Currently there are a number of similar approaches addressing grandfathered conditions. Limitations which have guided online shopping experiences.

It’s important to address the consequences of dealing with grandfathered conditions as the solutions have been less than ideal brand experiences: credit fraud fear, established instore expectations, payment system introductions, the generate confusion of not insisting on familiarity between consumer and shopping experience but rather insisting unfamiliarity have led to time consuming and brand depreciating demands on the consumer.

That said, it would take a marketing proposition and not a technology answer to create a true shopping experience online. Using the available tools. Not impossible, but effort intensive if your firm has invested heavily in the technology base, but there are always solutions…

Consumer Demands

Online consumer requirements have for the most part been task-oriented and are not inline with intuitive shopper behavior – again due to grandfathered conditions. It’s important to remember that as we have centuries developing behaviours and interests within markets, these activities have also found incorporation within a consumer’s life. Therefore, there is opportunity in following them. These consumer behaviours provide for non-consumer activity; life planning, time management, social activity, family orientation, value support, etc…

This isn’t a new observation, but the interpretation by online effort appears to be a less-than appreciative perspective.

Instore, so called offline environments, have the more fluid brand experience. What steps or directions are online displays undertaking? Recently, a few have begun using and AJAX enabled “drop” off area to address the shortcoming of e-cart solutions. 

Nonetheless, these “drop” offs mimic more closely a consumer’s behavior instore, where collecting articles is a primary instore behaviour. It follows a shopper pushing a cart until checkout, rather than having to return the cart as a result of having selected an article. Very counter-intuitive to do otherwise, very dead in its approach to brand building.

A truly integrated online-cart, therefore has to begin from the landing page, or from a lead in that provides information on the consumer. It also has greater room to employ a sales strategy supporting marketing effort, inlife, rather than it being so focused on resurrecting the diminishing consumer interest. For instance, current Sales messaging strategies, although they provide support, in these dead end areas, fail to engage consumers along the established marketing proposition. Rather, generally speaking, they’re design to hawk a ware at the checkout counter and suggest that customer service is supporting their long term interests. Essentially asking them to reconsider leaving. 

This is a enormous misstep in brand building as it inaccurately addresses consumer behaviour. It is more recuperative in nature than confident in positioning. 

The counter argument needless to say surfaces along catching the consumer well within the experience. This is a wasted consideration. Sales strategies at this level of the experience do the opposite. By enticing the consumer into believe something else remains to be purchased Effort and Immediacy become barriers. At checkout, after which a consumer has been led through a time consuming process, each step removing them from the shopping environment, the door becomes an increasingly attractive option.

Instore, the activity of checkout is surrounded by the experience. This raises an interesting observation. Psychographics play a huge role within instore shopping. They are what I’ll call dynamic data, by-products which lead to insight of a consumer’s extended interests: They can be formed around notions of: Browsing for social communication. Social survey purchasing. Brand relevance for providing diversity and social currency. Personal management, as well as research towards the fulfillment of a number of personal interests. With or without purchasing an item.

Moreover, the timing of these events: Time at purchase, developing histories revealing Short- and Long- term goals can lead to defining a customer service strategy aligned with personal value. All of these brand building opportunities exist within any single one visit. Yet, as long as task-orientation drives traffic through an experience these by-products will not have a natural environment within which they can surface.

Community as a Solutions

I recently reviewed a video where social networking was touted as a great way for consumers to connect with the brand. Via the employee who is empowered through sales activity, a channel for customer service and reciprocation appeared established, forthcoming. Great!, you’d think, but it’s dishonest. There are several proposed expectations which are not true. Return for Participation and Company Flexibility. 

We would all like to think that like a very few, those intimately tied to consumer health, for instance, replying expeditiously with innovation and immediate product address, consumer connections occurs. The truth is, the bulk of firms have very few mechanisms in place to facilitate this – Stock holders, responsibility for retaining a solvent firm, and employment are prohibitively expensive negotiating tools. Thus, these are barriers to replying individually to consumer requests and incorporating interest, theirs, within whole product directions – Customer service, yes. Product provisions, no, not now, or yet. Process orientation, yes, in time. Therefore, it’s dishonest to tout complete brand access. 

Is it wishful thinking a community tool can resolve the issues mentioned above, drive interest, hold a consumer, ensure a sale? It can’t, nor can it really. Community tools, it should be noted, although they generate interest, that interest is self-depreciating. Contributing to a commercial forum exhausts the interest. As they are not political venues for expression, interest in the brand, also diminishes. The life of the activity, in effect, ensures its exhaustion as there is little transferrable motivation to continue – unless of course the brand is failing on all fronts and complaints are necessary to bring this to corporate attention. 

Single minded shopping scenarios insisting checkout, and community tools distracting the experience poorly address branding. A branded shopping experience, including checkout should begin at the point where relevance begins assembling. “Trial” or “Investigation” areas/landings can then become appropriate as they mimic carts and dressing rooms. However, as instore, the experience is focused on pursuing the experience and not checking out. The course from here is obvious: Brand unique experiences which retain consumers while building general interests along serviceable routes.

It may be time to replace the general positioning strategy of online displays from “acceptable for everyone” with “confident branded experience”.

The remaining tools, features and employment strategies will enjoy a correct conditioning rather than addressing an existing condition. More importantly it creates a vehicle for correcting brand parity amoungst the various online entities. 

Confidence Shopping

I’ve always been fascinated by how women shop. More to the point, why they shop. Online, there must be, I hope, experiences which mimic this. I have yet to find one.  

Addressing the question above, how and why do women shop, I’ve always found female behaviour, instore, equally interesting. They are perhaps the barometer for a brand experience.

Another like observation is, I found, within large stores, for instance, an REI environment. It’s activity is outdoor wear and gear. 

A consumer walks through the aisle and as we elevate ourselves through the various strata ladders, those which enable mobility and affluence within our lives, the question which came to mind was, What is the relationship between an end-island and an aisle’s value proposition – as a brand building event. 

