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The Saudi government recently announced plans to build what could be the world's tallest building (unless Iraq succeeds in building an even taller one). The so-called Kingdom Tower will loom 3,280 feet tall and cost $2.2 billion to construct.

But the skyscraper has a long way to go — quite literally. The current record-holder, Dubai's Burj Khalifa, soars 163 stories.

In celebration of the Kingdom Tower, we rounded up photos of the 20 tallest buildings in the world. They're sure to put you in awe of mankind's creations.

20. Al Hamra Tower in Kuwait City, Kuwait

Year Completed: 2011

Height: 1,354 feet

19. The International Financial Centre in Hong Kong, China

Year Completed: 2003

Height: 1,362 feet

18. Princess Tower in Dubai, United Arab Emirates

Year Completed: 2012

Height: 1,358 feet

See the rest of the story at Business Insider

Russia's economic prognosis is dire.

Alexei Kudrin, who was Russia's finance minister from 2000 to 2011, said, that within the next few years, Russia's "reserve funds will be exhausted and they will have to raise taxes." 

Kudrin was speaking in London on Tuesday at a Moscow Exchange conference.

He said one of the big problems Russia faces is servicing its social security payments, particularly pensions.

Kudrin said Russia would have to find a way to cut pension payments and devolve budget powers to the regions.

He also said Russia should boost infrastructure investment by using funds earmarked for military and defence spending.

But with an election coming up in a few years and geopolitical risks increasing with airstrikes over Syria and tensions with Turkey, these types of reforms would be unlikely to happen soon.

"The main thing is we should change the economic structure," said Kudrin. "What we're seeing is that the current growth potential is quite low."

This is an understatement.

Russia has been home one of the worst performing major world economies this year. It's been squeezed by sanctions on government-controlled companies (of which there are about 1500) and an oil price crash.

It's got both high inflation, at about 15%, and double-digit interest rates, making private financing for business difficult.

Here's a map of how Russia's been doing on a global level from HSBC:

And here's its inflation rate compared with other economies:

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: Jeff Sachs: Here's why the Middle East is going to get a lot worse

If you've ever dreamed of writing your own book, look at self-publishing. It can bring you five clear business benefits.

Wine is a great accompaniment to almost any meal. But if you want to surprise the wine connoisseur in your life with more than just a bottle of red or white, Business Insider UK has selected some gadgets and gifts that are clever and useful.

Check out our gift guide below. 

 

Let them chill their champagne in a giant cork.

If keeping wine at the absolute perfect temperature isn't too much of a concern, then splash out on this ice bucket, shaped like a giant cork.

It is made from 100% real cork and is waterproof, so it won't leak all over the place when you fill it with ice. A bit of a novelty gift admittedly, but a pretty cool one.

Price: £55

A bike wine holder is perfect for picnics.

This wine bottle holder, which attaches to a bike, will come in handy if you want to cycle to a picnic or pop over to a friend's house for dinner and need to bring the booze.

It also looks really stylish since it's made from 100% naturally tanned English leather.

Price: £35

Their wine will never spoil with this amazing gadget.

This is probably the most hi-tech wine gadget on the market right now. The Coravin system is designed to let you pour wine by the glass, without even having to take out the cork. It works by injecting a needle through the cork and basically sucks the wine out, before pumping nitrogen gas into the empty space.

Once you're done, you just take the Coravin out and the cork reseals itself. This means you can put any bottle back on the shelf and not have to worry about it spoiling.

Price: £269

See the rest of the story at Business Insider

The new government wanted to make its first policy move in the House substantive and symbolic, but it also managed to make it historic. On Monday, the government gave notice that it will introduce a motion (a Ways and Means motion, to be precise) to cut the second federal income tax rate (applied to taxable income between $45,283 and $90,563) and create a new tax bracket applied to taxable incomes of $200,000 or more.

It’s true that this is the first time since 2001 that the basic architecture of federal tax rates has been renovated in a big way. It’s also true that if your taxable income is $45,000 or less, then this tax cut isn’t for you. Finally, yes, it’s true that a person with a taxable income of $120,000 stands to save more ($783) on their federal tax bill than a person with a taxable income of $80,000 ($582).

No, no, that’s not the historic part in my view. Look, 2001 wasn’t that long ago and I’ve written loads before about tax credits and public programs that benefit the better-off.

I’m talking about Clause 9 of the government’s motion that scales back the annual contribution room available to adults who open a Tax-Free Savings Account (TFSA) from the current $10,000 limit introduced for 2015 to the $5,500 annual limit that had done just fine before an election loomed on the horizon. Don’t forget, unused contribution room rolls over each year and there is still no lifetime cap on contributions. This means that between exemptions for home equity, lifetime capital gains rules and the TFSA, it won’t be long before most households in Canada are able to shelter virtually all of their assets from income taxation.

Back before the election, federal officials were at pains to explain that the increase in the TFSA room was well, really, really necessary, because, you see, over a quarter-million low-income Canadians (making less than $20,000 a year) had managed to max out their TFSA room under the $5,500 limit. ”Don’t you understand that these low-income people are just trying to put away some savings? Why do you hate people who are just… frugal?” With the national household savings rate stumbling along at about four per cent these days, shouldn’t we reward those who were saving roughly half of their modest annual incomes?

Well, no, and here’s why: From what I can see, the phenomenon that was offered as”‘the problem” to be fixed is likely temporary.

Looking at data from the 2012 Survey of Financial Security (Statistics Canada) when the TFSA was four years old (offering $20,000 of accumulated room for every adult in Canada) is instructive here:

– Singles and families aged 65 and older are far more likely to own a TFSA than their working-age counterparts (38-47 per cent versus 25-34 per cent respectively).

– Median TFSA balances amongst all working-age singles (under age 65) were just $5,000 (or 25 per cent of that limit) but median balances for singles aged 65+ were $15,000 (75 per cent of the limit). That’s the median, meaning that half of single seniors had TFSA balances between 76 per cent and 100 per cent of their allowable limit.

