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I was recently leading a Demand Generation workshop where one of the attendees asked “what approach they should take to develop a vertical or industry aligned marketing strategy.” Besides discussing the need to align strategically to the buyer, we did have a longer conversation where I cautioned against taking a vertical go-to- market approach.

I have worked in companies in the past and with other organizations that have taken a vertically aligned approach to their sales and marketing, and rarely have I seen it work very effectively.  While many organizations look to implement a vertical strategy, there are some things that should be considered before moving forward with one:

1. Vertical Marketing is Truly Focused on the 10%

There are very few circumstances where the key buying drivers of personas differ across verticals. Let me explain further.  A few weeks ago I was speaking to a CEO of a small business in a completely different industry than my own.  We spoke about the challenges that we both faced, and even though he was in a different business, selling product in a completely different industry, about 90% of my focus, challenges and goals were very similar to his.

Such is the case with many other roles.  Most CFOs grapple with the same challenges, have the same goals and objectives as their counterparts in different industries. They do not view their jobs within the context of being in a certain vertical and where there are industry differences, in most cases they are minimal and can be addressed with reference calls or case studies. At the end of the day, most challenges and objectives are similar, despite the vertical or industry.

2. Lack of Organizational Expertise at all Levels

I have yet to see a company who strives to take a vertical go-to-market approach have sufficient industry subject matter experts at every level of the organization.  The expertise is usually found at the sales level and a perhaps a few people within marketing that can write content to address unique industry challenges.  That is a good start, but what about Lead Qualification teams, Inside Sales, and Customer Support? If the whole idea of vertical marketing is to align to the buyer where they are, it is necessary for the organization to align and support the customer at every stage, not just part of it.

Making this happen is difficult, which is why it so rarely happens.  Not to mention, it will foster a bad buyers experience to be marketed to in very specific terms, only to find that the organization as a whole does not understand the true nature of the industry at all levels of customer interaction. So efforts in vertical marketing need to be taken seriously and committed to fully to be effective.

3.Buying Committees

Corporate Executive Board (CEB) reports that the typical B2B buying decision involves more than five buyers as part of a buying committee.  Welcome to the world of Buyer 2.0! B2B Marketers are no longer selling to individuals; they are selling to groups of people, all of whom have their unique view and biases about a potential purchase.  It is this dynamic that makes the “Time to Produce Content” and “Producing Enough Content” the top two content challenges for marketers according to Content Marketing Institute’s 2014 report.

Now add in the complexity of developing content to five plus buying stakeholders that is specific to their industry.  The challenges of time and the ability to create enough content only grow exponentially and would be almost impossible to do effectively.

Rather than try to focus on a specific industry or vertical, most marketers should look at the commonalities among their buyers.  What are the 80% of common challenges IT Directors are dealing with on a day-to-day basis?  Try developing content that aligns to those needs and their needs as they progress through the buyer’s journey with case studies and references that align to their specific industry. This shows your buyer that your organization has enough experience with their unique challenges and can help them.  This is a more economical and efficient approach to addressing your buyer than vertical marketing and one that most organizations should seek to adopt.

Author: Carlos Hidalgo @cahidalgo is CEO and Principal, ANNUITAS

Very soon we’re going to hear the earnings news straight from the horse’s mouth. Quarterly earnings are beginning to trickle in and even if you aren’t interested in the stocks that you don’t own, corporate reporting is the most important market intelligence you can review.

For years, Paychex, Inc. (PAYX) was one of those companies that continually reported great financial results. It was a growth stock during the technology bubble in the late 1990s, and it made a lot of money for shareholders.

The company hit a wall in terms of its double-digit growth shortly after the technology bubble burst, but what this payroll and benefits outsourcing company has to say about its business conditions is still material to equity investors today.

Recently, Paychex beat the Street by a penny and reported revenue growth in-line with Wall Street consensus.

The company’s first fiscal quarter of 2015 (ended August 31, 2014), saw its total sales grow nine percent to $667 million, with particular strength in human resources services revenues, which grew 17% comparatively to $244 million during the quarter.

Earnings grew five percent to $171 million (which is very strong profitability per dollar of sales). Earnings per share rose seven percent to $0.47.

Company management recently repurchased 900,000 shares for cancellation during its first fiscal quarter for a modest expenditure of $37.5 million.

The company finished the quarter with cash and total corporate investments of $956 million with no debt. In July, Paychex increased its quarterly dividend nine percent to $0.38 per share.

Overall, it was a pretty good quarter for this mature enterprise. Earnings for its upcoming quarter are expected to grow between six percent and eight percent, with total service revenues expected to be eight percent to 10% greater than the same quarter last year.

The other big company in payroll and benefits administration is Automatic Data Processing, Inc. (ADP), which has been doing incredibly well on the stock market since the beginning of last year. (See “How to Create a Winning Portfolio in a Market at Its Highs.”)

ADP doesn’t report until the end of October, but its top-line growth should be similar to Paychex’s.

ADP has been a good earner for shareholders of late and the stock is still yielding approximately 2.4%. Similarly priced to Paychex in terms of its valuation, I suspect ADP will be able to keep ticking higher on the stock market going into 2015.

The stock would be attractive for new buyers depending on how the company reports its fiscal first quarter of 2015 before the market opens on October 29, 2014.

This stock has doubled since 2010, as institutional investors bet on the economic recovery. ADP reportedrevenue growth of 10% to $3.1 billion in its fourth fiscal quarter of 2014.

The company’s earnings were $289 million, or $0.60 per diluted share, compared to $224 million, or $0.47 per diluted share. Management expects fiscal 2015 total revenue growth of between seven percent and eight percent.

Paychex’s latest numbers were solid and they bode well for ADP. The company’s share price has been in consolidation all year and its latest numbers will likely be the catalyst for a breakout.

How do you turn an Inbound Content Marketing Strategy into a powerful force for lead nurturing and conversion?

In addition to a compelling value proposition that captures your brand and speaks directly to prospective buyers, you need a persuasive call to action (CTA) that comes with a hard-to-resist offer.

This isn’t as simple as “Call now – operators are standing by!” It demands keen attention to the needs of your prospects and a commitment to turning them into satisfied customers.

Primary and Secondary Calls to Action

A call to action can actually come in two forms: primary and secondary.

In many cases, a primary CTA is all that’s needed to reinforce the message of your website content and draw visitors into your conversion pipelines.

For B2B firms, and those that may need prospective customers to go through a more complicated or multi-step buying process, a secondary CTA may be necessary to keep prospects primed and to track their movements as they – hopefully – move toward an ultimate buying decision.

A primary call to action should clearly communicate the next step that your prospect needs to take. This might take the form of a discount for buyers who enter the sales funnel within a specified period of time or a free download of a high-level piece of content for all buyers.

A secondary call to action may include an invitation to a meet-and-greet or an information session with company executives or a no-obligation signup for a conversion-centric mailing list.

Tips for Locating Your Call to Action

Like other key aspects of your online presence, your primary and secondary calls to action need to be highly visible to your prospects. Whether it’s high up on your homepage or located near the bottom, your CTA should be located within the eye-path of your website’s visitors.

Even if the CTA is located on a sidebar or footer, it’s critical for all supporting content to lead visitors towards it. This requires the deft blending of text, visual and multimedia content.

Your CTA should always follow the concise outlining of your company’s value proposition. Likewise, it should clearly indicate why it’s important for visitors to take this step.

This indication doesn’t have to be wordy: “Get Savings Now” or “Get Your Reward” could be sufficient.

Testable Lead Nurturing

These tips offer some general guidance on how to formulate and locate your call to action, but your website’s unique visitor demographics and approach to marketing will determine its ultimate success or failure.

As such, monitoring the performance of your call to action and its lead nurturing potential is critical.

The most efficient means of analysis is A/B split testing, a protocol that splits your site’s incoming traffic into two parallel tracks for a period of time. Each track sees a different version of your homepage, including your primary call to action and offer.

By measuring each version’s conversion rates over time, you can determine which layout maximizes your CTAs potential.

Unlock Profit with a Compelling Call to Action

From a relentless focus on search engine optimization (SEO) to a keen understanding of website design best practices, your online marketing strategy requires you to juggle many different moving parts.

Along with your company’s value proposition, a persuasive and coherent call to action can make the difference in attracting, nurturing and converting your leads. Over time, it will turn a solid content marketing strategy into a truly great one.

Discover how a compelling call to action generated jaw-dropping results for one company by downloading this free case study “Digital Marketing That Converts: See How A New Digital Marketing Plan Drove A 210% Increase In Conversion Rate.”

I got the chance to hear Nicholas Muldoon, an agile coach at Twitter, speak at a recent Integrated Marketing Summit event in San Diego. I find myself thinking about his presentation again and again, and how important agile thinking is to businesses of all sizes, and I’m finally getting around to writing about it here.

What is Agile Marketing, Anyway?

I’m glad you asked. I’m going to go out on a limb here and suggest that “Agile Marketing” is one of those terms people hear, nod because they know they’re supposed to know what it means, but really, they have no stinking idea. And you know what – that’s exactly what I used to do when I heard the term. I kinda sorta knew what it was, but really, I had no idea.

Agile marketing is a radically different approach and it’s certainly very different than most marketing teams are used to thinking. Nick and his team at the Agile Marketing Organization Chapter in San Francisco have defined agile marketing really simply: it’s about discovering better ways of creating value for customers through new approaches to marketing. Ridiculously simple, isn’t it?

How Do You Adjust to an Agile Marketing Mindset?

Agile marketing requires people to change the way they do things and to quit doing them, or thinking them, because that’s the way they’ve always done it or thought it.  That means tossing conventions and personal opinions out the window and relying on what your data shows you (i.e. we tested this x number of times and here’s what our users told us) to drive strategies. Nicholas talked about the Agile Marketing Manifesto and how the mindset of creating value for customers by approaching marketing in a different manner leads to the understanding and the appreciation of:

Image credit: AgileMarketing.org

How Does Agile Translate to Product Development

When it comes to product development, the Agile concept is crazy fast. According to Muldoon, you’re not talking a six or nine month period of development and testing, you’re talking about a one or two week period, and sometimes even a one-day period. I’m pretty sure I saw his eyes light up when he said this – the mark of a true Agile lover – and I loved that. When you’re using Agile Marketing tactics, what you’re striving for is to build something, get it into the hands of customers immediately, get their feedback, respond and react.  This gives you 52 (or more) opportunities throughout the year to continue to innovate and adapt.

How to Build a Cross-Functional Agile Marketing Team

So let’s think about this in an ad agency model. In a traditional agency environment you generally have a sales team (new business development), creatives (designers/copywriters), digital teams, print and media specialists, SEOs and more. Yet when we have teams of people in the creative space, all focused on individually creating what is sure to be “their best work,” we often struggle to tell a consistent story or have a consistent message. We’re all to often not really thinking about the whole customer experience, we’re just thinking about our little part of it.

When you build cross-functional teams within your company, whether you’re an agency or a brand, and regardless of the size of your business, this lowers barriers to communication and enables your to deliver as quickly as possible. And the key to effective cross-functional teams is to empower the team to deliver as quickly as possible.

Sounds great. How do you make this happen within your company? The easiest way to do this is to take a pilot approach: develop a small team incorporate Agile thinking into everything you do and this will be your proof of concept. Once you’ve done it once, move on and do it with other groups and teams within the organization.

Focus on Developing T-shaped people

The way we marketers traditionally structure things, within any organization of almost any size, is that we have people who have deep experience in one area, then a little bit of experience in other things. They are email marketing specialists or social media specialists, new business ninjas or great web developers and terrific copywriters. And they know a little bit about other things, but just enough to be dangerous. Agile Marketing adoption means that you work within your marketing teams to deepen existing skills and move away from what we’re used to, which is skill sets that are really very siloed. These traditional teams leave you with an Achilles heel when one part of the team either isn’t available or leaves the team or organization. With T-Shaped team members, it’s like having a team who are all cross-fit nuts. They’re all focused on keeping the team strong, fit, focused and successful.

The Keys to Success With Agile Marketing

The basic premises of Agile Marketing make perfect sense. Here’s Muldoon’s advice on how to make it work for you:

• Test and Validate. Never stop testing and validating your hypothesis. Expect it to change regularly, because it will.
• Look at the Whole Product. Look at the whole product (or customer experience) not just your little part of it. Think about them (the end user/consumer) and not about you.
• Exploit Opportunities. Everybody likes to hold up the example of the Oreo creative team and how they “stole” the Super Bowl a couple of years ago. The reality is, that didn’t happen by accident. They didn’t know what was going to happen that night, but they had a team ready to make the most of whatever did. That’s what smart marketers need to be thinking about today, in the world of real-time, 24/7 marketing. Be prepared, empower your teams to move quickly and get out of their way to make it happen.
• Have a Plan. Being agile doesn’t mean you don’t have a plan. It just means that the plan isn’t the Holy Grail. It’s not set in stone. And learning to be comfortable changing that plan, most likely on the fly, is integral to your overall success with Agile Marketing.

Agile is truly about incorporating change on a constant basis. It’s adaptive and it’s addictive. More importantly, it’s highly effective. Once you start seeing the amazing things that can happen as you work to develop T-shaped people, build adaptive teams, learn from and with one another and embrace change I predict that you, too, will be hooked.

As a marketer who happens to be wired in such a way that I love and thrive on constant change, I totally get the concept of Agile Marketing and I loved hearing Nicholas talk about this. That said, I very much realize what a challenge change in general, much less regular and ongoing change, can be for others. And we often don’t pick how it is we’re wired — we just have to deal with the respective hands that we’re dealt. Those of us who happen to like change are in a great position to thrive in an Agile environment. For those of us who aren’t instinctively that way, we can learn to adapt. Right?

Agile isn’t for everyone, but it makes great sense as we marketers work to get our arms around how the Internet of Things is reshaping the way we do business. Our target audience is everywhere, on a dynamic and constantly changing journey, accessing information from a myriad of devices in a myriad of ways. Equally as important, what we do from an SEO standpoint impacts our content strategies and our social media strategies and our email marketing strategies and what we do offline and how it’s connected to what we do online—you get my drift. The marketing department of the future (as in tomorrow, not next year), would do well to begin the process of embracing Agile Marketing, learn to structure T-shaped teams and start practicing concept, design, develop, test, launch, test, tweak, test some more. I think it’s the way of things to come. You?

The basic premise of Agile Marketing is as applicable for small to medium-sized businesses as it is for larger, enterprise level businesses. And the advantage for the small business owner is that they are typical more adaptable to change, and able to change course quickly than larger organizations are. This give small businesses owners a decided competitive advantage–if only they use it.

Oh, and do yourself a favor and make it a point to learn more about Agile Marketing if you, like me, started out not knowing much. And if you ever get the chance to meet Nicholas and/or hear him speak, trust me, he’s terrific. You can find him on Twitter at @njm.

Get this: Over a quarter of all organizations redesign their websites to optimize it for lead generation, yet less than 40% of them use any metrics to measure their site’s effectiveness (either the new or old one).

Looking a little further into some numbers discovered by Hubspot, and they show that some companies redesign their websites every 12 months. That’s every year! And a full third of them are unhappy with the results.