Do customers completing an aisle adventure where “durability”, “challenge” and “personal potential” value propositions provide resounding answers of confidence and the brand’s acknowledgement of their being an outdoor adventurer? Or, as they approach the end island display have they been exposed to assumptions leveling them to accepting a bulk, cheap end-aisle item as the only relevance they’ll share with the brand.  

The latter is what I believe accosts consumers online. Though an item is in hand, the end-aisle messaging, sales messaging, places shoppers in a less than comfortable position. It’s very inconsiderate. 

Addressing again female shopping behaviour, in addressing a brand along any of its relevance points, social mechanism begin to surfaces. These do not dissipate in consistency or effectiveness over time. Beyond, “One bad experience, never again”, they become tangent points for social activity. Not all negatively leverage brand failures, but they do enjoy airtime which is lost air time, lost potential, lost equity, lost opportunity for word of mouth transference – each which could positively communicate your brand’s value. 

Needless to say, relying on “community tools” is a funny idea. It begs the parody which community? Here on the internet or the hundreds of thousands micronets walking about. Sharing their experience to their captive audience. 

Yet “viral” activity is an insistence. Again, but from a different direction, an exhausted interest also exhaust the equity built to that point. Communities are customer service functions and should always reinforce developing shoe-ins for the brand – new customer referrals from existing customer satisfaction.

Market forces, as evident recently, are difficult to control or defy. Much of a senior executive’s business success can be put down to luck – to being in the right position when market forces are moving positively. Not me speaking:  I’m paraphrasing a recent interview with a retired chairman of one of my country’s more successful companies. He attacked bonus systems that focus only on rewarding achievement of short-term financial outputs: his point being that sometimes managers ”win”  mainly because the tide of the times turns in their favour, while others make  carefully considered decisions, for the all the right reasons, but lose out because the market moves against them.  Reviewing his company’s 100 year history, besides “good luck”, he saw the factors that had allowed it to survive and prosper as boiling down to diligence, persistence and a certain bloody-mindedness about making key client relationships work.  From this perspective, the rewards systems in many companies favour the “lucky”, and may actually stifle qualities of diligence and persistence. Is this relevant to Market Research?

I think that there is more than good fortune involved in achieving profit and growth targets in MR (even in good times), but I strongly agree that the focus is wrong and that as we emerge from recession, MR companies need to rethink their remuneration and recognition systems. Put simply, as an industry, we have failed to align reward systems with the type of work we do.

Compared to buinessess like ad agencies, we are less dependent on a “grand pitch” or a few super salesmen or creative geniuses to make or break our companies.  Overall MR is driven by relationships and revenue streams that ebb and flow over the course of years.   In this setting persistence, planning and on-going client contact may be the key drivers of long-term success.

Remember that, despite all the talk of “globalisation”, we remain an incredibly local industry.  Not just where we source our work from, but also in terms of localisation of design and implementation. Most of our work  is still customised. Even highly structured “global” services (a Nielsen Retail Service for instance) usually ends up needing  local market customisation and support from managers with an intimate knowledge of local conditions. Most MR employees spend most of their time interacting with local contacts and most purchasing decisions remain at local or regional level. Sure, major corporations are increasing the number of global research deals they commission, but this trend is far from universal and is counteracted by the rise, throughout the growth markets, of large local clients looking for intensive, locally based servicing.

No-one doubts that big global deals can drive cash-flow and ease overhead management. But many also involve discounts or offering concessions in growth markets to subsidise weaker markets. Over the long-term, are they are really more profitable or worthy of recognition than, for instance, the efforts of a local director who works quietly to build an on-going relationship with Banko do Brasil or PT Telekom Indonesia? (BTW, In case you doubt the significance of companies like these, consider that in June the latter paid a cash dividend of 50% of its net profit to shareholders – US$584m). Significant profitable growth, in most MR companies, comes from the additive effect of lots of little incremental decisions made by local executives as they work with their clients every day.

So, do we recognise this incremental effect: the role of everyday diligence and persistence? Obviously local MR companies should be better at recognising this kind of  “grass-roots” effort simply because they are closer to it. Yet often a lack of formal review process means that even in such smaller companies the director who trumpets his/her wins the loudest triumphs. In the bigger companies the setting is more difficult. Many big MR companies have moved from having few systematic performance review processes at all, to the complete opposite, where a mix of over-complex bureaucratic HR procedures combine with broad but rigidly enforced financial targets (the type which, as argued above, may measure luck as much as good management). This creates a setting where bonuses simply fail to motivate the behaviours that actually drive sustainable growth. To improve on this we not only have recognise that the rewards and recognition process needs much more local involvement, but also to get a clear grip on what kind of individual effort is really driving MR success. More of that in my next post.

I have been spending the past 6 weeks focusing on marketing with Tourism and Hospitality students at Capilano University.  We are now discussing online promotion and of course social networking is part of the mix.  There is a lot of discussion about whether businesses should embrace or restrict the use of social networking.

I think the biggest challenge business owners and executives is understanding this new medium and how it can help market their products and services, establish relationships with their customer and learn more about what customers are saying about them and their competitors.

Chris Hall’s article, Socially Adept, in the Financial Planning magazine has listed the following reasons to social network your business online:

* Expanding awareness. Social media allows you to extend your online presence, deliver key messages and build relationships online.

* Enhancing your credibility. Within compliance restraints, you can engage audiences across the social web.

* Driving traffic your way. With a social media presence, your own website will benefit from inbound links and better search engine page rankings.

* Converting opportunities. With a thoughtful plan and a consistent commitment to social media, you can nurture prospects into new clients.

Is social networking a rose or  thorn in your business?

The answer is yes, a plan is needed for any kind of marketing program a business will embark on. The plan must include goals, objectives and budgets. Without a plan and direction the effort that will be made will be time consuming and will most likely not achieve goals or impact a business positively.

The buzz today is all about social media marketing. Many business people are focusing all of their attention on this, taking their eye off the ball and forgetting about other types of marketing. Social media will become a more integral part of marketing but traditional marketing, advertising and media relations should not be forgotten or put aside. Although the internet and social media marketing can drive sales and be a fantastic tool for brand building it will not work for everyone. What is really disturbing is that most people don’t really know how to use this kind of marketing effectively. Social media marketing can be time consuming and if done improperly will not achieve the return on investment desired. The return on investment for any marketing program should be measurable.