– Among couples and families, the age-related gap in median TFSA balances persists: $10,000 at the median for working-age households and $20,000 for those aged 65 or older.

– Within the working age population, there are also important age-related differences. Median TFSA values for couples or families aged 35-44 suggest median deposits of about $1,000 per year. But closer to retirement (age 55-64), household TFSA balances suggest median deposits of a little more than $3,500 per year, still well below the old $5,500 limit.

Those older households are, in the vast majority of cases, unlikely to be saving “new” money. Instead, they may well be shifting assets from one source—maybe perhaps proceeds from the sale of a family house that is now too large for their needs; or maybe this is coming from taxable RRIF income that is being recycled into a different and non-taxable registered savings account. Recall that the TFSA doesn’t offer a deduction for (most) deposits, doesn’t create new tax liability on withdrawals and is exempt for the purpose of working out the key income-tested senior’s benefit, the Guaranteed Income Supplement (GIS). Seniors with $20,000 in total personal income have too much income to receive the GIS now, but they may worry about exhausting their savings and needing the GIS later on. In these cases, shifting assets into a TFSA just makes good financial sense.

But that’s not what the TFSA was supposed to be for.

When it was introduced in 2008, the late Jim Flaherty cheerfully called the TFSA “an RRSP for everything else in your life.” His budget communications documents that year offered examples of people saving for all kinds of short- and medium-term uses like vacations and “rainy days.” The literature dating back to at least a 1987 study by the Economic Council of Canada (of which, Liberals, please give thought to reviving that creature to complement the work of a beefed-up Parliamentary Budget Officer) saw tax-prepaid savings as a way to stimulate more saving and investment by giving households choices when RRSP incentives fail. The literature doesn’t seem to have anticipated asset-shifting uses among the already-retired.

Unless the TFSA undergoes more dramatic changes like a lifetime limit, future generations of seniors are unlikely to worry much about annual caps limiting their ability to shift assets around to gain the best tax and benefit treatment. A person aged 55 today will have nearly $100,000 in TFSA room by age 65. And while today’s seniors with low income but some savings may feel cheated by an accident of policy timing, there are many other ways to address some of their concerns—flexibility on RRIF withdrawals for example.

But I still haven’t given you the punchline, have I?

The TFSA is just one among five separate tax-preferred and registered savings instruments in Canada. The first was the RRSP, introduced in 1957. When Kenneth Carter recommended scaling back RRSP limits in his 1966 report on Canadian tax reform, he was summarily ignored. Instead, we have, through relentless incremental policy choices, grown a tax and transfer system that is schizophrenic in its treatment of savings—rewarding people who already have money for saving it but often penalizing small savers. In the last 58 years, there have been exactly zero reductions to annual contribution room to any of these instruments—that is, until now.

By scaling back annual TFSA limits, the new government can keep the flexibility that tax pre-paid accounts offer without encouraging as much asset-shifting among the already comfortable. Promoting economic growth is the stated motive behind this renovation to the income tax brackets. If the government is serious about making that growth inclusive, then removing regressive incentives is a good start at breaking a 58-year trend.  But it’s just a start.

 

 

 

The post The Liberal changes to TFSA contributions were actually historic appeared first on Macleans.ca.

Canada’s exporters may be figuring it out: the future is in Asia.

Policy makers have been trying to nudge Canadian executives to the Pacific for years. Mark Carney, the former Bank of Canada governor, used a speech in 2012 to counter the excuse that Canadian companies were uncompetitive; Carney presented evidence that showed exporters struggled after the crisis because they were overexposed to slow-growth markets such as the United States and Europe. (More than a dozen Asian countries grew at least 5% that year, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The U.S. economy expanded 2.2% and that of Europe effectively stalled.) Former prime minister Stephen Harper signed the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a free-trade agreement that would bind 12 Pacific Rim nations. The new government of Justin Trudeau hasn’t yet said whether it will stay in the TPP, but it would be a shock if it reneged. Asia is on the mind of Canada’s leader. The only two nations mentioned by name in Trudeau’s mandate letter to Trade Minister Chrystia Freeland are China and India. He referred to them twice. (Neither China nor India are members of the TPP.)

A pivot to Asia may already be on. Merchandise exports to China continue to grow, and the world’s No. 2 economy now is firmly Canada’s second-largest trading partner after the United States. Shipments of goods to India surged to a record in the third quarter, according to data released by Statistics Canada last week. Asia’s third-biggest economy is on track to leap over France, Germany and the Netherlands to become Canada’s seventh-biggest market for merchandise exports. South Korea, with which Canada signed a free-trade agreement that went into effect in January, is on its way to securing its place as a more important economic partner than any of the big countries of continental Europe.

The U.S. still matters most to Canadian traders: Americans purchased 76% of the $134 billion worth of goods that Canadian companies sent abroad in the third quarter. The United Kingdom is the third-biggest destination of Canadian merchandise exports after China. Japan is No. 4 and Mexico is No. 5. The reshuffling occurs in the bottom half of the Top 10. When the books close on 2015, India and South Korea likely will have supplanted continental Europe on Canada’s export league table. Canada shipped goods worth $1.45 billion to India in the third quarter, a 78% increase from the previous quarter and almost double the year-earlier amount, as back-to-back droughts increased demand—and prices—for lentils and other pulses. Through the end of the third quarter, Canadian goods exports to India were valued at $3.16 billion, slightly less than the $3.19 billion of stuff sent to South Korea.

Is the shift permanent? Probably, if only due to gravitational pull of growing demand. But there still is reason to the ability of Canadian companies to take full advantage. As I’ve argued previously, Corporate Canada is notoriously timid. Glen Hodgson, a former Finance Canada official who now is chief economist at the Conference Board of Canada, calls Canada’s trade performance over the last decade “mediocre.” That’s problematic because the trade winds have changed since Carney’s speech more than three years ago. Hodgson calls it the “next trade era.”

