Archive for the 'emerging business' Category

Sell More & Work Less Excerpt – Jumpstarting Your Pipeline

Description: C:\Users\Alan\Desktop\Sell More & Work Less\image icon 3 Globe.jpgReal-World Scenario (Excerpt from Sell More & Work Less)

About ten years ago, I helped a company develop their virtual sales and marketing strategy. Its solution, let’s describe it as a client behavioral research solution, was new to the market and required an evangelical sale. The businesses targeted for this new solution had to be convinced to take a leap of faith and try a new method to analyze their customer behavior. In addition, this method was a completely Web-based, SaaS solution. Evangelical sales are common with technology companies seeking to sell a breakthrough product (e.g., eMarketing solutions, MP3 downloads, cloud computing, electronic reading devices, and even DVRs). The first step in the process was to identify the target market and build a suspect list, just as I mentioned above. The CEO had an insurance background and landed a few insurance company clients. We decided this would be the first niche market to target. How did we build a comprehensive virtual suspect list? We utilized several top 100 industry lists and imported them into a simple Microsoft database. We searched for on-line insurance company listings and added them to our virtual suspect list. Then, we called every one of these insurance organizations (there were about 300 initially targeted). These targeted cold calls resulted in up-to-date contact information, key executives, titles, direct phone numbers, and emails. These were often gathered by offering the suspects an opportunity to attend an informational Web seminar. Within a few short months, the database was quite comprehensive, and the suspect list began to yield a compelling prospect list. Utilizing my Prospect Scorecard system and qualifying acronym, we were able to identify possible buyers, convince these buyers to review the solution in a Web seminar or one-to-one web meeting, and then move them to the qualification phase. Out of the 300 initial suspects targeted, we were able to convince over 150 to review the solution in our first year of sales efforts, and about 20 percent of them purchased within that same year. An impressive result for a self-funded, emerging operation selling 99 percent virtually, without travel or face-to-face meetings and the costs and inefficiencies associated with that model. Today, many years after we helped this client create a target suspect list, they continue to dominate their niche.  

For more information on web marketing go to StartMarketingTech, StartUpSelling or JurisMarketing.

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Cloud Computing Up and Big Box Stores Down

eTail vs Retail

eTail vs Retail

Two interesting, albeit expected news reports came across my browser today. The first was about Cloud Computing, with a recent Microsoft study showing a significant increased in paid cloud computing services expected for small and midsize businesses over the next five years. As reported on PR NewsWire, “The research conducted by Edge Strategies includes survey responses from IT decision-makers or influencers at more than 3,000 SMBs in 13 countries.” We’re talking about doubling and tripling of paid cloud services here, an obvious trend even for those who are still unsure about the cloud.

In a somewhat related matter Best Buy announced it will close 50 big-box stores and cut 400 jobs in corporate and support areas. Best Buy will continue to roll out smaller, Best Buy Mobile stores. Best Buy big box stores have been hit hard by the likes of Amazon, with shoppers researching products in their stores, then buying elsewhere based on price and availability. I blogged about this on June 9, 2010 (BestBuy vs Amazon) when I tried to buy an new stereo receiver but was unable to purchase a model with the features needed at Best Buy, ultimately buying it from Amazon.

The casualty list of retailers is getting longer with the likes of Circuity City, Computer City, Linens ‘n Things’ and Borders, and recent challenges for department stores including Sears (A Company Problem or Industry Issue). Best Buy is working hard to reinvent themselves, something that malls and shopping centers may need to work on simultaneously with growing eTail trends and continued challenges for many retailers. No wonder there are so many shoe and sneaker retailers in the malls these days – one size does not fit all in that business. We’ll have to see if Amazon and other eTailers can fill those shoes when it comes to online sales.

For more information on web marketing go to StartMarketingTech, StartUpSelling or JurisMarketing.

