Clint Landrock had been looking for the next big thing in nanotechnology and he found it in Costa Rica, on the wings of a bird-sized Central American butterfly. He had been pursuing ideas for organic solar cells, but he was soon frustrated by a lack of useful ideas in the scientific literature and turned his attention to nanostructures in the animal world.

The "risk-pricing mechanism" of the global economy is "broken," and we are "building up terrific stresses in the system," according to Michael Burry.

Burry is the central character of 'The Big Short,' a financial crisis blockbuster that hit theaters earlier this month.

The movie, which is adapted from the best-selling book written by Michael Lewis, tells the real-life story of how Burry figured out the global mortgage market was on the verge of collapse.

But that was then. Now, he doesn't see imminent destruction, just the slow build of yet another doom machine.

Here is what he told Jessica Pressler at New York Magazine in a recent Q&A.

Where do we stand now, economically?
Well, we are right back at it: trying to stimulate growth through easy money. It hasn’t worked, but it’s the only tool the Fed’s got. Meanwhile, the Fed’s policies widen the wealth gap, which feeds political extremism, forcing gridlock in Washington. It seems the world is headed toward negative real interest rates on a global scale. This is toxic. Interest rates are used to price risk, and so in the current environment, the risk-pricing mechanism is broken. That is not healthy for an economy. We are building up terrific stresses in the system, and any fault lines there will certainly harm the outlook.

So no, we're not going down now. But eventually, yeah.

For the full Q&A head to NYMag>>

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: The infamous pharmaceuticals CEO Martin Shkreli has been arrested

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REVIEW:

I’ve been using Google’s Project Fi cellular service on the LG Nexus 5X for the past two months, and I like it a lot. I recognize that it’s not for everyone — currently it works in just three Android phones — but for some people, it’s worth trying out at least.

Google isn’t relying on its own mobile network to deliver Project Fi. It’s a mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) that uses Sprint and T-Mobile’s networks, as well as Wi-Fi connections when they’re available.

The word Project in the name is a giveaway about the nature of the service within Google as a whole and its recently formed umbrella company, Alphabet. Fi is ultimately an experiment in a new market, an area where Google does not have a track record. Google does this on the regular. It’s possible that Fi could one day resemble, say, Google Fiber in terms of its adoption and industry impact, but it’s also possible that Google could discontinue the service.

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From VentureBeat

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Here are some of my thoughts after using Fi for my main phone for the past two months.

Value

The first thing you have to talk about when you talk about Project Fi is how much it’s going to cost you. And my experience so far has been very positive in that department.

You can get started at $20 per month for unlimited calling and texting and $10 for every gigabyte of data you want to use a month. So I pay $80, with 6 GB of data allotted. I get credit back for any data I don’t use, and I only pay extra based on exactly how much I go over my plan. It’s great.

For my main phone — a 2014 second generation Motorola Moto X — through the recently launched L (for large) talk, text, and data plan from Verizon, I now get 6GB of data for $60 per month, but that’s on top of various fees, including a $40 smartphone line access fee. My monthly Fi bills are generally lower. In other words, I would save money by ditching my Verizon account and switching to Fi.

Fi’s Wi-Fi Assistant feature should be part of any discussion about the economics of the plan. The feature connects your device to free high-quality Wi-Fi networks and thereby prevents unnecessary data plan consumption, without requiring tinkering on your part. It’s the type of technology that helps stave off overage charges, month after month. And it’s the type of thing I could imagine AT&T and Verizon adopting because it’s so smart.

Simplicity

I actually like getting my Project Fi monthly statements. Isn’t that crazy? They are just so simple and pain-free and predictable. They are what telecoms should aspire to.

Here’s what I mean:

There are no endless tallies of mysterious fees. What is there is a nice, simple chart showing data usage for every day of the month, including tethering.

Of course, the statements look great in the Fi app on your phone. There are no PDFs to zoom in on.

If you have questions, you can get technical support 24 hours a day and seven days a week. The app shows that if I want to call in and leave a message, a Fi rep will call me back within one minute, and that I can get a reply to an email inquiry within one to four hours. This might not scale if and when Fi becomes more widely used, but for now it’s excellent.

Speed

The surprising thing about living with Fi is that it isn’t slow — because that’s what I was expecting.

Using the Speedtest.net app, I tested Wi-Fi and regular cellular network connections for Fi and Verizon in 10 locations in the Bay Area. Believe it or not, Fi was faster than Verizon more than half the time, across both Wi-Fi and cellular networks, for both uploading and downloading. For instance, once in San Jose I got a 29.84 Mbps download speed on Fi over LTE and 6.69 Mbps on Verizon.

I definitely could run these tests more frequently and in more places to arrive at a more meaningful data set. Still, I do have a little bit of data suggesting that Fi isn’t always slower than a top-tier network.

And that lines up with my actual experience. While using the 5X on Fi from day to day, I never once found myself reaching for my Moto X with the hope of getting faster Internet service.

The problem: Wi-Fi call quality

With Project Fi you get unlimited calling, so the plan’s support for Wi-Fi calls is not absolutely necessary. But I found that when Fi routes calls over Wi-Fi networks, it isn’t good.

I found the call quality to be choppy or distorted or both. I would answer calls and not hear anyone on the other end for a few seconds. It was so frustrating that I felt I might as well not take the call and have people contact me in some other way instead. On the Project Fi subreddit I found a few other people complaining about Wi-Fi call quality.

This happened to me particular when I was indoors, so it’s not very common — maybe one out of 10 calls would go to Wi-Fi in my testing.

Fortunately, I’ve discovered a fix. You can turn off Wi-Fi calling inside Android’s standard-issue Phone app. It’s as simple as opening up the app’s settings section, tapping Calls, tapping Wi-Fi calling, and switching the toggle to the off position.

At least in the Bay Area — and in some other metropolitan areas in the United States, like Boston, New York, and Portland — the Fi network is usually sufficient for calling, so turning off Wi-Fi calling generally won’t leave you stranded.

Limited availability

There are a couple other small issues I should point out.

First, Project Fi currently only works with just three mobile devices: the Nexus 5X and Nexus 6 from Motorola and the Nexus 6P from Huawei. If Google wanted to distinguish Android phones from iPhones, Google could extend Fi across all of Android. And if Google wanted to really freak out AT&T and Verizon, the tech giant could make Fi work on any phone. But for now, it’s limited in availability.

The second issue has to do with the Fi data-only SIM cards that you can order for additional devices once you’ve started using Fi in one of the three aforementioned phones. The data-only SIM cards are officially compatible with a few tablets: Apple’s iPad Air 2 and iPad Mini 4, Asus’ Nexus 7 LTE, HTC’s Nexus 9 LTE, and Samsung’s Galaxy Tab S. Google says its Fi data-only SIM cards may well work in other devices but that it “might not be able to help you activate or troubleshoot these other devices.” That’s not very reassuring.

Depending on where you go, the data-only SIM cards only provide you with a 2G or 3G network connection, not the fast 4G LTE that some consumers have come to expect. See the coverage map for more detail on this.

Altogether

But even with these quirks, Project Fi is impressively good, given how new it is and the high standards that consumers have when it comes to cell service.

I just hope Fi goes beyond being called a project and into something that’s a little more permanent for Google, so that over time it can pick up greater scale and start competing more seriously with the biggest cellular carriers.

More information:

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VB WEBINAR:

It’s one of the most effective tools in the marketer’s toolbox, but thousands keep making critical errors and losing out — especially in a mobile-first world. Join our live webinar and learn from proven experts why your email campaigns may be failing to live up to their massive potential — and what to do about it. 

Register here for free.

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With the average email user estimated to have over 8,000 messages in their inboxes, it’s never been more crucial for marketers to nail down their email marketing strategy. Even committing one marketing sin could push your clients to unsubscribe, and when you’re expected to lose 30 percent of email subscribers every year, you really don’t need that percentage to go up.

Sure, there are the casual mistakes like misspellings or poorly-placed graphics, or the obvious ones like too-little-too-late notifications on a timed deal. Any of these can destroy your impression as an authority figure in the eyes of your clients. Then there’s overhyping your subject line with a clickbait headline more suited for BuzzFeed which will ruin any sense of trust you may have established — or were hoping to establish with your audience –and make them click the unsubscribe button.

But ignoring critical behavioral data may be the most grievous error when it is so readily available. It can result in offers that lack apparent value to your audience, not enough focus on the customer and their specific needs and wants, batch-and-blast emails that appear to be coming from a no-name, “no-reply” sender rather than sounding like they’re coming from a real human being ready for interaction. And, as 2016 kicks off, is your email strategy optimized for mobile-first consumers?

If you’re struggling to keep a healthy number of email subscribers, than this webinar is for you. Join Yummly COO Brian Witlin and Doug Roberge, Strategic Services Consultant at Kahuna, as they share five significant ways you can increase email engagement through mobile behavioral data. Learn how to keep your email subscribers happy by delivering content that keeps them hooked.

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Don’t miss out!

Register here for free.

