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Window Safety Week, held next week, is observed to heighten the awareness of what parents and caregivers should do to help keep their family and visitors safer from the risks of window falls or injuries in their home, as well as how they can use their windows for emergency escape and rescue purposes.

I realize that, as fenestration dealers and manufacturers, you are not in the business of writing headlines, but in the business of providing excellent window and door products and services. Regardless, in this digital age, all businesses must focus strongly on how they market themselves online. While many companies choose to delegate the responsibility of website content creation to a staff member or freelance writer, it is important to know how content affects your bottom line.

The economy is hot, construction is healthier than it has been for many years, and window and door dealers are running faster than ever. This business activity is welcome—most of us remember the vacuum sound that started in 2007-2008 and continued for years. So yes—bring it! However, many of the dealer owners we work with are working 70-hour weeks to keep up.

In the early stages of any industry, innovation is active. The winners are those who tightly integrate design, production, sales and marketing. Take the auto industry as an example: because the products (cars) were not quite good enough and needed constant improvement, proprietary integration allowed leaders to create better and more reliable vehicles. After some decades, owners could rely on buying great autos from many brands and the commoditization of the industry was in full swing, giving us the plethora of brands we have today, and pushing out the Oldsmobiles of the market.

Not long ago, I was on a call with a potential client who was lamenting the fact that he didn’t have enough leads in his business. “Once I get in front of them, we can close the sale,” he told me. “But getting in front of them—that is the issue.” Some variation on that theme is one of the three most consistent complaints I hear about growing businesses.

Windows, doors and skylights sometimes fall under the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act’s definition of consumer goods, and other times they do not. Magnuson-Moss is a federal statutory scheme that mandates certain requirements for written warranties.

It provides, in part, that the “warrantor” (party giving a warranty for a product) may not make conditions in a written or implied warranty that consumers must use only parts or service identified by brand, trade, or corporate name—i.e., “authorized parts.” If the consumer or her agent is buying the windows, the statute likely applies.

Last week, the Window & Door Manufacturers Association brought together industry stakeholders and members of Congress, agency leaders and political strategists for its signature policymaking event. The lineup of speakers included representatives from the U.S.

Regular readers of my articles know I have a one-word answer for any small business looking to improve search engine optimization: content.

It's really that simple. Yes, you can do many other things to improve your window and door website's SEO, but nothing matters more than content. Many say content is king—I think it's the entire royal court. Nothing makes the search engine "spiders" happier than websites that are rich in original, relevant content and that organically include top-performing keywords for, in our case, windows and doors.

In the recent months, there have been several opportunities for Energy Star partners to have their voices heard. In May of 2017, the Environmental Protection Agency invited public comment on existing regulations pursuant to Executive Order 13777, Enforcing the Regulatory Reform Agency.

Last week, I attended Glass Processing Automation Days in San Antonio. Organized by FeneTech and supported by the National Glass Association, the event is focused on the glass side of our world. But there was still a ton of great information about integrating automation that applies directly to our industry.