At Corbett Public Relations I regularly work with clients to create messages, set marketing goals and determine what image clients want to have with their target audiences. I would venture to guess that most people who have Facebook pages or Twitter accounts and are using some form of social media marketing did not and do not think twice about the image that they were seeking to convey to the general public as well as potential customers. This is a huge mistake and a topic for another blog entry. Most people dabble with social media sites and post information ranging from what they had for lunch to some type of new product or service they are offering. These mixed messages don’t work and confuse followers. Followers don’t care about these types of posts and that’s the worst thing that can happen, if they don’t care they will stop following, probably forever.

We saw in the early and mid 1990s the growth of the internet. Businesses started to create websites and the “Field of Dreams” movie quote “If you build it they will come” was often used. We found over the years that this is the farthest thing from the truth. The truth is that if you build it they might come but probably won’t. Search engine marketing and optimization has helped with this for websites. People can now find what they are looking easily on the internet. Businesses people now also understand that websites for the most part are marketing and branding tools, not direct business generators. Social media also allows more businesses and people to have a presence on the internet but just because you are doing it does not mean anyone is following or even cares what you have to say. This is why you need to have a marketing plan.

A marketing/social media marketing plan will help to remedy the situation of no one following your or caring about what you have to say. A plan will set goals for pushing out messages, acquiring followers and branding your business (or you personally). Each of these efforts requires planning and the use of the proper tools and having the right creative message and image. Simply put if you do not have a clear image or brand to promote your social media marketing or any marketing program is likely to fail.

Social media offers many opportunities, but how these opportunities are taken advantage of and used is the key. Do it right and do it with a clear plan.

I am compiling a long list of tips for social media marketing and will eventually publish this with comments and best practices for small businesses and individuals seeking to build their own brands. If you are interested in a copy of these tips feel free to e-mail me at wjcorbett@corbettpr.com I will be writing over the next few weeks about creating the right online image and brand. This will be followed by how to communicate with prospects and friends to generate a buzz and business.

As time goes by and the picture gets clearer, I take one important learning from the Kellogg course with me. The good thing is: This learning can be summarized in one equation. Well, good thing for me since I have to admit liking mathematical rigor (No, please don’t take me as a boring/picky!).

Well, this is the equation:

Δ price ≤ Δ value

So, why do I like this equation? Let me explore it further.. in other words that equation equals:

Price(your price) – Price(your competitor’s price) ≤ Value(your offering) – Value(your competitor’s offering)

So, what does the left hand side of that inequality represent? That’s your price premium. What about the right hand side? That’s the additional monetary value your offering provides, the extra value that only your offering can provide (and that competition can’t match).

Thus, what if there is no Δ value? Or what if you “don’t know”/”can’t prove” the differential value your offering has in comparison to competition?

Well, this is what our equation gives us:

Δ price ≤ 0, that is to say:

Price(your price) – Price(your competitor’s price) ≤ 0, which finally means:

Price(your price) ≤ Price(your competitor’s price)

Yes, you got it all right. In case you cannot prove the value side of that equation in monetary terms, your offering/product might be, and as a matter of fact should be, perceived as a commodity. And how do you think procurement managers buy commodities? They buy the cheapest!

Then you might think: Great, that’s a matter of having my marketing people creating some smart business cases. Well, I wouldn’t simplify things to that extreme. Please have a look at the value creation arrow below:

Marketing should rightfully be held accountable for “Communicating the value, educating the market”. However, the value creation process should start much earlier. In fact, it should start as early as when you decide what to take to market.

Very well then. So, what is the monetary value proposition for the product/service you plan to offer? And how is it better than competition or the second best alternative (that solves the customer’s problem)? In case you can’t answer that, you better get prepared for a price war!

Links:

• Customer Value Management – I found some interesting info on customer value management in that link

Working With Freelancers: Find Things That Motivate Themhttp://ping.fm/hCRiZ

As a Buyer, you can encourage your Freelancer to create an ongoing way to replicate his success strategy even when he’s not forced to do so by circumstances. The key to creating a sustaining work relationship with a Freelancer is to show the person why a successful project is always important. Providing constant feedback will encourage him to duplicate or work properly on a project. However, if you are always telling him to stop working on a project the way he likes, his instinctive reaction is either to defend what he is doing and continue as before or to focus so hard on not doing it that his behavior may appear uncomfortable or contrived. It’s essential to find ways to encourage and reinforce positive change.

• Judiciously negotiate projects’ goals with him
• Regularly give him the feedback he needs to self-correct and keep going
• When he succeeds, celebrate with him from time to time.

Dealing with a Freelancer is not an easy task. In order to motivate him, you have to think about intrinsic motivators. What it is that makes him go the extra miles? These are motivators that reflect people’s internal beliefs and values about their place in the world and how the world works. A Freelancer, who believes in hard work, bringing innovation and creativity to a project, will do his best when offered an opportunity.

However, a Freelancer who is only interested in money, perks, will avoid challenges and find excuses, when a project is not fully completed.

Many businesses have realised that some of the best freelancers they work with are attracted to altruistic opportunities as well as intellectual challenges and money.

Once you have outsourced more than two projects to a Freelancer, start paying attention to motivators. What are they interested in, ask them questions and make sure to use both intrinsic and extrinsic motivators, and use them judiciously. You can then motivate a Freelancer in the way that suits him best.

Dental Nurses! I was reading an article in one of the Dental Press Papers the other day discussing the issues facing CPD cost for Nurses. The article was saying that Nurses are paying too much for CPD and that some organisation are even exploiting Nurses by making them pay for training that was either free or unnecessary.

Without wishing to step on the toes of Dentists and Business Owners, who are extremely busy people trying to run profitable, caring and professional business. I do find that Nurses get quite a rough ride.

