them

Something that should never be missing from a business web site are testimonials. I’d sooner forget my kid at a public swimming pool as forget testimonials on my web site (well…almost).

Testimonials are simple yet powerful. They are quotes from past clients and happy customers telling future site visitors that doing business with you is a smart move. Unfortunately most web sites I’ve visited don’t have them.

Testimonial pages are often the most frequently visited pages on a web site. If people praise you, get in the habit of asking them if you can quote them on your web site.

Try to have the testimonials address concerns that first-time visitors might have, or highlight the main benefits visitors may be looking for in your company. There’s nothing wrong with coaching your happy customers on what kind of quote would benefit your business, but be sure to post the quote in their own words and style of talking.

If possible, have a testimonial signed such that future clients could verify the information in the testimonial. For example, a testimonial signed “Richard Jones, President XYZ Inc.” or “Emma Richards, Pasadena CA” carries more weight than a testimonial from “Bob T.”

Beware of errors

Nothing hurts web site credibility as an obvious mistake sitting right there on your web site. Here are some of the common problems (and some you may not have thought about).

Sounds obvious, but we’ve all seen broken links, grammatical errors, and misspelled words, all of which act as negative points against a web site. Errors will erode your credibility. Spell-checking is a good start, but everything published on your web site should first be read by someone besides the author for clarity and continuity as well as errors and mistakes. This practice has saved me a lot of grief.

Different Browsers

One other thing you may not realize: It is very possible your site will look fine in one browser but not in another. Your site should work correctly in all major browsers. If your site looks good in Internet Explorer, but not Firefox, a good percentage of your visitors may have a bad impression of your site.

Here are the latest numbers on what browsers are most popular.

Unfortunately, if you do find something wrong on one browser and not another, it will probably take a knowledgeable web designer to fix the problem.

Keeping the site up to date

If the year is 2009, and a web site says “Copyright 2002″ at the bottom, I assume the company has gone out of business and someone forgot to take the site down.

It is well worth looking over your web site on an annual basis to make sure there isn’t dated or outdated information causing visitors to question the relevance of the information they’ve read elsewhere on the site. Having a site with fresh updated content is not only a draw for site visitors, it helps with your search engine rankings as well.

One helpful thing, when keeping dates up-to-date, is a handy bit of javascript you can put on your site that will automatically take the current day, month, or year and display that on your web site. So if you want your copyright date at the bottom of your page to always display the current year, search for “javascript today’s date” in a search engine and you’ll find snippets of code that you can place on your web site to do things like this.

(this is also used to create urgency when selling something-”This deal ends midnight on !!” although most people aren’t fooled by that anymore)

In this way blogs, articles, and up-to-date announcements about company and industry news do much to show that you’re open for business and thriving.

Effective “About Us” or “Company” pages

Most sites already have a page that talks about the company, but many don’t allow site visitors to get to know the company through this page. If this page simply restates the services your business provides, it’s a lost opportunity to add a personal touch to the cold, vast void of the Internet.

This page could also be titled “About Us” or “Who We Are”. Site visitors who go to these pages are looking for something that tells them what the company is like on the inside.

Tell your visitors about the people who make the business what it is. Let them know how the owner built the company on hard work and integrity, describe the charitable work the CEO is spearheading, or that the company hosts daycare for their employees. Feel free to let people get to know your company from the inside as long as-and this is the key-you can supply this information in such a way that it supports the impression your trying to give site visitors (see Site Flow and Focus-advanced tutorial).

You can get fancy like Saturn, simple like Google, or funny and conversational like Ben and Jerry.

Evogear’s “About Us” page is a great example of a company page that speaks to their target market.

Remember: many of your customers are just as interested in what kind of business you are as they are interested in the products or services you provide.

So where’s your company page, Jarom?
An excellent question…join my site, jump on the conference call, and ask me directly. By that time I’ll try to have an answer ready for you.

Yours in success,
-Jarom Adair
www.InternetMarketingForBusinessOwners.com