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Filling the Sales Funnel with the Four Step Marketing Plan – Webinar

Expert panel will review the Four Step Marketing Plan and discuss the critical elements required for a successful strategy in 2012. Case studies of several organizations leveraging this integrated approach will be analyzed. The Four Step Marketing Plan helps organization gain access to in-profile prospects and provide sales team with qualified opportunities. Topics include:

  • Building your prospect database and email list
  • Reaching your target market through email marketing
  • Leveraging warm calls for quality appointments
  • Expanding reach through Social Media Marketing

Title:      Filling the Sales Funnel with the Four Step Marketing Plan

Date:     Wednesday, February 8, 2012

Time:     1:00 PM – 1:30 PM EST

https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/616170737

After registering you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the Webinar.

For more information, please visit: www.startmarketingtech.com

For our new book, please visit: Sell More & Work Less

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Updated Top 20 Website Tips For an Effective Website

Here is an updated Top 20 Website Tips to ensure your website is effective and up to date:

The Top 10 website elements that your organization should review when designing your website:

  1. Header, logo and value proposition
  2. Navigation (keep it simple)
  3. Page title, meta description, keywords (on page SEO)
  4. Unique design, color and theme & content balance
  5. Graphics, video, blog
  6. Download speed
  7. Quality inbound links, no-follow outbound links
  8. Call to Action!
  9. Analytics
  10. Conversion rate

The Top 10 Watch Out tips include:

  1. Beware of templates that make your site look the same as other sites
  2. Out of date content
  3. Out of date images and photographs
  4. Comingling of Personal Lines and Commercial Lines
  5. Vague or non-existent Call To Actions on each page
  6. Too many Calls To Action on a given web page
  7. Browser incompatibility
  8. Large graphics or Flash video with limited content
  9. Broken links
  10. Using design elements and features that make your site look the same as other sites

Once the Top 20 is fully reviewed, take the time to review your analytics, be it free Google analytics or a fee for service solution. What is your bounce rate? What are your top ten blogs? Are there certain traffic spikes attributable to web marketing initiative such as eMarketing and webinars? Learn the nuances of your site, monitor, measure and leverage your website as one of the truly important tools in your marketing efforts.

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Microsoft Is Up In The Cloud With Office 365

Microsoft Moves to The Cloud

Microsoft Moves to The Cloud

Microsoft has further embraced the cloud and will offer it’s hugely popular Microsoft Office solution as a cloud based application. This is a major admission by Microsoft, showing an understanding that it needs to address Google Apps which has a small but growing marketing share. Considering the billions of dollars in sales of MS Office, Microsoft is hoping that their cloud based Office 365 won’t cannibalize desktop Office sales, which seems like a reasonable guess, at least in the short term. The pricing currently listed on Microsoft’s website is $6 per month with a guarantee of 99.9% up time.

With progressively more work taking place in the cloud, this is a bet that Microsoft needs to make. Other than Office, everything this blogger, writer and businessman uses is in the cloud, certainly not anomalous to many people and businesses today. The market seemed to respond favorably to this announcement with strong gain for the week, the largest Microsoft has seen in some time. Only time will tell if this is a bet Microsoft will win. So much time has elapsed with cloud computing developments that Microsoft’s progress reminds me of a Joni Mitchell song:

From up and down, and still somehow
It’s cloud illusions I recall
I really don’t know clouds at all

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Beware Of Tubely Emails – Viral Marketing At Its Worst

Tubely Spam Invite

Tubely Spam Invite

There are many great companies and attributes when it comes to social media, email marketing and social networking. Then there are companies like Tubely. Beware of emails from friends, colleagues and relatives if you see an email asking to “Accept” an invitation to join their network. Make sure the email is from a reputable network (like Facebook or LinkedIn for example).  Yesterday my wife received an email from her sister. She thought it was an invitation to access some online photos her sister was posting. So she clicked the green accept button to view them. After all, the email did come from her sister who is active on Facebook and other online social media networks. Moments later, she realized she was duped, taken in by an email which had not been sent by her sister at all, her sisters address book had been “Tubely hijacked”.