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After this webinar, you’ll be able to:

• Create email campaigns that incorporate cross-channel behavioral data
• Understand the role of email in a holistic omnichannel experience with push, in-app, and more
• Know how intelligent communication plays a crucial part in each customer’s individual journey

Speakers:

Brian Witlin, COO, Yummly

Doug Roberge, Strategic Services Consultant, Kahuna

Moderator:

Wendy Schuchart, Analyst, VentureBeat

More speakers to be announced soon!

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 This webinar is sponsored by Kahuna.

After decades of research on successful startup formulas, the odds are still against new entrepreneurs.

Recent findings from Harvard Business School estimate that 75 percent of all startups fail; however the process of starting a company can be less risking by following the “lean startup method.” This methodology favors experimentation over creating the perfect business plan, “iterative design” over traditional upfront development, and an emphasis on nimbleness, speed and agile practices.

Meet three entrepreneurs who have beaten the odds using similar principles that guided them in their 20s and continue to work today.

Leah Busque, CEO of TaskRabbit
After completing a degree in math and computer science in 2001, Leah Busque worked for a small software development startup that IBM eventually acquired. In February 2008, while still working as a programmer at IBM, Busque was rushing out of her home and discovered she was out of dog food. She hoped a neighbor might help and realized she wasn’t the only person in need of a favor. “At the time, no one had leveraged social locations and mobile technologies and social networking. Four months later, I quit my job and launched TaskRabbit, a site that allows users to outsource small jobs and tasks to others in their neighborhood based on the idea of ‘neighbors helping neighbors.’”

Busque cashed out her IBM pension to fund the business for the first six months, but by March 2009, at age 28, she was able to secure angel funding for her online and mobile solution and since then has received more than US$38 million.

“Looking back at the time I left IBM, I had no concept of what starting a company entailed. I think successful people in general tend to over think things and sometimes this can hurt us. I needed enough confidence that I would learn on the job,” she says. “There were steep learning curves but not to overthink was a key lesson during the early years.”

Busque says these lessons remain valuable years later and uses them for hiring and business development.

Ammar Sharani, Founder and Chairman of In/Pact
With limited opportunities for entrepreneurs in Syria during the early 1980s, Ammar Sharani relocated to the United States to continue his studies by way of Mississippi State University and the University of Central Florida. Starting several businesses while a student and graduating with a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering, Sharani made the conscious choice to follow his passion for business instead of engineering.

Sharani’s big break came “by accident” in 1989 while raising funds for a local school. He negotiated a plan with AT&T where a portion of a customer’s bill would be contributed to a school of the subscriber’s choice.

“While I just wanted to help a local school, it became a profitable business with a higher purpose.” At the time, Sharani was 26 and married with a son. “The stakes were high, but I think having a dream and vision helped keep me going.”

Within a year, his new company, International Community Marketing, expanded to more than 1,000 employees, and sales increased to more than US$300 million with clients in the financial services and Fortune 50 telecom companies.

In Sharani’s latest startup, In/Pact, a platform to increase employees’ productivity by engaging with a higher purpose, he continues to be driven by his need to create social and economic value for clients. “Entrepreneurship is when you have passion and blind faith in your mission, to the extent that it becomes almost delusional. Have this kind-of faith in your business and nothing will stop you.”

Roger Hardy, Chairman of Hardy Capital Partners
Roger Hardy started an online contact lens business from his basement 14 years ago — never expecting that the Vancouver-based e-commerce company would secure a US$435 million exit through an international sale in February 2014.

Ever since he was young, Hardy was interested in business. He started selling ice cream at age 11 and operated a T-shirt company in college. Hardy relocated to Vancouver in 1993 and worked in transportation logistics before moving into a marketing position for a contact lens company. There, he recognized difficulties customers endured while buying contact lenses and built a website with his sister for US$2,500 to make purchasing easier. At the age of 29, Hardy partnered with snap.com (formerly an independent search engine) and this changed the direction of his business. The US$55,000 he invested, which allowed him to get visibility on searches for contact lenses, seemed exorbitant. But the move paid off. In the first month, the company secured US$60,000 in sales, marking the starting point expansion.

“The lesson I learned was that you have to think not what the business is today, but what the business will be in a few years. We did US$10 million in sales the second year.”

In 2009, the company diversified into eyeglasses, and Hardy hit another pivotal point in his career expanding to eye glasses manufacturing. “Everyone was worried when we had built a state-of-the-art manufacturing plant with initially very little demand for glasses. Again, it was a big investment upfront, but within a year we were making 1,000 pairs a day.”

Currently, Hardy is working on developing SHOES.com, an online shoe company — and he is doing it with a core team from his first startup. “Another lesson I learned during my early stages of being an entrepreneur is the importance of working with great people.”

A Swedish biometric technology company called Fingerprint Cards outperformed every other European stock in 2015, according to a report by Bloomberg News.

The company's stock surged 1,391% in 2015, more than 1,000 other companies on the Bloomberg World EMEA Index, and now has a market value of 32.8 billion kronor ($3.9 billion).

Here's how that looks on the chart:

The company makes fingerprint sensors and has boosted sales as mobile-phone makers begin to include biometric technology as a standard feature in their products.

Chief Executive Officer Joergen Lantto told Bloomberg's Adam Ewing that the market for Fingerprint Cards' technology will be at least 500 million units next year, rising to around 1.7 billion units in 2018.

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: JIM CRAMER: 'YOU SHOW UP AND THAT'S THE REVENGE'

Just because your title begins with a C – as in CIO or CTO – it doesn’t necessarily mean you have full access to the rest of the C-Suite. And without that access, it may be tough to get the true lowdown on company strategy. Hearing the results of those conversations is definitely not the same as being a participant.

It can be frustrating to get information second hand. Or through the filters of orchestrated “company speak.” There’s real power in watching people interact as they discuss the goals and objectives of the company to position it for success. That’s what you’ll really miss out on if you’re not privy to the actual business strategy discussion.

Your ultimate goal should be to become an integral part of that group of business leaders to help improve company performance. And for good reason. Price Waterhouse Cooper’s 2013 Digital IQ Study supports better business outcomes for companies that have a strong relationship between the CIO and the rest of the C-Suite.

“Our survey found that companies with collaborative C-suites that intertwine business strategy and information technology and are often rewarded with stronger company performance,” according to Chris Curran, a PwC principal and a lead author of the report. “They can also adapt quickly to market changes to maintain an advantage over competitors.”

Until that happens in your company, here are four things you can do to become a part of the conversation, ensure ITs value is recognized and solutions are integrated with business objectives.

1. Build Relationships

Strong relationships with senior leaders are the foundation of business-IT alignment. But it’s not just the relationship that will make it happen. When building those relationships with the C-Suite members, your discussions with each member around how IT can enable the achievement of their critical goal and ultimately company success are key. Find out what’s most important to each of them. Do your homework and speak the language of their line of business. Look inward and make sure your leadership style is congruent with the style of the C-Suite team. Learn how they view technology’s role in achievement of their goals and help make them happen. Find out if they have unmet technology needs and work together to remove any obstacles.

2. Be A Team Player

Now I know this is cliché, but it will help you make progress. You have strengths that will contribute to the success of each line of business and can help the leaders of those organizations achieve their goals. Plus your technology background will be an asset. Look at the big picture of what they’re trying to accomplish and help them see where technology can be added or changed to get better results – outcomes, operational efficiencies or both. Offer up resources where possible to assist at the front line.

3. Push their Agenda, Not Yours

You, of course, have a vision and plan for technology in the company. Make sure you use opportunities to test that plan out with each of the senior leaders by showing them how their priorities can be moved forward with the assistance of your plan components. Tread carefully here and make sure you are pushing their agenda forward not just yours. Help them see how customers will have a better outcome, company sales will improve, or money will be saved. Adding value is the key here.

4. Share Success Stories

As each of the leaders achieves success, help them share those stories with the rest of the C-Suite. These stories should include how technology and your department’s involvement enabled that success to happen.

Wearable Tech Healthcare Market Wearable technology has come a long way over the years offering a broad array of products and services. In the next few years we can expect continued growth and many new opportunities for businesses to tap into this exciting market. Wearable device market value from 2010 to 2018 (in million U.S. […]

This post The Wearable Tech Healthcare Market Continues To Grow appeared first on CloudTweaks Connected CloudTweaks.com.

The one-on-one meetings I used to hold were horrific. They were more or less glorified status updates. 30 minutes seemed too long and I left each one exhausted. Self-reflection, strong mentorship, and constant learning helped me identify the best way to structure a one-on-one meeting. Most recently, a Rivalry team member expressed their new found love of our structured, weekly 30 minutes. In the next few paragraphs, I’ll highlight what worked for us. Now, Rivalry team members leave one-on-ones heard, inspired and focused.

Below is not the end all be all, and many individuals have suggested the best format for one-on-ones. The following is what has worked for us and hundreds of managers we see and work with week in and week out.

The Perfect Structure | 10 : 10 : 10

• 10 minutes for the direct report
• 10 minutes for the manager
• 10 minutes about the future and/or upcoming week

When you look at one-on-ones in this manner, they fly by.

10 Minutes for the Direct Report

We know the value of a one-on-one meeting, however running a productive one on one is a learned skill. The first step is to make sure the direct report is heard. Remember: the fundamental reason one-on-ones exist is to give a platform for the direct to allow them to communicate to you. The first 10 minutes of any one-on-one should be you hearing out whatever the direct report wants to talk about. It can be anything.

