Sales

Social events need not be a huge affair, but they can be extremely effective. They should definitely be a part of any social media strategy that your organization is considering. From a marketers perspective they can be a good way to persuade the C level that the trip to Vegas will be more than just a non-stop party.

Having created your Facebook page, your Twitter account(s) and your LinkedIn page how do you take that work out to the real world with a consistent message? How do you leverage all that online work when you meet people in real life?

For some reason this is still one of the biggest puzzles for a lot of organizations. They understand face to face marketing & sales, they go to tradeshows, conferences and other events, but for some reason when they get there they completely forget to utilize their Social Media efforts.  Here are some suggestions to make that connection easier.

Four simple things to do

Let’s imagine you are sending a team of four people to a tradeshow in Vegas with a booth. If all your efforts are focused on the tradeshow floor you are missing a big opportunity. Why not create a tweetup at a bar, perhaps in the hotel that the tradeshow is being held in.

• Use Twitter to find out who is going to the tradeshow. It’s as simple as sending out a tweet asking just that.
• Create a hashtag for your event that reflects your company name and/or the main event.
• Put up signs at the event – just simple ones printed in the business center of the hotel reminding people to Tweet the event, use your hashtag, checkin on Foursquare and send a shout.
• Have a couple of door prizes for people who tweet your event, maybe even have a few quiz questions about your company or the event and reward the first person to tweet the answer.

These simple steps can turn an ordinary conference trip into something a lot more creative, that has tangible results that can be built into the trip autopsy.

What does your organization do to move Social from online to the real world?

This week I found an addition to my Gmail, Google Buzz. Like so many others of you I was surprised at the way this was rolled out. No invites, no “elite” group of users first, just open your email and there it was.

Open Rollout – Not the Google Way

A definite departure from the way Google has rolled out previous applications, including Gmail. What to make of that? Was Google not so sure that they could create a buzz about Buzz?

Having played around with Google Wave and been left with the impression that while it might be useful for groups of collaborators, as an individual it left me feeling like I had taken a trip back in time 15 years or so to the days when I was one of only a handful of people I knew that had email. I could see that this might be useful, but no one I knew used it and so for the most part it was irrelevant.

Turn Down The Volume

Google Buzz seems to be much the same type of thing. For the first time I would have to say that Google is a day late and a dollar short. Google Buzz is little more than an echo chamber, in a world that has enough noise already. Rather than bringing something new and exciting to the table, they have invented a solution to a problem that doesn’t exist, namely, how to stay in touch with people I email using Gmail. The people I email using Gmail I am already connected to, on Facebook, Twitter, FriendFeed, Foursquare, Plaxo, LinkedIn, Flickr, YouTube and of course via email. Why do I need another tool?

When I look at Buzz what I see is cross-posting from Twitter & Facebook, along with “Hey, how does this work?” posts. So what is the point?  That is a classic software development conundrum. Google has given me a tool, but I have no idea how or why I should use it. So I will just leave it be and not use it.

A New Tool For The Miner

If you are going to build a social tool, then at least look at what already exists, and look at the problems that occur with them. The primary problem for anyone actively involved in Social Networking is Noise. A tool that enables me to reduce the noise, focus on what I am interested in across all sites and still enables me to catch those odd alluring snippets that might otherwise be missing from my attention stream is what I need.

Tweetdeck is the nearest tool that I use that comes anywhere near that, and that barely does the job. I currently have more than 20 columns in Tweetdeck that I scroll across every day looking for the good stuff. I am an information miner, what I need is a laser, not dynamite and definitely not a 16oz claw hammer which is what Google Buzz is. Old tech, old approach.  Google I expect more from you.  Back to the drawing board you go.

Have you found a use for Google Buzz?

The last installment of the Foursquare series takes a look at B2B and how Geo-Location services like Foursquare, Gowalla & even Twitter can be used by them.

Successful use of Social Media by the B2B space is a bit of a holy grail amongst marketers. Some have even gone so far as to dismiss the technology as it currently stands because they see no real method of seeing returns on their investment.  If services like Facebook, Twitter & LinkedIn are a hard sell, how much harder is it to sell a service like Foursquare which seems to reside firmly in the B2C space and be little more than a game?