Google’s search engine results offer a long list of complaints and accusations about Tubely, on page one the 5th through 10th results are all negative, accusing Tubely of spamming, scamming, stealing and hijacking. My wife agrees and spent a couple of hours responding to her friends and colleagues who received an unsolicited Tubely invitation from her.  I think many would agree that Tubely is in violation of the CAN-SPAM Act. The first three rules of the CAN-SPAM Act: 1. Don’t use false or misleading header information. 2. Don’t use deceptive subject lines. 3. Identify the message as an ad. In this bloggers opinion, Tubley is repeatedly violating the CAN-SPAM Act.

Of course this is merely a legal issue. There are boatloads of ethical and professional issues too. When a company hijacks an entire address book and sends out unsolicited emails, we must be dealing with the low end of the gene pool, or perhaps in this case, the low end of the gene tube. I went to the Tubely website but the Contact Us link does not work (what a surprise). There is no phone number to call (another shocker). But after a few minutes, I was able to find a company name. Astute Software, 502, Sampada, Bangur Nagar, Goregaon (West), Mumbai – 400 090,  Maharashtra, India and an email: business@tubely.com.

On the Tubely privacy policy tab, visitors are instructed to contact Astute Software at the address noted above. If they listed a phone number or email address, I would have contacted them.  What is the relationship between Astute Software in India and Tubely? “Astute Software (India) specializes in offshore Development of digital solutions and software applications.” After a little research, it appears that Astute Software is the publisher of Tubely, as they advertise “Tubely free video sharing 1.0 download by Astute Software” on several sites.  Perhaps some free marketing advice may help Tubely and others like them. A new tag line might help: Tubely Both Viral And Vile. It is both descriptive and alliterative.

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LinkedIn Tops 100 Million Mark

On March 22nd LinkedIn reached a major milestone, eclipsing 100 million members worldwide. That’s a pretty significant number, one which according to LinkedIn is now growing at “roughly one million new LinkedIn members every week, the equivalent of a professional joining the site at faster than one member per second.”

LinkedIn sent me an email, noting that I was member number 356,048, an early adopter according to their email. I’m sure many of you reading this blog joined even earlier. The lesson here is about change, a roller coaster of change. Sometimes it takes a while for the coaster to make it up that big first hill, and then, it comes speeding down the track, weaving and winding its way toward a final destination. Of course on a coaster it is a known destination while on the internet, the horizon remains a vague blur. In both cases we can anticipate many unexpected (and sometimes thrilling) turns along the way. LinkedIn is now speeding down the track, and like any other roller coaster, and internet related things in general, don’t expect things to be in the same place very long. The internet is changing our lives and doing so quickly.

Many industries are in the process of climbing up that first roller coaster hill. And once they hit the peak, the subsequent velocity can be truly amazing. What’s changed so far? Social networking of course, trade shows, seminars, book publishing, etailing, newspapers, news reporting, public relations, marketing, banking, auctions and telecommuting to name just a few. Next up is movies and television. We’ve already seen some significant changes here – and we’re still climbing up that first roller coaster hill. Will traditional network TV be supplemented by a vast array of online, homegrown shows, or will it be replaced. Will individual reality shows be home produced and become the norm, or will the audience still prefer to see a professionally (if I can use that term) produced reality show? Will movies change, all but the mega special effect blockbuster replaced by indie movies, once pervasive and cheap internet distribution is available? Will we soon be watching news broadcasts and TV shows predominately on our Androids and iPhones? My eyes say no, though my brain says it will someday be likely.

Marketing has already hit the top of the hill and is changing rapidly. Telemarketing is on the decline, search marketing optimization, blogging, ePublishing and social media marketing are becoming mainstream. What’s the next big change we can expect to see? There are many expected, and they will likely change our lives, and optimistically I’d like to say for the better. Congratulations to LinkedIn on achieving this significant milestone, I use it (and so do many of my colleagues) every day – and it sounds like many, many others are finding value with this new network too.

 

 

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Borders Group Falls Victim To Internet Rivals

Brick and mortar infrastructure will make it progressively more difficult for companies to compete with Internet based rivals. These days the imminent casualties are pretty easy to spot, but in the future there will be many casualties which might seem surprising today. The most recent victim is Borders Group, which is the second-largest U.S. bookstore chain. According to Reuters, Borders filed for bankruptcy protection, after years of sharp sales declines that made it impossible to manage its crushing debt load, and it plans to close nearly one-third of its stores. Borders has not been able to capture market share in the online world, making it difficult to compete with Amazon and other rivals.