The real money over the longer term still will be made in places where English isn’t the first language. But the emerging-market superstars of a few years ago—Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa; the BRICS—no longer are growing in a straight line north. China is slowing as Beijing attempts to orchestrate a soft landing from years of unsustainably fast economic growth. Brazil and Russia are in recession; South Africa’s GDP will expand a mere 1.3% in 2016, according to the IMF. These three countries were hit hard by the collapse of commodity prices. India alone retains some shine. It now is the world’s fastest-growing major economy, advancing at an annual rate of about 7.5%.

The collapse of oil prices and other commodities hasn’t helped Canada, either. It has wiped out wealth that could otherwise be used to finance expansion and technological upgrades. The Canadian dollar has weakened to about 75 cents against the U.S. currency, making Canadian goods and services relatively cheaper on the world market, but boosting the cost of investing abroad. The U.S. economy won’t startle anyone with its vigour, but it does seem to found decent momentum. That’s good for Canada, at least in the short-term.

This is a tricky environment. Hodgson and the Conference Board are in the midst of an assessment of whether Canadian companies are up to the challenge. “Our preliminary assessment is they are not,” Hodgson said in a commentary earlier this month. He laments the dismal amount of money Canadian executives spent on their companies in recent years. Now they either are struggling to keep up with orders or unable to approach new markets. “It is primarily the responsibility of businesses, not policy makers, to up their game through investment,” Hodgson said.

MORE ABOUT INTERNATIONAL TRADE, EXPORTS & ASIA:

• Services matter—but making stuff is the core of any strong economy
• Canada’s effect on the U.S. economy might be bigger than you think
• Why the future of global trade deals could be small businesses
• With this TPP deal, chalk up a victory for Stephen Harper
• How the Trans-Pacific Partnership will grow Canada’s service exports
• Scotiabank CEO Brian Porter is bullish on Canadian exports

The post Canadian exporters are finally waking up to opportunity in Asia appeared first on Canadian Business - Your Source For Business News.

From Surge Pricing To Surge Payments In a very short period of time, Uber has emerged as a world-changing business philosophy that goes well beyond cars. It represents a new approach to crowdsource-based, on-demand service. It is changing the way companies look at the delivery of goods, in terms of direct delivery to a customer […]

This post The Surge Pricing Model And Free Market Economics appeared first on CloudTweaks Connected CloudTweaks.com.

Did you ever come across two people at loggerheads over the number of Facebook Likes? Well, I am not insane nor the persons that I was just trying to describe here. These days, people are boasting off and barking at each other over the number of Facebook Likes. In fact, Facebook Likes have become some kind of modern status symbol and sometimes more than that. However, do not brand me as a Facebook hater. I am a big fan of Facebook and devoutly believe that more Likes do mean more engagement and appreciation.

But doubts still linger large in the backdrop. Like any other marketing medium, it can be screwed to achieve one’s objective. However, this is not the only thing that irritates me. What irks me is that you cannot relate between a spike in Facebook Like and sales volume. So, what good are these Likes if they do not make any impact on the actual revenue system? This is a valid question and here in this article, we are trying to gauge the real value of a Facebook Like:

It is Not Always Recommendation

The best thing and also the worst thing about Facebook is that it does not have a “Hate” button. So, when you are not pleased with an update, you are left with no option but to post an angry comment against the update. However, not all the people are that smart. I know some people in person who are in the habit of Liking everything even when they do not agree with an update. Since people are too lazy to take the pain to comment to express their feeling, they take the shortcut and press the Like button. That being said, we can safely come to the conclusion that the number of Likes cannot be taken as a powerful metric to determine the popularity of a brand.

It Can Be Gamed

A recent study revealed that Facebook has 83m fake accounts and the number is on the rise. Since there are a large number of fake accounts available, the system can be gamed easily. I mean when I see a new brand gaining traction in Facebook, doubt creeps into my mind. There are two ways you can get thousands of Likes – either your updates are super awesome or you are gaming the systems by doing some sneaky things like “Facebook Like Exchange”,   “Facebook Visitors Exchange” and more. So, it is quite tough to say at the very first glance whether the Likes accrued are genuine or fake.

Edge rank

There is a correlation between the number of Likes and Edge rank. The higher the number of Likes, the greater the possibility of scoring high in Edge Rank.   So, there is at least one real worth of acquiring more Likes; yeah, it will help your brand secure higher ranking when searched on Facebook.

Likes are Influential Sometimes

Yes, believe it or not, Likes sometimes influence buying decision of people. People are most likely to buy a product recommended by their friend on Facebook rather than taking a decision after reading some reviews online. So, if the Likes are genuine, you can see some improvement in the sale volume to some extent at least.

New York (AFP) - Flashing some interplanetary gold bling and sipping "space water" might sound far-fetched, but both could soon be reality, thanks to a new US law that legalizes cosmic mining.

In a first, President Barack Obama signed legislation at the end of November that allows commercial extraction of minerals and other materials, including water, from asteroids and the moon.

That could kick off an extraterrestrial gold rush, backed by a private aeronautics industry that is growing quickly and cutting the price of commercial space flight.

The US Commercial Space Launch Competitiveness Act of 2015 says that any materials American individuals or companies find on an asteroid or the moon is theirs to keep and do with as they please.

While the Space Act breaks with the concept that space should be shared by everyone on Earth for scientific research and exploration, it establishes the rights of investors to profit from their efforts, at least under US law.

Christopher Johnson, a lawyer at the Secure World Foundation, which focuses on the long-term sustainable use of outer space, said the law sets the basis for the next century of activity in space.

"Now it is permissible to interact with space. Exploring and using space's resources has begun," he said.

The US move conjured visions of the great opening of the United States' Western frontier in the 19th century, which led to the California Gold Rush of 1849.

But for the moment, the costs of pioneering the economic exploitation of space remain exorbitant and the risks high.

Large companies are still studying their options, but smaller startups are impatient to get going, like Planetary Resources, launched in 2012 by Google co-founder Larry Page.