Rivalry Tip: apply pressure to the direct report to have their agenda for the one-on-one prepared. If applicable, have them send it to you before hand so you can be as prepared as possible. Finally, do not ask them a specific question in the first 30 seconds of sitting down. It is about them!

Many times the direct report will run over on this 10 minutes. This is okay. A key objective for one-on-ones is to build a great relationship. Better relationships yield better results. This is the top priority.

10 Minutes for the Manager

There’s no need to have a hard stop or abrupt transition into “your time.” However, if the direct report is finished covering what was on their agenda, now is your time to start asking the right questions. These questions range from culture all the way to specific skills and tactics to be more efficient at their role.

Rivalry Tip: Do not slide in the extremely casual zone. Your direct report and you both know this is a business relationship. There is a degree of professionalism and discipline required to run it. Talking about family and the weekend is absolutely normal, however, the direct report and you know the relationship is revolved around business so keep it focused and structured.

10 Minutes for the Future

If, and this is a big “if,” there is time to discuss about the upcoming week, career goals, and more, now is the time. Uncovering what they are most excited about and/or challenged about in the upcoming week. How are they tracking towards personal and professional goals? What big projects do they want to discuss and more are all part of this 10 minutes.

Take the perfect structure of a one-on-one meeting into the week and watch the relationship with you and your direct reports soar.

The post The Perfect Structure of a One-on-One Meeting appeared first on OpenView Labs.

Odds are, your pipeline has you fooled.

You might think you have enough deals to make your number. But in truth, your pipeline may be clogged with dead ends. New buyers, or new product buyers, who need more convincing. Or deals that have no hope of closing this quarter.

Overestimating pipeline size is a common trap. For many sales organizations, the problems run deep. Their systems and processes are inadequate. They just can’t keep the pipeline full and flowing. And they don’t know bloat when they see it. 

Do you have reasons to doubt your own sales forecast?

Here are five signs you do.

Google it, and you’ll turn up more than 9 million results for inbound marketing. And yet, many organizations are still getting it wrong. Marketing departments fail to obtain leadership buy-in. Feuds between marketing and sales are permitted to wage on. Campaigns are haphazardly tossed into the Web-o-sphere. And targeting? Not always on point. When goals aren’t reached, executives begin to question whether inbound marketing is all it’s cracked up to be. But the problem isn’t the marketing approach, it’s the lack of understanding about what inbound marketing actually is. To help you more easily explain what inbound marketing actually is to your organization’s stakeholders, let’s look at the other side of the coin.

Here are four things inbound marketing is not.

1. Inbound Marketing IS NOT a Campaign

A campaign is a fraction of all the moving parts that amount to inbound marketing. Campaigns focus on a single product or service, and use coordinated steps to promote information about it. Once the promotion is live, analytics track engagement to determine if and how any sales resulted. The number of sales can then be compared to the overall cost of the campaign to determine ROI and decide whether the campaign was effective or not.

Inbound marketing encompasses numerous digital marketing actions. Its focus is on the brand, not a single product, and its goal is to educate and provide value to buyers by delivering helpful content at the right time in the right place. Inbound marketing relies heavily on analytics and audience insights for continuity because the more a marketer understands about her audience, the more she can tailor content and targeting to better reach and serve the buyer.

In other words, a campaign sells a product or service. Inbound marketing builds brand reputation and caters to the wants and needs of the buyer via many modalities.

2. Inbound Marketing IS NOT Social Media

Just because you decide you want to step up your social media game doesn’t mean you are deploying inbound marketing. Again, social media is just one piece of the inbound puzzle. If it stands alone, it’s simply managing social media accounts. Only when it is paired with lead intelligence, audience targeting, content creation and analytics can it be considered inbound.

Think of social media as a distribution channel. Organizations should use it to share their content and collect audience intelligence. But on its own, social media is not inbound marketing.

3. Inbound Marketing IS NOT a Cost-Cutter

If you think inbound marketing is a way to cut back on the cost of outbound strategies, like direct mail and event marketing—you’ve got it all wrong. And you definitely don’t want to sell an inbound marketing budget to C-suite on that point. True, the overall cost per lead tends to be much lower with inbound marketing strategies (60 percent, actually) but this isn’t the type of marketing success that happens overnight.

How long before you’ll see results? Sorry to break it to you, but there’s no telling. Inbound marketing is about building momentum, and that means consistently investing time and money until eventually, you get it right and your audience begins to recognize you as a thought leader within your industry.

It starts with investing in the right marketing platforms. You also need to conduct thorough market research and set SMART marketing goals. This alone can take a few months. Once you begin creating and distributing content (and a lot of it), it takes several rounds of refinement before you begin hitting your targets. As of 2013, HubSpot reported that it took seven months for 83.9 percent of companies using inbound marketing to increase leads.

We’ve all heard the saying, it takes money to make money. Inbound marketing is no exception to the rule. But the payoff is worth the upfront investment. HubSpot also estimated that the average company saves about $20,000 per year by switching from outbound to inbound marketing. And the average cost per inbound lead in companies that generate between $250,000 and $10 million in revenue is about $26 to $50.

4. Inbound Marketing IS NOT a Single Channel or a Tactic

It’s more like a philosophy from which all marketing strategies are based. Inbound marketing is the belief that buyers are more willing to purchase from a brand they trust and respect than a brand that pushes products and focuses intently on the sale.

Inbound marketing shows reverence for the buyer, sees the buyer as an individual and intends to build a long-term relationship with the buyer by giving them what they want: valuable information that consistently meets their intellectual and entertainment expectations. When done successfully, organizations benefit from more than just a sale, they gain a brand advocate that repeatedly returns and brings friends.

You can’t try inbound marketing once and expect magic. You can’t half-heartedly participate, or delegate the responsibility to one person. To reap the benefits, you must fully invest in and dedicate your marketing efforts to the philosophy of inbound. From sales, revenue and bottom-line profitability to customer experience and reputation, with the right people and tools in place, inbound marketing has the power to positively impact every part of your organization.

Partnership marketing has long been a core strategy for professional services firms seeking efficient ways to both grow and increase their profitability. For startups that may be on the cusp of a hot service innovation but lack market visibility and credibility, partnerships with established firms can provide much needed early recognition. Even for large firms with established brands, partnerships can be beneficial in building visibility around a new direction for the firm, for example.

And by partnership marketing, I’m not talking about simply sponsoring events. While sponsorships can certainly get you in front of the right crowd and may even generate a few leads here and there, they are more costly and less effective than partnership marketing that is more project oriented.

For example, you might consider conducting a research project with your partner or starting a special educational program. An innovative, high-profile project is more distinctive than your logo on a crowded sponsorship banner — and is a far more compelling when it comes to explaining to people why they should be doing business with you. Large, well-known businesses, trade associations or universities are all good partnering candidates.

At Hinge, we either do this ourselves with our own partners or walk our clients down the path of strategic partnership marketing. Here’s a list of the top most effective strategies that have actual results.

1. Write the definitive book on your signature topic.

This requires that you and your partner know your stuff. We always recommend that a book written in this spirit should be written for clients, not fellow professional practitioners. Probably the most time consuming of the top tactics, if you can manage to make a complicated topic easy to understand and appreciate, you and your partner will be seen as leaders by the people who matter most.

1. Produce quality webinars.

You and your partner can generate an entire webinar series around the content of your book. Webinars are a known commodity in the world of lead generation and brand building. Leverage the hard work that goes into a substantial thought piece like a book and tell the story with a compelling webinar series.

1. Conduct a groundbreaking research project.

Does a major question remain unanswered in the industry you collectively serve? Do people understand their competitors, or is perception foggy at best? Industry players rarely conduct research on their own, and when they do, they usually keep it proprietary. As service providers to the industry, you and your partner have more freedom. Do the research, share the results widely, and count the leads that come your way.

The research might be the foundation for other types of content, such as a book, a webinar series, or smaller pieces like joint white papers. The point is that research produces data, and data grounds the intuition upon which so many strategies and recommendations are built upon.

1. Develop a guest blogging strategy.

Posting your blog posts on your partner’s site accomplishes two goals in one. Having someone else pitch your expertise catapults your credibility and visibility with an audience much bigger than your own. It is also beneficial for SEO as guest posts drive traffic directly to your site and increase your search engine visibility. Just as with your own blog strategy, make sure the blog you’re pitching to your partner’s site is something that potential clients and referral sources want to read — having a blog just to have one won’t cut it. And it isn’t the time for your sales pitch.

1. Organize a specialized program.

While the bulk of the most effective strategies are going to have a digital component to them, more traditional means work too. Conference participation is a proven way to build credibility around your expertise and generate leads. Speaking and sponsorships are both tried and true. But you want to be a leader.

Why not be bold and develop your own specialized conference with a known partner? Let’s say your IT firm handles cloud computing security, and you have customers in the health care industry. Instead of presenting a panel at a health care conference, organize an entirely separate event centered on your topic. Set a clear focus on an emerging niche that is not currently addressed. Keep the conference small and specific at first, bringing in as many partners as needed to make it successful. As the conference grows, so will your audience.