No wonder. If you’re simply redesigning for the sake of redesigning, then no one’s going to be happy. Website visitors want an easy-to-navigate site that includes all the information they’re looking for. They don’t want to be confused every time they come to your website and have to re-discover where you’ve hidden the contact form or product information.

And if you really want to unlock the potential of your B2B website, here are the secrets to better lead generation with your website.

Secret 1: Clear CTAs (Calls-to-Action)

A CTA is a button, image, or text link that encourages visitors to take an action after visiting your website. Usually that’s to sign up for a special report, attend a webinar, or purchase a product. The actual words you use here are very important. Lose the clever phrasing and in-jokes when creating your CTAs. Be clear, to the point, and use good action verbs. For example, Click Here or Sign Up Today.

Secret 1a: CTA placement on the page matters

Try putting your CTA on the extreme right or left of your page. Studies show that they tend to get more clicks if they’re out on the edges, rather than in the middle of the page.

Secret 2: Simple user experience

It’s important the B2B visitors can access the information they want and need quickly. Even though their buying cycle is long, they still don’t want to spend a ton of time trying to find the information. Who does, right? Apparently, the #1 thing B2B visitors want to see on your website is pricing information. Then technical support information, then other resources like white papers, case studies, and blog posts.

Be careful in how you gate your information as well. (“Gating” means you require users to register in order to access or download the information.) A good mix of gated and ungated content will serve your visitors well, and avoid any annoyance or anger with you. For example, blog posts, infographics, and case studies could be ungated, while white papers and webinar content is gated.

Secret 3: High quality content on all pages

This one should go without saying, but it still needs to be said: use a professional writer on all of your marketing materials. Whether they’re in-house or an external freelancer, working with a pro will increase every related metric you’re measuring on your website. Visitors will be captivated by the engaging and insightful content, and be willing to register their information with you for future updates. Your bounce rates will drop drastically as they’ll stay to read everything, instead of navigating away at the first sign of a typo.

What pages do I need to spend the most time on?

This is always a tough question, as you should spend quality time crafting each page on your site. However, at the very least, look at these ones:

• Home page: A well-written home page does a good job of sending visitors further into your website. It’s not just a splash page for introductory information. Use it to guide them to the next step in the buying cycle, and the next set of content on your site.
• Product pages: These pages will describe your products and services in an engaging manner.
• Sales and Landing pages: These pages are designed to sell or convert visitors into leads. Use strong and clear headlines, compelling ledes, bullet points to spread out the text, appropriate images, and a clear promise of what they’ll gain by filling out the form on the page.
• Thank you pages: This page is often the least customized by B2B marketers, and they’re missing an opportunity for additional business. Use the Thank You page to offer additional information to the prospect, or buttons to your social media profiles so they can share the page with their network too.

Secret 4: More sharing on social media

While not really a secret, using social media to amplify your B2B content is a given these days. It’s a legitimate lead generation channel in today’s fast-moving Technology market. Put social media sharing buttons everywhere that’s appropriate on your website. Don’t forget to include them on any landing or sales page, as well as in any eNewsletters you send out as well.

Secret 5: Take your time

It’s cliched, but true: lead generation is a marathon, not a sprint. You can’t simply build a great product that offers value to customers and expect to generate more leads with that. Good lead generation strategies take time. You must publish content and offers regularly that provide real value to your prospects. THAT’s what’s going to convert them from prospect to lead, and eventually lead to customer.

Update your website on a regular basis with unique, quality content that has real value to prospects, and you’ll find yourself connecting with them more.

Your website is a lead generation magnet

It’s true. Setting it up the right way to bring in leads and potential customers will benefit your B2B Technology company in the long run. You’ll develop a strong and deep relationship with them and seriously affect your bottom line.

Onboarding and Ramping New Hires

Sales and channel executives responsible for hiring and ramping new hires have a whole host of challenges in finding and hiring good candidates and in getting them productive.

Onboarding new sales hires in many companies is a process of indoctrination in the product; demo, presentation, pricing, followed by CRM and sales process training.

After meetings with the sales manager to discuss territory and key accounts, the sales rep is off-and-running.

Unfortunately for sales reps in many companies, from this point on, they are on their own. They have to source their own leads, figure out how their customers buy their product and through trial and error, how to sell the product.

Sound familiar?

It should, this is pretty standard stuff in mainstream technology companies.

For a straightforward product with a 1-month sales cycle time, it might take 3-4 months for a rep to become fully productive. For a complex enterprise solution with a 6-month sales cycle, it will likely take a year or more.
Dave Kurlan’s formula for Ramp up time = the length of your sales cycle + the length of your learning curve + 30 days. Dave adds a couple of months to ramp time for either lack of industry knowledge or lack of sales experience.

The only variable in Dave’s formula is the length of your learning curve.

CSO Insights suggests that the factors causing long ramp times are:

• Higher customer expectations (What do you know about me and my business?),
• Increasing product complexity,
• Complexity of the selling environment and more product offerings,
• Entry into new markets,
• Global competition (via the internet) introducing new competitors

From the same CSO Insights 2014 Sales Performance Optimization Study, only 36.6% of companies are able to ramp salespeople to full productivity inside 6 months. 59.7% of respondents take 6 or more months to ramp salespeople to full productivity.

Sales Ramp and Productivity Issues

In sales there is no hiding a slow start. Weak pipeline and revenue forecasts are self-evident.

But there are other telltale signs that indicate problems in ramping salespeople;

• Sales reps complain of poor quality marketing leads.
• Despite making lots of calls (activity), forecasts and revenue are weak.
• Salespeople will try to sell lower cost point-products to departmental users, instead of going for the enterprise platform sale, (except it takes 10 times as many deals to make up for an enterprise sale).
• A small handful of senior sales exec’s. are “knocking it out of the park”, but the rest of the team is struggling.
• New hires become frustrated at their lack of success and quit.

Once a new rep has been hired, the only levers you have to increase the speed of ramping salespeople are through more effective transfer of selling knowledge, increasing the effectiveness of selling tools provided and on-the-job coaching from sales managers.

If you are a product-marketing manager or sales-enablement leader, what can you do to help new hires, (and established salespeople) to become more successful, faster?

It Starts with the Message

Weak and ineffective product-focused content is a primary cause of long sales ramp times.

In 9 out of 10 meetings with buyers, B2B salespeople fail to contribute value beyond product features and pricing, (Sirius Decisions).

Buyers don’t need more product information from salespeople; they can get that in a couple of mouse-clicks. Buyers need more insight from salespeople and they expect salespeople to have some knowledge of their business and their likely challenges, in order to contribute value.

Plus buyers need to hear how others have succeeded in overcoming similar challenges.

When contemplating the above scenarios, a couple of questions come to mind;

• How effective is your existing value messaging in relating to the problems your ideal customers really care about?
• How long does it take for salespeople to develop a point-of-view that resonates with buyers?
• We all want salespeople having conversations and telling stories, – do you arm them with an inventory of conversation points and stories, mapped to buyer problems, roles, buying stage, competitive context, so they don’t have to figure them out, they a ready to be delivered?
• How well do your salespeople create solicitation and follow-up emails, – how long does it take them?
• How many times do your salespeople tell buyers, “I’m going to have to get back to you on that”?

How much more effective would your salespeople be and how much faster could they become fully productive, if they had everything they needed right at their finger-tips?

How much faster could they learn, if they were supported by a collaborative platform where they could share knowledge and learn from others, and all they had to do, was use it?

Structured Content Drives Behavior

What if from day-1 in the company, a new sales hire could tap the experience of the most successful sales reps?

What if you could provide new hires with:

• Ideal customer profiles, including buyer problems and likely causes,
• Relevant capabilities and positioning,
• Call preparation guides,
• Why Change and Point of View conversations,
• An inventory of customer stories,
• An inventory of emails, with tested subject lines and calls to action that work,
• Key question to ask and key objections and counters,

Coaching Sales Managers to Coach Salespeople

The real secret to reducing sales ramp times and unlocking sales performance, lies with sales managers.

Sales managers must be fully committed to the onboarding and behavior change program… isn’t effective onboarding a behavior change program?

Sales managers must fully understand the messaging and frameworks provided and how to use them and be capable of coaching salespeople in using the tools provided.

Where to From Here?

Much of the above knowledge exists as tacit knowledge inside the heads of the top-performing sales reps and sales managers.

The reason new hires fail isn’t because they were bad hires, are dumb or lack motivation, most of the time it’s because they cannot tap the pool of existing knowledge and must learn it all for themselves through trial and error.

My colleague Jim Burns likes to say, “If it’s not written down, it does not exist”.
To move from “random acts of content” to a disciplined approach to capture and maintain customer conversations that everyone can use, is a major 5-step undertaking.

1. Top-down commitment from executive management is required to create the sales support infrastructure to reduce sales ramp times.
2. It requires new people (sales enablement and sales operations), executing new processes with the right enabling technology.
3. Customer content and conversation frameworks are required, along with process to capture and synthesize knowledge in a useful form.
4. Customer-facing content, combined with content delivery platforms that enable salespeople to quickly locate and use information are required.
5. Collaborative sharing of knowledge and best practices and a process of tracking and continuously improving content and sales performance.

For the first time in history, five generations will soon be working side by side. But whether this multi-generational workplace feels happy and productive or challenging and stressful is, in large part, up to you: the boss. How should you relate to employees of different age groups? How do you motivate someone much older or much younger than you? And finally: what can you do to encourage employees of different generations to share their knowledge?

What the Experts Say
As people work longer and delay retirement, internal career paths have changed. “Organizational careers don’t look the way they did before,” says Peter Cappelli, professor of management at the Wharton School and coauthor of Managing the Older Worker. “It’s more common to see someone younger managing someone older.” This can lead to tension on both sides. “Maybe there is a feeling of: why am I being bossed around by someone without a lot of experience? On the other hand, maybe the younger person feels insecure and wonders: how do I do this?”

“It’s important to be aware of generational tension — loosely defined as a lack of respect for someone who’s of a different generation from you — among colleagues,” says Jeanne C. Meister, a founding partner of Future Workplace, a human resources consultancy and the coauthor of The 2020 Workplace. “It’s your job to help your employees recognize that they each have distinct sets of skills and different things they bring to the table,” she says. Here’s how.

Don’t dwell on differences
The Boomer mystified by Facebook; the Millenial who wears flip-flops in the office; the Traditionalist (born prior to 1946) who seemingly won’t ever retire; the cynical Gen Xer who’s only out for himself; and the Gen 2020er — born after 1997 — who appears surgically attached to her smartphone. Generational stereotypes abound but according to Cappelli, “they are just not true. There is no evidence that 35-year-old managers today are any different from 35-year-old managers a generation ago.” Besides, your goal is to help your team “move beyond the labels.” Generation-based employee affinity groups are a waste of time and energy, he adds. Don’t assume people need special treatment and “don’t dwell on differences with a group discussion that devolves into: ‘People my age feel like this.’ Or ‘All Boomers act a certain way.’ There’s a lot of variation,” he says. “Get to know each person individually.”

Build collaborative relationships
While it may seem daunting to manage someone much older than you, try taking a cue from the military. The U.S. Marine Corps routinely puts 22-year-old lieutenants in charge of 45-year-old sergeants, notes Cappelli. “The mindset is to make that person your partner and involve them in everything you do. You’re still the boss and the one making the decisions, but you should hear them out.” A collaborative approach works well when managing workers who are in their 20s, too. “They are used to discussion and engagement because that’s what they had in the college environment,” Cappelli says. Help your employees make the transition from school to the workplace by encouraging debate. “You don’t necessarily need to take their advice, but be aware that this is where they’re coming from,” he says.

Study your employees
“Just as you would research a new product or service, you need to study the demographics of your current workforce and the projected demographics of your future workforce to determine what they want out of their jobs as these things are different generation to generation,” says Meister. If your company conducts an annual survey of vision and values, Meister suggests adding new questions to the mix, such as queries about your employees’ preferred communication style and planned professional paths. Then “use that information to look critically at your human resources and business strategies. Figure out: What matters to different sets of employees? What can you do [to attract younger or more experienced workers]? It’s a low cost way to get a pulse on generational career issues,” says Meister.

Create opportunities for cross-generational mentoring
Reverse or reciprocal mentoring programs, which pair younger workers with seasoned executives to work on specific business objectives usually involving technology, are increasingly prevalent in many offices. “The younger person — who grew up with the internet — teaches the older person about the power of social media to drive business results,” says Meister. Meanwhile, the more experienced employee shares institutional knowledge with the younger worker. Mixed-age work teams are another way to promote cross-generational mentoring. “Studies show that colleagues learn more from each other than they do from formal training, which is why it is so important to establish a culture of coaching across age groups,” says Meister. In mixed-age teams, mentoring relationships develop more naturally, adds Cappelli.  “Older folks are more likely to fall into a mentor role and help the young employees,” he says. Meanwhile, young people often find it easier to take advice from an experienced worker than from one of their peers “because they’re not competing in the same way,” he says.

Consider life paths
When it comes to inspiring and incentivizing employees who are much older or much younger than you, it helps to think like an anthropologist. “Consider where your employees are in their lives and what their needs are,” says Meister. Younger people, for instance, typically don’t have many outside obligations; work-wise, they are motivated by new experiences and opportunities. Employees in their 30s and 40s, on the other hand, often have children and mortgages and are in need of flexibility as well as “money and advancement” says Cappelli. Workers at the end of their careers “are probably not as interested in training, but they do want interesting work and work-life balance,” he says. “Understanding the characteristics around these predictable life paths will help you figure out how best to [divvy up] work assignments and also the best ways to manage and motivate your team.”

Principles to Remember

Do:

• Experiment with mixed-age teams and reverse mentoring programs that enable older, experienced workers to interact with and learn from younger hires
• Develop incentive plans that reflect where your employees are in their lives
• Conduct regular human resources surveys to get a pulse on your employees’ demographics and needs

Don’t

• Bother with generation-based employee affinity groups — they generally reinforce stereotypes
• Act like a top-down manager — forge partnerships with employees of different ages and encourage them to share their opinions
• Assume you already know how to motivate employees who are older or younger — ask them what they want out of their professional lives

Case Study #1: Leverage your young workforce’s expertise
Ron Garrow, Chief Human Resources Officer at MasterCard, is not a technophobe, but he readily admits that social media didn’t come easily to him — at least at first. “I recognized that I had a lot to learn about operating in this new world,” says Ron, who is 51.

So he volunteered to take part in a reciprocal mentoring program run by one of MasterCard’s internal business resource groups. The program partners young employees with older colleagues to work on tech skills. Ron was assigned a coach, Rebecca Kaufman — 24 years old and an avid social media user — who taught him how to use Twitter and how to get more out of professional networking sites, such as LinkedIn. “Rebecca has shaped my thinking in terms of how I operate in the social space,” says Ron. “I now carve out time in my day to get on LinkedIn and I have a [better appreciation for] the importance of social media.”

Working with Rebecca also helped Ron relate to Millenials as both the consumers and workforce of the future — a critical insight considering the changes taking place in MasterCard’s industry. “This new generation is shaping the future in terms of purchasing habits: They don’t use cash to buy things; they use electronic means. [As a result,] MasterCard’s job descriptions have changed.” Rebecca also benefits from the relationship: Ron provides professional counsel and is also helping improve her communication skills.