"It has often been a question as to whether a commercial company will be able to go out and develop a resource," said Chris Lewicki, president of Planetary Resources, which bills itself as "The Asteroid Mining Company."

But now, the Space Act "allows us to give assurances to our customers and investors as we build a resource business in space," Lewicki told AFP.

"Since the passage of the law, we've been getting a lot of support messages and our current investors are very excited," he added.

Meagan Crawford, vice president at another ambitious asteroid miner, Deep Space Industries, said that with the law's passage investors are no longer fretting that they are wasting their money.

"This is absolutely a big win for us. We don't seem crazy any more. We don't have to work very hard to convince investors."

According to NASA research, of some 1,500 asteroids within easy reach from Earth, possibly 10 percent have valuable mineral resources.

Both companies see great possibilities in space: deposits of nickel, iron ore, gold and platinum that could support the space industry in the same way that the huge deposits of iron ore in the US upper midwest laid the foundations for the Detroit auto industry.

But their first target is water frozen in substantial deposits on relatively close asteroids.

The water's value, more than just to drink, is in providing hydrogen fuel for space vehicles. It could supply a refuelling station for the rockets, for instance, destined to explore Mars. And it could be used to refuel satellites in orbit.

Lewicki says an in-space fueling station could save hundreds of millions of dollars in water transport costs.

"If we can store that water there, we can refuel rockets, satellites -- it will be a huge opportunity. 

"You can refuel your rocket in orbit; that makes it easier to get it there, and cheaper."

The first space prospecting missions could be launched from 2017, the companies say, and extracting minerals could begin as early as 2020.

Deep Space Industries is planning the deployment of 25-32 kilogram (55-70 pound) mini-satellites to asteroids with good prospects to better assess their resources and bring back samples.

For its part Planetary Resources has already identified asteroids for exploitation using space telescopes place in orbit last year. It plans to launch a small exploration satellite early next year, Lewicki said.

The two companies estimate that the new space gold rush could need around $3 trillion dollars over the next 10-15 years. 

For that, they need global support for their operations, and need to begin pressing other governments to adopt laws similar to the US Space Act that will recognize a company's rights to any space mineral riches it can harvest.

Join the conversation about this story »

This year may very well go down as the year that live streaming video became a marketable asset. It began with the launch of Meerkat in February of 2015, then the launch of Periscope in March and BLAB in April. Unlike Meerkat and Periscope, a BLAB can feature up to 4 people live streaming at one time, and allow followers to comment and give “digital love” to the participants.

Just by its name, BLAB sounds like it could be an ongoing live-chat discussion that goes on and on without any end in sight. That could work if you’re wanting to kill some time on a Friday night or over the weekend, but that application wouldn’t work well for marketing most products or services. There has to be some kind of structure or outline in order to achieve success with this platform.

Like any form of marketing, a good plan has to be laid out ahead of time to get the most benefit from the effort that’s invested. This is especially true when laying out a live streaming strategy. So where to begin? The first thing to remember is that not only can BLAB help you connect with customers or potential customers that watch the video stream “live”, but it can also be turned into a video or be edited into several videos, in which case it then becomes a reusable piece of content for your business.

5 Ways to Use BLAB to Market Your Business

#1 – Provide Live Customer Service

One option is to host a session where a company representative answer some of the most common questions asked by your customers. After the live BLAB, the video can be edited and repurposed as content for social media posts or on FAQ pages.

You can also host a Q&A session where you company spokesperson answers questions that prospects and customers submit either via messaging while the BLAB is going on, or as participants in the video-feed on the BLAB.

#2 – Feature New Products & Services

Video provides an excellent way to showcase a new product or service. Because BLAB has the capability to combine up to 4 video feeds at 1 time, one feed could be the narrator, another can be showing the product or service, and another could be a brand influencer or customer sharing their comments while the presentation is That way you are providing valuable product information while showing practical use or best practices to your audience.

#3 – Incorporate Customers in the Process

It’s very rare that organizations make customers a part of the process when determining how to streamline their products/services or add new ones to the mix. A BLAB can be used as a tool to get real-time feedback about what your customers would like to see more or less of as well as things they’d like to see made available in the future.

There is a risk involved with collecting this feedback in real-time, but think of the impact that this type of content could have for your business.

#4 – Share Company Insights

A BLAB can be used to create a series that updates prospects and customers on the latest wins within your organization as well as the top business trends within their industry to keep an eye on.

You can also conduct interviews of company employees or loyal customers or provide value and usable content to promote your business.

#5 – Test Replacing Other Forms of Digital Marketing

You can also test replacing some of your more traditional digital marketing methods with a BLAB. Examples include:

• Use BLAB as your platform for the next webinar that you plan to conduct.
• Run your BLAB as you would one of your podcasts, and then use the unique embedded code to upload the file to a podcasting host service
• Convert your blog post ideas into a BLAB. Then you can just embed the file onto your blog post, which can be a big help if you’re a better visual presenter, rather than typing out your thoughts for a blog post.
• In addition to embedding your file onto a blog post, it can also be edited and repurposed as an Instagram video, or it can be left untouched and uploaded directly to your YouTube channel.

Questions to Ask Before Adding Live Streaming to Your Marketing

Once you’ve determined how you want to use BLAB, the next thing to do is to put together your strategy for how you will approach live streaming to augment your existing marketing strategy. Answer the following questions to help your approach to using BLAB be successful:

Style

• Should there be a more serious tone, like a professional broadcaster or a serious infomercial, or instead go with a lighter more casual tone that’s less structured?
• Since its video, what should you or the company spokesperson wear while presenting on BLAB? The clothes can affect the presentation.
• Lighting, should there be primarily natural light, is there enough light in the space to be used or does additional light need to be installed or temporarily brought into the space?

Length of BLAB

• Does a set time need to be set firmly, or is a rough idea of 30 minutes or an hour good enough?
• How much time should you or the company spokesperson speak, and how much time should be set aside for other contributors, and for comments and input from other followers of the BLAB?
• Will questions be answered throughout the BLAB, or will they be addressed at the end of the discussion/presentation?