I was talking this idea through the other day with a friend who read my first post in this series and she extrapolated a very interesting concept for me. I was proposing the use of the technology by B2B service organizations, such as HVAC, copy machine repair etc. Her extrapolation of my idea was to incorporate the heat maps that I showed in the first post into a CRM/Lead Generation environment.  I can definitely see this being used, especially by small B2B outfits.

Imagine being a service based organization that has some type of field force, whether they are making deliveries, making maintenance calls etc. By using heat maps you can see the frequency of visits in a particular area, and by field force member. The heat map would show you where your calls were and where they were not. This would immediately give you valuable information for targeting either customer service issues (too many maintenance calls) or sales opportunities (no deliveries). While I am sure that there is enterprise level shipping, tracking or delivery scheduling software out there, I am equally sure it is beyond the budget of a small B2B businesses trying to compete with bigger organizations. I posted the link to wheredoyougo yesterday, here is another service, checkoutcheckins (produced by Danny Pier) doing a very similar thing with heat maps – still in Alpha.

Location, Location, Location

Of course the key here is still a physical presence. What of companies that do not have a physical product, for example a Marketing Communications Agency?  How do they leverage geo-location services to advance their marketing, especially in the B2B space?  The quick answer is they don’t, not directly. After all the key to geo-location social networking is exactly that, location. However, in much the same way as companies are now starting to feature select staff member twitter streams on their websites, I could definitely see some companies showing select staff member check-ins on their websites. Why? If for no other reason than to show that the company has more than a passing knowledge of how to leverage the technology. More than this, it can provide subliminal messaging showing your potential customers who you are already working with. Of course, it has to be managed correctly, and there is the question of just how much transparency you want with your organization.

Other concepts that have been proposed all revolve around having a location, even if its a temporary one such as at a trade show or conference. This is still a good idea, though temporary locations really do go against the spirit of geo-location social networking, insofar as the idea is that you can repeat the experience of others. If your “friends” are checking in at a conference that you aren’t at, then you have no way of repeating their experience.

Changing The Game

B2B Marketing through geo-location social networking is a much harder proposition. If I were the marketing manager for a company such as Avery Dennison, how would I use Foursquare or services like it to market my message to potential customers? Having access to an individuals’ check-ins doesn’t help me much.

Because I lack the other information about that person, are they authorized to make purchases on behalf of the company etc.? Just because I see that they have checked-in at Office Max doesn’t mean they are buying labels for their company or at all. So no point in pushing them discount coupons. So what do I get from a geo-location service that helps me get my message through all the noise that potential & existing customers are already experiencing? I reverse the concept. Instead of trying to use the service to simply promote my products, why not use my products to promote the service. For example, market to restaurants, bars, coffee shops etc. that are using Foursquare, labels that they can give away to “Mayors”?

Overall, I think that there is a long way to go for geo-location services. We will need to see a greater convergence of both current software technologies and new adaptations of hardware technologies. I certainly see a role for RFID technology in geo-location social networking, having a product check-in for you as you buy it will certainly expand the B2c potential of these services. Quite where B2B will go with Social Media in general, and geo-location in particular, remains to be seen. But there are some very smart people out there figuring it out and you can be sure that, given the right incentive, we will see some innovative campaigns using these tools.

Share your predictions for these services with everyone in the comments below.

Read Part One of this series.

Read Part Two of this series.

There is a worrying trend that has been prevalent in Social Media for sometime, but has now been forced on so many people that it is considered one of the “rules” of good Social media. To what do I refer? The “Social Media is for the common good” trend. Its time to call BS on this. The Bright-Siders that have crept into most aspects of our lives have of course jumped on Social Media as yet another channel through which they can spread their overly optimistic view of the world.

I am not being a grumpy old man here. My answer, whenever anyone asks, to is the glass half empty or half full is always – “Overflowing”. I am an optimist but I am also a pragmatist. I do not believe simply wishing things would happen will make them happen. Making things happen takes work, planning and intent. However, there is a movement within Social Media that tries to guilt people into conforming to the view that we should only spread happy, cheerful messages, that to try and make money clearly makes you an agent of Satan and that you are completely missing the point.