Today hundreds of MasterCard employees take part in the program, which is currently offered in five offices. “There’s a contagion going on — people are raising their hands and saying: ‘I want a mentor.’ It’s really about making yourself vulnerable,” he says.

Case Study #2: Motivate your employees with incentives that matter to them
Kris Snyder — the founder and CEO of Vox Mobile, the mobile technology management company based in Cleveland, Ohio — offers his 130 employees a veritable cafeteria of benefits, compensation, and work assignments. “I think of my employees as a cast of characters,” says Kris, who is 42. “Everyone’s needs are different, so we can’t be a one-size-fits-all [employer].”

The majority of Vox Mobile’s sales force — about 85% — are just out of school and on their first or second job. Its leadership team, however, is comprised of people in their 30s and 40s. To appeal to these different age groups, he has developed different sets of employee perks based mainly on where these two age groups are in their personal and professional lives. “I noticed that these groups have different motivations and, therefore, they need different incentives,” he says. “There are no hard and fast rules, but generally speaking, my Gen Y workers want us to fund their LinkedIn accounts; they like things like branded gear and company-sponsored happy hours — they’re more social and they’re not going home right after work. Gen Xers don’t care about logoed backpacks; instead they are looking at our 401(k) matching plan and our healthcare provisions.”

The different incentive packages and perks will likely shift along with the company’s demographics, says Kris. “As we build and grow and as the company goes through different stages, the makeup of our workforce will change, too,” says Kris. “We will navigate those changes and experiment with new ways to incentivize employees.”

Given the recent news around high-profile account takeover attempts on other services, we thought it’d be useful to share the ways we work behind the scenes to keep your account secure and some of the quick steps you can take to improve the security of your LinkedIn account.

Security starts at login, so our systems proactively evaluate member login attempts for suspicious activity and to detect for potential intrusions. Many of these takeover attempts use automated tools to guess passwords, which our systems work to detect and then deploy roadblocks against. We also monitor key site metrics 24×7 looking for and mitigating attacks against our login system. We’ve also moved the majority of our member traffic to HTTPS which provides authentication of our site and protects against man-in-the-middle attacks.

We also compare username and password combinations we find on the Internet to our member’s credentials, and in the event we find matches, we promptly invalidate the password for the account and then notify the member to update their password.

Most account takeover attempts leverage these large sets of emails and passwords, though in some cases, hackers spend time researching specific targets and working to obtain account identifiers such as email addresses. To mitigate these types of attacks, we deploy automated defenses to prevent abuse of functionality that members use to connect such as address book import. We are building an opt out setting where members can choose to not have their email address discoverable to people they are not connected with through address book import. In the meantime, our support teams can answer questions about the visibility of your email address and manually opt you out.

You can also take three quick steps to make your account more secure. We encourage you to take five minutes today to do the following:

• Turn on two factor authentication (2FA)
• Regularly monitor your account activity
• Check your privacy settings

Peter Thiel — the billionaire cofounder of PayPal and early Facebook investor — took to Reddit on Thursday for an AMA as part of the run-up to the release of his new new book "Zero To One," which will be available on Sept. 16. 

The whole thread is worth the read, but we were intrigued by three targets of Thiel's hyper-articulate ire: b-school grads, the overly dressed, and the cult of Silicon Valley.

Thiel doesn't love to hire MBAs. 

If there's one thing the uber-libertarian Thiel despises, it's people who act like sheep. And MBAs tend to get caught up in groupthink, he says.

While he doesn't have an "absolute ban" on hiring MBAs, he thinks that they tend to be "high extrovert/low conviction people." 

That's "a combination that in my experience leads towards extremely herd-like thinking and behavior," he says. 

Thiel hates suits. 

While he cautions that there are "no absolute and timeless sartorial rules," Thiel says that "in Silicon Valley, wearing a suit in a pitch meeting makes you look like someone who is bad at sales and worse at tech." 

Maybe that's why he has a simple rule for investing: never bet on a CEO in a suit. 

As we've reported before, Thiel says that this rule has helped him avoid making poor bets on slick businessfolk compensating for crap products with well-dressed charm. 

"Maybe we still would have avoided these bad investments if we had taken the time to evaluate each company's technology in detail," Thiel writes in his new book. "But the team insight — never invest in a tech CEO that wears a suit — got us to the truth a lot faster."

Thiel thinks Silicon Valley is overrated.

Some of Thiel's A-list entrepreneur/investor peers, like LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman, insist that Silicon Valley is the place to do great entrepreneurial work, since there are so many influential and intelligent people to bump into and start opportunity-enabling relationships with. 

Thiel is less enthusiastic.

When a Reddit user asked him if it was possible to successfully found a company without living in Silicon Valley, Thiel's answer was "yes." 

"It's more affordable," he says, "in almost all ways."

Of course, that affordability has its costs. "You miss out on the network effects of Silicon Valley" by living elsewhere, Thiel says. "But sometimes these network effects lead to negatives, as people end up behaving more lemming-like in the SOMA hotbed," referring to the hip San Francisco neighborhood. 

Like the MBA, Thiel considers SOMA just another acronym for groupthink.

SEE ALSO: Mark Cuban Shares The 4 Simple Keys To A Perfect Pitch

Join the conversation about this story »

Sightjogging in Brussels? Don’t miss the Japanese Tower, an architectural curiosity. (Sight Jogging Brussels)

At 11 o’clock on a Wednesday morning in Amsterdam’s red-light district, I’m getting strange looks. Unlike the other sleepy denizens of Europe’s sexiest tourist attraction—at this off-peak hour, I spot just a smattering of sightseers and one entrepreneur working her window—I’m dressed in workout gear and running, not strolling, up and down the infamous alleyways.

The truth is, I’m sightseeing too. I’m on a “sightjogging” tour with Tourist Run Amsterdam. On our eight-kilometre route, we check off most of the city’s must-sees (including the recently renovated Rijksmuseum and the bustling canals), even stopping to take pictures next to statues of Baruch Spinoza and Tante Leen. It’s my first trip to Amsterdam, and after a 90-minute run, I don’t just feel invigorated—I feel like I’ve learned my way around the city, too.

Business travellers know the conundrum of the frequent flyer: The glamour of far-flung locales is hard to enjoy when your schedule is a succession of nondescript hotels and conference rooms. And fitting in exercise—supposed to alleviate not just fatigue but jet lag, too—is a challenge when the snooze button’s so inviting and the hotel gym so uninspiring. Running tours are a multi-tasker’s dream: a way to pound the pavement, see the sights, meet a few locals and go home with a good answer to, “How was your trip?” Most tours cost around $40 (or $80 for a private run) and can be booked and paid for online. Your guide will often meet you at your hotel.

MORE: Five things you need to turn your commute into an easy, efficient workout »

“The experience of discovering a country or city is more intense when it’s done in an active way,” says Paul Bierman of Tourist Run Amsterdam. Bierman founded the business five years ago with his partner, who works in IT. They came up with the idea while doing an endurance run (they’re both triathletes) and discussing their recent travel experiences. “It enables you to really absorb the atmosphere.”

And running tours are not just for the hard-core. “We design our group runs so they are for all levels,” says Michael Gazaleh, founder of City Running Tours. The company offers custom and themed excursions in 15 U.S. cities (jog past San Francisco’s sea lions, say, or up the “Rocky steps” at the Philadelphia Museum of Art). “It’s not going to be an intimidating distance,” Gazaleh says. “If people are looking for a longer run or have a set schedule, we have personalized runs.”

MORE: So you just got a treadmill desk. Now what? »

On the same trip, I have about eight hours in Frankfurt, a city I’ve only ever seen from an airport window. So I book an hour-long tour with Tim Gondorf of Sightjogging Frankfurt, who meets me on the waterfront to show me the best of his city. We wind past the historic old town and modern skyscrapers, through the glossy pedestrian shopping street and a cluttered Saturday-morning market. But it’s when we cross the Main River and enter the hush of Frankfurt’s greenbelt that I’m most surprised by the diversity of the city core. Next visit, I think I’ll up the mileage.

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The post On your next business trip, save time and still see the sights with a “Sightjogging” tour appeared first on Canadian Business.

Apple's two newest smartphones — the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus — will be available for preorder starting Friday and hit stores Sept. 19. Both phones will be available through all four major carriers in the U.S., and here's a quick look at how their pricing models break down.

Verizon Wireless

Verizon is selling the iPhone 6 starting at $199 and the base model iPhone 6 Plus for $299 on a two-year carrier contract. If you don't feel like shelling out all that money up front, you also have the option of paying off your new iPhone over a period of 20 months as well. With this option, the iPhone 6 would cost $32.49 per month, while the iPhone 6 Plus would cost you $37.49 per month. There's no down payment for qualified customers on the starting price, and we've reached out to Verizon with more details on whether or not there's a down payment on other models. 

AT&T

AT&T has a few different option for those looking to buy one of Apple's new iPhones. AT&T allows you to either buy the phone on a two year contract, or pay it off over the course of 20 or 24 months. With its Next 12 or Next 18 Plan, you also have the choice of upgrading your phone after 12 or 18 months, depending on which plan you choose at no additional cost. Here's a breakdown of the carrier's pricing plan, which an AT&T representative sent to Business Insider.

T-Mobile

T-Mobile is selling Apple's new iPhones with its Simple Choice plan, which also allows you to pay off your phone in monthly installments over a period of 24 months. The iPhone 6 will cost $27.08 per month for two years, while the iPhone 6 Plus will sell for $31.24 per month over the same period of time. There's no down payment required if you're buying the base model iPhone 6 or iPhone 6 Plus (16GB), but you'll need to pay $99.99 up front for the 64GB iPhone 6 or 6 Plus and $199.99 for the 128GB iPhone 6 and 6 Plus.  

Sprint

When it comes to selling iPhones, Sprint thinks you should be able to lease Apple smartphones the same way you would a car. The carrier just unveiled its new "iPhone for Life" plan earlier this week. With the plan, you'd be able to lease the iPhone 6 or iPhone 6 Plus for $20 per month with no down payment required. After two years, you would trade in that iPhone for Apple's newest model. If you prefer a more traditional buying plan, you can purchase the phone starting at $199 on a two-year contract, or pay $58 up front and $30 per month to pay off your iPhone 6 or iPhone 6 Plus.

SEE ALSO: Here's How The iPhone 6 Compares With Its Biggest Competitors

Join the conversation about this story »

People still love print – sometimes more than digital – so enabling good printing is essential for online marketing success

Internet marketers live in a digital world, but they should not forget printed documents. In this article you will discover:

• Why print is psychologically important
• How to ensure your website is printable
• What printed documents are worth providing

Back in 1975, Business Week magazine predicted that we would soon have a “paperless office” thanks to all the new technology being introduced at that time. Of course, here we are almost 40 years later and the paperless office is still a distant dream.

Even in this age of instant digital information, where you are not short of things to read, the chances are you also have a pile of print to wade through. The notion that digital would replace print clearly hasn’t happened. Indeed, even though the sales of ebook readers have soared, printed book sales are still healthy. Ebook sales appear to have peaked back in 2012/3, yet in the same year some 184 million printed books were sold in the UK. True, that is a fall compared with the previous year – but that was a record year thanks to “50 Shades of Grey”.

Furthermore, a study by Pew Internet showed that significant numbers of young people still want to read printed books, in spite of being brought up in a digital age.

Even though you can read headlines that digital books have overtaken printed books, these stories are often misleading because the total number of books being consumed has gone up – and besides most of the digital books sold are novels. For business books, print is still king.

Why do people love print?

You would think that children brought up with digital documents would not want to print things out, nor would they want printed books and magazines. But they do. Indeed, in one study of magazine readers across all ages it was found that even though people could subscribe to digital editions of their favourite magazine, they still preferred the printed version.

So why is that? What is so enticing with print, in spite of the ease and convenience of digital? The answer lies at the end of your fingers. Your fingers include millions of touch sensors and they are vital in helping you negotiate the world around you. Indeed, they are so important the information they provide is seen as central by your brain. When we live solely in digital, our brain misses out and is a bit concerned about the lack of detail it is receiving. Indeed, research shows that we remember less from digital alone and recall more when we print things out. It is as though our brain is more sure when we are touching something.

Some people need this touch information more than others. These are known as “kinaesthetic” individuals – their brain puts a greater weighting on tactile information than other individuals. You can spot a kinaesthetic person by the things they say. They say things like “I don’t feel I understand that” or “I need to get a grip on my studies” and so on. People who have a tendency to prefer touch sensory information reflect this in the words they use which tend to reveal physicality.

Here’s the problem in the digital world. Even though all of us will include touch sense input into what we engage with, around one in three people are touch-dominant.

That means that three in every ten people who visit your website desperately want to touch your information in order to engage with it, but have to rely solely on their visual senses. It means that a sizeable proportion of your website visitors cannot properly engage with your content.

Often, these individuals will print out your web page so they can hold it, so they can feel the content and so their brains can relax a bit because they are getting the range of sensory input required. Some people still print out all their emails so they understand what they have been sent and they can therefore respond properly.

Your web pages needs to be printable

One of the problems with printing out web pages is that browsers are not very good at printing. The key material on the page gets squashed, the adverts can dominate and the pages break in inappropriate places. As a result, standard web page printing is a mess. People can use Evernote’s “Clearly” product which allows them to print out the essence of a web page, getting rid of all the “furniture” that confuses. However, unless every one of your visitors has this browser add-on, they will get poor printing.

You can, of course, avoid this issue by having a “print only” CSS file which means when someone chooses to print your web page, the print only CSS takes over and delivers a much more desirable print experience for people. If you want to print out this article you will see that Smart Insights uses a “print.css” file to ensure the printed page is easy to read.
However, this kind of thing is not always possible, due to limitations of your content management system or the web design software that is used for your website. In such instances, then preparing a “print version” of the content is a good idea. This would be as simple as taking the content, creating a PDF of it and then having that available as a download link. Kinaesthetic people would then get a sense of relief as they would be able to click on the link and get something to print.

Should you make everything printable?

If you have to turn every page of your website into a printable PDF that is going to eat into your time and other resources. So what documents do people really want to be able to print?

Clearly any downloads you have people can print out – switching off the ability to print from within a PDF can work against you. The very reason that many people want such documents is so they can print them out.

The real reasons many people want to print something out is so they can reduce risk.

Our brain is constantly evaluating everything we do in order to reduce the risks involved. It is a central component of our survival mechanisms. Risk reduction transfers to many of our day to day activities, such as buying something. We seek to reduce the risk of spending too much on the wrong things. Hence we like to be well-informed about many of the things we buy.

For people who have a high degree of tactile input requirement, printing out something is required to help them reduce their risks. That means anything on your website that involves decision-making, such as something to buy, really ought to be printable. In this way people can print out the product details and get to “feel” them, helping their brain assemble yet more sensory input as part of its desire to reduce risk.

Key things to enable printing for include:

• Product information
• Terms and conditions
• Biographies and profiles
• Anything else that involves making decisions

Even though we are in a digital age, where millions of words are read each day online, the printed word still has immense value. Ignoring print could reduce your chances of online success; enabling print can bring about greater engagement.

(By the way, I printed this out to check before I posted it.)

Since Michael Brown’s shooting in Ferguson, Missouri, more than 154,000 people have signed a “We the People” petition to the White House to “require all state, county, and local police to wear a camera” to curb misconduct. The Ferguson police force was recently given about 50 cameras, following a national trend toward tech-enabled transparency.