Script / Outline

• What should the title be? In the form of a question or a tease as to what is going to be considered?
• Are bullet points as to what needs to be considered enough, or should it be more scripted so that key points are covered in a specific way?

BLAB is another form of social media in the marketing toolbox full of options, but it also can be a form of usable content that can highlight various aspects about you and your company. Video can break through a lot of messaging and present the most authentic view of you and your business to your audience, while engaging your prospects and customers in the process.

If you’ve participated on a BLAB or other sort of live streaming platform, what did you find to be the most interesting about this new form of interactive marketing?

Header image via Shutterstock

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The post 5 Opportunities to use BLAB for Digital Marketing appeared first on Online Marketing Blog - TopRank®.

Author: Chris Gillespie

As the weather gets colder, the days get shorter—one other sure sign of the changing season is the flu. Offices are awash with red noses and kleenex tissues, and sales teams are catching the “rejection-flu” as they wrap up the sales year. If you’re a salesperson, this is the time for you to brush up on your preventative measures and keep your immune system happy, healthy, and fighting back.

What is the rejection-flu? It’s when you start feeling down from too much rejection—day in and day out. And for those who aren’t familiar, sales can be like asking someone on a date and being turned down over and over again. Imagine that as your job.

While you never fully escape the sting of hearing “no,” “no thanks,” or “I chose your competitor,” you do get used to it and you start to build up an immunity. But, like all immunities, it goes away over time if you don’t maintain it. If you go for a few weeks without hearing “no” or engaging in tough conversations, you’ll start to get soft and susceptible. Your immunity will drop and you run the risk of getting yourself and coworkers sick.

What are the symptoms of the rejection-flu?

A salesperson suffering from rejection-flu has unusually low confidence. You can hear the shakiness in their voice and see the defensiveness of their body posture. They’re engaged in negative self-talk like “no one would want to buy from me,” and they’re locked into this unrealistic belief that they or their product isn’t good enough. Here are some specific symptoms:

• Feverish chills about getting on the phone
• Negative coughs about their abilities
• Rejection fatigue or taking the first “no” for an answer
• Sore throat or a knot in their stomach
• Runny questions or adding “tails” to their questions like “Do you see value? It’s totally fine if you don’t, but if you do, let me know…”
• “Mind-reading headaches” from trying to assume they know everything

What can immunization do for me?

It pays to be immunized against rejection because it’s the only way to get to a “yes” and close deals. Rejection is merely a phase in the prospect’s journey and it takes, on average, 5 “no’s” to get to a “yes.” There are a myriad of possibilities for why someone would reject you and most of them have nothing to do with you, although you may feel like it at the time. They could be having a bad day, fighting with a significant other, stressed from obligations, or just plain old hungry.

A demoralized salesperson will think it’s their fault and won’t take “no” well. But once you’re immunized against taking rejection personally, rather than reacting defensively, you’ll become curious and start digging in to find out “why?” It may take encountering a few more rejections before you get to the bottom of things, but this process is absolutely the only way that you can do your job well. They say that the true selling doesn’t really begin until you hear your first “no.”

Want to close deals and get paid? Of course you do, so let’s start by getting you immunized. Here are six ways to build up your immunity to rejection:

1. Don’t procrastinate. If there’s a conversation that you’re dreading having because the client might say no, just get it over with. There’s a reason that this one comes first. Exposure to getting rejected is like diving off of a diving board—the longer you think about it, the more likely you are not going to do it. So get the bad stuff over with and you’ll soon realize that it wasn’t so bad after all. Don’t accept excuses from yourself, like “I’ll wait until the timing is right,” just get to it!

Create a routine to tackle those rejection-flu symptoms before they even begin. Make a few cold calls first thing in the morning. My routine is always the same: I get in early, read a chapter of Og Mandino’s The Greatest Salesman, write down a list of goals I want to accomplish that day, and then make a few cold calls until I connect with someone. I call people on my list, and it’s like ripping the band-aid off before thinking about it. Once I’ve connected and get a response, either positive or negative, I can breathe a sigh of relief and move on with my day free of the fear of people telling me no.

2. Be open with your team. If you think you’re getting sick of rejection, come right out and say it. Share your worries with the team instead of sharing your sickness with them. The flu is contagious and once a few salespeople in the office start feeling the symptoms, others will start to catch it. But you can nip it in the bud by telling your coworkers that you’re having a bit of a tough time and getting their thoughts and feedback. Sometimes talking through it is all you need to put you back on the right track. Give your team permission to stay on top of you to remind you what you’re fighting for if they hear you being negative or making excuses for not having tough conversations. A good team is a network that’s always picking each other back up. With a little support, you can skate right through the early symptoms without really getting sick.

3. Be prepared. A lot of times rejection protection comes down to simple preparation. If you dive blindly into a situation where you’re not sure if you’re right, but you need to convince someone else that you are, it won’t end well. Write out your argument ahead of time. Why should they buy? Why should they commit to a timeline? Practice it aloud, and then try to anticipate their responses or objections and write those down too. It’s a bad idea to script it out word for word; just have the key bullet points in front of you for the call. If you get lost, reference them. By having your rationale in stone, you’ll find yourself feeling much better to be able to carry the conversation in the direction it needs to go

4. Get curious. Get into the habit of answering questions with questions. This keeps you safe from responding flatly with “OK” to a rejection. Instead of accepting someone’s first answer, get used to digging deeper. Play the question game with teammates and get more comfortable coming back from questions or negative responses. You’ll find that if you can shift your mindset away from being offended at “no” to being curious, you’ll start uncovering the real reason the response was a “no.” Do this consistently and you’ll develop a toolkit of default responses to hearing “no” that become second-nature. Your anxiety will subside when you know that you’re better at dealing with these situations.