Some Nurses don’t help themselves, having a runny nose, whilst is inconvenient and perhaps not particularly pleasant, doesn’t equate to three weeks on the sick, even with the current fear of Swine Flu.

Please don’t miss understand if you’re ill you’re ill.

All the same Nurses are often overlooked within the practice and are not treated as the key members of the team that they are. Perhaps GDC registration and the current lack of Qualified Nurses will change this; however it is often the case that Nurses are not provided with support and opportunity for CPD, have to fund their own GDC registration and perhaps the most disappointing are not given written contracts of employment.

CPD is essential for Nurses. It’s a requirement. Business owners genuinely should see this as opportunity as apposed to an inconvenience. The training of staff increases moral, up skills the team and will generate loyalty.

GDC Registration is a necessity, its not a nice to have it’s a must have. Nurses should be supported with this. If loyalty is an issue, pay their registration back to them over the year. GDC Registration is a contentious issue, business should budget for it and get rid of the atmosphere it can evoke.

Contracts, simple if you don’t want your staff to stay, don’t give them a contract. Maybe you’ll be wasting your own time though. Business need stability to prosper and employees are essential to that stability. There are statutory employment rights that protect the nurses anyway, so all you actually do is force them to the Citizen Advice Bureau if things go wrong

A useful site http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/employers-bulletin/bulletin30/emp-law.htm
It’s a HMRC but don’t fear it use it.

http://www.venturewoods.org/index.php/2009/11/02/israel-leader-in-business-innovation/

I began a series of definitions for my business’ marketing and found something very interesting. Very interesting with respect to this group. And thought I’d surface the observation made while defining “tools”. 

Living in Switzerland I became familiar with two uses of the word “plier” in French. Plier is “to fold” as in ballet, but also to apply force, to pry, at least within the construction group I was working with at the time. 

Oddly, I thought, pince, is to pinch, which is the name for the english pliers, yet plier can be applied to folding sheets or paper to create layers. This led me to understand something very unique about “tool” as a distinguished definition. 

Seeing the commonality of both the english and french understanding of “plier” I rummaged through my tool box, cerebrally as it’s in S.F., and I’m here in L.A. to look at one of mine, typical wrench head that I am, to feel it in my hand, feel it at work, look at its details, when I stumbled on its most unique attribute. 

It’s not a true tool at all. 

Wait, I know, as in the bra burning of the 60’s, now wrench heads are tossing their tool bags in pyres protesting any new definition of who they are… but I’m not mistaken. It’s true. 

Pliers are not true tools. 

Of course this lead me to look even further into what my discovery actually meant. Was I crazy, going crazy. NOT! 

What I discovered is that the unique attribute also provided access to a range of other discoveries. For instance: 
* Fundamental perspective all people harbor, how they actually predicate, not preface an experience. 
* How quickly any perspective dissolves into understanding. 
* How even the most vile, complex, and wholly righteous understanding fails to acknowledge itself as perceptive given the intricacy of symbiotic micro and macro contingents with any topic. 

The net result was – as the pursuit continues in understanding conditions, design, marketing, politics and how the world really works – formulating a question (outlined below) which has helped me tremendously. 

Is it hype? Well, that will depend on how you answer the following question. 

You are given a country to develop. It is locked within several tall mountain ranges which prohibit access other than through a port which is given to you and a road which you’ll have to build. It’s roughly 20 days by foot to traverse the range to reach the nearest city of your closest neighbor. 

What type of engine would you design to facilitate your country’s growth? 

Your requirements are, to establish a community, provide for them, and produce all of the industrial components so that it can sustain itself – there’s no foreign aide other than one raw material – processed steel billets. 

You’ll have to build everything from scratch. There are no imports of any finished product, only steel. Your foreign aide is limited and no country is allowed to rescue you or your citizens. 

People need structural steel to build homes, hospitals. You are building a country with families, not skilled technicians. You need car engines, airplane engines, engines to generate electricity, engines to build and drive road construction equipment and engines for fishing. 

What engine would you design, where would you use it first? 

You also have to remember that people need syringes, braces, and unless you can train everyone to manufacture these necessities before they die of hunger – your very fragile ecosystem, will disappear, as your country is only 4 miles in length. 

Pollution is a problem. 

What engine design would ensure your survival? An electric engine? Batteries? Waste? 

Would it be a solar?. And where would you have people live or farm? 

Interesting isn’t it? 

This is what defines true tools. A form which in effect and construction, duplicates the desired outcome.

If you’re considering how to best improve your customer service – take a look at your organization from top down. Ask yourself this question “Are we continually thinking of Customer Service”? If not thats part of the answer. Then ask “What is the customer perception when they first do business with us?” Are they greeted on the telephone in a pleasant manner, do my employees meeting the customers dress reflecting the company image?”. If not there is a good starting point.

Make sure your customer is greeted in a friendly manner either when they visit you or call you every time.

Make sure your customers are dressed for success- that meet your company image.

Finally allow every employee to become part of the customer is number one program.

 Just making sure these three points are covered could take you way ahead of you competition which will result in higher sales for you!

HOW hard can it be, as the joke goes, to speak Chinese? (Six-year-olds do it all the time.)

Yes, it turns out that learning languages is one of those skills that humans, even relatively young ones, master seemingly magically. It is all enough to make a mainframe computer jealous.

At I.B.M., a team of nearly 100, including mathematicians and software developers, is working on a project to create an automatic translation tool, so-called machine translation, that has the speed and accuracy to be used in instant-messaging between speakers of two different languages. (By NOAM COHEN, The New York Times, November 22, 2009)

Read More

How do I maximise sales?

This is a key question for many small businesses looking to grow effectively.

In order to maximise sales you really need to put a plan of daily business activity in place that allows you to prioritise tasks and maximise sales performance. I would like to look at this as optimising your time effectively:

1. Avoid scheduling too many appointments in one day otherwise it will be harder to invest more quality time in important prospects.

2. All prospect or customer enquiries and requests should be dealt with quickly and efficiently. Failure to do this could result in loss of business and it’s better to deal with it when it’s still fresh in your mind.