The public may expect cameras to remove bias from interpretation of police behavior. If we can just see what happened, the thinking goes, we’ll know who was in the wrong.

But that’s not what the research shows. Video (particularly one-way footage) is not an all-seeing, neutral observer, as Florida International University law professor Howard Wasserman has repeatedly pointed out. The most significant impact of bodycams, taxicams, and the like is not reliving the past but, rather, changing behavior in the present. We act differently when we know we’re on camera.

That can certainly be a good thing, as researchers found in a field experiment with California’s Rialto Police Department. In that study, incidents occurring during shifts without cameras were twice as likely to result in the use of force. Indeed, when officers wore cameras, every physical contact was initiated by a member of the public, while 24% of physical contact was initiated by officers when they weren’t wearing the cameras.

You’ll see similar results — with an interesting twist — in a study by Washington University’s Lamar Pierce and his coauthors, who looked at employee behavior at almost 400 U.S. restaurants. Technology-based monitoring reduced restaurant employee theft by 22%, or about $24 per week. (The effect grew over time, with theft dropping $7 a week the first month and $48 a week by the third month.) But the monitoring actually had a much larger impact on productivity and sales: On average, total check revenue increased by 7% ($2,975 per week), and total drink revenue by 10.5% ($927 per week). Tips went up, too, by 0.3%.

When it became harder for workers to steal money, the researchers observed, people redirected their efforts toward “increasing sales and customer service in order to regain some of that loss.” The positive responses — performance improvements that benefited employees as well as their employers — were more substantial than the negative behaviors prevented by the monitoring.

So perhaps the real upside of surveillance is the potential to spot and reward good work, not to deter bad conduct. Other research suggests that, as well. A food-service study, for example, found that dining hall customers perceived greater employee effort and valued the service more when they could watch workers doing their jobs (through video-conferencing software on iPads). The effect was mutual: Employees felt more appreciated and, in turn, exerted greater effort when they had a clear view of customers. They completed orders much faster, and customers reported higher food quality. The reciprocal transparency created a positive feedback loop, generating value for both groups.

But transparency can also have an unintended negative consequence: Knowing that their managers and others will closely evaluate and penalize any questionable recorded behavior, workers are likely to do only what is expected of them, slavishly adhering to even the most picayune protocols. That’s what has happened in factory production work, where excessive transparency has thwarted both creativity and productivity. Assembly line workers hide fruitful time-saving and cross-training experiments to avoid having to explain them to anyone who might be watching. (See my recent HBR article about such tradeoffs.)

If too much transparency kills innovative behavior, how can police departments improve officers’ track record on profiling without sacrificing the kind of educated risk-taking and problem solving that’s often needed to save lives?

I would argue that the answer lies in focusing on developing good judgment and supporting justice, rather than on enforcing police protocol. Police in Ferguson and elsewhere can learn from companies that use cameras for coaching and development instead of evaluation and punishment. For example, a U.S. trucking company has installed a DriveCam in each of its tractor cabs — recording what’s happening both on the road and in the driver’s seat — to improve fleet safety. Coaches review the footage with the individual drivers, who are receptive to the feedback because they know the videos won’t be used against them. (The footage is only shown to managers in situations where drivers willfully break the law.)  Even at UPS, which has sensors in its trucks to track workers’ every move and reduce delivery times, the master agreement with the Teamsters prohibits management from using the data to discharge employees.

More organizations — including police departments — should explore ways of making employee surveillance constructive rather than punitive. Part of the challenge here, of course, is that law enforcement and government agencies are required (for good reason) to be transparent to the public. A certain amount of transparency ensures accountability. But unless it’s mitigated with zones of privacy — areas where workers can receive developmental coaching, as the truck drivers do, without getting dinged for mistakes that generate learning — it may actually be counterproductive. If every choice, every little misstep, is recorded for all to see and to second-guess, people will quickly learn to play it safe in the worst sense. There aren’t many individuals who could work productively under the magnifying glass of an entire country of arbiters — the Hunger Games version of policing.

That said, in a country where smartphone penetration is now over 70%, and almost every smartphone has a video camera, another question is: how much police work is on video already?

With the popularity of the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge and with the many causes that have flooded and leveraged social media to fundraise, it’s important that organizations ensure that they have raised awareness along with capital.

Social media offers the unique opportunity to know more about your charitable campaigns beyond the amount of dollars raised.

For instance, ALS’ wikipedia page views are up 18% since the Ice Bucket Challenge commenced. The Ice Bucket Challenge isn’t alone in this field, even though it has fully dominated most newsfeeds this summer.

Race for the Cure, The Big Dig, Charity Swear Box, amongst others have all raised funds successfully on social media. The hope beyond money is that the message of why these campaigns exist gets across to a large and engaged audience. Essentially, to go viral in some capacity.

Each campaign must monitor and measure their website analytics, where users are interacting with their website, Wikipedia and any other satellite websites where information of their cause is kept.

On top of all of this, you need to closely monitor social media activity. Every tweet, post and comment must be part of your measurement and determining success.

An interesting point to note is that the ALS Wikipedia page in other languages has generated an increase in traffic, proving that this sparked interest from around the world.

This is not to say that the money raised isn’t the real cause, but the real value lies in increasing awareness which can lead to ensuring spikes in fundraise don’t take nosedives in the future.

Social media has the power to get a message out to the large group of people and have it expand from there. This has to be part of the intention when crafting these online campaigns.

Once the Ice Bucket Challenge subsides, it’ll be fascinating to see how the next few campaigns handle the challenge. As well, will people have gotten the message of what the Ice Bucket Challenge was really about.

The post Build Awareness through Social Media appeared first on Sysomos Blog.

Decades ago, Marvin Gaye crooned about hearing news through the grapevine. This 1968 hit was around long before the likes of social media, but let’s be honest – social media is the digital grapevine of our time.

Drawing on the inspiration of singers like Gaye, we’ve created a musically inspired list of tips to help you communicate on social media. After all, social media is about more than status updates, hashtags and selfies. It’s about having a conversation with new and loyal customers. Not to mention, it’s a great way to show off your customer service skills. Here’s how to improve your social media skills:

1. Don’t just “Shout it Out Loud”
KISS is a big fan of shouting, but shouting is just a loud, one-sided conversation. You don’t want that on your social media feeds. Make sure your posts do more than just tell customers something. If that’s all you do, it’s very one-sided. Mix up the kinds of posts you share, including product or service updates, but be sure you’re engaged in the conversation by answering questions or comments.

Sure, you should let customers know about an upcoming sale or tell subscribers about a new service that you’re about to add, but make sure these informational posts aren’t the only think you’re posting. What else should you post? Bonnie Raitt has a few ideas.

2. “Let’s Give Them Something To Talk About”
Raitt’s got the right idea. When it comes to posting messages on social media, try to give people something to talk about.

“Questions are great conversation starters,” Derek Overbey, our Senior Social Media Manager says. “They can be general life questions or more business-focused, depending on your type of company.”

Take a look at the example below from the San Francisco Ballet, which garnered 40+ comments:

Other types of content like humorous photos, memes and videos can also spark conversation.

3. Be sure to “Answer Me”
Nat King Cole wanted an answer, and so do your social media followers. When a customer responds to a question, asks a question, retweets something you posted, comments on a photo, or signs up for a social contest, respond in a timely manner.

“If someone takes the time to like, comment or share, you should do everything in your power to publicly thank them for that effort,” Overbey says.

“This will help you build a tighter relationship and can go a long way to building a team of advocates that can spread the word about your company,” he adds.

Monitor your social channels often to keep the conversation going.

4. You should “Talk The Talk”
You know your product or service inside and out. Share that knowledge to help your customers use your product or service better. In other words, “Talk the Talk” as Mr. Mister’s 80s song title suggests.

For example, if you own a photography business, share a link to help your customers care for their camera after taking pictures in bad weather.

Make sure the article is written in a conversational tone, avoid sales pitches, and offer your customers value. It should be information that helps your customer in some way. Take this tweet for example. We offer some creative help for our customers.

The bottom line:  Make sure you post engaging content, respond to comments and work to have a two-way conversation with your followers. If you do this, they’ll “Thank You for Being a Friend.”

Have another suggestion? Please share it. We can all improve “With a Little Help From Our Friends.”

No institution is more responsible for educating the CEOs of American corporations than Harvard Business School – inculcating in them a set of ideas and principles that have resulted in a pay gap between CEOs and ordinary workers that’s gone from 20-to-1 fifty years ago to almost 300-to-1 today.

A survey, released on September 6, of 1,947 Harvard Business School alumni showed them far more hopeful about the future competitiveness of American firms than about the future of American workers. But, as the authors of the survey conclude, such a divergence is unsustainable. Without a large and growing middle class, Americans won’t have the purchasing power to keep U.S. corporations profitable, and global demand won’t fill the gap. Moreover, the widening gap eventually will lead to political and social instability. As the authors put it, “any leader with a long view understands that business has a profound stake in the prosperity of the average American.”

Unfortunately, the authors neglected to include a discussion about how Harvard Business School should change what it teaches future CEOs with regard to this “profound stake.” Now, I realize that HBS has made some changes over the years in response to earlier crises, but they have not gone far enough with courses that critically examine the goals of the modern corporation and the role that top executives play in achieving them.

A half-century ago, CEOs typically managed companies for the benefit of all their stakeholders – not just shareholders, but also their employees, communities, and the nation as a whole. “The job of management,” proclaimed Frank Abrams, chairman of Standard Oil of New Jersey, in a 1951 address, “is to maintain an equitable and working balance among the claims of the various directly affected interest groups … stockholders, employees, customers, and the public at large. Business managers are gaining professional status partly because they see in their work the basic responsibilities [to the public] that other professional men have long recognized as theirs.” This view was a common view among chief executives of the time.

Fortune magazine urged CEOs to become “industrial statesmen.” And to a large extent, that’s what they became. For thirty years after World War II, as American corporations prospered, so did the American middle class. Wages rose and benefits increased. American companies and American citizens achieved a virtuous cycle of higher profits accompanied by more and better jobs.

But starting in the late 1970s, a new vision of the corporation and the role of CEOs emerged – prodded by corporate “raiders,” hostile takeovers, junk bonds, and leveraged buyouts. Shareholders began to predominate over other stakeholders. And CEOs began to view their primary role as driving up share prices. To do this, they had to cut costs – especially payrolls, which constituted their largest expense. Corporate statesmen were replaced by something more like corporate butchers, with their nearly exclusive focus being to “cut out the fat” and “cut to the bone.”

In consequence, the compensation packages of CEOs and other top executives soared, as did share prices. But ordinary workers lost jobs and wages, and many communities were abandoned. Almost all the gains from growth went to the top.

The results were touted as being “efficient,” because resources were theoretically shifted to “higher and better uses,” to use the dry language of economics. But the human costs of this transformation have been substantial, and the efficiency benefits have not been widely shared. Most workers today are no better off than they were thirty years ago, adjusted for inflation. Most are less economically secure.

So it would seem worthwhile for the faculty and students of Harvard Business School, as well as those at every other major business school in America, to assess this transformation, and ask whether maximizing shareholder value – a convenient goal now that so many CEOs are paid with stock options – continues to be the proper goal for the modern corporation. Can an enterprise be truly successful in a society becoming ever more divided between a few highly successful people at the top and a far larger number who are not thriving?

For years, some of the nation’s most talented young people have flocked to Harvard Business School and other elite graduate schools of business in order to take up positions at the top rungs of American corporations, or on Wall Street, or management consulting. Their educations represent a substantial social investment; and their intellectual and creative capacities, a precious national and global resource.

But given that so few in our society – or even in other advanced nations – have shared in the benefits of what our largest corporations and Wall Street entities have achieved, it must be asked whether the social return on such an investment has been worth it, and whether these graduates are making the most of their capacities in terms of their potential for improving human well-being. These questions also merit careful examination at Harvard and other elite universities. If the answer is not a resounding yes, perhaps we should ask whether these investments and talents should be directed toward “higher and better” uses.

The internal systems of many organizations have shocking user interfaces. This costs companies in productivity, training and even the customer experience.

Fortunately, we can fix this.

“How come I can download an app on my phone and instantly know how to use it, yet need training to use our content management system? Shouldn’t our system be intuitive?”

This was just one of the comments I heard in a recent stakeholder interview. People are fed up with inadequate internal systems. Many of those I interviewed had given up on the official software. Instead, they use tools like Dropbox, Google Docs and Evernote.

The problem seems to exist across the board. I am hearing the same thing from employees across many companies and sectors. I am also hearing it about almost all types of internal systems, from ones for customer relationship management (CRM) to ones for procurement. They are all painful to use.

Frustration will only increase as millennials enter the workforce. These people are digital natives, and they expect a certain standard of software. They expect software to adapt to them, not the other way around.

The result of this frustration is that employees are abandoning these systems. People use email instead of a CRM and put documents in Dropbox rather than on the intranet. This leads to systems being out of date and, thus, irrelevant to the organization.

How have things gotten to this state? Why is enterprise software so bad?

One Size Does Not Fit All

I think technology is often oversold. “A content management system is the solution to content!” “An intranet is the answer to improving efficiency!” “A CRM system will manage the customer relationship!” But that is just not true.

Unfortunately, in the eyes of senior management, once a piece of software is purchased, the problem is solved. Job done, move on to the next challenge.

One size rarely fits all. Organizations rarely work in the same way, even within the same sector. Even if a law firm purchases an intranet designed for the legal sector, the system won’t necessarily work well out of the box for that firm.

People work in different ways. The functionality required by the secretary to the CEO will be different from the functionality required by someone in accounting or HR. Yet many enterprise systems do nothing to streamline the experience for different groups. (Image source: opensourceway¹)

Many of these systems could be tailored to the needs of individual organizations or employees, but they are not so out of the box. They need to be configured and optimized, which usually does not happen — or else the wrong system is purchased to begin with.

There must be a better way.

Starting With Users’ Needs

The procurement process for these systems too often begins with a list of desired features. This is the wrong starting point. We should approach internal software in the same way that we develop external applications: starting with users’ needs.

Regardless of whether you already have a system in place, identify your different user groups. Who will be using each system? Once you know that, shadow them for a while. Understand how they work. What do they do each day, and what system do they already use to get their work done?

Look for pain points in that system, and talk to them about where they get frustrated. Identify the information they need to do their job, and be aware of any clutter that gets in the way.

Finally, identify your users’ top tasks. Which tasks do your different user groups do again and again. These need to be super-accessible.

You might think that you now have enough information to buy a system. But just because something has the functionality you need does not mean it is easy to use. Before leaping for expensive software, design the user experience. We can do that with some simple prototyping.

Prototype Your Perfect System

Creating a prototype of how your ideal system would work does not need to be time-consuming or particularly expensive. Best of all, it could replace a long-winded and abstract specification of functions.

Using nothing but a bit of HTML, CSS and JavaScript, we can build a working prototype that can be tested with real users. Does this prototype match their workflow? Does it give them quick access to key tasks? Does it accommodate the differences between groups? Which parts of the prototype are having the biggest impact on productivity, and which are just nice to have?

We can iterate on the prototype based on user feedback until it offers the optimal experience.