5. Avoid negative self-talk. If you’re already sick, this is the key step to recovery. Health and immunity are all based on your mental state and a negative narration going on in your head can become a self-fulfilling prophecy. I’ve heard plenty of salespeople say, “I’m about to call this vice president and she’s going to tell me no, I just know it.” Lo and behold, that’s what happens. Their negative self-talk set them up for failure. On that call they probably answered their own questions, like “You don’t need my service, right?”, rather than just, “Do you need our service?” Instead, guide them down the right path and give them a fair chance to tell you “Yes!” To get out of the negative mindset, simply step away from your work and take a break and do something that you love and are good at, and rediscover your self-worth. Savor it, then channel that in the office.

6. Find your totem. Find the thing that gives you confidence and keep it nearby. Maybe it’s having your significant other’s picture on your desk. Maybe it’s reading Og Mandino’s The Greatest Salesman. Maybe it’s Tony Robbins-style positive affirmations and beating your chest while whooping war cries. Or maybe, it’s this video by Nike. Come to think of it, there is probably a lot that salespeople can learn from professional athletes who, while often appearing wacky and superstitious in their pre-game rituals, know a great deal about preparing themselves before stepping into a high-pressure situation where potential defeat looms around the corner. They use totems or rituals to keep their spirits up and avoid getting sick with fear. Michael Jordan wore his lucky shorts underneath his Chicago Bulls uniform. See what thing on your desk can do that for you.

Beat the rejection-flu

While nobody likes rejection, it’s baked into your job and others have suffered it before you. Remind yourself that, ultimately, it’s building you up for much better things. Salespeople who go on to other roles have a massive advantage over coworkers without this experience. It makes you better prepared to ask for raises, and better at being yourself and putting your ideas out there. If you can make it through this rejection-flu season with these six simple steps, you’ll set yourself up for a great end of year, a happy holiday season, and a future that’s full of success.

I’d love to hear how you immunize yourself against the rejection flu in the comments below!

 

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6 Strategies to Immunize Yourself from the Sales “Rejection-Flu” was posted at Marketo Marketing Blog - Best Practices and Thought Leadership. | http://blog.marketo.com

The post 6 Strategies to Immunize Yourself from the Sales “Rejection-Flu” appeared first on Marketo Marketing Blog - Best Practices and Thought Leadership.

It’s December which means it’s time for next year’s predictions about social media marketing and content marketing to appear in multitudes, seemingly all at once, like the opinion version of new-to-the-bandwagon Carolina Panthers fans.

From time-to-time I’m asked to provide my own prediction(s) for these roundups, and I’m honored that the producers of such pieces believe my theses have merit for either predictive value, or for eyeball acquisition.

But I figured, “jeez, maybe I should put my content marketing trend prediction not just in the articles, slideshares, and ebooks of others, but on my own blog!” That minor epiphany led me to create this post.

Content marketing (and social media marketing) predictions are easier to make in batches, because you give yourself exponentially more chances to be correct. I eschew that and instead offer just one content marketing trend that I believe will massively disrupt the business in 2016.

The 2016 Content Marketing Trend is Low-Res Video

All signs in 2016 point to video that is quick, disposable, and omni-present.

Whether it’s Facebook Live (which they just announced will roll out to everyone), video on Twitter, Periscope, Blab (which I predict will be a huge boon to the podcast movement), Instagram, Vine or the old standby YouTube, 2016 will be the year when video becomes a primary content and social marketing consideration for all brands – even B2B.

Partially this is because customer appetite for video (especially low-res, real-time video) is insatiable.

This content marketing trend will also be a force in 2016 because video is the most efficient way to atomize your message.

If you have video, you have audio. If you have video, you have text (via transcription). If you have video, you have photos. But it doesn’t work the other way around. Always start with video if you can.

In 2016, video will take its rightful place as the petri dish of great content marketing. (highlight to tweet, it’s fun!)

Great salespeople aren’t born. They’re made.

That’s right.

Contrary to popular belief, there’s no such thing as the “natural salesperson.” Yes, it’s true that some people naturally have personality traits that make it easier for them to sell. But even these lucky people have to learn how to be better influencers. They work hard to hone their sales skills. They learn through experience and practice. Just like any other professional.

In order to be successful, entrepreneurs have to learn how to sell effectively. If they don’t, it becomes almost impossible to succeed. Here’s the good news: Anyone can learn how to sell. I learned. So can you.

When I first started learning how to sell, I was excited. I loved the idea of getting people to buy from me. Since I was good at dealing with people, I figured it’d be easy for me. I was both right and wrong. Yes, I knew how to talk to people I knew how to get them to like me. It helped, but it wasn’t enough. I could get some business, but not as much as I wanted.

So I ended up going through sales training. I learned quite a bit. I worked hard to master the sales techniques I learned. It made me better. Again, it helped, but it wasn’t enough. I wasn’t as good as I wanted to be.

Through my experience, I learned that there are certain qualities that make a person a great salesperson. I found that these are qualities that I needed to possess in order to become the type of influencer I wanted to be.

When I started to adopt these qualities, I found that they shaped the way I used the sales techniques I had learned. I saw that I could use what I learned to have a positive impact on my prospects. Below are the qualities that can make you a great at selling.

How To Become Great At Selling

Trait #1: Mental Toughness

“The way you think when you lose will determine how long it will be before you win.” – GK Chesterton

Let’s face it, selling is not for the faint of heart. You have to be mentally tough to be an effective persuader.

Here’s why.

Selling involves rejection. Lots of it. Even the greatest salespeople in the world get rejected. A lot. It’s unavoidable. If you’re not mentally tough, rejection can erode your self-confidence until you feel like giving up. It can be pretty discouraging. To make matters worse, the discouragement you feel because of the rejection can carry over to the next sales call.

This makes it harder to keep the same level of enthusiasm, which makes it more likely that you will get rejected again. It’s like a vicious cycle.

The difference between a great salesperson and a not-so-great salesperson is how they view rejection. Great salespeople see rejection as an opportunity to improve. They can learn from the mistakes they made on the sales call and adjust their approach accordingly.