3. Prepare daily to-do lists the previous day to ensure that it’s ready in the morning otherwise you may find your time taken up with additional tasks that you could have prioritised for the night before.

4. Plan your presentation carefully – see how you can personalise it to the prospect you are selling to.

5. Always set aside some time in the day to prospect for new business. Try to promote your product/service thoughtfully and positively to prospects.

6. Manage relationships with existing customers consistently. I think customer relationships are crucial to not only retain existing business but to establish yourself and your organisation as a viable, professional organisation.

7. Automated list management is a very quick, useful way of tracking and managing prospects. For example, email marketing systems will allow you to upload a list of prospect email addresses and mass-mail to them rather than spending too much time sending out individual emails.

8. The key to being successful is to have a good work/life balance. Spending all your free time focusing on sales and work will not only leave you with no real personal social life but also means that you aren’t leaving yourself to wind-down after a tough day. Personally I like to go down the gym and take out my frustrations on the treadmill or simply go home, have a beer and spend time with the family.

Now don’t get me wrong – I am as guilty as the next man, and I have been known to sit at my laptop until late into the evening working on projects, much to the annoyance of my wife and daughter I might add. Despite this I have started to learn that switching off the PC or work phone in the evening is as important a step as any other on this list. My advice to any aspiring business man is to allow yourself time to breathe otherwise you’ll drown in your own ambition.

More useful links:

Taking a larger bite out of the marketplace

Ten tips to maximising your sales through ECommerce

Photo by: Danilo Rizzuti

Gov. Bev Perdue on Nov. 19th announced that North Carolina will join forces with Microsoft in an innovative, public-private partnership to provide free technology training to individuals across the state. Perdue joined Gail Thomas Flynn, Microsoft’s vice president of state and local government, at the Harris Campus of Central Piedmont Community College in Charlotte to applaud the unique partnership titled “Microsoft Elevate America.”

“This partnership will provide North Carolinians with another opportunity to retrain for today’s new economy,” Perdue said. “At a time when businesses are seeking a highly qualified, well trained workforce, Elevate America can provide potential employees with new skills to succeed.”

Microsoft is partnering with the N.C. Community College System, Commerce’s Division of Workforce Development and the N.C. Employment Security Commission to distribute a total of 23,700 training vouchers during the next 90 days across the state. Courses range from basic technology literacy to intermediate-level technology skills. A portion of the vouchers will be issued to North Carolina residents for Microsoft Certification Exams, all at no cost to the recipients.

Commerce Sec. Keith Crisco and Cultural Resources Sec. Linda Carlisle on Nov. 24 unveiled the findings of new research showing that the Creative Industry in North Carolina accounts for nearly 300,000 jobs, just over 5 and one-half percent of the state’s workforce, and contributes $41.4 billion to North Carolina’s economy.
The new study, “Creativity Means Business: Economic Contributions of North Carolina’s Creative Industry,” was prepared by the Policy, Research, and Strategic Planning Division of the N.C. Department of Commerce. The analysis follows Creative Economy research commissioned in 2007 by the North Carolina Arts Council.

“People with creative ideas, innovators, and entrepreneurs bring investment and jobs to our communities,” said Gov. Bev Perdue. “This report highlights the creative spark in North Carolina, and will be a big help in economic development.” Learn more about the study and read the report.

On November 23rd, Gov. Perdue announced the creation of the first North Carolina Innovation Council.  The purpose of the Council is to foster strategic investments and policies in the growing knowledge and innovation economy.  Perdue made the announcement after touring a lab in the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine in Winston-Salem.
 
“To continue growing jobs in North Carolina we must make sure this state is poised to compete globally in the 21st century,” said Perdue.  “Innovation is North Carolina’s launch pad to success in the global economy, and it’s a primary way for us to maintain and sharpen our competitive edge.”

Executive Order No. 29 establishes the North Carolina Innovation Council and empowers it to advise the Governor on:

• coordinating public and private investments and policies to promote innovation;
• moving innovative ideas from the lab to the marketplace more efficiently; and
• strengthening collaboration among business, academia, state and local government.

The Council’s membership will draw on a broad spectrum of expertise in entrepreneurship, science, academia and government. It will be co-chaired by Steve Nelson, managing partner of the Wakefield Group, and Al Delia, senior advisor to the Governor.

“North Carolina has a rich history of innovation with its high-impact businesses, championed by world-class leaders and entrepreneurs. Yet the opportunity in front of us is to build on this strength.  I very much look forward to working with this distinguished group to encourage investment, bring jobs to North Carolina, and grow our economy,” said co-chair Steve Nelson.

The North Carolina Innovation Council is part of Gov. Perdue’s JobsNOW initiative.  Through JobsNOW, the state will work aggressively to create jobs, train and retrain our workforce, and lay the foundation for a strong and sustainable economic future.

U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu today announced more than $18 million in funding from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act to support small business innovation research, development, and deployment of clean energy technologies. In this first phase of funding, 125 grants of up to $150,000 each will be awarded to 107 small advanced technology firms across the United States.

“Small businesses are drivers of innovation and are crucial to the development of a competitive clean energy U.S. economy,” said Chu. “These investments will help ensure small businesses are able to compete in the clean energy economy, creating jobs and developing new technologies to help decrease carbon pollution and increase energy efficiency.” ( November 23, 2009)

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HONG KONG — While Internet advertising revenue growth in the U.S. has stalled since the global downturn set in, some hope remains for China’s highly trafficked Web sites.

“For 2010 we’re estimating about 20% growth for online advertising,” says Ben Cavender, a senior analyst at Shanghai-based China Market Research Group. “That’s compared with the U.S., where it’s under 5% a year.”

China’s largest Internet portal, Sina Corp., is optimistic about online advertising–and rightly so. Forecasting advertising growth in 2010, Sina, which Forbes Asia named one of the “Best Under A Billion” companies, posted third-quarter profits Tuesday that beat some analysts’ expectations.(by Hana R. Alberts,Forbes, 11.17.09)

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Why do CRMs so often fail to meet expectations? I’ve known many companies to launch CRMs with such excitement and hope, only to be bitterly disappointed within months of the launch. Recognizing the difficulty companies have with change management and with CRM implementation and ongoing use, salesforce.com tries to help its clients with this process by providing tools and a designated “Customer Success Manager.” Ultimately, though, a company can greatly increase the success and effectiveness of its CRM by following some basic guidelines and rules.