Buzz Words

They throw around phrases like “engagement”, “relationship building”, “Its all about you, not about me” etc etc. Again I call BS. There are no wallflowers in Social Media, anyone who is an active user of Twitter, Facebook, Friendfeed etc is not there because they are trying to hide from the world. They are there precisely because it is all about them.  They want the world to know what they think, they want to convince, persuade, cajole and in some cases bully others into thinking the way they think.

I recently had a Tony Robbins session forced on me at a Twitter conference. Now I have no real beef with him, he does his thing, he makes money at it, great. I didn’t think a three hour group hugging session was appropriate for the conference but it is what it is. What I found most annoying was the “charismatic” nature of the event, the guilting of people to do things. “Everyone raise your hand and say Aye”, was the most frequent words out of his mouth. It is this manifestation of “group think” that is currently running rampant in Social Media.

It leads to the very opposite of what I believe Social Media is for, public opinion, not group opinion but public opinion. Which includes dissent. The bright siders don’t want dissent, they dont want to engage in reasoned argument or debate. They want to use the weight of mass opinion to crush opposing views.

Please don’t misunderstand me, I am not saying Social Media can’t be used for Social Good, I was a part of the past two Twestivals in Austin and I am a strong believer in social advocacy through lots of different channels, but there is a difference between that and trying to convince someone that a medium such as Social Media only has one legitimate use.

The Art of Selling

I am as annoyed with the MLM use of Social Media as anyone, but lets recognize that Social Media, for all of its fun, meeting people benefits, is still a viable channel through which making money is possible. Does that mean it has to be rammed down people’s throats, no. Equally however, it doesn’t mean that we all have to sit around in a circle holding hands and singing kumbaya. Its Social Media, not Socialist Media. The continuing trend toward telling marketers and others that they have no place at the table of Social Media if they only want to sell stuff is as wrong as simply using it as a broadcast medium. We have all become jaded with push media, however, there is an artistry to selling well, and when it is done well, most of us can appreciate it. Social Media lends itself extremely well to the art of selling.

So lets truly embrace “transparency”, own up to the fact that whether it is a product or ourselves when we use social media we are all selling something, and that closing the deal, whether that is something as complex as getting a contract signed or as simple as being retweeted by someone who we view as popular is our goal. Then perhaps we can all move this amazing vehicle forward and not become caught in a rut of giving each other group shoulder rubs.

Share your thoughts with me – Grumpy Old Man or Pragmatist?

Last week I posted a review of the Twitter tool Twollow. I was interested to see that it almost immediately went under the auction hammer. The tool that took 24 hours to build, took only 7 hours to sell. Bidding started at $25, with the tool finally being sold for $1,750.00. I am surprised by for two reasons, one, it was developed in 24 hours which means the developer realized $72 per hour. Second, it was obviously built for sale. This is an interesting trend. Almost akin to the House flipping market and I wonder if it will follow the same pattern.

Tools for Sale

Will we now see a rush of tools for Twitter brought out simply for resale? I will be interested to see what happens to Twollow – there is no disclosure of who bought the tool. Considering it was really a work in progress and needed quite a bit of remodeling it might not have been the bargain that someone thought.

The model that was used was very interesting. Build & launch a tool. Garner blog coverage for it, on the auction site there were 6 different blog sites with articles about the tool, including this one. Then put it on an auction site like Sitepoint.

Facebook reportedly offered $500m for Twitter this week. An offer that was turned down by the Twitter team. $500m is not a bad offer for a company that is barely 2 years old with a tool that has really only started to gain popularity in the later half of 2008. If we take the interest by Facebook as an indication, tools that support Twitter and extend its functionality and usefulness, will ultimately attract the same type of attention. Tools that support business functionality are already starting to appear, last week I posted on Mashable a HOW TO using the Xpenser tool, which utilizes Twitter functionality to track business expenses.

Twollow had none of these to offer. There was no business functionality, no extension of existing Twitter use and yet it managed to attract both publicity and bids. One can only imagine the interest that a tool with both business and personal functionality might attract.