In this way, a great salesperson can turn a rejection into a tool that can be used to earn more business on her next sales call. Being mentally tough is the only way you can handle consistent rejection without missing a beat. If you want to be a great persuader,  you better become tougher.

Trait #2: Genuine Concern For The Prospect

“Stop selling. Start helping.” – Zig Ziglar

Yes, I know it sounds nice and fuzzy, but a great influencer actually cares about the people they seek to influence. They desire deeply to bring a lasting benefit to the lives of the people they wish to persuade. The same is true when you’re trying to convince prospects to buy your offering.

Great salespeople want to see their prospects get what they want. This means they present only the solutions that fit the prospect’s needs and wants. They won’t try to push potential customers into buying things they don’t need.

When you approach your sales calls in a way that is focused on helping the prospect solve their problems, you gain a greater level of trust. It enables your prospects to connect to you on a deeper level. You have to show your prospects that you view them as more than just a paycheck. You must have a genuine desire to see your prospect get what they want. If your prospect believes you are only trying to get their money, they will be much less likely to listen to what you have to say.

Start finding ways to help your prospects. Even if the help you’re giving them doesn’t involve your product or service. Give value beyond what you sell. When you do this, you become more valuable to your prospect.

The more valuable you are to your prospects and customers, the more likely it is that they will continue to do business with you. The amount of influence you have over a prospect is directly tied to how much of a benefit you are to them. Find ways to offer more value.

Trait #3: Patience

There are no shortcuts to any place worth going. – Beverly Sills

This might be a surprise, but I’ve found that patience is a key trait to have in order to be great at sales. I know it goes against how most people view salespeople, but it’s true.

Great salespeople are patient with their prospects. Instead of shoving their offering down their prospect’s throat, they take the time to get to know them. They focus on understanding what their customer’s true needs are.

Being pushy and aggressive has become a thing of the past in most cases. People just don’t want to deal with high-pressure sales tactics.

I can’t blame them.

I’ve found that taking the time to make sure my prospects are comfortable with buying from me creates a better experience for both the customer and myself. That’s exactly how great salespeople want their clients to feel

Before presenting your solution to your prospect, take the time to get to know them. Ask questions. Build rapport.

Make the interaction as human as possible.

The more your prospects feel connected to you, the more likely they are to buy your product or service. You must focus on building the relationship. It may take a little longer, but in the end, it’ll be worth it.

Trait #4: A Sense Of Purpose

“People don’t buy WHAT you do. They buy WHY you do it.” – Simon Sinek

This is incredibly important. If you don’t have a sense of purpose in what you’re doing, you won’t be able to persuade others that your product or service is worth buying. You have to believe in what you’re selling.

It’s about branding.

An attractive brand purpose helps you stand out from your competition. It gives your prospects a more “human” face to connect to.

With so many brands to choose from, your prospects have many potential choices to make. By identifying and expressing a purpose that people can buy into, you become more relatable.

Why do you do what you do?

What do you believe about the world your company occupies? What problems are you trying to solve? What kind of impact do you want to make on the world and the people in it?

These are the types of questions you must answer if you’re going to persuade prospects to become paying customers. A strong sense of purpose will enable you to sell with conviction. This is something that makes great salespeople far more influential than those without the conviction of their purpose.

Trait #5: They Serve

“Make a customer, not a sale.” – Katherine Barchetti

A great salesperson is there to meet their prospects’ needs. After the sale, they don’t just move on to the next prospect. They understand the importance of continuing to give value. They focus on building relationships.

The customers of great salespeople know that they are in good hands. They are confident in the fact that they are going to be taken care of.

Great salespeople work hard to make clients are happy. This is what keeps their clients coming back for more.

Because of this, these salespeople are able to turn their clients into evangelists who sing their praises to others. Also, they don’t have to worry as much about the competition. They have cemented their place as their clients’ resource.

If you want to be great at selling, you have to serve. You have to do everything in your power to give a wonderful experience for your customers. In each interaction with your customers, try to make as big an impact as possible by giving them as much value as you can.

Exceed their expectations whenever possible. Give them unexpected benefits every now and then. When your clients feel they are truly being taken care of, they will remain loyal to your brand.

Conclusion

If you want to become great at selling, you must have these traits. It takes time. But when you have these traits, you will find it easier to attract and keep clients.

Become mentally tougher. Genuinely care about the success of your prospect. Don’t rush through your sales process. Find your sense of purpose. And finally, serve your newly-earned customers.

Becoming great at selling will also help you become a great entrepreneur. Not only that, it will help you make a greater impact in the lives of others.

Salesperson Photo via Shutterstock

Originally published at Small Business Trends.

All 40 books on the shortlist are worthy of admiration and any business person’s attention. But, for one reason or another, the following eight gained momentum in our awards conversations that ultimately pushed them through to the final round of conversations that will determine the overall 800-CEO-READ Business Book of the Year.

• We Are Market Basket: The Story of the Unlikely Grassroots Movement That Saved a Beloved Business by Daniel Korschun and Grant Welker, AMACOM Books (General Business)
• Everybody Matters: The Extraordinary Power of Caring for Your People Like Family Bob Chapman and Raj Sisodia, Portfolio (Leadership & Management)
• How to Fly A Horse: The Secret History of Creation, Invention, and Discovery by Kevin Ashton, Doubleday (Innovation & Creativity)
• The Compass and The Nail: How the Patagonia Model of Loyalty Can Save Your Business, and Might Just Save the Planet Craig Wilson, Rare Bird Books (Marketing)
• The Revenue Growth Habit: The Simple Art of Growing Your Business by 15% in 15 Minutes Per Day by Alex Goldfayn, Wiley (Sales)
• Boss Life: Surviving My Own Small Business Paul Downs, Blue Rider Press (Entrepreneurship)
• Reclaiming Conversation: The Power of Talk in a Digital Age Sherry Turkle, Penguin Press (Personal Development)
• America’s Bank: The Epic Struggle to Create the Federal Reserve by Roger Lowenstein, Penguin Press (Finance & Economics)

We're giving away a bundle of all eight shortlist titles. Click here to head to the giveaway. 