1) Clearly state the reasons why you want a CRM. Articulate what it is you hope to achieve with a CRM, and make this visible to the company, including the leadership team. One company I know clearly chose to implement one primarily as part of its window dressing in order to facilitate the company’s sale. Needless to say, this was not a recipe for success.

2) Have a firm understanding of the monetary investment. Per user cost may seem fairly inexpensive, but what are the implementation costs? Does the software require investment in training for an administrator? Is there additional development required down the road? Make sure you can pinpoint the upfront and long term dollars.

3) Create a road map for your launch. Decide how you want to roll it out – user training, who will own the solution moving forward (i.e., who manages it), how will you establish user adoption, how much time you’ll need to roll it out, etc.

4) Executive buy-in does not end with approval to purchase or implement the CRM. A company’s senior leadership must have visibility into the CRM AND they must support the sales manager’s ongoing attempts to embed this within the culture of the company. Dashboards offer an effective and efficient way for company leaders to view CRM activity. However, it must be more than this – employees must know and see the importance of the CRM to the leadership team.

5) Find the right person to be the CRM administrator. Ideally, the administrator has been trained on the technical aspects of the CRM, is detailed oriented, and also has a background in sales and marketing. Remember, CRMs should be living, breathing, and dynamic. The launch and initial data dump are only the beginning.

6) Don’t think the CRM takes the place of sales or managing your customers. Your CRM is another tool for your company and sales team to leverage; be careful not to over-rely on it.

7) Finally, ultimately someone within your company must “own” the CRM. Whether or not it’s you, somebody must think of it as his or her “baby.” They must care deeply about it – nurture it, help it evolve, put it in a position to be successful, and pay close attention to it – in an ongoing manner.

Statistically speaking, CRMs have about only a 15% success rate (according to the 2004 Global CRM Study from IBM Business Consulting Services). However, if you follow the above guidelines, your chances for success will increase dramatically.

Report on the inaugural Internet Research Group of Otago (IRGO) unConference 23 and 24 November 2009.

The three questions posed in the lead up to this unconference were listed on http://irgo.otago.ac.nz/

Centre for Innovation, University of Otago, Dunedin, NZ

1. what might be possible for the future internet of the region?
2. what will citizens want from the internet in the future (two, five, ten years ahead)?
3. what potential internet problems or issues will we have to navigate in the immediate future?

These questions were addressed by all of the panel discussions throughout the two days.

This forum was successful in its approach to address these questions but raised more questions than answers, which will require an ongoing collaborative approach to develop new thinking and strategies to address the issues raised.

These are my bullet points from the Internet Research Group of Otago (IRGO) unConference this week.

Work

• Mobility of work, the Internet is everywhere with, generally, high accessibility.
• Technology is available to enable an “office anywhere” approach.
• Issues could include
  • A reduction in the control of the worker and the worker’s environment.
  • Appropriateness of this approach to industry type.
  • Speed and quality of broadband.
  • Productivity may be affected (positively and negatively).
  • Acceptance of this approach is required by business community.
  • Social interactive nature of the work place is potentially missing.
  • Concept of the “digital nomad”

Content

• Quantity vs quality
• Intellectual property issues
• Copyright vs Creative Commons
• Who has access to content and what rights do users have.
• Moderation of content vs self-regulation.
• Is it quality or just share-able

Social Media (reasons for…)

• Change management discourse.
• Community generated content.
• Client feedback
• Crowd sourcing of publicity/marketing/information
• Collaboration
• Brokering services
• New client/peer interaction model
• Networking online and face to face

New Revenue Models

• Traditional sales diminishing online.
• Value of digital content is “nil” as it can be an unlimited supply.
• Move to pay for service rather than pay for content model.

Ethics

• Freedom of speech vs control of content
• What is the definition of harm?
• Posting of anonymous content, including offensive, harmful or untrue content and comments.
• Who or what jurisdiction has control of what is “allowed” on the Internet.

Issues of Accessibility

• Quality of broadband in New Zealand is poor.
• Availability of Wifi or wireless ISP.
• Business exposure to the Internet.
• Acceptance of business that there is value in use of Internet.

Archiving

• Permanence and durable accessibility of data is an issue in long-term electronic storage.
• Technology changes will always need to be backwardly compatible. (Floppy disks used to be used as back up but who has a drive to access data now)
• Usability of back-up systems is vital
• The need for offsite and multiple storage options required for back up.
• Standardisation and meaningful file systems required
• What data is required to be backed up?
• What is worth keeping?
• The archivist has a vital role
• How to back up institutional knowledge.

The Future

• Much more development in telecommunication and automation using connective technologies.
• Dependent on quality and reliability of telecommunication networks whether wired/fibre or wireless.
• Cost to implement is an issue.

In conclusion I would congratulate IRGO in this its first unConference and look forward to the ongoing information that will be developed as a result of this forum.

Please visit http://irgo.otago.ac.nz/ for more information.

Paul S Allen aka paulusthebrit

http://twitter.com/paulusthebrit
http://thewaterside.tumblr.com

1. All businesses require a Vision.

2. All Visions are personal and impersonal.

3. Every company is an organisation

4 . An organisation is an organization of systems

5.  There’s no such thing as customer service, there is only customer commitment, a promise, this outrageous promise has become your brand, built on your word, reflected in every decision and action you take, all employees must understand and be an expert at the part they are to play in keeping the promise, the effectiveness of every system is based on the function it plays and how it validates the promise; if this is not happening, what are you gonna do about it?