With that vision in place, you can compromise intelligently.

Informed Compromise

A working prototype is a good standard by which to measure different software — much better than a specification.

Could your existing system be set up to mirror the prototype? If it can’t exactly, then which areas would you have to compromise on? Based on your user testing, are these compromises acceptable?

If your existing system cannot replicate the key functionality of the prototype, look at alternatives. Talk to other vendors and show them your prototype. Ask whether their system can replicate it, and once again, decide on areas of compromise based on user feedback.

Do you see the difference here? The experience is designed around the user, not around what the software provides. Also, if you cannot find software that meets the needs of your users, consider building a bespoke system.

Buying software off the shelf makes no sense if no one will use it or if it provides no business value. (Image source: opensourceway²)

I know what you’re thinking. This makes sense, but senior management won’t go for it. They won’t pay for a prototype or a bespoke system. Well, that depends on how you sell it.

Selling The Need For A User-Centric System

Convincing management to spend money on a prototype can be hard. It’s hard enough when a clever salesperson says that their software will solve all of the company’s problems — harder still if management has already paid for a fancy system. Nevertheless, solid business arguments can be made for this approach.

If your company has a system that is not fit for its purpose, you should be able to prove this. Collect data on how users interact with the system. Combine this with user testing and stakeholder interviews. This should be enough to establish a compelling case — at least compelling enough to justify some limited prototyping of an alternative approach.

Remember that you are not asking them to replace the system. You just want to prototype a potentially better solution and see whether the current software could be set up to match it. When managers see a better way, they will usually be open to change.

If the company does not already own a system, then your position is even stronger. Enterprise software is expensive, and so ensuring the right fit is important. Getting it wrong could mean hundreds or thousands of dollars wasted. A prototype will prove more effective than a specification at measuring the suitability of different products. It will also make it easier to compare software.

Of course, management could take the position that employees will just need to get used to what they have. This argument has some merit. Given time, users would adapt to even the most archaic of systems. But at what cost?

The Cost Of Failure

Poor user interfaces require more training and support. Both are a cost borne by the organization, not to mention the frustration it causes. Even more significant is the cost in lost productivity. Organizations are keen to maximize efficiency, and systems that are easy to use go a long way towards this.

Unfortunately, some managers seem to care little about internal processes. But they do care about customer satisfaction, which is becoming one of the most popular factors for organizations to measure. We now live in a world of consumers who are connected and have a voice through social media. That makes organizations sensitive to negative comments and experiences.

Internal systems weigh heavily on the performance of your employees. And they have a massive impact on the customer experience. These systems ensure timely responses; they help deliver the product; and they facilitate customer relationships. This is why internal systems are becoming the next big competitive advantage.

³

Are you struggling to implement an effective digital strategy? Do you need help bringing about a digital transformation? The Digital Adaptation⁴ book can help you prepare and adapt your company for the new digital landscape, and teach you everything you need to know. — Ed.

(al, il)

Footnotes

1. 1 https://www.flickr.com/photos/opensourceway/4371000486/
2. 2 https://www.flickr.com/photos/opensourceway/4504724163/
3. 3 http://www.digital-adaptation.com/
4. 4 http://www.digital-adaptation.com

The post Are Your Internal Systems Damaging Your Business? appeared first on Smashing Magazine.

Yesterday, Apple announced that the iTunes App Store had reached 1.3 million applications—increased from the 1.2 million mobile apps announced in June. Additionally, Google Play features approximately 1.36 million applications. Let’s face it, today the consumer market demands mobile. And, even if the market user of a product is not the budget holding buyer, the reality is that the majority of our corporate prospects are buying with a very different consumer in mind.

When embarking on my career in corporate sales, I would have been doomed without the guidance and bizarre perspective bestowed on me by my, at the time, mentor—a rather outrageous and seemingly chaotic individual who, lucky for me, proved to be a social selling savant of some sort. The basis of this genius advisor’s sales mantra? Dating as a metaphor for selling.

Now, you’re probably wondering how this kooky take on sales relates to the ever growing mobilization of our marketplace. And, more importantly, why are either of these matters critical to the future of your livelihood?

Critical learnings from the collision of mobile and dating below expose how sales professionals should adapt their perspective during the lead nurture stage of the sales cycle, in order to continue increasing the ROI that is gained over COA, and to finish FY14 strong with a mile high increase in your Q4 revenue win.

How Tinder just did the global sales force a major solid

Today, technology innovation is rapidly driving the evolution of business strategy in alignment with the rise of the #disrupt movement. Developers, marketers, businessmen, and sales organizations alike have all figured out that content is key for raising brand awareness and driving engagement with customers. Unfortunately, what they’re realizing is content alone is not enough to mature the deal to 100% close-won, as we’ve begun to see many sales organizations experience a huge build-up at the end of their sales funnel behind the 90% commit stage.

What’s the missing factor? CONTEXT.

Sharing marketing content drives exposure for the brand and, perhaps, helps convince the market that your value proposition is valid— but, this only wins half the battle. Content supplies the prospect with a message; however, strategic use of context is what truly equips a seller with the power to make his/her desired outcome a reality. For instance, take the example we found in Tinder.

Tinder represents a new phase in the era of, not only online dating, but also lending reality. Tinder’s own Sean Rad describes the significance of taking online-dating (or “Facebook creeping”) away from the cold blue light of one’s computer and into the pockets of its users:

‘Not only is the app free, but it tries its best to mimic the experience of perusing hotties in a bar, as opposed to surfing pictures on the web like a creep. And that’s the dream, right? To look across a crowded room and see eyes glaring back at you, silently undressing you until numbers are exchanged…, and some token of trust and monogamy has been formed.’ (“#Love: I’m Single, Therefore I Tinder”, TechCrunch)

You see, where Tinder went right was focusing on the basic user experience. Tinder desires for its users’ experience on the app to be as exciting, entertaining, and anxiously thrilling as it is to pick up a stranger in a bar. Here lies the main reason Rad and the Tinder team chose to develop an app in the first place—always on, always connected, always available.

Tinder’s example shows us, as sales leaders, the ultimate gamification strategy for increasing the rate of return on your cost of acquisition. That is, positioning the sale in a way that our, often young and inexperienced, sales force has been conditioned to recognize as the most accessible and relevant pastime today—a mobile app; instantly gratifying and always satisfying any millennial’s thirst for entertainment, attention, and, ultimately, total domination.

In Greek mythology, Charon is the ferryman who guides souls across the river Styx to the underworld. Those who do not employ his services are forced to wander the shores—lost for a hundred years.

Dealmakers who try to “go it alone” can expect to suffer a similar fate. Closing a major deal with a Fortune 2000 company is seldom straightforward. Large organizations are so complicated and diffuse that frequently even the people working there are unclear about what is required to make something of consequence happen. Without a guide, time and effort are squandered and the deal goes nowhere.

In a previous article, I wrote about the triangle of players involved in getting a major project green-lighted: Champions, Blockers, and Decision Makers. Here, I will show how to identify and win over a suitable champion—the crucial sponsor who can help you navigate the labyrinth of opinion, prestige, and politics between you and the approval of your project.

Although champions are not the ultimate decision makers, and they rarely have substantial power within their organization, they have four things that make them irreplaceable in developing and closing the deal: credibility, connections, company intelligence, and motivation.

These were all true of Charlie, a champion I met in 2004 just as the tech world was beginning to show signs of life after the dot com implosion. At the time, Charlie was an internet security specialist at IBM, and I was running business development at a company called Zone Labs.

Zone Labs was an upstart internet security software developer aspiring to disrupt established giants such as Symantec, McAfee, Check Point Software, and Cisco. It had a free consumer product that was downloaded by millions of users as well as a modestly successful premium product that sold online for $49. These assets resulted in roughly $2 million in annual revenue—not bad for a young enterprise. Yet, the real money in the space was being made selling to large IT organizations with significant security concerns. Zone Labs needed a name-brand customer.

Charlie came into our line of sight following a routine product inquiry from IBM. After a few meetings, it was clear that he was a champion who could bring Zone Labs and IBM together. He had credibility—he was a well-respected staffer and a 25-year veteran at IBM. He had connections—he had a deep understanding of how IBM functioned and he knew scores of people in the organization. He also had company intelligence. We learned through Charlie that there was a major undertaking underway at IBM to determine which security-related products they would invest in for the following year. The existing short list was comprised exclusively of large, well-established companies and their marquee products.

Credibility, connections, and company intelligence are the table stakes—they are the attributes that all suitable champions possess. So, how does a dealmaker align with someone in command of these assets and capture their interest? That’s where the fourth element comes in: motivation.

Zone needed a major name to establish its credibility in the marketplace and set it up as a viable alternative to the usual suspects. But what did Charlie need? Figuring out a champion’s motivation can be difficult, but the exercise is compulsory. Why? Because understanding human nature is a primary part of doing the deal. In many cases, it is more closely linked to getting the green light than even financing and business fundamentals.

The champions that I have known, Charlie and numerous others, have been motivated by various (but often overlapping) objectives that can be boiled down to five key words:

• Innovation. Some champions are visionary types with deep domain focus. They want to explore, experiment, and break new ground. I call these champions “the dreamers” because they are motivated by progress and exploration.
• Advantage. Other champions hope to use the deal to improve their company’s competitive position within an industry. These champions are “the lions,” because they are motivated by a desire to advance their company’s competitive position and aggressively dominate an emerging trend or market.
• Advancement. These champions strive to improve their own career prospects. As “the climbers,” they are motivated by opportunities to solidify their position within an organization or gain a lead over a rival individual or business unit.
• Respect. Many champions are seasoned professionals who feel underutilized by their organization. I call these individuals “the loyalists” because they are the heart of every company—valued for their know-how but universally under-celebrated. These champions are motivated by status: they want someone to pay attention to them and value their experience and input.
• Order. Many, many other champions simply want the numbers to work. Deeply rigorous, “the Vulcans” are motivated by logic, evidence, and proof of concept.

Like most champions, Charlie had a mix of motivations. During his lengthy career at IBM he had been consistently passed over for the big jobs (making him a loyalist). Although he knew his potential for advancement was limited, he had a deep desire to gain prestige. Charlie also cared deeply about his work and was looking to bring in new business that would offer IBM something above and beyond what the bigger security players had in-hand. He wanted to help create a competitive advantage (like a lion).

Understanding his underlying motivations, and knowing that he could help us navigate the mammoth IBM organization, we embraced Charlie as our champion. He got us on the short list (ostensibly to use us as a lever against the more established players). He identified the decision-makers and told us who the deal-blockers would be and why. And he was our inside man—delivering the details about what our competitors were doing. With his help we put together a solid story about why this little company, Zone Labs, was the future and could be trusted with a mission-critical component of a 300,000-person organization.

In this particular case, the decision-makers were a small group of IT professionals headed by Chris Matthews, the then-CIO of IBM. Matthews personally hosted regular visits from the CEOs of Cisco, Symantec, and others who lobbied for IBM’s business. We knew that, if Zone Labs prevailed, its product would need to sit on the computer of every employee next to the products of these competitors and would require additional support effort above and beyond what they were already managing.

In the end, Zone Labs beat out all the usual suspects and got a $1 million+ purchase order, plus a follow-on order for another $1 million for the next-generation of the product which, at the time, hadn’t yet been released. The company also made a strong connection with the service side of IBM, which became a major distributor of its product. Charlie earned lasting prestige within IBM and was credited with finding an unlikely yet extremely high-potential data security solution.

Champions are only one, crucial side of the deal triangle —you also have to align the deal’s blockers and the decision makers. All three must be managed with an understanding that people make decisions based on personal and professional motivations that are often hidden to the rest of the world. But once you get a champion in your corner, you’ve made a major breakthrough. You’re ready to enter the ring.

Good negotiators have the ability to recognize the negotiation style of the other party.

When a buyer comes to the negotiation in partner mode, it allows you to work collaboratively to create possibilities that expand the pie and result in the best possible agreement for both sides.

But what about when your buyer takes a different approach? What if your buyer is just trying to get the price reduced, get more from you for less, or something else altogether?

Despite the benefits of a partner-style negotiation, you need to know how to deal with positional buyer tactics when they arise.

In this infographic, we share 18 of the most common tactics a buyer might use, what they look like, and how you can be prepared for and respond to each so you can successfully negotiate with buyers on their terms.

View the infographic now.

Everywhere you turn, you’re being sold something. Literally everywhere. On your TV, smartphones, tablets, laptops, billboards, and even those crazy sign flippers on the street corners;  they are all mediums used to sell you something.

You are constantly inundated with advertising, and for many, these these advertisements seemingly fall on deaf ears. Why is that?

Do you ever mute commercials during your favorite TV show? Or quadruple tap the fast-forward button? I certainly have, and that’s okay!

But what are businesses doing to mitigate the muddling of unfocused advertising? In a day where marketers need to work twice as smart to reach their target audience, there emerges a wave of new methods for targeting specific audiences, methods that utilize existing web-based platforms, such as Facebook, Twitter, and many more.

As we approach 2015, things are a little bit different than they were in the early 2000s. People are unique and advertisers know that they have to maximize their brief opportunity to catch your eye. Online advertisements you see today are often specifically targeted to you based on your interests and activity online. Behavioral targeted advertising has proven to be highly effective.

In a 2010 report conducted by the NAI, economist Howard Beales asserts:

“Based on proprietary data provided by twelve major advertising networks, the study found that in 2009, behaviorally-targeted advertising secured an average of 2.68 times as much revenue per ad as non-targeted “run of network” advertising. The study also found that behaviorally-targeted advertising is more than twice as effective at converting users who click on the ads into buyers (6.8% conversion vs. 2.8% for run-of-network ads), and that behavioral advertising accounted for approximately 18% of advertising revenue.”

In the consumer market industry, these numbers are significant and directly translate to massive ROIs for producers.

As a producer, there is nothing more important than knowing who you are selling your product to, what catches their eye, what doesn’t, what makes them chirp, and what makes them hit that red dot at the top of their browser.

Jon Gibbs of Hugeinc.com has this to say about the personalized experience:

“Digital personalization offers users content and experiences specific to their profile, interests, habits and behaviors. When done well, personalization drives higher conversion and customer satisfaction.”

The start-up and small business industry is booming today. Unfortunately, in many ways, it’s difficult for these budding companies to be able to track analytics in the same manner as major corporations and in turn utilize those analytics to entice current and additional consumers with the same highly sophisticated, and generally expensive, campaigns and strategies.

For these small businesses, we suggest these three tips:

1. Know your Target Audience

To successfully advertise and market to your target audience you must know who they are. Decide who exactly you want to target.

• What do they do for a living?
• Where do they go?
• What do they read?
• What are they interested in?
• What websites do they frequent?
• What challenges do they have?

Understanding your target audience allows you to find them, speak their language and increases your odds of being heard.

2. Decide Which Metrics are Important to You

As an organization, determine which goals are most important to you. How will you track your progress? It’s is best to closely monitor a few key metrics, rather than analyze every possible number. Consider key metrics such as:

• Unique Visitors to your Website
• Conversion of Unique Visitors
• Average Session Duration
• Cost per Conversion

Being data-driven allows for easier, informed decisions as  you continually optimize your strategies.