Tweetlater is a good example of one such tool, and one to watch.  It has been extending its functionality over the past couple of weeks.  Going from its original one trick of allowing you to schedule Tweets to adding Keyword tracking and @replies digests so that you don’t miss important replies.  I think that Tweetlater would raise a lot more than $1,750.00 if it came under the hammer.

Twitter Tool Realtor

Perhaps there is an opening for a Twitter Tool Realtor? After all Twollow was a single function tool, the software equivalent of a Shotgun Shack, and that sold in 7 hours. A Twitter Tool Realtor could bring together developers with purchasers who could then take the tools to the next level.

What Twitter tools would you buy, and how much would you be willing to pay for them?

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Please Call Us

I have been trying to find a web hosting company to move this blog to.  You would think that would be fairly straightforward.  I have certain criteria, like a wordpress install included in the webspace, reasonably priced etc. but nothing too difficult or demanding.

In the past two weeks I have visited several web hosting companies that offer the services I am looking for.  I found their “contact us” page and filled out the required form, including details of what I am looking for and explaining that I would like to do this quite soon.  Of the three companies that I contacted, not one has responded with anything more than an automated email telling me that they will be in touch very soon but that if I would like a faster response I can call them at 1800……

Let me get this straight, you are a web based company, you have a contact us form on your website and you want me to phone you to get your attention long enough for me to do business with you?  I have that correct don’t I?  You have the technology to setup an auto-responder for the mailbox that your form posts to, you have the financial resources to have someone answering phones but you can’t answer you own email?  I am going to do business with you why?

Closing Down

Experian states that 4,798 businesses failed in the first quarter of 2008 up 8.5% on the same quarter previous year.  The media abounds with stories of businesses failing, of the economic downturn that we are all experiencing and yet I can’t seem to give my business to anyone.

Anyone in business development will tell you that it is between 5 & 10 times harder to acquire a new customer than it is to service an existing customer, so why, if you have a customer knocking on your door asking to do business with you would you completely ignore them?

Real Recession?

This makes me ask the question, is the recession real?  Is it conveniently timed to coincide with the election?  They say that two things that are guaranteed to get votes is to have a war or have a financial crisis.  Seems we have a war but that isnt really getting the attention it once was, so now we need a financial crisis to focus people on voting for change.

Or perhaps certain industries are immune to the recession, I would have thought that web hosting falls into the data center industry which is one of the country’s biggest users of energy, with rising energy prices I would assume their cost base has risen.  Of course my evidence is all anecdotal but given that this has happened with not one, not two but three companies over a three week period it seems that I am either being boycotted by the web hosting industry or I am experiencing something that is common to that industry and quite likely others too. As Thomas Edison said “What you are will show in what you do” a lack of follow through to a sales inquiry really doesn’t give me confidence that your customer service is going to be what I am looking for.

If you have had a similar experience please share it with me, maybe we can use Social Media to get these companies to take note of the sales opportunities they are missing.

Many businesses are turning to White Papers as part of their Marketing communication strategy. Unfortunately many of them seem to have the wrong idea about what constitutes a White Paper. For a large number of companies it seems that their White Papers are really extended sales brochures. As Steve Hoffman writes in a recent Marketing Profs White Paper, “White papers are not marketing collateral,” he says. “They complement marketing collateral.”, He goes on to state ” A ‘white paper’ that actively markets your company to readers is nothing more than a long, wordy brochure.”

However, many companies just don’t seem to understand this and continue to produce White Papers that truly don’t meet this criteria. Lets examine the reasons why a company would engage in the creation of a White Paper.

1. The intention to position their company as Subject Matter Experts with regard to a particular service, product or technology
2. To differentiate themselves from their competitors by sharing knowledge
3. To drive traffic and/or leads to their website
4. To reinforce or create an impression with prospects and clients that they are a trusted voice in their industry
5. To introduce a new concept, solution or technology to the market

These are not by any means the only reason why a company would seek to publish a White Paper but they certainly constitute the most popular reasons. Now given that a company is going to commit time, money and resources to this endeavor with the hopes of meeting at least one, if not more of the aims above then it would seem reasonable that some consideration of the readership, both intended and unintended would be considered.