6. Master the money, bottom to top, all must be a master of money, truth of the business is the money, how it makes it and how efficiently it runs

7. Your people are not your business and your business are not the people, your business is its own reality, your people are only interested in the business as long as it gives them what they want for themselves, the business provides them them; the business must provide a philosophy that meets their needs so they meet what the customer wants according to the agreed upon standards; what are the rules of the game?  No rules = no business

8.  The business is a good idea, if it’s a bad idea there is no business, so get out! If its a great idea, great stick with it, commit and be consistent. Exude Passion for it.

9. We know more about our business than anyone else, we need to coach and train our people so that they know and deliver what we know, until then they are at risk of harming our business

10.  A business must mean something, it has to do something that means something, if it produces meaningful results to the customer that’s what it means.  Adding value to business and peoples lives.

Stop and focus.  The Vision begins to take form.  Dream to envision, be specific – The specificity asks questions, keep asking the questions.  No idea how you going to do it?  Who/what is the success model, why, what are we saying about how we provide it better than the others; a medical service that runs better than a racing crew does.  Unlikely excellence? Think Kick Ass Quality (KAQ), make a list of the attributes your business will have – visually, functionally, emotionally, financially – keep a pad by your side noting about these – Notes to myself, insights? Impressions, uncommon impressions. Call it your Entrepreneurial spiritual scrapbook.

Excerpt, and adapted slightly, from the Gerber’s Dreaming Room

Hi, Everyone!

Did you know that the word “business” actually comes from the word “busy”?

Business is something we do to keep ourselves BUSY — to fill our days with something that pays our bills at the very least — perhaps amuses us — and ideally, give our lives meaning.

Business offers us several ways of keeping busy. In fact, three types of activities fill everyone’s days — those which are income GENERATING … those which are income CONSERVING … and those which are income CONSUMING.

The challenge facing all leaders is keeping their teams focused on the right activities.

So what is YOUR business busy doing?

Understanding the Difference

Before we look at the distinctions between each of the three types of activity, it’s important to keep in mind that we’re not making value judgements here. We’re NOT saying that any particular activity is good or bad or right or wrong. We’re simply examining the activity from an income-oriented perspective.

Income Generating activities are the lifeblood of every organization. They are where ALL of the money comes from. These activities involve leveraging ANY of the resources you have in such a way that a net gain in income is achieved.

In this category you’ll find all sorts of activities — prospecting … customer acquisition … marketing … research & development … mergers and acquisitions … investments — and that’s just a glimpse.

Some jobs are focused on income generation — the most obvious being sales. Others are more indirect — like graphics design or product development. These activities may not be as cut-and-dried as getting a prospect to sign on the dotted line — yet they support the organization’s sales efforts … and give it more products to sell. But every employee has the potential for boosting the company’s bottom line. Exemplary customer service teamed with high-quality products and a company-wide friendly and helpful demeanor all impact the buying public’s perception of your company – and that can definitely increase your profits.

Income Conserving activities protect the money you’ve brought in. These activities aim at saving your company more money than they cost to perform.

In this category you’ll find activities relating to efficiency improvement, cost containment, safety, human resources, suggestion campaigns and numerous others — as well as anything that impacts your less-tangible resources, like corporate image, good will and customer loyalty.

Finding a way to do something faster, cheaper or better helps you keep more of the income you’ve generated — as will examining the real value of doing something BEFORE you expend any amount of time, energy or money.

Income Consuming activities are a normal part of every business. Everyone knows you have to spend money to make money — a manufacturer must MANUFACTURE something … a service provider must PROVIDE a service. While many income consuming activities are necessary … unavoidable … important … perhaps mission-critical, most are simply a blatant waste of time and resources and eat away at your hard-earned profits.

Income consuming activities can be tough to evaluate, because on the surface they often appear to be income generating or conserving … and no one wants to think that what they’re doing isn’t an important contribution to the overall growth of their company. If you want to ruin relationships, create animosity and stop people dead in their tracks, the slightest HINT that you believe their work is income consuming or lacking in value is CERTAIN to carry all of those consequences … and more.

Nevertheless, activities that ARE of PARAMOUNT importance to your business can STILL be income consuming.

For example, let’s say you want to have a brick wall built behind your house. You open up the phone book and call a few masonry companies. Each company sends out a representative. The representatives provide you with cost quotations. You pick one and sign the agreement. The company sends out a mason. He builds your wall. End of story.

While he’d do his best to argue the point, the mason and the work he did is NOT income-generating for his employer … it’s income CONSUMING. That doesn’t mean it wasn’t important — it was CRITICAL in fact! But the income was actually generated by the efforts of the marketing department who placed the ad in the phone book as well as the efforts of the sales representative who ultimately secured the deal. Everything that occurred AFTER that moment became an expense incurred in order to fulfill the agreement.

The mason can certainly help CONSERVE income by being fast, flawless and frugal with materials. He even has the potential for GENERATING additional income by suggesting another project to you – or by making such a positive impression that you would eagerly recommend his company to others — but the pure activity of building the wall is income CONSUMING.

Obviously, there are countless income consuming activities happening throughout an organization each and every day. While some are a necessary part of the business model, there still exists abundant opportunities to stop money-gobbling activities from destroying your profits. Whether it’s being dragged to and through another pointless meeting … or participating in a debate that goes nowhere … or investing in a task force whose recommendations are never implemented … or suffering through countless layers of bureaucracy that compromise communication … or policies and procedures that do nothing but complicate the simplest of tasks …or (fill in the blank with whatever drives YOU crazy), the average day is filled with things that are of little or no value to anyone inside or outside of the company.

Evaluating Your Situation

If you’d like to keep your busy-ness as profitable as possible, here’s how:

First, detach yourself emotionally from the assessment process. Your evaluation needs to be objective, candid and clear.

Second, examine your company at the corporate, departmental, project and individual levels and estimate the percentages of time focused on each of the three categories.

Third, decide what would be the ideal activity ratio at each level — and 100% income generating isn’t a realistic expectation!

Finally, instill in every member of your team a fundamental respect for income — its generation, conservation and consumption. Every moment of every day should be governed by a simple question: “How does doing this affect income?”

The answer will dictate the level of priority that activity should receive:

Priority #1 — EVERY team member should take full advantage of EVERY opportunity to perform something income generating.