I’ve posted several blogs on this topic since March 2010:

Was this a moment of clairvoyance, should I quit the day job and become an Internet soothsayer? These predictions are pretty simple, just look for the cheaper and better distribution system and you’ll find the winner. Think of the Eerie canal compared to transit by horse and buggy. How about steam powered ships versus sail powered vessels? The telephone as opposed to snail mail, and email as opposed to fax. And today (and in the imminent future), Internet based or leveraged businesses will continue to win over brick and mortar businesses. Where are the next battles? Blockbuster versus Netflix, BestBuy versus Amazon and traditional publishers versus ePublshing are a few obvious matchups. Perhaps less obvious might be Walmart, shopping malls and libraries. These may seem an incongruous group, but they all face Internet based challenges, their existence predicated upon the ability to compete with cheaper, swifter and digital rivals.

Last week I purchased a new Dell XPS from Dell’s website. Upon receipt of this laptop (shipping was free), I noticed that it only had HDMI output (after all – VGA is getting old) and I needed a new nine foot HDMI to DVI cable to connect my external Samsung monitor. Online at Amazon and other e-tailers, prices ranged from $10 to $20 for many of them including shipping. Upon my arrival at BestBuy, my options were to buy a six foot cable for $40, or a longer HDMI cable with DVI converter for $90. The latter was the generic BestBuy brand, if I went with the name brand it would have been $130. This isn’t a matter of price gouging or unfair retailing by BestBuy, rather it’s a cost of doing business issue. Retail infrastructure is expensive, e-tail infrastructure is much, much cheaper. Time will tell who shall be the next brick and mortar victim, but I don’t think we’ll be waiting too long.

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Office Buildings Are Obsolete – Big Box Stores Too?

Internet Marketing

Internet Marketing

Last year I wrote a blog stating that office buildings are obsolete, and this year I’m thinking the same conjecture might also apply to big box stores. I recently noticed a Yahoo post entitled, The Coming Collapse of Commercial Real Estate is Already Here, by Stacy Curtin. Stacy aptly notes that BestBuy and Target missed their expected earnings targets, and as of this writing, Wal-Mart has seen 6 consecutive quarters of negative same store sales. Further, this happened to BestBuy even though a key competitor, CircuitCity, had moved into bankruptcy. Though this has occurred in a tough economy, many of their online competitors have seen significantly better results.

Stacy’s article states that more people are buying, they are just buying online. This seems true globally and anecdotally. About a year ago, I tried to purchase a receiver from BestBuy, only a couple of miles from my home. Unfortunately the receiver was out of stock. In fact all the receivers that might have been of interest to me were out of stock. A couple of years ago, I would have driven across the street to the now defunct CircuitCity (speaking of brick and mortar retail challenges). Instead, I drove home, went online to Amazon and purchased a better receiver for less money, which was delivered a day later. Obviously, I’m not alone. Many of my friends and colleagues now make routine purchases from Amazon as progressively more consumers become comfortable with online searching and shopping.

My CPA buys all his books on his Kindle, as do I, a faster, easier and more cost effective alternative to the brick and mortar bookstore. The challenges for BestBuy, Target, Wal-Mart, Blockbuster and Barnes & Noble are obvious, perhaps most evident by the huge electronic book display in the premium retail location at the front of the Barnes & Noble stores. B&N appears to be working hard to transition to a Kindle type operation with their new Nook. Better late than never, or simply too late for the date? Only time will tell, though their extensive brick and mortar costs may result in too much ballast for them to successfully navigate from retail to e-tail.

But retail isn’t alone in the commercial real estate challenge. Traditional office buildings will face a virtual workforce shift, as progressive companies opt for less costly and more efficient work from home staffing. This is happening with small virtual companies like StartUpSelling, Inc. and giants like IBM. Working virtually has amazing advantages, from resolving the commute related issue with today’s snow storm in Boston, to using highly cost effective tools like Skype which allows multistate, multiparty video conferencing for pennies a day.