3. Treat Each Potential Customer Like Gold

Your strategies will flourish if you work to achieve higher than expected conversion rates. Once you have someone’s attention, you want to stand out by being helpful and resourceful. Unlike large corporations, you want to show your leads that they are more than just a number to you. Consumers’ desire to consume inherently useful information has never been greater.

Jay Baer notes in his recent book, “Youtility“,

“There are only two ways  for companies to break through in an environment that is unprecedented in its competitiveness and cacophony. They can be ‘amazing’ or they can be useful… While amazing can work, it’s difficult to do and doesn’t produce reliable, linear results.

If you know your audience well, prove to be useful in their time of need and you closely monitor your ability to attract and convert them, your business will be able to successfully compete against sizable behavioral marketing techniques.

HubSpot’s annual report of inbound marketing and sales trends provides an overview of how companies are using inbound strategy and content marketing. The results provide interesting insight into the ongoing evolution of the modern marketing ecosystem.

The sixth annual report contains data gleaned from more than 3,500 marketing and sales professionals surveyed, to uncover what marketing strategies and tactics they are using. One of the things I found so compelling is the diverse audience composition. You might assume that a Hubspot survey would be comprised of mostly Hubspot customers, but in fact the audience was a solid mix altogether: customers and non-customers, B2B and B2C, marketing and sales, as well as company size, industry vertical and job level.

What does Hubspot mean by “inbound” marketing?

Inbound marketing, a phrase coined by Hubspot back in 2006, is defined as “a methodology that focuses on creating quality content that pulls people toward your company and product.” It’s essentially pull marketing, as opposed to push marketing (cold calling, tradeshows, purchased lists etc. or outbound marketing as Hubspot likes to call it). As a philosophy, inbound marketing shares much in common with content marketing and the report even deals with the debate (see pp. 12-13, 25). Modern marketers that neither subscribe to Hubspot nor use the “inbound marketing” vernacular will definitely find the report completely relevant and enlightening. The 54-page report contains a wealth of interesting statistics and findings, but several rise to the top as key takeaways from the research. Here are 10 key takeaways that stand out:

1. The use of inbound marketing methodologies continues to rise

The methodology and approach of inbound is rapidly picking up steam. In fact, the number of marketers who state they are practicing inbound rose from 60% last year to 85% this year, while the percentage of marketers who concede they don’t practice an inbound approach was nearly halved to 13%. I won’t get into the debate over the difference between content marketing and inbound marketing, however it’s clear that as buyers are evolving, marketers are adapting an attraction-based approach to marketing using online and social as primary channels and educational content as the magnet.

2. Budgets for inbound marketing activities are up

As more and more companies shift their budgets away from more traditional, interruption-based methods, it makes sense that inbound marketing related budgets are up for companies across the board. In fact, more than 5 times as many marketers reported higher budgets that claimed budgets had been cut this year. And the majority of B2B companies surveyed are experiencing steady or increasing budgets, with 74% reporting the same or increased budget in this year.

3. Past success greatly impacts future budgets

As you would imagine, companies that have had success investing in inbound methodologies are more likely to get more money to spend on inbound activities. According to the research, no single factor has a greater impact on increased budgets more than previous success with inbound marketing. More than 50% surveyed stated past success as the number one factor influencing a positive change in budget.

4. Inbound is becoming a primary source for lead generation

Inbound marketing continues to drive more and more leads and overtake outbound marketing as a primary source for lead generation. In 2014, half of marketers (B2B, B2C, and nonprofit) ranked inbound as their primary lead source, exceeding the average (42%) of all other channels combined. And more than twice as many respondents cited inbound (45%) as their primary source of leads versus outbound (22%). In fact, outbound marketing as a primary lead source dropped sharply in this year’s survey, from 34% down to 22%.

5. Proving ROI remains a top challenge for modern marketers

Of all the challenges that marketers cited, proving ROI was the only challenge that did not see a decrease, instead climbing to nearly 30%. Other challenges such as securing adequate budgets, managing the website and hiring the right people have all decreased over the last year. It’s understandable that proving ROI is a top concern, especially if companies have made considerable investments over the last few years, and leadership wants to see the fruits of their labor.

6. Marketers that measure ROI are seeing greater results

Interestingly, there’s a very strong correlation between simply measuring ROI and actually achieving it. Marketers that measure inbound ROI are 17 times more likely to see the same or greater ROI over the previous year than marketers that don’t. And only 53% of marketers measured ROI in 2014—a slight 3% increase over 2013. As Peter Drucker famously quipped, “if you can’t measure it, you can’t improve it,” so in order to optimize your efforts and realize higher ROI, measuring inbound activity is essential.

7. Increasing the quantity of leads is the top marketing priority

You can never have enough leads, right? Although marketers consider demonstrating ROI as their top challenge, the number one marketing priority is lead generation (24%) followed closely by lead conversion (21%). As the lines between marketing and sales continue to blur, marketing teams are under more pressure to generate leads and assist with nurturing those leads into qualified leads that can be handed off to the sales team for closing.

8. Inbound leads are consistently more knowledgeable about your company

According to the survey results, inbound-sourced leads are consistently more knowledgeable about a company prior to speaking with a sales or business development representative than leads that originate through outbound means. Research from the Corporate Executive Board Company found that today’s B2B buyers go through nearly 60% of the purchasing process before ever talking to sales. So this makes the role of content and inbound marketing efforts critical to engaging prospects before they engage you and providing the information they are searching for.

9. Blogging is the single activity most commonly associated with success

The benefits of blogging are universally known and blogs are a primary component of nearly every content marketing and online marketing program that leverages inbound methodologies. But in spite of the shear growth of blogs and content in general, blogging remains a powerhouse of inbound, generating more ROI than any other single inbound activity or tactic. According to the report, marketers who have prioritized blogging are 13 times more likely to experience positive ROI.

10. Non-profits are benefiting from inbound

While B2B seems to primarily get the inbound spotlight, non-profit organizations are seeing incredible results. Non-profits are seeing inbound (58%) is responsible for procuring nearly twice as many leads as the roll-up of all other channels (31%). And in addition to non-profits’ success using inbound for lead generation, they also outperform B2B and B2C companies in ROI growth.

There are a lot of interesting finds in the State of Inbound 2014 Report, but these 10 seem to stand out. Inbound marketing methodology (and everything associated with it) is not simply a fad or the flavor of the month; rather it’s a fundamental shift in marketing in response to today’s changing buyer. What other findings stood out to you? Download the free 54-page State of Inbound 2014 Report from Hubspot (registration required)

Above: The most active acquirers of mobile apps

Image Credit: Digi-Capital

Every year, the naysayers warn about a financial bubble in the game business. They sit on the sidelines and wait for the world to fall apart. But it still looks like they’re missing out. The game business is still on track to grow from $70 billion now to $100 billion by 2017.

Above: Digi-Capital explains game consolidation.

Image Credit: Digi-Capital

Venture investors have put about $472 million into game startups in the first half of this year, according to boutique investment bank Digi-Capital. But exits are already running past $10 billion so far this year, thanks to the most recent $960 million acquisition of the social game assets of FunPlus. That’s already more than double the number of acquisition dollars in 2013. Most of the buyers are Asian game companies acquiring players in other territories, but the biggest deal here reflected a tech titan moving into gaming: Amazon’s $970 million purchase of gameplay livestreaming firm Twitch. With big companies like game engine and services firm Unity Technologies up for sale, it’s easy to see how the record year could get even bigger.

In 2009, the average deal value was $42 million for an investment in a game startup. By the first half of 2014, it was $84 million, up 98.9 percent over five years, according to merger and acquisition advisory firm The Corum Group. Why is this happening?

We’ll find out as we discuss Total World Domination. That’s our theme for GamesBeat 2014 conference that takes place Monday and Tuesday in San Francisco. We’re trying to get all the right people in the room — the movers and the shakers who are creating the earthquakes in gaming. We’re trying to build an event where you can meet these people who want to dominate the world.

Competition in consoles was pretty limited to a few territories, and games made for one market didn’t fare well in other territories. That’s not the case with mobile, as iOS and Android have spread the world over and given even the smallest indie gamer the chance to reach a billion players. The opportunity to seize a global audience has created a race.

Game companies have been under a lot of stress in recent years. The older traditional firms like Electronic Arts and Activision Blizzard had to make the leap to digital. They had to figure out how to make free-to-play games to become relevant in emerging markets where $60 titles aren’t. Companies that were successful in one market had to dip their toes in another to see how they could thrive. In 2012, we called this the Crossover Era. As this trend accelerated in 2013, we chose The Battle Royal as our theme. Disruption was the order of the day.

Above: Corum Group’s game deals

Image Credit: Corum Group

Now the growth of the mobile game market is accelerating, and the major players of this era are coming into focus. Google and Amazon fought over Twitch. SoftBank has invested a few billion dollars in game companies such as Supercell and GungHo Entertainment. EA and Activision Blizzard are no longer the biggest kids on the block, as Tencent, which bought majority stakes in Western companies Riot Games and Epic Games, is now the world’s biggest game company. But Tencent has to be looking over its shoulder at Chinese e-commerce vendor Alibaba, which is about to have the biggest initial public offering in history and has made big game-related investments in Tango and Kabam.

They’re all jockeying to be in the right position so they can grab the big prize, and a lot of these people will be at our event. If I see any of them talking together at lunch, maybe they’ll be plotting an acquisition. Among the speakers at our event: Andrew Wilson, CEO of Electronic Arts; Bob Meese, head of business development for Google Play; Mike Frazzini, vice president of games at Amazon; David Helgason, CEO of Unity Technologies; Owen Mahoney, CEO of Nexon; Dan Brody, vice president of business development at Tencent; and Peter Molyneux, CEO of 22cans.

The prize that they’re all competing for in the game industry isn’t just the money in games. With transmedia, it includes game brands that could grow up in mobile (think Angry Birds) and spread into other media. Skylanders has enabled Activision Blizzard to become a huge toy company. Disney and Nintendo are chasing it with their own toy-game hybrids. Movie tie-ins, which were once the magnet for poor quality, are back in good stead as companies like Kabam show the value of film franchises like The Hobbit. Lionsgate, having seen the success of movie-related mobile games, has Kabam working on titles based on The Hunger Games film and book franchise.

Halo is a nice case in point for how to make a trillion dollars in games. Microsoft launched Bungie’s sci-fi first-person shooter game in 2001, and it has sold more than 50 million copies at $60 each. That’s maybe $3 billion in retail revenues. Microsoft ventured into Halo toys a while ago, and it is now making Halo TV shows and a web series. The Halo movie may yet come about if those video series are successful. Eventually, that’s going to add up to a lot of Halo dollars, all inspired by a game. If you dominate games, you may dominate entertainment. Or so the thinking goes. Halo may still have something like $997 billion to go in its quest for a trillion. But it’s a good start. Take-Two Interactive and Rockstar Games might have a similar opportunity with Grand Theft Auto.

Game companies are colliding with entertainment companies in a race to build the dominant medium. Indies like Mojang want to strike a blow for free thinking, creativity, and diversity of content. The Swedish company, run by the eccentric indie Markus “Notch” Persson, has unlocked a giant creator economy with its Lego-like Minecraft game. But will Mojang, which is rumored to be in the process of being bought by Microsoft for $2 billion, have its price? If Mojang gets bought. Someone else will come stand for the indies. Maybe it will be one of our best game startup contest finalists.

Above: Apple Watch

Image Credit: Dean Takahashi/VentureBeat

Among the platform owners, nobody wants to be checkmated. Apple’s smartphones checkmated the watch business, and now that we use our smartphones to get the time instead of watches, Apple is now bringing the watch market back with its Apple Watch product. That could create a whole new layered ecosystem of watches, apps, and, yes, games. In that process, Apple is the one calling the shots, trying to stay one step ahead of rival platform owners. If Apple checkmates someone else, the odds that we’ll all be working for Apple increase.

But the creators of content always have their say in controlling their destinies. They migrate to platforms where they can find freedom and growth. Zynga thought it found that platform with Facebook. But then King one-upped Zynga with Candy Crush Saga on mobile. The stock market hoped that these two companies would carry the industry — and investors — to greater riches. But they’ve stalled a bit.

Still, you can see the potential. In the larger mobile Internet market, there are 25 companies with $1 billion in value. Those companies are expected to drive the mobile Internet industry’s revenues to $700 billion in three years. Why can’t something similar happen in games, since games are the most engaging apps on mobile devices? After all, many of those mobile Internet leaders are companies like Microsoft, Amazon, and Google. All of them have become game companies.

And there are so many companies with billion-dollar games, like Machine Zone, Supercell, GungHo, Gumi, and King. They’re like one-hit wonders, or maybe three-hit wonders, for now. But they may get lucky and churn out a whole string of hits. If they do, they will become the companies with multibilion-dollar valuations in gaming (if they’re not already there). Venture capitalists like Mitch Lasky of Benchmark, Tim Chang of Mayfield, Rick Thompson of Signia Venture Partners, and Phil Sanderson of IDG Ventures are always plotting how to fuel game startups that can take advantage of or unravel the monopolistic desires of the platform owners.

If we’re going to have a trillion-dollar game industry, it’s going to take a beautiful ecosystem, filled with things like Apple Pay, which makes it easy to buy games or buy stuff in games. But the ecosystem has to be open enough to permit real competition. Platform owners can enable a wonderful world of revenues, but they can’t get too greedy and drive publishers and developers away. They shouldn’t charge 30 percent fees just for holding the door open. Valve, the maker of Half-Life and the digital game distribution platform Steam, is cognizant of the risks of being beholden to a platform holder, and that’s why it is scrambling to create its own Steam Machines gaming platform.

The next-generation consoles like the PlayStation 4 and the Xbox One are contenders to be the enabling ecosystems. But there’s going to be so much more than that as Total World Domination plays out in the coming years. The Chinese companies that enable Western game developers to publish their games on the many app stores in China could be the ones holding the door open to a trillion dollars. The smartphone and tablet platforms could open the door to wearables, which in turn could open more doors for games. Virtual reality might be the platform that triggers another explosion in gaming.

That’s the thing I like about games now, even though I have covered them for 18 years. There’s so many open doors. We hope you come to our conference and use them.

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GamesBeat 2014 — VentureBeat’s sixth annual event on disruption in the video game market — is coming up on Sept 15-16 in San Francisco. Tickets are limited!

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Most digital marketers agree that landing pages can make or break any campaign, be it PPC, social media, email, or display ads. Once you get people to click, the landing page has to convince your visitor to complete the conversion.

To assist in the goal of landing page success, a number of software platforms exist to help marketers test landing page elements. Visuals, calls-to-action (CTAs), layouts, offers, buttons, and many more elements can be tested. Software can help you conduct A/B tests and create new landing pages on the fly. Just a tweak with the placement of a key visual element might lead to a significant increase in landing page performance.

Unfortunately, when it comes to the actual words on the landing page, marketers tend to rush the process, going with a combination of gut feelings, past campaigns, and cursory competitive reviews to piece together landing page copy. This method leads to costly mistakes and wasted time until the “right” message gets discovered through trial and error.

Despite all the conveniences afforded users with software and testing, they all overlook what accounts for the absolute biggest factor in landing page success: the words on the page. And some of the most successful landing page copy comes directly from customers. It’s not creative writing—it’s sales writing.