Priority #2 — When not busy generating income, team members should seek out ways to conserve what has been gained.

Priority #3 — If an activity neither generates nor conserves income, it must be carefully evaluated for its income gobbling potential. If the activity is necessary, team members should strive to be as efficient as possible. If it is simply a waste of resources, it should be avoided altogether.

Now, get out there and DO something with this information — you’d hate for the time you’ve spent reading this to be income CONSUMING because you did nothing useful with it!

-T-

For all you small to midsize agencies out there: the Second Wind network is a vast collection of industry tools, tips, and resources for all your business development needs.  The site does have certain areas that are catered to paid members, but there are plenty of whitepapers and ideas to bounce for free.

It’s worth a look.

Cheers.

Odyssey Marine Exploration, a pioneer in the field of deep-ocean shipwreck exploration, has acquired a minority interest in SMM Project LLC, a company funded by a group of investors to bring together the exclusive licenses and skills of world renowned deep-ocean geologist Dr. Timothy McConachy of Bluewater Metals, the deep-ocean survey and exploration expertise of Odyssey, and the offshore coring and mining expertise of Robert Goodden.

SMM Project LLC recently purchased a majority interest in Bluewater Metals Pty Ltd, an Australian company with licenses for mineral exploration of approximately 150,000 square kilometers of ocean floor in four different countries in the South Pacific. The group will focus on the exploration and monetization of gold and copper-rich Seafloor Massive Sulfide (SMS) deposits through a new business entity which will acquire the remaining interest in Bluewater, in accordance with a memorandum of understanding concluded between the parties.

It is anticipated that Odyssey will dedicate certain marine assets, including a ship and related marine exploration technology to the endeavor, and will own approximately 40% of the new entity. In addition, Odyssey is expected to provide proprietary expertise and personnel management to the entity under contract, and will supervise operations to explore for deep-ocean gold, copper and silver deposits in areas covered by exploration permits currently held by Bluewater Metals.

“This is a natural extension for Odyssey and leverages our core competencies in an exciting new deep-ocean field. Deep-ocean SMS exploration and mining is where offshore oil exploration was 50 years ago, and the challenges to date have mostly centered on lack of technical expertise to find and recover these extremely valuable deposits that have high concentrations of gold, copper, silver and other minerals. We have been monitoring this field for years and have finally decided that the time is now right – and we have found the right partners – to make our move,” stated Greg Stemm, Odyssey Chief Executive Officer.

“The Bluewater Metals team has done an outstanding job building relationships with governments and securing exploration permits in some of the most promising areas in the world for deep-ocean mineral deposits. We look forward to working with their team to maximize the revenue potential from high-value mineral deposits on the ocean floor. The opportunities in this arena are a perfect complement to our pioneering shipwreck exploration work. Interestingly, looking for SMS deposits is a lot like looking for barely discernable shipwreck ballast piles, and I don’t think there is a better team in the world for this kind of work than ours, ” continued Stemm.

“We’re excited by the possibilities of this new deep ocean mining venture, but we remain committed to our core shipwreck exploration goals,” said Mark Gordon, President of Odyssey. “Although we plan to dedicate certain marine assets and personnel to this exciting venture, we’ve become highly proficient at mobilizing our technical gear on ships of opportunity and therefore retain our full operational capability for our shipwreck projects. We’re planning a full schedule of shipwreck exploration for 2010.”

“We’re looking forward to exploring our permitted areas with the Odyssey team,” said Dr. Tim McConachy, Co-Founder of Bluewater. “We’ve been successful in securing exploration permits in areas that we believe are likely to feature valuable SMS deposits based on previous expeditions and years of detailed geological research. The next step is conducting the deep-ocean surveys necessary to confirm these deposits. Partnering with Odyssey, a company with proven deep-ocean expertise and capabilities is the best way to ensure our success and with Robert Goodden and his team’s involvement we are confident of successfully proof coring anything we find.”

Seafloor Massive Sulfide (SMS) deposits are naturally occurring deposits which contain high concentrations of gold, copper, zinc, silver and other metals in relatively compact areas. Although possible anywhere new ocean crust is forming, the highest grade deposits have been found at convergent plate margins, especially in the South Pacific. These deposits are formed as cold seawater moves down through cracks in the seafloor and is superheated by the molten magma deep within the crust. The hot hydrothermal fluid rises to the surface, dissolving and leaching metals from the surrounding rock as it rises. When the hydrothermal fluid encounters the cold seawater, the metals and sulphur precipitate and accumulate on the seafloor as a SMS deposit.

Bluewater was co-founded by Dr. Timothy McConachy and Mr. Harvey Cook. Dr. McConachy is widely considered to be one of the world’s most knowledgeable geologists with respect to subsea mineral resources and exploration. He has previously served as Chief Geologist for one of the world’s largest mining companies, Rio Tinto, and as Head of Seabed Ore Systems for CSIRO, Australia’s national science agency. Mr. Cook is an Australia-based businessman with broad experience in the South West Pacific region.

Since its inception, Bluewater has been granted 46 exploration areas called “tenements” representing approximately 146,311 square kilometers of exclusive mineral exploration rights from the governments of Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands and Tonga and non-exclusive mineral exploration rights from Vanuatu.

Robert Goodden, a mining engineer, is an acknowledged expert in deep-sea coring and mineral exploration. He founded Seacore Ltd in 1975 and built the company into a world leader in marine geological and geotechnical drilling. Seacore Ltd was sold to the Fugro Group in 2006. Mr. Goodden personally retained Seacore’s marine mining interests and renamed the division of the company Subsea Minerals Ltd.

Mr. Goodden first became involved in SMS deposits in 2001 when he provided advice and oversight of the first two deep ocean drilling programs for Nautilus Minerals, a current leader in the SMS deposit industry. Since that time, Subsea Minerals has acted as a site consultant and drilling contractor to Nautilus. Goodden has been intimately involved with every commercial SMS core drilling project carried out to date, and together with members of his team, has amassed unique know how in remotely operated deep sea coring.