Another type of highly effective program is a high-profile interview series. Let’s say that you market your services to CIOs. Imagine that you set up video interviews with the most visible CIOs from the entire industry you serve. Now all these high-profile CIOs know your firm. Other CIOs are interested in what the leading CIOs have to say; now they are also exposed to your firm. Everyone assumes that your firm knows a great deal about CIOs (which it does). In short, you generate leads through the promotion of others’ credibility and visibility. Make sure to share the full videos, excerpts, summaries, etc. in a variety of formats to maximize your overall visibility. Whether on your own or with a partner, educational programs deliver the goods.

Not convinced or think these are too time-consuming to actually make happen? Like anything, once you get past the exploratory phase, things can fall into place surprisingly fast – as long as you’re aligning your partnership marketing strategy with your core capabilities. The above strategies are really about jointly promoting your expertise so that you can spread the marketing work load when it comes to the nurturing and promotion that needs to happen for an effective lead gen campaign. They also allow you to leverage each other’s customers, contacts, and other partnerships that might be in place, and lastly, your own customers can benefit from an expanded referral pool of trusted resources.

Jessica Herrin wants to hire "missionaries, not mercenaries," she tells The New York Times' Adam Bryant.

"Missionaries" are driven by passion for the mission, while "mercenaries" are more concerned about the material reward.

To find missionaries, Herrin, the founder and CEO of Stella & Dot Family Brands, which made $300 million in revenue last year, implements a very specific hiring strategy.

"The challenge, especially when you're growing fast, is to be incredibly fierce about your hiring filters," she explains. "You have to commit to caring for the culture more than the quarter."

She starts by asking job candidates personal questions about their past: things like how they grew up, what was influential in their life, what their parents did, and what they're really passionate about.

Next she asks candidates, "What do you want to be known for, what mark do you want to leave?"

"I just want to see that they're someone who really has a deep well of passion and that they think that way," Herrin explains. 

She says she will then ask job seekers what their superpower is.

"It's really about, do you care about the mission, do you have a fierce work ethic, are you a good person who other people enjoy being around, and do you care about winning as a company? That's what I really try to tease out," she tells Bryant.

The CEO says she's also looking for adaptability and whether job candidates can let things roll off their backs.

"You've got to find people who have the mental wiring to see opportunities more than they focus on obstacles," she says. "And if you offer them constructive criticism, they're curious instead of frustrated, and they're open-minded instead of defensive."

Read the full New York Times interview here.

SEE ALSO: PayPal just stepped up its leave policy — and it goes beyond helping new moms

Join the conversation about this story »

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3500+ SaaS CEOs, Execs, and VCs will gather to talk about all things scaling SaaS revenues at the SaaStr Annual this coming February 9-11th, at the Masonic Theatre in San Francisco. Last year, it was one of the highest quality audiences you’ll see at a conference anywhere. This year, we’re 8x-ing it.

Here’s why you need to be there

1. It’s the biggest peer group of buyers you can possibly want in one location. Where else can you find other companies that are exactly like you? And since they’re like you, they’re more likely to buy from you. And they have the cash because…
2. They’re all venture-backed and have capital to invest in things that will grow their businesses. They’re making their buying decisions for the first time for your product area. While it’s likely not the individual buyer’s first time (hired experienced execs), it is the company’s first time, so they know they need it and don’t have it yet. It’s up to you to educate, diagnose, and close the deal. These are the fastest growing companies in the world by headcount and revenues, and there aren’t any existing contracts standing in your way!
3. Yes, I said Founders, CEOs, and Execs. It’s all decision-makers and budget-holders–the ones who dictate what the budgets are and tell their buyer/your prospect what to do.
4. Deals get done, no matter how big you are or what sales experience you have. Last year, ChartMogul came from Berlin, just the CEO. They were venture-backed but only to the tune of $500k. They met their two biggest prospects to date at SaaStr and closed them shortly thereafter. They were small, and he was not a savvy sales rep, so imagine what you can do. They raised another round of funding not long after.

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At the SaaStr Annual, deals get done no matter how big you are or what sales experience you have.
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5. Sure, you can meet new customers, but how about closing existing pipeline faster? Face-to-face time is the best way to move deals along that are stuck in the pipeline and need some greasing. Odds are that a lot of the companies you’re currently working with in SaaS will be at the SaaStr Annual.
6. There will be plenty of mid-market software companies, but they won’t all be. Last year, we had execs from companies such as KLM, Bank of America, GE, Samsung, Amazon, KPMG, Apple, HP, IBM, Cisco, Goldman Sachs, and many more. Many of them came to learn about new opportunities in SaaS and shop for SaaS solutions that solve problems in their businesses. A large percentage of those execs are going to be from Sales and Marketing.
7. But it’s not all just meet and chat. We have tons of strategic and tactical content strictly for Salespeople spread across all three days. On Tuesday it will be high-level strategy on the main stage for the Execs and Founders, and on Weds and Thurs, it’s tactical sales content for everyone in the breakout stage.
8. Fun, period. We’ll have the booze flowing, legit food options, activities, after parties, dinners, and so much more. On top of that, you’ll get to meet all of the tech bloggers, influencers, and content producers you follow online. They’ll all be there.

Tickets are cheap for the value you’ll get and there’s almost no way you won’t make more than your money back on deals moved along, deals closed, and pipeline created.

Want to go? Here are a few ideas

• Buy a team pack and use the tickets to the Annual as a prize for your sales reps. Give three of the tickets to your top performers of 2015, or the month of January. The top three reps get to go as a prize for hitting the highest numbers and the fourth is for your exec.

• If you’re not from San Francisco, send sales execs and have them set up other meetings locally. Make a week out of it. There are some big companies and VCs set up out here that you can take advantage of meeting with while in town. Send the email to that hard-to-reach exec at company X telling them you’ll be in town, they should let you take them to lunch.

• Check out opportunities to sponsor. If your deal size is large enough, it’s a no-brainer, especially if you’re not based in San Francisco. Then you need to have a presence.

Sales Hacker is a partner on the event, so I’m biased, but this is going to be highly valuable and I just can’t stress that enough. That’s why we partnered with them in the first place. The content will be incredible, and the networking opportunities are some of the best you can find anywhere. I’ll leave it at that.

Tickets go up in price each month, so buy now before they increase for January. Use promo code SALESHACKERVIP to get a special deal from us on GA tickets, but the team packs are by far the best deal. Again, prices climb each month and space is limited. We will sell out a few weeks before the event, so make it happen.

Hope to see you there, Sales Hackers,

Max

The post 8 Easy Reasons Why All Tech Salespeople Should Be at the SaaStr Annual 2016 appeared first on Sales Hacker.

To celebrate its 30th anniversary, The Canadian Encyclopedia created 30 lists of 30 things that make us proud to be Canadian, from famous people and historic events, to iconic foods and influential artists. Read more of their lists here.

Canadians are super smart (we just don’t like to brag about it). Among the numerous scientific minds this country has produced, some, like David Suzuki and Sir Frederick Banting, are household names. Others are lesser known, but deserve equal celebration. For example, Elizabeth MacGill, the first woman electrical engineer to graduate from the University of Toronto, went on to design fighter planes during the Second World War. Nobel laureate Richard Edward Taylor discovered “gluons,” or the pieces of a proton that bind it together. Read on to discover the work of 30 of Canada’s greatest scientists.

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The post Canadian Encyclopedia: 30 great Canadian scientists appeared first on Macleans.ca.

Here is a review of the Ten Economic Questions for 2015.

There are always some international economic issues, especially with Europe, China and other areas of the world struggling.  However, my focus is on the US economy, with an emphasis on housing.

Here are my ten questions for 2016. I'll follow up with some thoughts on each of these questions.

1) Economic growth: Heading into 2016, most analysts are once again pretty sanguine.   Even with weak growth in the first quarter, 2015 was a decent year (GDP growth will be around 2.5% in 2015).   Right now analysts are expecting growth of 2.6% in 2016, although a few analysts are projecting a recession.    How much will the economy grow in 2016?

2) Employment: Through November, the economy has added 2,308,000 jobs this year, or 210,000 per month. As expected, this was down from the 260 thousand per month in 2014.  Will job creation in 2016 be as strong as in 2015?  Or will job creation be even stronger, like in 2014?  Or will job creation slow further in 2016?

3) Unemployment Rate: The unemployment rate was at 5.0% in November, down 0.8 percentage points year-over-year.  Currently the FOMC is forecasting the unemployment rate will be in the 4.6% to 4.8% range in Q4 2016.  What will the unemployment rate be in December 2016?

4) Inflation: The inflation rate has increased a little recently, and some key measures are now close to the the Fed's 2% target. Will the core inflation rate rise in 2016?  Will too much inflation be a concern in 2016?

5) Monetary Policy:  The Fed raised rates this month, and now the question is how much will the Fed raise rates in 2016?  The market is pricing in two 25 bps rate hikes in 2016, and most analysts expect three to four hikes in 2016.  However, some analysts think the Fed is finished, the so-called "one and done" view.  Will the Fed raise rates in 2016, and if so, by how much?