This guide will show you how to improve your landing page copy and ensure your messages are on point using the “Voice of the Customer” process. Market research methods and voice-of-customer (VOC) data are positioned as the most effective means to find, not create, the right words to use on landing pages to increase conversions.

What Is Voice of the Customer?

Voice of customer analysis, also known as VOC, is a market research technique that focuses on customers’ (and prospects’) wants and needs, then prioritizes them into a hierarchical structure before prioritizing them in terms of relative importance and satisfaction with current alternatives. VOC is a way to describe your customers’ experiences with and expectations for your products or services.

Voice of the customer is actionable data that includes a target market’s desires, pain points, preferences, expectations, and aversions. Once VOC data has been captured (via methods I’ll explain a bit later), it can then be used to create landing page copy, sometimes using the exact words that come from prospects and customers during voice of customer research.

As technical as VOC sounds, it can be distilled down to basic questions and answers with prospects and customers, and simply listening to the various conversations occurring online and offline.

The messages on the landing page below, from FreshBooks, comes from knowing what their customers’ pain points are. It’s simple to deduce that their research shows the target market, who are small business owners:

1) views billing as painful,

2) sees accounting as challenging,

3) needs access from anywhere, and

4) doesn’t want to waste time with billing.

This type of actionable insight is gleaned from VOC research, and it makes landing page messages highly impactful for the target audience. It also separates the ho-hum landing page from the home run landing page.

A great copywriter can use emotional appeal, action verbs, and power words to make a message feel compelling, at least to other marketers, but the question remains: Is this how the target audience feels? Companies know the features and benefits of their products inside and out, but do those benefits match what the target audience desires?

Existing Approaches to Landing Page Copy And Their Flaws

Landing page design, aesthetics, and user experience are all important, but they’re at-a-glance components. The serious visitor—the target audience marketers want to convert—will read the words on the page, and if that copy misses the mark, a potential sale just left the website.

1. Guessing: Trying a variety of random messages to see what works. As advertising great Claude Hopkins wrote in Scientific Advertising in 1923, “Guesswork is very expensive.” Sure, the right message may be found eventually but not before a lot of money has been spent and time gone by.
2. Borrowing from competitors: Not flat-out stealing, but making a landing page just slightly different from the competition’s, under the assumption they know what they’re doing. But what if their assumptions are wrong? Then you’re also starting off with the wrong message.
3. Recycling messages: Using tired, cliché messages that make vague promises to no one, e.g., “World-class software solutions for changing times.” Nonsense cliché messages are signs of laziness and only lead to boredom—and who wants to buy a service or product from a lazy, boring company? It’s anyone’s guess what this software does in these changing times.

The point of marketing is to solve a specific problem for a customer. To do this, the first requirement is to understand the pain or problem the prospect has, then tell them how the product or service in question remedies the problem, in the customer’s voice.

Closing The Gap Between Target Audience And Message

The ideal solution for the landing page copy problem would be a software product that runs an algorithm to tell marketers exactly which words to use – or just writes it for them. Unfortunately, no one’s created that (yet), though it could be in the works in Silicon Valley.

The only way to know what customers want, to know what their true pains are and what the ideal solution would be, is to ask them or observe them. Armed with this knowledge, marketers can create landing page copy that positions their product or service as the exact solution the prospect needs.

How to Conduct Voice of Customer Research

Some research methods, such as surveys and interviews, require detailed planning, while others require nothing more than structured eavesdropping. The more research conducted, the better, but for landing page copy most marketers need only use a few of these options. Depending on the project, marketers may employ all the methods or just a few.

It’s best to aggregate all the research sources into a final report for future use. It can also serve as a creative brief for future projects—until the market or the product, service, or company changes.

For all the methods below, except surveys and interviews, a simple document or spreadsheet, like this, should suffice to capture and communicate your VOC findings:

Example tracker

But as the voice of customer process evolves, it can become more sophisticated. The key thing is to use the same format for all research so combining it all at the end goes smoothly.

Whatever research method you choose, keep track of your findings and look for:

• common phrases
• the particular pains that your customers and prospects experience
• what people want or expect in your product or service

…to name just a few.

Research sources for customer insights

Internal company sources

Internal sources such as customer service and sales reps, who have front-line experience with prospects and customers, serve as excellent sources of voice of customer information. They have phone calls, email exchanges, and even online chats with the target audience to pull from. Volumes of specific feedback, including complaints and praise, reside with these internal sources.

Voice of customer surveys

Formal surveys can be done either on the company website or via email. Fortunately, survey companies have all the tools to assist in the creation and execution of surveys. Among the best known are Survey Monkey, where practically any type of survey can be created, and Qualaroo for on-site surveys, which appear directly on websites and typically ask one or two questions.

For surveys it’s best to put extra thought into the types of questions to ask of both prospects and customers. The main point is to ask questions that will produce actionable answers. In other words, ask questions that have answers that can be used in creating your landing page copy.

Here are some sample voice of customer questions to ask in a survey and create the types of sound bites that prove useful in crafting copy for landing pages:

• Why did you choose our solution?
• What’s most important in your product or service search? Price, quality, etc.
• Why haven’t you solved this problem or pain point yet?
• What work title best describes your job?
• What do you dislike about the options available in the market now?
• How does our product or solution make your life easier (i.e., fix the pain)?
• What adjectives would you describe our product or service?
• What would make our product or service better?

Customer interviews

Interviews reveal how customers feel about a product, service, or company overall. Some of the best quotes and sound bites come from this source. In fact, this source often provides compelling social proof to be used in a landing page’s testimonials section. They can even be used as headlines or subheads.

Claude Hopkins wrote, “The advertising man [or woman] studies the consumer.…They learn what possible buyers want and the factors which don’t appeal. It is quite customary to interview hundreds of possible customers.”

Focus groups

Focus groups still carry some weight, though the internet has diminished their use in many industries. Still, real one-on-one interaction with prospects and customers using a product can prove to be a goldmine. Unfortunately, these can be costly and probably aren’t feasible for small businesses.

Online forums

Forums exist for virtually every product or service in existence, and they are a treasure trove of customer feedback. Marketers can find community-based forums where the conversations flow freely about specific topics or whole industries and their participants. Company-sponsored forums focused on the company’s existing products and services keep the conversation focused.

A search for “smartphone forums,” for example, shows 23,000 results—and that’s where people are sharing their thoughts, feelings, and experiences in abundance.

Review sites

Reviews on Amazon and other review sites like Yelp and Angie’s List contain specific reviews about products and services that can be used to inform your landing pages. In the case of Yelp and Angie’s List, those reviews are usually at the local level, giving marketers a good view of the local market. Review sites are also valuable for getting insights on how a target market feels in general about an entire industry.

Question and answer sites

Q&A sites such as Quora and Yahoo Answers have engagement for a variety of questions, from the simple “How do I pick an accountant?” to “What is the best e-commerce platform in the world?” Quora tends to have higher-quality answers from people who work in the particular industries, so it may be more valuable for some industries than standard review sites.

Blog comments

Blog comments have been maligned by internet marketers as dumping grounds for spam links. In fact, some sites have chosen to remove comments and move the conversation to social media. However, for high-traffic sites with popular topics, it’s not uncommon to see hundreds of comments from a target market. This is a front-row seat to how people feel and think. However, much like forums, blog comments can be filled with unhelpful comments from people who don’t add much insight to a topic. It can take some digging to find the gold.

Social media

Social media offers a glut of opinion and feelings, but sentiment analysis tools can shorten the time needed to find what a target audience is saying. Marketers can join the conversation or eavesdrop on what’s being said. A company’s own social media channels can serve as optimal places to gauge customer sentiment. On the downside, social media can lack depth, leaning more toward short comments that don’t reveal much detail.

Example of sentiment analysis research from Datameer

Search engine research

Search continues to be a fast path to find out what target markets think and feel. Odds are good that someone has written a piece that has the information you need to understand the market. Marketers can search “what to look for in XYZ product or service” and read an article (or report or industry website) from a trustworthy expert in the field—and it’s safe to assume the marketer’s target audience of prospects have read some of the same information during their own research, which means the landing page should address the exact same points brought forth in the article, report, or website.

Competitor messaging

Your competitors’ content and landing pages should be reviewed and catalogued to potentially learn from what they know about the market already. But relying solely on competitors, who may not have done any research themselves, can be risky, because they may just be guessing at what’s important to the target market.

This isn’t an exhaustive list of all the research channels available; however, it should get you started on where and how to conduct primary and secondary voice of customer research.

How to Organize and Analyze Your VOC Research

After the research phase is complete, the analysis begins to create a hierarchy of needs that’s prioritized by customers. Depending on the products or services, multiple customer profiles may emerge, each with different priorities.

For example, a web hosting company may find that small businesses are most concerned with price, while its enterprise customers are more concerned with security. That analysis might look something like this:

Should the VOC Match the USP?

Ideally a company’s voice of customer data and USP match. The USP (unique selling proposition) is the number one reason people pick a solution or service from a company, so it should match what customers say in the VOC research. It’s vital to test and reformulate a USP if it doesn’t match your customer’s needs and wants. For example, if price doesn’t matter to a target market, a company shouldn’t use price as its USP.

Part of the USP is the promise it makes to the target market, and voice of customer data can reveal what that promise should be. Of course, the delivery of that promise is paramount—and companies should avoid promising something they can’t deliver on.

Final steps: Putting Voice of the Customer Research into Words

VOC data will drive the creation of:

• headlines
• subheads
• bullet points
• CTAs
• testimonials

And other copy on the landing page. Each written element of the landing page should be traceable back to the research. The question shouldn’t be, how do these words sound to the marketer? Instead it should be, how do they sound to the target audience? Do they address the prospect’s pain points and show how your solution or service will alleviate the pain?

It’s important to clarify that a company might have several types of customers, each with a different hierarchy of needs, therefore the landing page copy will differ for each offer and customer segment.

For a company’s homepage, it’s nearly impossible to create a message targeted at every conceivable visitor, so the best approach is to choose messaging that targets the most important prospect or customer segment.

Examples of research copy placement on landing pages:

• The product or service’s features and benefits (primarily the benefits) should match the target audience’s pain points from the research that was conducted. See the FreshBooks example from before.
• Answer the “Is this solution right for me?” question by stating explicitly who the solution is for. Landing pages are no place for implying anything, and, again, visitors will read everything that’s targeted to them. The best way to do this is to use the intended audience’s title: “Project management software for freelance graphic artists.”
• Repurpose a customer quote as a subheading: “ABC Plumbing truly does go the extra mile. –John Q. Customer”

Despite the mountains of research a company may produce, awesome landing pages still require testing on an ongoing basis. Though it seems the research should be a one-and-done exercise, a good marketer knows the work is never finished and everything must be tested regularly because markets, needs, and wants change over time.

Download this guide as a free PDF.

Have you ever noticed that some tasks can be intimidating, but if you have a step-by-step, proven process, and you practice the task, the fear goes away and the tasks become easy? Well, cold calling is one of those tasks that many people fear. However, it’s still a powerful way of building business. So, rather than make excuses not to do it, find out how to do it well and practice your cold call techniques until you’re confident. Below are some tips to help build your confidence and your success rates.

• Prepare Obsessively

“Success depends upon previous preparation, and without such preparation there is sure to be failure.”—Confucius

To conduct a successful cold call, you must first break the ice, and this takes preparation. It starts with researching the customer or prospect you’re calling, including their industry and market. This investigation helps you to assess their potential problems and determine how you might be able to help them with your product or service.

After the initial research, you should prepare a brief introduction of your company, in terms of how it can help person you’re calling. Also, create some questions that enable you to assess the prospect’s situation, problems and the implications of the issues they’re facing.

• Open the Call Conversationally

You’re a real person calling another real person. So, you don’t want your opening to sound like a robocall. Starting with a simple “Good morning Mr. Brown. How are you?” makes for a relaxed opening.

• Get Attention

Let’s face it, there are often remarkable similarities between your company’s and your competitors’ offerings. So how do you differentiate your company and get attention? Statistics and storytelling are key to engagement and credibility. Provide the facts about problems your company has solved. It can surprise your audience, incite curiosity and spur conversation, especially if you use a story closely related to the problem your prospect faces.

So, know your company’s case studies inside out so you can naturally weave them into the conversation. However, while you do this, make sure you tailor the stories you tell to your prospect’s needs.

• Set a Clear Goal

Goals are your landmarks on the roadmap to success. If you know the landmarks along the way, you’re much more likely to reach your destination. So, set a realistic goal for your call and make sure the focus is on helping the prospect. For example, make it a goal to learn about your prospect’s problems and develop a plan for the next step in helping them to solve the issues they’re facing. This step might be sending them a white paper and following up with a scheduled phone call. If you approach your goals in this prospect-friendly way, you’re more likely to be successful in the long term than if you focus on sales alone.

• Ask Questions

To solve a problem, you have to ask questions that enable you to define the issue and determine the best approach. For example, as a company that offers lead generation services, we want to understand the difficulties our prospects have with generating leads. We might ask:

• Are you generating enough leads to meet your sale force’s needs?
• Are your sales people happy with the quality of your leads?
• Do you currently have a lead nurturing program? If not, do you feel leads that are not ready to buy yet are being well utilized?

If you aim your questions at helping the prospect and developing a solution, you will find it easier to develop a relationship with them that could eventually lead to a sale.

• Move the Sales Process Forward

For most of the sales people, moving the sales process to the next phase of the sale is difficult. Again, since it’s all about the prospect, you can’t be pushy about the next steps. But since you’ve already outlined the problem and have the prospect’s attention, you can now move seamlessly into the solution. Clearly state the benefits of solving the problem, and how your product or solution can help. In other words, you’re demonstrating how the solution is crucial to your prospect’s job.

Once he understands that you’re helping to make him and his business more successful, ask which day and time are best for your next teleconference or for a salesperson to meet with him.

How Networking Can Increase Your Sales and Help Your SEO written by Guest Post read more at Small Business Marketing Blog from Duct Tape Marketing

It’s guest post day here at Duct Tape Marketing and today’s guest post is from Samantha Pena – Enjoy! 

photo credit: Thinkstock

You know the saying, “It’s not what you know but who you know”? Although your skills and dedication play a large part in starting your business, your chances of success rise when you know the right people.

Networking is one of the most valuable business tactics in growing your business, because it gives you the opportunity to learn from others and to tell them about your business in return. Consequently, networking can expand the reach of your business, boost your website’s search rankings, and increase your customer referrals. Here’s how:

Collaboration with industry experts increases your brand exposure

Networking gives you the chance to not only discuss your business with professionals but to also offer them something of value, whether that is your help, your service, or your knowledge.

When you meet others whom you think might be a great resource for your business, offer to partner with them on a project that is mutually beneficial to both of you. Although the type of partnership you create will largely depend on your business and your goals, there are so many collaboration opportunities available in real life and in the digital world.

Offering to speak at one of their events or collaborate with them on a white paper gives you the opportunity to showcase your industry expertise while tapping into and connecting with their existing network. Cross-business collaboration is thus a great way to gain greater publicity for your business without coming across as overtly promotional.

Trustworthy referrals influence consumers’ purchasing decision

In an age when reviews are readily accessible on the Internet and the market is inundated by similar products and services, businesses rely on positive referrals to gain new customers. In fact, statistics show that 65 percent of new customers come from referrals, primarily because people gather other people’s opinion before determining whether they should purchase a product.