However, that seems to be the last thing that companies consider when setting out on this path. They start and end with a focus on selling their product and in doing so hamstring their endeavor before it has even started.

Lets examine a typical White Paper from cover to cover and review how so many companies are producing them and make suggestions about how they can do them better.

The cover – Often produced as an after thought, this is where the trouble starts. A large Logo emblazoned on the front of the White Paper, immediately announcing that this is the product of a particular company. Then a title that also includes the company name, e.g. “ABC’s Solution to your Problem”. A reader seeing this has already put up their anti-sales barriers, that’s if they even bother to go any further. Given that most companies ask you to complete a short info form before you can download a White Paper, the reader is now feeling cheated, they have given out their email address and name and possibly other information on the pretext of being given some valuable information, only to find that they are in fact going to be sold to.

• The Alternative – Move your logo – if you must in fact include your logo on the front page, and I am by no means supporting that, to a greatly reduced size to the bottom of the front page, precede it with “Sponsored by” or “Provided by”. In place of the Logo put a title that fairly represents the content of the paper, it doesn’t have to be bland, it can be catchy but it must most importantly be relevant and should not under any circumstances include the company name. Make sure that the author(s) names are on the front page so that people have some sense of who wrote the paper, include their position or expertise.

The content – Having opened the White Paper the reader is then told how they are going to read in this paper that ABC’s solution is the only one they need to consider. They are told how not considering ABC’s solution will in fact lead them into dire straits, financial ruin, or end their career. That everyone who is anyone in the industry is already using this solution and that only buyers who truly lack vision would be considering anything else. This may seem extreme but I can honestly say I have seen just these tactics used in what was supposed to be a White Paper. Using fear or other “sales” tactics in a White Paper not only doesn’t work, its completely inappropriate for the medium. Using unsupported claims is also pointless, again these leave the reader feeling that they have downloaded a sales brochure and are unlikely to get any useful information from this paper.

• The Alternative – Make the content compelling. Tell a story, that doesn’t mean fictionalize it, it means have a narrative thread that runs throughout the paper. Lead the reader through your arguments with facts that support your position. Where possible cite studies or quote industry figures that agree with and support your position. Use images where appropriate, but not so many that the paper becomes more like a graphic novel than a White Paper. Leave out any mention of your company. This is the hardest pill for most companies to swallow. “How will the reader know about us”, they ask. We’ll get to the part where you get to pitch, but it isn’t in the body of the White Paper. Provide some proprietary information, give the reader something that they would have to have paid for to get normally. Perhaps its from a study that is only available by subscription (be sure to source it properly) or perhaps its from the companies own data. Many companies fear doing this – “what if our competitors get this information?”, what if they do? Obviously don’t include something that would remove your competitive edge, but revealing some information, even if it goes to your competitors is more likely to strengthen your position than weaken it. So where does the pitch go ? At the very back of the paper, separate page, separate heading, so that it is clearly not part of the paper. A heading like “About the Sponsors” gives the reader a clear indication that this is the pitch part, it gives them the opportunity to read it or not, but it also allows them to clearly delineate in their minds the meat of the paper and the sales pitch, which is more likely to have them read the pitch because after all, you have given them something useful, now they are more likely to give you something back – their time.

The Readership – just because the paper was written with a specific reader in mind, new prospects, existing customers etc. doesn’t mean that is who will read it. White Papers are used by a variety of sources, competitors, market researchers, journalists, and yes new prospects and existing customers. If a White Paper reads like a sales brochure, provides no new information, doesn’t offer a genuine insight and relevant data to a reader how does this meet the defined objectives? Will a company be seen as an industry subject matter expert, will it drive new prospects to a website, will existing customers think of the company as a trusted industry voice, will journalists or market researchers think of them when they next need a quote about the industry?

As a recap, avoid selling in a white paper at all costs, make the body engaging, provide facts that the reader can use, be subtle about the branding of white papers and keep in mind the wider audience that you might reach however unintentionally.