6) Real Wage Growth: Last year I was one of the most pessimistic forecasters on wage growth.  That was unfortunately correct.  Hopefully 2016 will be better for wages!  How much will wages increase in 2016?

7) Oil Prices: The decline in oil prices was a huge story at the end of 2014, and prices have declined sharply again at the end of 2015.  Will oil prices stabilize here (WTI is at $38 per barrel)?  Or will prices decline further?  Or will prices increase in 2016?

8) Residential Investment: Residential investment (RI) was up solidly in 2015.  Note: RI is mostly investment in new single family structures, multifamily structures, home improvement and commissions on existing home sales.  How much will RI increase in 2016?  How about housing starts and new home sales in 2016?

9) House Prices: It appears house prices - as measured by the national repeat sales index (Case-Shiller, CoreLogic) - will be up about 5% or so in 2015 (after increasing 7% in 2012, 11% in 2013, and 5% in 2014 according to Case-Shiller).   What will happen with house prices in 2016?

10) Housing Inventory: Housing inventory bottomed in early 2013.  However, after increase in 2013 and 2014, inventory was down slightly year-over-year in 2015 (through November).  Will inventory increase or decrease in 2016?

There are other important questions, but these are the ones I'm focused on right now.

Join the conversation about this story »

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Price elasticity is a concept every business person should understand but I have found that many don’t.

Wikipedia defines price elasticity as:

a measure used in economics to show the responsiveness, or elasticity, of the quantity demanded of a good or service to a change in its price

Here is a chart that, I think, makes the concept easier to understand:

In it’s simplest terms, the lower the price of something the more demand there usually is for it. But every product and service has its own elasticity curve and it is important to understand what the price elasticity is of your product or service.

The good news is that it has never been easier to determine the price elasticity curve of a product or service.

Here is how you do it.

1. offer the product or service on the web and make the purchase as easy as possible (Stripe and/or Paypal).
2. establish the range of pricing you want to measure, start at a number higher than you can imagine anyone paying and end at a number that is equal to the cost to produce your product or service (the cost of good sold)
3. set the price at the high end of the range
4. buy some search traffic to your offering (Google Adwords)
5. measure the traffic to your offer and the conversion rate (Google Analytics)
6. lower the price
7. repeat 4 & 5
8. lower the price again
9. repeat 4 & 5
10. continue this process until you reach the low end of the range

Then plot conversion rate against price and you will have the price elasticity of your product or service. It is best to keep everything other than price constant as you move through this exercise. For example, don’t change the adwords campaign as you move through this process.

As you do this, you can also measure what it costs to acquire a customer (CAC) via search. That may not turn out to be the best way to acquire a customer but it’s a very helpful number to know.

You will want to consider this formula as you think about where to land on pricing:

Price > CAC + COGS

That means the price you charge must be greater than the cost you must pay to acquire a customer plus the cost you must pay to make or deliver the service.

If your product or service is sold on a subscription basis, then you must also know the amount and timing of churn to expect and the lifetime value of a customer (LTV). In a subscription offering, the above formula becomes

LTV > CAC + COGS

All of these concepts and math falls under the terminology of “unit economics” and you will often hear investors (including VCs) talk about “understanding the unit economics” of a business. If you don’t know what that means when an investor brings it up, you are unlikely to close that sale.

But I am not writing this to help entrepreneurs raise money. I am writing this post to help entrepreneurs understand how to build a profitable business.

You must know the price elasticity of your product or service. You must know how much it costs to produce. You must know how much it costs to acquire a customer. And if your model is subscription, you must know your churn and lifetime value. From all of that comes the data and knowledge that allows you to optimize price, margins, and profitability. Which, after all, is the goal of a business, all the other bullshit you read on the internet notwithstanding.

 I’ve always wanted to make a lot of money, have people pay a lot of attention to me and do a lot of exciting things. I just never knew how. Many of my friends who are founders of their own companies tell me how they exhibited the entrepreneurial spirit as a kid — they sold candy out of their backpacks, had a landscaping business during the summer, etc. They created value and… Read More

What's next for bitcoin?

2015 has seen the digital currency's volatility stabilise and price jump, but it has also seen much of the hype dissipate. And there's been a divergence between bitcoin and the technology that underpins it — blockchain.

Blockchain, which uses complex cryptography to regulate and record transactions, is in the ascendancy, with millions of dollars flowing into the technology and banks lining up to experiment with it.

Meanwhile, many of the leading consumer bitcoin companies — digital wallets, payment processors, and exchanges — are being forced to adjust or rethink their business models in the face of slower than expected consumer uptake.

"It’s naive to think there will only be one blockchain"

According to Jeremy Millar — the co-author of one of the most extensive reports to date on the corporate ecosystem emerging around the digital currency — the issue is that the markets for bitcoin and blockchain have already fundamentally divided.

"I’m looking at this in terms of market development and what I’m saying is the market of people who buy blockchain to implement financial services is fundamentally different as a market to bitcoin," Millar told Business Insider.

Millar, a partner at boutique technology investment bank Magister Advisors, recently co-wrote an extensive, 75-page report on the two sectors.

"A cryptocurrency market will have exchanges, it will have brokers, it will have speculators, it will have payment networks," he says. "The features of blockchain as a market are institutional adoption, integration with existing business processes, IT planning and budgeting, evaluating technology replacement."

In other words, the two products are pitching at different audiences — one to consumers and currency speculators, the other to corporate IT departments.

The crucial element in understanding all this is that while bitcoin's blockchain is the best known, it's not the only one. Blockchain is shorthand for the complex cryptography-based software underpinning the network. It regulates transactions and records who owns which bitcoins. It's faster, cheaper, and quicker than traditional payment methods.

But the technology can be duplicated with private blockchains, and Millar says: "I think it’s a bit naive to think there will only be one flavour of blockchain."

So even if blockchain becomes the norm in banking, it doesn't necessarily mean bitcoin will rise with it.

"Emerging markets are much more bitcoin native"

But Millar thinks bitcoin will find a home in emerging markets. He says: "Emerging markets are much more bitcoin native. Look at an area like Argentina, where there are capital controls, challenges in the local financial institutions, and there’s a need to do cross border payments.

"If I am running a commerce warehouse in the Philippines or Argentina, my supply chain even at a small scale is going to have many currencies and many areas where there could well be capital controls, fluctuating exchange rates, volatility, what have you.

"In those environments, the ability to get into bitcoin — the ability to get out of the local currency into something that’s portable — has value in and of itself. For me and you here in London, getting into bitcoin doesn’t offer us much value."

In this case, bitcoin's global scale is a unique advantage over any rival digital currency using blockchain technology. Millar says that while he expects there to be multiple blockchains, he thinks there will be only one dominant digital currency. And, barring any big upset, that will be bitcoin.

He continues: "I’ve talked to people who are building bitcoin services in places like Argentina. They’re not appealing to hipsters. They’re trying to help people manage their pay roll or supply chain.

"When you go and talk to the exchanges and the wallets they say the same thing — 90% of bitcoin is held by wealthy individuals for speculation. But 90% of the transactions are commercial transactions." And most of those transactions are coming from emerging markets.

"If you were to start TransferWise today, you would look at bitcoin"

That's not to say there isn't going to be a bitcoin market in the UK, but Millar believes it will look pretty different.

"What you’re going to see in Europe and North America is the development of bitcoin inside, and that is people who are building next generation financial services will be incorporating bitcoin at least in their strategic thinking in terms of payment rails and how they store value."

"You may or may not choose to use it, but if you were starting a consumer finance business today, particularly one around payments or exchanges of value, I believe you would have to look at bitcoin," Millar says.

The advantages offered by bitcoin from a business perspective — it's faster, cheaper, and gives you more control — will make it attractive to new consumer fintech businesses starting up. Once again, its the scale of bitcoin that gives it an advantage over rivals.

The founder of international payments startup TransferWise was recently dismissive of bitcoin, but Millar says: "I believe if you were to start TransferWise today, you would look at bitcoin."

"The existence proof of someone doing this is Circle in the US. Circle [a bitcoin-based payments app] is revolutionising the way people pay by creating the features of how people actually pay for things as a group. It’s actually much more like WhatsApp than traditional internet banking."

"You can [build that on traditional payment networks] but the reason why you integrate bitcoin is because you control the ledger, you control the exchange of value, and you cut out traditional payment rails to reduce costs and increase flexibility."

With this "bitcoin inside" set-up Millar envisages, bitcoin becomes almost invisible. It's effectively relegated from a currency to simply the mechanics of payment — under the hood rather than a logo on the dashboard.

Payments app Circle is right now trying to appeal to a wider audience by pitching the appeal of bitcoin to people who want to use dollars. Circle is effectively offering the benefits of the blockchain to people who don't want to use bitcoin.

If more businesses move this way it could anger bitcoin purists who see it as a revolutionary technology that deserves to be front and centre. It's also seen by many as an ideological tool. Still, it could also give bitcoin a much needed second wind in the west that could transform it into more than just an asset for speculators.

Join the conversation about this story »

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Earning an MBA can provide business-school graduates with an increased salary, a vast network of industry contacts, and new opportunities, but the extent of these career benefits can vary significantly depending on the school.