Therefore, in order to boost your brand trust and increase your referrals, you must establish excellent business partnerships. For example, ask a business connection if they’d be interested in setting up a barter program with you, in which you’ll do work for them and refer new clients to their business and vice versa. Although you’ll be doing some work for free, the high-quality leads that you’ll receive from the partnership will override any monetary loss you may have.

In addition, maintain positive relationships with your loyal customers by offering them referral incentives. Offer a reward or a discount if they refer your business to a friend. A compelling reward and a clear and easy call-to-action will encourage customers to recommend your business to their contacts, increasing your network, brand reach, and leads.

Digital networking encourages brand trust

Building a network between your business, your customers, and experts in your field not only builds up your brand’s credibility but also boosts your SEO efforts. The best way to do this is to create connections with important bloggers and to network with your customers on social media.

In the last year, consumer confidence in social media as a trustworthy source of information increased +75 percent. Therefore, instead of advertising, which don’t work anyway, network on social media. When you connect with consumers on a personal level, you not only gather valuable insight on your their needs and wants but you also earn their trust. In addition, many experts say that there is a correlation between social media and SEO in link opportunity and search volume increase, which is an additional perk of using social media.

You also don’t have to network with just business owners. Sometimes, establishing a connection with thought leaders and influencers in your industry who are willing to write about your product or service and link back to your site is useful in increasing your brand exposure and building up your backlink profile. Especially since SEO and PR are becoming more integrated, it is important to get featured on authoritative sites in order to boost your site ranking.

Networking is a powerful strategy earning you high-quality leads, more customers, and brand trust. Therefore, view every moment as a potential networking opportunity and watch your business grow.

Samantha Pena is a Content Strategist for Hudson Horizons, a digital agency that offers Web design, development, and marketing for small to mid-sized businesses. In addition to her weekly posts on Hudson, she also writes for various notable digital marketing sites on social media marketing and SEO. You can read her latest posts on Google+.

They say that less is more—and when it comes to your company’s homepage, that can often be the case. The front page of your website establishes the first impression that most clients and potential clients will have of your brand. It ultimately determines whether your leads become sales, your visitors turn into paying customers—or whether they simply navigate off the page and forget about you altogether, unimpressed by what they saw. As such, it’s important to have content on your home page that helps your brand to shine. At the same time, it’s important to delete anything that diminishes your brand’s appeal.

The Grammar Chic team visits an awful lot of business websites, and many of them are quite good—but some have elements that are likely doing more harm than good. Three of these damaging elements are especially common—and if any of them currently mar your own business website, then we recommend you ditch them immediately.

1. Your life story.

We say this frequently, but it’s most assuredly pertinent here: The content on your website really isn’t about you. Not even the content on your About Us page. No, the content on your website should be all about the reader, and what benefits he or she derives from doing business with you. When John Smith visits your business website, he should come away from it with a good sense of what’s in it for him to pick up the phone and call you, or click over to your e-store to order a product. He should be able to envision himself benefitting from your company’s offerings.

Yet, far too many businesses use their home page to outline their entire history, or to provide a personal narrative from the business owner. These things can have their place on the About Us page, perhaps, but your homepage needs to be quick, to the point, and value-focused. You only have a few seconds to form that positive first impression, so focus on consumer benefits.

2. Buzzwords.

We’ve written about this before, as well, but meaningless marketing buzzwords can really turn off your readers. Your company website should have a voice of its own, communicating whatever it is that makes your business special. Clichés and jargon are only going to detract from that.

3. Prices.

There is an ongoing debate about whether it’s smart to have all your pricing online, and we’re not saying it doesn’t have its place. Many companies do benefit from having pricing online. It doesn’t always work out well to have it on your homepage, though. It can be a turnoff to some, who might otherwise have dug deeper into your site to learn more about the company. If you do choose to include pricing, put it somewhere other than the homepage.

Five Selling Mistakes that Cost You Marketing Dollars written by Guest Post read more at Small Business Marketing Blog from Duct Tape Marketing

It’s guest post day here at Duct Tape Marketing and today’s guest post is from Mike Montague– Enjoy!

Most businesses these days seem to take a sales or marketing approach to business development instead of a sales AND marketing approach. These common mistakes in sales can cost you marketing dollars and a lot of revenue from potential sales. If you are looking for a better return on your marketing budget, you might try looking at your sales department.

You don’t tightly target your prospects.

When business is slow, the temptation to tell your story to whomever will listen is great.  Instead, be choosy about the people to whom you “tell your story.”  Use your existing customer base to identify the characteristics of your best customers.  With that information, have the sales and marketing departments sit down together and develop a profile of your “ideal” customer.  Then, search out prospects that most closely fit the profile.  You may meet with fewer people, but you’ll close more sales.

You’re not sufficiently selective about the prospects with whom you meet.

Expressing an “interest” in your product or service is not a strong enough reason to schedule an appointment with a potential prospect. If prospects’ “interests” aren’t backed by recognized needs or desires for your product or service – now or in the immediate future – then there’s no compelling reasons to meet with them.  Find out why prospects are interested and what trigger event sparked their interest before you schedule sales appointments.  Use the marketing department to score the leads and nurture them until they are “sales ready”.

You neither establish credibility nor demonstrate expertise.

In sales, your job is to help the prospect view their situation from different perspectives and discover elements or aspects of their challenges they didn’t previously recognize.  And most importantly, you can’t just tell them! Prospects can get information from your marketing, but you must be able to ask questions in such a manner as to help prospects make those “discoveries” through a conversation.  Here’s an example:

When you asked your production manager to measure the injection pressure differential between the beginning and end of the production cycle and to what extent it contributed to the casting inconsistencies, what did he report?

Educating your prospects through intelligent questions demonstrates your understanding of their problems and allows the prospect to discover your expertise. It is perhaps the single most important skill to master in modern selling.

You don’t ask “tough” questions.

To be valuable as a salesperson, you must be able to identify elements at the center of controversies, uncover root causes of problems, discover carefully guarded information, and obtain rarely volunteered commitments.  You won’t be able to accomplish any of those tasks without asking tough questions. Again, marketing materials can explain features and benefits, but only great salespeople can ask and answer tough questions.

You rush to make presentations.

Many salespeople are too eager to make presentations.  They view them as opportunities to establish the value of their products or services by demonstrating their unique aspects. However, the real purpose of presentations is to confirm your ability to deliver the solutions prospects are predisposed to buy.

Until you know what and why you are presenting, you should refrain from making presentations.  Don’t cool off your lead from the marketing department by presenting information they don’t care about, instead heat it up by discussing the prospect’s situation and understanding why they are considering your help.

Make the most of your marketing and sales opportunities!

If both departments work together, the harmony can take your organization to the next level. Marketing can become sales enablement specialists who create and nurture leads, and then escort them over to sales at the perfect time. The sales team can relax and become closing conversation masters that bring the expertise of a trusted advisor to remove road blocks for prospects. Both departments can work together to create an environment that allows the customer to buy and enjoy doing so!

These five mistakes are just some of the ways selling mistakes hurt your marketing. If you can think of others, please share them in the comments below.

This is a guest blog by Mike Montague, Associate and Certified Trainer at Sandler Training Kansas City. Sandler Training empowers their clients to achieve higher levels of success through innovative training courses in sales, management, and customer service for companies and individuals around the Kansas City area. They offer public and private courses for individuals and organizations who value lifelong learning and continuous improvement.

Traditional marketing is not dead!  People watch television (although commercials seem to be dominated by cell phone service providers, automobile manufacturers and insurance companies). People still listen to the radio and read magazines. Some see the ads in the few newspapers still in print.  Direct mail and brochures are successful for some companies.

However, more and more, we are living in a digital world.  We “tape” shows on DVR’s and skip through the commercials; we get our news from on-line newspapers and magazines; we visit websites and Social Media Pages to learn about companies and products we are interested in.

Consider this: Avon, Mary Kay and Fuller Brush all started as companies relying on personal selling through large sales forces. Today, all of these companies have websites; May Kay and Avon both have a strong presence on Social Media.

The reality is that whether you provide a local, personalized service or sell products nationally, in today’s marketplace Digital Media Marketing must be part of your plan.

Here are four indispensable digital marketing tools that every company needs to consider:

1. Website.  $1.1 trillion of all retail sales in 2011 were “web-influenced.” (Source: Forrester Research) Just having a website is no longer enough. Websites have to be attractive to both search engines and human viewers. Websites must open quickly, have useful content and have an intuitive navigation system. Finally, they must translate well to mobile devices. 48% of users say that if they arrive on a business site that isn’t working well on mobile, they take it as an indication of the business simply not caring. (Source: MarginMedia). As website users become more attuned to what a good website looks like and how it functions, companies that try a DIY approach may be losing customers – and money.

2. Social Media.  71% of Consumers are more likely to make a purchase based on Social Media Referrals. (Forbes)  Social Media platforms have become the premier places for word of mouth advertising. They are virtual referral and leads groups. These sites are where people hang out, find out about new products and services, read reviews and get referrals from their friends. They are where people decide whether a company is worth doing business with.  Add to this that Facebook, Twitter and Google Plus are all indexed on search engines (Google Plus posts often appear before websites for company searches on the Internet) and you will understand how important having a professional, who understands how to get the most out of these sites, handle your Social Media is for your overall success.

3. Blog.  61% of online consumers have made a purchase based on recommendations from a blog. (Source: BlogHer)  Blogging is one of the most important things you can do to give your business visibility on search engines. Each blog becomes an indexed web page, which could give you Page 1 Google results for your key words.  It also establishes you as a thought leader, builds relationships with consumers, enhances your brand and builds credibility.  Blogs can give you a vehicle for communicating with your customers, your employees and the general public. A good blog can become the online equivalent of print, TV and radio advertising, reaching a targeted audience far more economically than other media choices.  Every blog post is a long-term investment that will remain in “cyberspace” and continue to promote your products and services.

4. Email.  Email marketing has an ROI of 4,300% (Direct Marketing Association).  Whether  email addresses are collected via your website, Social Media forms or by personally collecting business cards at tradeshows or networking events,  opt-in email marketing is a great way to promote products, services and events to an interested audience. Email can be used as an interactive connection to nurture customer relationships.  Email marketing campaigns can be executed quickly and economically; are more cost-effective than traditional direct mail or banner ads; and can be easily measured (opens, click throughs, etc.)  This gives marketers the opportunity to adjust strategies to improve future results.

Finally, measuring results is an important part of the marketing function in deciding what is working and what isn’t on each of the platforms. Understanding the ROI of each marketing tactic is important to the overall health of any business. However, it is important to consider each of these functions as interwoven into the larger marketing picture. Measuring the overall success of your company – in terms of new customers, added revenue and overall customer satisfaction – might be the most important element to consider.

 “Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted.”  (Einstein)

Also, keep in mind that change is inevitable. What works today may not work tomorrow. Staying ahead of the curve by gauging customer response, adjusting to new features of existing platforms and evaluating new platforms as they become available are all important marketing activities as the “playing field” seems to shift and change almost daily.

Writing a resume can be a daunting task. And if you're changing careers or industries, it's even more challenging.

"When you're attempting to change careers, you're often going up against many other candidates who possess a more traditional (and regularly accepted) work history for the role or industry you're targeting," says Amanda Augustine, a career expert at TheLadders, an online job-matching service for professionals. "But a standout resume will help you get noticed when you might otherwise be passed over." 

In order to create an eye-catching resume that'll help you stand out from the competition, you'll have to look at all your experience and accolades in a different light, she says. "You must evaluate your experience, education, and professional development and skills to determine what's considered important for your new career, and then you'll have to re-position or re-brand yourself." 

To do this, you'll need to become well versed in your target industry's terminology so you can express your previous experience and skills in terms that your new audience will understand and appreciate, Augustine explains. "That can take a lot of effort on the part of the job seeker; it may even require you to speak with people who work in your target field — which you should be doing anyway — to learn which of your skills are transferable and most prized."

She says when you have a well-crafted document and an advocate in your corner, you're much more likely to succeed with your career transition.

To get a clearer picture of what makes a resume stand out, we asked Augustine to create a sample of an excellent one for a professional changing careers. 

While your resume may look different depending on the job or industry you're targeting, the one below from someone hoping to transition from HR to sales should serve as a useful guide:

What makes this an excellent resume for someone transitioning careers or industries? Augustine outlines the following reasons:

1. The job seeker's new career objective is clear. 

If you want to change careers, it's best to have your new job goal well-defined, as this will dictate how you reposition your experience and which qualifications you decide to highlight in your new resume, Augustine says. 

2. This resume focuses on the skills, achievements, and qualifications that are most relevant to the job seeker's new career track. 

"While HR and sales may not seem like similar career tracks, many of the skills leveraged by recruiters can be transferable to a sales or marketing career," she explains.

It's important to identify which of your skill sets are valuable to another field, and in what capacity. "I can rattle off a list of common skills that are easily transferable to a variety industries and functions — problem-solving, strategic thinking, strong written or oral communication, people management, innovation, negotiation, etc. — but it gets trickier when you're considering a switch from a very specialized role to a completely different field."

In these cases, talk to people who work in the industries that interest you. Once they have a good understanding of your background and strengths, they'll be able to provide insight into which roles in their field might be relevant to you.

3. This resume sells what the job seeker has to offer. 

"Hazel" is a technical recruiter seeking a position selling recruiting software to corporations, so her extensive knowledge of the recruitment process and her experience using and training others on various social recruiting platforms and applicant tracking systems work is emphasized in her professional summary and highlighted throughout the rest of her resume.

4. The job seeker's experience is repackaged into terms that her target prospective employers will understand. 

"Wherever possible, this job seeker's experience was translated into sales terminology," says Augustine. "For example, the terms 'clients' or 'internal clients' were used to describe the hiring managers. Candidates were turned into prospects or potential leads. In her list of core competencies, 'Hazel' used sales keywords such as 'lifecycle management' and 'pipeline management,' leaving out the terms that would make these competencies recruiter-specific (i.e. 'recruitment process lifecycle' and 'candidate pipeline')." 

Every field has its own acronyms and terminology. It's your job to figure out how to translate your experience and past successes into terms that resonate with your new target audience. Subscribe to industry-specific publications, conduct informational interviews, and start attending events that are relevant to your target field to gain this insight, and update your resume accordingly.

5. This resume is concise and only includes relevant information.  

Even though the job seeker has over six years of experience and has worked in at least three positions, her resume is only one page long. "Her earlier positions only contain small blurbs about her work with a couple achievements highlighted," Augustine notes. "Rather than listing out a laundry list of your skills and experience, carefully select the accomplishments and responsibilities that will support your current career objectives."

6. The job seeker's major contributions and achievements are quantified. 

Include numbers whenever possible, whether you're describing the size of your budget, the number of events you helped organize, or the number of people you managed, to demonstrate your value to the employer.

7. The job seeker included non-work related skills and activities. 

"Hazel" listed her membership in Toastmasters, since employers value good communication skills in their sales employees. "Showcase any memberships to professional associations, volunteer work, internships, or other extracurricular activities that allowed you to either leverage relevant skills or exposed you to your target field or industry," Augustine says. 

SEE ALSO: This Is An Ideal Resume For A Mid-Level Employee

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