Do these changes spell the imminent destruction and removal of office buildings and big box retail? I think this is too strong a statement. There will likely be a need for many types of retail establishment, from groceries to lumber, from household items to convenience items. And there will be office based businesses that require some or perhaps many employees to congregate. That said, the changes to brick and mortar retail and offices are upon us, gaining speed every day, as the convenience and cost efficacy of virtual business and e-tail offers a more convenient path for the rapidly increasing, interconnected internet world.

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The Virtual Storm Changing Marketing And PR

facebook youtube linkedin

Web-based Strategies

There is a new approach, a new way, a virtual storm of change swirling around marketing and PR. Take for example, the new reach of internet based PR methods including free PR websites, social media marketing opportunities, RSS feeds, blogging best practices, and pod casting. These are just a few of the innovations changing the landscape of publishing, journalism and public relations, a virtual storm within which we all now live, as the winds of change continue to alter the business climate.

These winds can be highly favorable to many businesses, including smaller and midsized companies, offering an opportunity to level the playing field regardless of employee count or cash reserves. The business world continues to experience a virtual evolution; some might argue it’s more akin to a virtual revolution. One of the dynamically changing elements encompasses the evolution of public relations. With inexpensive and even free PR sites available to any business; it’s fairly easy to create and implement an effective PR strategy, and carry the message to millions. This opportunity is compounded when leveraging social networking sites such as LinkedIn, FaceBook and Twitter. And businesses can take advantage of these new virtual opportunities while simultaneously helping their SEO and Search Engine Marketing.

There are many good sites to choose from. Some of these are free, some have a modest annual fee, others charge on a per press release basis and some offer all three of these options. The big difference between the free and fee based press releases revolves around the appearance of the actual release. Free sites typically incorporate ads around the press release in a similar way to article directories or search engine results pages (SERPs). This is essentially a PPC strategy whereby these free press release sites derive revenue from traffic and clicks. Fee based sites eliminate the ads, create a more attractive and professional release, and derive revenue for the fees. And some sites offer a combination of both offerings.

There are many press release sites available for use. Two of the sites I have recently used include:

Both sites work well, distribute the press releases promptly and do so to a wide audience, send a confirmation email once the release is accepted and distributed and offer a link to the posted release. Of course there are a plethora of other sites available including: PR.com, 1888PressPrelease.com, TheOpenPress.com, FreePressReleaseCenter.info, Information-Online.com, OpenPR.com, PR-Inside.com, PRdb.net, PressAbout.com, PressMethod.com, PressReleasePoint.com, YourFreePressRelease.net, BusinessWire.com, MarketWire.com, PRWeb.com, eWorldWire.com, PRLeap.com, eReleases.com, PRBuzz.com andPRNewsWire.com to mention just a few of the choices your business might consider. PR sites are often measured by page rank and Alexa rank. These are relevant in so much as a higher ranked PR site theoretically packs more internet punch than a lower ranked site. However, your results may vary based upon your industry, niche and specific PR strategy.

Which one is right for you? That depends upon your goals. Is your business trying to drive traffic to your website? Is your goal primarily SEO based as you try to move your business up in the rankings? Are you seeking to capture the attention of a highly specific audience? Is your goal to merely augment your search engine marketing strategy? Are you seeking highly tailored, branded results and wish to ensure there are no PPC ads on your releases? Do you need more advance functionality for tracking and monitoring your prior releases or scheduling upcoming releases? Predicated upon your goals, your business can determine which site(s) are most appropriate and if you need free PR, fee based PR or some combination of both. The level of marketing proficiency to submit consistent press releases for your organization is relatively low. That said the level of marketing discipline to do so often remains beyond the reach of many small businesses, usually the result of a lack of personnel, thus offering a relatively painless outsource opportunity for those companies which just can’t get the PR job done. For more information read Your Virtual Success (Career Press)or contact StartUpSelling:  http://www.startupselling.com/contact.html

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