For our sixth annual ranking of the best business schools, we looked at 60 perennially top-rated institutions that offer MBA programs and evaluated them based on the most recent data available on five metrics: reputation (determined through our annual reader survey); average starting salary after graduation; job-placement rate (the percentage of graduates employed within three months of graduation); average GMAT score; and tuition and fees.

We considered reputation and starting salary as the most telling factors of a school's worth, and these categories were weighted more heavily than the other three. Read a breakdown of the methodology here.

The revamped methodology reshuffled this year's ranks with surprising results, with the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School topping the list for the first time. The highest-ranked international school on the list is the London Business School, earning the No. 12 spot.

Read on to see the full list of the 50 best business schools in the world.

Editing by Alex Morrell with additional research by Andy Kiersz.

SEE ALSO: The 50 best colleges in America

NOW READ: The 50 best companies to work for in America

50. Nanyang Technological University, Singapore — Nanyang Business School

Location: Singapore

Average starting salary: $80,300

Average GMAT score: 665

Nanyang's double MBA and master's degree programs allow students to earn a simultaneous degree from partner business schools, such as a second MBA from Waseda University in Tokyo or a master's in management from France's ESSEC Business School.

All students complete a weeklong Business Study Mission, locally or overseas, in which they attend seminars with industry leaders, meet with local business associations, and visit businesses. The study mission gives students an opportunity to build professional networks and apply what they learn in the classroom to real-world environments.

49. University of Toronto — Rotman School of Management

Location: Toronto, Canada

Average starting salary: $88,400

Average GMAT score: 663

The Rotman School of Management is the only Canadian MBA program on our list, offering students the best business reputation in the country. It draws recruiters from Toronto and beyond, including companies like the Royal Bank of Canada, Bain & Co., IBM, Microsoft, and Accenture, among others.

The school started its own venture incubator in 2012 called the Creative Destruction Lab, and Rotman MBA students are tasked with providing analysis and insight for the lab's startups. Its first cohort has generated more than $165 million in equity value.

48. University of Wisconsin — Wisconsin School of Business

Location: Madison, Wisconsin

Average starting salary: $100,700

Average GMAT score: 668

Recent graduates from the Wisconsin School of Business typically landed salaries greater than $100,000, and 90% secured employment within three months of graduation. The small program — WSB has fewer than 200 full-time MBA students — gives students individualized attention from the school's experts: professors, staff, guest speakers, and others.

See the rest of the story at Business Insider

In my previous blog, I mentioned a few trending topics that come up when you mention professional women (i.e. wage gap, lower percentage of women in sales roles, etc.) One topic that I noticed the most is the low number of women occupying the C-suite in Fortune 500 organizations. What does this have to do with getting more women interested in sales roles? I’ll tell ya!

I recently came across an article in the Huffington Post that gave a compelling reason for getting more women into sales. Debra Walton outlines that “getting more women into sales leadership roles is not only good for business, but is critical for paving the way for them to ascend to the highest executive ranks.” She references a McKinsey study that found that “sales experience is a must for people seeking the so-called “line jobs” — those with profit and loss accountability — that are a pipeline to the C-suite. Though 62 percent of the women in large corporations are in staff jobs, many of these provide service and assistance but don’t directly generate revenue — and thus don’t lead to top jobs in senior management. In contrast, 65 percent of the men on executive committees hold line jobs, a fact that may explain why so many more of them are CEOs of Fortune 500 companies, of which only about 3 percent are led by women.”

Whoa…compelling stuff right? This study echoes my previous statements that sales experience is invaluable for professional development!

After I read this, I wanted to engage some of our female SDRs (because they are rock stars and amazing at their jobs) and pose a few questions to them in order to feature some of their answers. The first question that I had for them was this:

What drew you to a sales role in the first place?

First, what drew me to sales? I needed a job. I graduated college during the ‘08-’09 financial crisis when it seemed like no one was going to get a job. So I applied to graduate school and received a Masters in US History two years later. Totally applicable to sales right?

Facing student loan debt, I needed to find any kind of employment, and fast. A friend of mine had previously worked at QuotaFactory and told me they were hiring rapidly to accommodate a big account. Needless to say…I got the job. “This is a one year gig” I told myself. “Just until I can figure out my next move.” Then something funny happened. I was good at sales, did consistently well and loved engaging with my clients. Five years later I am still here and have progressed from an SDR, to managing a team of reps, to now managing the accounts we service. I am glad that all of the SDRs (men and women) that we have on the phone today see the value in exploring a sales role.

When speaking with the women in our office I asked them what drew them to a sales role and you can read some of their answers below:

“I already had sales-related experience prior to applying for my first “real job” post college graduation. So, I felt fully qualified for the position I was applying for and thought that it would be a great way to build on skills I had already started developing. Also, because of my focus on Marketing in school, I thought starting in a sales role would get my foot in the door for a marketing position.”

“Personally being right out of school and looking for a job I saw sales as being a great learning experience even if I wasn’t too sure at the time if I would even be good at it. I figured, either way, spending time in a sales role would give me great skills and experience to use if I decided to change career paths.”

“I like that what you put into it is what you get out of it. I also enjoy being able to structure my own day.”

At QuotaFactory, we have a handful of women occupying roles in sales development, customer success, marketing, and senior management. We’d like to open the discussion to women in sales roles outside of our own community. What has sales done for you? Do you have an argument for – or against – women in sales? Let us know in the comments below!

You’ve heard us say many times that inbound marketing is all about educating your prospects with relevant content. The hard sell isn’t as effective as it used to be, simply because people don’t want to be sold to.

But everyone’s always open to hearing a story.

That’s why successful inbound strategy is first and foremost about telling your company’s story, not about selling your company’s product. You want to build a relationship between your company and your customers, and you do that by providing them something that’s of value to them. The story of your business becomes how and why you can serve your prospects.

You’ll notice that strong inbound marketers are masters of subtlety. We never want to come right out and tell prospects that they should purchase. In any piece of content we produce, on any premium offer or landing page we create, we’ll make it easy for someone to buy, but the point is never about pushing them to buy.

So for example, very rarely will we mention our clients’ products in any of their blog posts. We answer the problems that exist in our customers’ world with the most relevant solutions, and information that will make them better informed and educated to handle similar problems. Over time, they’ll see us as part of the solution, and the purchasing will come from there. They’ll equate the fact that we have so many answers for them and the fact that we know so much about this topic with the fact that we’re the best fit for this topic across the board–including as the product/ service they use to address it. That realization will come organically if you keep your focus on telling the story of your expertise in a way that benefits them.

And that doesn’t mean we make it difficult to purchase–we always include a conversion path on any and all content that is developed. But when they visit your homepage, resources section, or blog, they should feel that we’re sharing what’s best for them; not us.

We do the same thing for the automated email workflows we create. With nearly all of our clients, we share the same approach for email workflows: value, value, call to action, value, value, etc.

To translate that strategy, we make sure that any email communications we initiate contain more added value than hard sells. Let’s say we plan a workflow for a client built off of delivering a premium offer; the first email will have the link to the ebook, and the next two emails will just contain added value–additional content that further educates them on the topic of the ebook they downloaded.

After that we can send them a push to purchase email, and that push to buy can be all about buying, because we’re confident in the degree to which we’ve served the customer up till this point. We’re comfortable saying, “Now that we’ve answered your questions, and provided other relevant information, we think this product/service can serve you, and you might be ready to buy.”

Ultimately you want to lead the horse to the water, but you don’t want to force it to drink. You want to attract prospects by answering their questions with relevant information, not with the name of your product. You want to tell your prospects and customers the story of why you’re the best fit and how you can best serve them without having to come straight out and say that. . Let them write that conclusion on their own.

Businesses and people are sharing, storing, producing as well as streaming more content than before. Cisco forecasts that by the end of 2018, 78% of the workload will be processed by the data centers dedicated to cloud applications. With enhanced production as well as content distribution and popular usage of cloud applications as well as services, higher upload speeds are becoming a necessity.

When it comes to Wi-Fi, speed and reliability acquire value. A slow connection not just casts an impact on customer experience, but it also lowers the productivity of organizations. Internet services are crucial for daily operations as well as tasks like data file transfer, internal communications, inventory management as well as point of sales applications. In the absence proper connection, businesses will neither be able to provide the customers commendable service nor keep up with the speed of growth and innovation.

Moreover, the Internet of Things that allows several devices to communicate with each other through cloud and over the internet will place a higher value on the need of higher data transfer speed.

There are services that fit almost everything right from small offices with basic email and web browsing needs to MNCs with hundreds of employees transferring large amounts of data. To find the right solution for your agency, it is critical to identify the steps necessary in assessing business requirement.

How is your Business Making Use of Technology?

Analyzing the way your business is utilizing technology will help you choose the right internet speed. You may have only a few employees but if your business has complex technological needs like video conferencing, online payments or e-commerce, you will require a higher bandwidth connection.

Understanding the Download and the Upload Speed

Though the business leaders usually remain concerned about the speed at which the devices can pull data from the internet, that is the download speed, the upload speed can prove more significant for your daily needs. In case the connection is not as fast as expected, the daily tasks will be slow and inefficient. Let’s take a look at some scenarios illustrating the value of upload speed in business.

Real-Time Communication

A reliable connection with sufficient bandwidth is necessary for virtual communication with the partners, colleagues as well as clients. For example, you may be using a web or video conferencing setup. For ensuring commendable communication, you require necessary bandwidth.

Data Back Up

Cloud is in prominent use today to back up the important files and applications. According to a report, though businesses still use the external hard drives to backup data, most small and medium business setups have embraced cloud for offsite backup. Businesses that deal with finance or the production studios may need to deal with huge quantities of data. Fast download and upload speed can create a huge difference here. The speed will decide whether it will be possible to complete the backup within a few minutes or a few hours will be wasted.

Online Content Share

Most businesses need to deal with bandwidth-intensive data. It can be for publishing videos on their website or for streaming live events. Fast upload as well as download speed ensures smooth operation both if you want to view the content published by others or if you want to upload it for your business.

How Much Speed is Necessary?

How can a business determine the bandwidth speed needed? No doubt, you need to consider the number of employees, but this is certainly not the only concern. You need to consider how many of these employees travel regularly. What kind of file transfer capabilities is essential for them? Probably, the most significant part is: how your business is making use of cloud. Businesses taking advantage of a wide variety of cloud-based services to store and retrieve documents will require more bandwidth.

Here are a few categories of business that need more bandwidth.

Healthcare

The need for data transfer is high in this industry. Most health care centers use electronic medical records now; moreover, x-ray file and MRI scan transfers, as well as management of appointments need enormous bandwidth.

Information Intensive Service

Businesses like advertising and the creative agencies, financial firms, architectural firms and the law offices have varied bandwidth requirement. The architectural firms rely upon bandwidth intensive software as well as bigger file transfers. The creative agencies move significant amounts of data, including graphics files.

IT

The consultancies and technology firms depend upon effective data movement for maximizing productivity. The hardware and software development teams, IT design firms and even the computer repair shops consume significant amounts of data.

Make sure to consider the upload speed while considering business connectivity requirement. Investing in upload and download speed has advantages that can be felt across several industries. Just make sure you have a rough idea of the bandwidth speed that you require to choose your plan better.

From Blake to Bach, why the ancient text long stripped of fact remains essential to our grasp of poetic truth.

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In my early twenties, I took up a peculiar practice of cultural insurgency — every time I found a Bible in a hotel night-stand drawer while traveling, I would go to the local bookstore, purchase a copy of Darwin’s On the Origin of Species, and replace the Bible with it. Although Nietzsche may have winced at this as a manifestation of the haughty rebelliousness youth often mistakes for being a free spirit, it nonetheless sums up my sentiments about the Bible.

But such wholesale dismissal of the Christian classic may be a monumental disservice to our comprehension of poetic myth as a hearth of the human impulse for beauty, morality, and transcendence. So argues Adam Gopnik, one of our few secular rectors of truth and meaning, in his introduction to The Good Book: Writers Reflect on Favorite Bible Passages (public library) — an anthology featuring such celebrated authors as Pico Iyer, Colm Tóibín, Lydia Davis, and Ian Frazier, edited by Andrew Blauner.

Gopnik writes:

How should we read the Bible in a secular age? At a time when this odd, disjointed compilation of ancient Hebrew texts and later Greek texts has lost its claims to historical truth, or to supernatural revelation, it would seem to some that we might simply let it fade, read, until it becomes one more of those texts, like Galen’s medicine or the physics of Aristotle, that everyone knows once mattered but now are left quietly to sit on the shelf and wait for a scholar.

As history and revelation its stories have long ago fallen away; we know that almost nothing that happens in it actually happened, and that its miracles, large and small, are of the same kind and credibility as all the other miracles that crowd the world’s great granary of superstition. Only a handful of fundamentalists — granted that in America that handful is sometimes more like an armful, and at times like a roomful — read it literally, and, though the noes may not always have it in raw numbers, the successive triumphs of critical reason mean that they have it in all educated circles. (Believers may cry elitism at this truth — but the simpler truth is that when the educated elite has rejected an idea it’s usually because there’s something in the idea that resists education.)

And yet. The Bible remains an essential part of the education of what used to be called the well-furnished mind. Not to know it is not to know enough. Most of what we value in our art and architecture, our music and poetry — Bach and Chartres, Shakespeare and Milton, Giotto at the Arena Chapel and Blake’s Job among his friends — is entangled with these old books and ancient texts.

But the Bible’s relevance, Gopnik notes, extends beyond art and into the realm of practical wisdom, offering guidance for our everyday lives — guidance we discern by doing away with the myths and holding onto the moral truth behind them. It’s an argument that parallels the distinction Margaret Mead famously made between “fact” and “poetic truth.”

Echoing Richard Feynman’s ideas on religion and why uncertainty is essential for morality, Gopnik observes:

Modern people are drawn to faith while practicing doubt, as our ancestors confessed their doubts while practicing their faith.

He considers the four ways modern people read the Bible, beginning with the aesthetic:

We read and dissect the books and verses of the Bible because they tell beautiful stories, stirring and shapely. We read the good book because it is a good book. We explore the stories because they are transfixing stories, dense and compelling. The beauty of the Song of Songs, or the nobility of the account of creation in Genesis, or the poetic hum of the Psalms — these things are beautiful as poetic myths alone can be. That they were best translated into our own language in the highest period of English prose and verse, in Shakespeare’s rhythms and vocabulary — conceivably with his hand at work, and certainly with hands near as good as his — only makes them more seductive… These are good tales and great poetry, and we need not worry about their sources any more than we worry about which level at that endless archaeological dig in Turkey is truly Troy. We read them not as “myth” but as fiction — we read them as we read all good stories, for their perplexities as much as for their obvious points.

[…]

To say that the Bible’s stories are good stories is to say that they are sustaining stories: tales we tell ourselves in order to live.

Next comes the accommodationist reading of the Bible, done through a moral-metaphorical lens:

It asks us to be stirred by the Bible as enduring moral inquiry — the accommodationist seeks to translate the gnomic knots of the Bible stories into acceptable, contemporary, and even universal ethical truths. It is the kind of reading that shows how, in texts that might otherwise seem obnoxious or alien to a modern mind, enduring moral teaching can still be found.

Then there is the anthropological reading, the kind that animated Margaret Mead and James Baldwin’s conversation about religion. Gopnik explains:

This style insists on intellectual detachment, on a sense that the Bible is an extraordinary compilation of truths about how we imagine miracles — that the miracles are imagined does not diminish what they tell us about that imagination, or about mankind. We don’t read scripture to hear good stories or learn good morals. We read to learn about human history, and human nature. How do laws get made? How do dietary restrictions work? Why? How does order come from warfare? Or, looking at the New Testament, the anthropological-minded reader asks: What is the nature of charismatic leadership? Academic in origin, the anthropological view need not be merely academic in practice. By seeking to use the holy text right at hand, it tries to enlarge our views of how we make ideas of holiness.

Lastly, there is the antagonistic reading — the more enlightened version of the blunt antagonism of, say, refusing to read the book at all and replacing it with On the Origin of Species. Gopnik writes:

We read holy books in order to show why we need none. We read to fight back. Nor is this habit merely antagonistic. Without strong oppositional readings, how can we ever make sense of texts at all? Indeed, much classic Talmudic reading, though not heretical, is often best described as antagonistic in this sense: fed up with the stolid apparent meanings of the verse, it searches for a meaning that wiser men can live with.

Any good reading of biblical text, Gopnik points out, includes elements of all four dispositions — the aesthetic, the accommodationist, the anthropological, and the antagonistic. He considers how the book’s non-negligible protagonist, God, amplifies these secular rewards of reading scripture:

Things that defeat logic can often invite imagination, and as a fictional creation the idea of the Deity remains compelling exactly in its — in his — plurality. We need neither believe nor doubt as we read, but remain suspended in that ether of scruples, credulity, and wonder where all good reading really takes place.

A deeper point remains. No moral idea worth preserving has been lost as the idea of God has diminished. Indeed, many moral ideas — of inclusion, tolerance, pluralism, and the equality of man, and the emancipation of women — depend on the diminishment and destruction of a traditional idea of an absolute authority Deity. But nor have moral ideas worth saving been gained simply by diminishing the idea of God. Atheism is a fact about the world, but humanism is a value that we make. Supernaturalism needs the cure of sanity. But humanism needs humility.

Complement The Good Book, which contains a range of stirring and stimulating contributions from some of today’s finest writers, with Isaac Asimov on humanism vs. religion, Flannery O’Connor on the difference between religion and faith, Carl Sagan on science and spirituality, and Hannah Arendt on the crucial difference between truth and meaning.

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In a perfect world, prospects would provide perfect answers on discovery calls so sales reps could accurately determine if they were a good fit for their service. Reps would only spend 15 minutes gathering what they needed before ending the conversation with either, “Thanks for your time” or “Next time we talk, bring a credit card.”

Unfortunately, we don’t live in a perfect world.

In reality, discovery calls don’t always go as smoothly as reps would like. Reps who don’t adjust to the preferences of the modern buyer become susceptible to mistakes that can sour a fledgling relationship.  

So what are these mistakes and how do reps avoid them? Here seven mistakes salespeople might be making on their discovery calls.

1) Not doing enough research.

Limiting yourself to a few minutes of research can derail your discovery call because you might not be familiar with the prospect’s pain point, business strategy, or market. Lacking this crucial background information will make guiding the conversation difficult.

Completing thorough pre-call research allows you to get a deeper understanding of the business, where the prospect has been, and where they are looking to go. Gather information about their top customers, competitors, and problems in order to tailor your discovery questions and more easily qualify them.

Dig into the following areas before your call:

• Company website
• LinkedIn
• Social media networks
• Financial statements
• Competitors’ websites
• Mutual connections

2) Asking only yes or no questions.

Discovery calls are meant to discover more about this prospect. But by asking only yes or no questions, you limit the amount of information you can gather. For example:

Rep: “Are you hiring right now?”

Prospect: “Yes.”

You don’t learn anything from this interaction other than the bare fact that the company is hiring. But how many people are they hiring? And In what part of the business?

Instead of gravitating towards simple “yes/no” questions, ask open-ended questions. Open-ended questions allow the prospect to expand on their thoughts and paint a clearer picture. They also prompt the prospect to more thoroughly describe their pain points, and provide additional background on their business.

For example:

Rep: “What’s the hiring plan going forward?”

Prospect: “Well, we’re hoping to add five new people over the next year. Ideally we’d get a developer, a new marketer, and a sales rep. But the problem is our recruiting software isn’t that great, so we’re moving a little slower than we’d like to.”

Here are some examples of open-ended questions to use on discovery calls:

• What are your goals for the upcoming year?
• How do you see your market adjusting next year?
• What made now the right time to look into our  service?
• How did you decide to make these changes?
• Why did you decide to get into this business?
• Where do you see the company growing during the next 18 months?

3) Interrogating the prospect.

Starting the conversation with hard-pressing questions can put the prospect on the defensive. A prospect might feel as if they’re under pressure to deliver answers that they might not have. In addition, buyers might not feel comfortable sharing delicate information with a sales rep they were recently introduced to. Interrogating buyers often results in the conversation shutting down.

Discovery calls should feel like a free-flowing, general conversation about the prospect’s business. Once the prospect is further along in the funnel, you can ask about the specifics and pose the tough questions. For now, the goal is to keep the conversation light, learn general information, and allow the prospect to become comfortable with you.

4) Dodging their questions.

While discovery calls are mostly associated with a rep qualifying a prospect, they’re also about a prospect qualifying the rep. When you avoid a prospect’s questions, they can’t learn about who you are as a person and as a sales rep. If you continue to dodge questions from a prospect, their trust in you might never fully develop, which will make buying from you unlikely.

Don’t brush off what they ask you; focus on responding to their questions so they can qualify you too. This is your opportunity to begin to create a relationship and develop trust with this prospect. When you answer questions you show you’re actively listening to what the buyer is saying, and are dedicated to delivering them the best possible solution to their problem

5) Thinking beyond the call (moving too quickly).

When reps enter a discovery call thinking about closing the deal, they often try to move the prospect through the funnel too quickly, and this turns buyers off. At this point, the prospect is likely looking to gather preliminary information -- not sign on the dotted line

Remember: This is the first step in a long process. Don’t consider this a “done deal” too early. Put your attention into qualifying and learning on the discovery call, and attempt to close only after the relationship has been developed.

6) Not adding value.

By not providing value in your discovery call, you’re setting a bad tone for the entire sales process. If one touch isn’t highly valuable, the prospect might assume all your emails and calls going forward will be be a waste of time -- and stop responding.

As great as discovery calls are for sales qualification, reps also need to give the prospect something of value during the conversation to prompt the buyer to move into the next phase.

Here are some ways to add value to your discovery call:

• Reference a case study
• Promise to send along some documents
• Quote a customer’s review of your service
• Connect the benefits of your product with the prospect’s pain point
• Provide a business strategy tip
• Alert your buyer to an industry occurrence they might not be aware of

7) Getting too specific too soon.

A prospect might not be ready to hear all the ways you can change how their business operates on the first call. By offering too much specific advice, you’ve assumed that they’re going to buy, when they’re really only looking for more information about the product.

While you will eventually coach the prospect later in the sales process, diving into a full-blown strategy on the discovery call -- before you qualify the person -- isn’t the right idea. Instead of a full plan, formulate some simple tips you can provide during the discovery call and offer those, but not an in-depth strategy.

Every discovery call is different because every prospect is different. And while every call might have the same goal, reps can fall into traps resulting in a bad experience for them and the prospect.

The discovery call is meant for you to discover more about the prospect and for them to discover more about you. That’s it. Remember these tips and you might discover a new strategy for your discovery calls.

One of the most influential, fictional racecar drivers of all time, Ricky Bobby, believed that “If you ain’t first, you’re last.” His motto, which gets repeated early and often in the film Talladega Nights, is one that many lead buyers also subscribe to. In their world, though, being first in line to receive a lead doesn’t exactly equal winning, but instead, being in the most favorable position to make a sale.

Not too long ago, lead buyers had no idea if they were the first, second, or tenth to receive a lead from one of their providers. But thanks to new data and technology, lead buyers are becoming more and more aware of a metric known as “lead velocity”. Lead velocity indicates the number of different companies that have received a lead before you, and bringing it back to Mr. Bobby, if you’re not first, then you might as well be last. In fact, through our data we’ve seen that, in the higher education space, schools who received leads first had an enroll rate 30-50% higher than the schools that followed. And in mortgage, there can be up to a 30% decrease in loan application rates for lenders receiving leads 3rd and later.

Clearly, being at the front of the line has its benefits − but if you have access to lead velocity data, and still aren’t getting leads first, what do you do? A lot of companies in this scenario are simply reducing the number of leads they buy from providers who aren’t putting them first in line. But there’s more to the issue than meets the eye, and better solutions probably exist rather than doing that. More importantly, there are questions that should be discussed with your lead provider before deciding where to take your relationship with them. Some questions you should ask your lead providers and your own team in regards to lead velocity could be:

• Is there an operational inefficiency with our provider(s)?
• Is there an operational inefficiency with our company’s workflow?
• Are leads not being sent to all buyers at the exact same time?

These are just a few sample questions, but in order to find out where problems are occurring and get to the bottom of your lead velocity problem, opening up a dialogue with your providers can help all parties improve the process overall.

Since the start of your business, advertising has been “the necessary evil” to gain new customers and keep your business profitable. Print advertising in books, magazines, billboards, direct mail, and brochures all play a major role in bringing customers to your business. The popularity of the internet has created new opportunities to market your business as well as marketing saturation.

The early internet adapters tried every form of marketing the internet has to offer. They used websites, lead capture, emails, banner ads, pop-up ads, pop-under ads, and so on. Now, with mobile traffic and social traffic gaining more popularity, the different ways to market your business as evolved to a level of “words I can’t describe”!

However, we’ve learned and perfected an extremely powerful way to organize all of your advertising and get the most out of the lead that takes action. What have we learned and perfected?

We’ve learned that if you place all of the adverting above—print, online, and mobile—into a sales funnel, you end up simplifying your advertising process, building a relationship with your customer base, and having your customers buying from you on complete auto pilot at their most qualified moment. What we perfected is the process called nurturing leads.

Nurturing Leads Through The Sales Process

In the sales process, there’s a buyer’s process. Connecting with the buyer through their process will pay dividends when the actual sale takes place. When buyers feel an emotional connection, it builds the relationship, which builds trust. Companies who understand and apply this see their revenues double, triple, and quadruple, and at the same time, their customers become happier, compliant, and easier to sell to.

Let’s examine three ways to stay connected with your customers and nurture them into sales.

Two Powerful Ways To Nurture Your Leads

Emails: This method of communication is still the most effective way to stay in contact with your customers, educate them, and connect with them. However, sending emails to every customer who has expressed interest in your business is a daunting task. So automate the process.

Companies on the first page of Google email marketing autoresponders make the task of connecting with your customer easy. You can set up email marketing campaigns and schedule emails customized to the buyer in their buying process—powerful in relationship building.

Remarketing Ads: Ever visit a website, leave that website, and see their advertising on other websites? This isn’t done by accident; it’s by remarketing in a pay per click campaign.

Google and Bing Ads have campaign platforms to help capture your leads when they’re on your website and follow them to other websites or webpages within their network. It’s a sophisticated way stay in front your potential client. Visit Google Adwords or Bing Ads for more information.

Everyone has a sales process when making decisions on what to buy. Some purchasing decisions require little thought—impulse decisions such as buying a pack of gum. Other decisions are more complex and time-consuming, such as buying a car or a house.

Nurturing leads through a sales process applies to larger ticket sales items with a long sales process. Traditionally, sales representatives have completed the nurturing. However, leaving this complex task to sales representatives to perform opens the door for mistakes and is less customized to the buyer.

Hiring an advertising agency to manage the task of nurturing your leads through the sales process will produce more leads ready to buy, your sales reps spending their time selling and more revenue for your company.