The Shortlist: What We Wrote

Here's what we recently wrote about all eight Shortlist titles in our series of Inside the Longlist posts.  

We Are Market Basket: The Story of the Unlikely Grassroots Movement That Saved a Beloved Business by Daniel Korschun and Grant Welker, AMACOM Books (General Business)

From our Inside the Longlist post: 

We Are Market Basket: The Story of the Unlikely Grassroots Movement That Saved a Beloved Business is the story of a New England grocery chain that has a little of everything. It’s a great company history and narrative, a good management primer, the story of a family power struggle, and a battle between two visions of American Capitalism—pitting employee and consumer interests against shareholder interests—which shows that undermining the former two ultimately undermines that latter. It is a story so idealistic that it’s hard to believe at first it is realistic, that it really happened. But it did. It is the story of Market Basket employees striking, and Market Basket customers boycotting the store, until a popular CEO and the business model he represented and fought for were reinstated. It is the story of the fight to preserve something more than the CEO, a business model and a model business, and it is a fight they won, after a lengthy media circus, legal battle, and involvement of two state’s governors. It is a truly remarkable story about the very foundations and philosophy of free enterprise. And, tell me, how many stories have you heard of people protesting in favor of a CEO?

 

Everybody Matters: The Extraordinary Power of Caring for Your People Like Family Bob Chapman and Raj Sisodia, Portfolio (Leadership & Management)

From our Inside the Longlist post: 

Everybody Matters by Bob Chapman and Raj Sisodia gained considerable weight as I read it, because I loaded the entire book with post-it flags, marking the ideas I wanted to come back to. Chapman’s overarching idea, the one he builds his company and book around, is that: “The machinery we build is just the economic engine that enables us to touch lives. The flourishing of those lives is our paramount concern.” And every bit of hard management advice he provides to instill that idea seemed tailor-fit for our small company, despite the fact that Chapman is the CEO of an enormous manufacturing company that grows primarily via mergers and acquisitions. And in the process of instilling his company’s dedicated approach to humanistic leadership in the companies they acquire, the message in Bob Chapman’s book has been born out:

The Barry-Wehmiller approach to transformation, rejuvenation, and renewed growth has been proven to work in dozens of companies in different industries and diverse cultures around the world. No matter the status of the industry—distressed or vibrant, even companies experiencing severe challenges—our approach has created tremendous stakeholder value.

 

I’ve witnessed what a commitment to people can do for a company--at 800-CEO-READ, our low turn-over and fiscal health is, I believe, a direct result of our people-first philosophy--, so it is no wonder I feel so convinced that Everybody Matters is the book every leader and manager should read. This focus can and should be applied to every company of every size, and this engaging book will help you do so with the stories of employees whose work lives were made better by managers who were enabled by an enlightened company policy to care fully for the their people.

 

How to Fly A Horse: The Secret History of Creation, Invention, and Discovery by Kevin Ashton, Doubleday (Innovation & Creativity)

From our Inside the Longlist post: 

Another big idea to challenge big ideas comes in Kevin Ashton’s How To Fly a Horse. The book’s historical breadth of industry and inventions is impressive, even beginning with the story of how vanilla beans came to be industrially farmed. Ashton uses this delightfully diverse history to illustrate his main argument: there are no lone geniuses. Though he’s not the first to make the assertion, his recipe is our favorite so far. How to Fly a Horse takes well-researched historical cases of invention, Ashton’s own expertise and experience with innovation, and finally adds a splash of the author’s own badass attitude as if to say, “I don’t care if you don’t like it, this is how it works!” By the end, How to Fly a Horse destroys the grand myth of individual innovators and lone creative types, and puts the act of innovation and credit for creating them back into the hands of organized people and the communities they exist in.

 

The Compass and The Nail: How the Patagonia Model of Loyalty Can Save Your Business, and Might Just Save the Planet Craig Wilson, Rare Bird Books (Marketing)

From our Inside the Longlist post: 

Our company has a long-time fondness for the team at Patagonia. Founder Yvon Chouinard's workplace classic, Let My People Go Surfing, was one of our earliest best sellers. We regularly monitor their pioneering efforts in work/life balance as we doggedly work for a better work environment of our own. And now, gratefully, we get a peek into their world-class branding machine from Craig Wilson, who spearheaded their multi-channel marketing efforts for nearly a decade.

In his first book, Wilson lays out the details of Patagonia’s “Brand Ecosystem” model, which answers the question: “How can some companies create such strong affection for their brands that their customers feel compelled to rave about them?” People identify with the Patagonia brand on a deep, personal level--the holy grail for all branding creatives.  

[The] path to long-term sustainable loyalty is based on an unspoken agreement:You believe what I believe and I believe what you believe. Now we can do business from a place of trust and inspiration.

It’s the reason customers of The North Face don’t wear Patagonia and customers of Patagonia don’t wear The North Face. Not because of features and benefits, but because if you believe in conquering nature, you’re likely a fan of The North Face. If you believe in the value of being in nature, you’re likely a fan of Patagonia.”

How well does your company do at drawing this kind of emotional distinction between two nearly identical products?

 

The Revenue Growth Habit: The Simple Art of Growing Your Business by 15% in 15 Minutes Per Day by Alex Goldfayn, Wiley (Sales)

From our Inside the Longlist post: 

One of the biggest problems that myself and many sales professionals and leaders have is, quite simply, time. Sales is a job that never sleeps. There is always a lead to chase, or a person to call, or an email to respond to. We are big proponents that the books that we sell help people, so naturally we try as hard as we can to read the books we see on our shelves to better ourselves. Alex Goldfayn takes the time investment equation off the table with his first book. The chapters are short and immediately actionable, so the reader can digest the points in this book at his or her own leisure, but walk away with valuable information to apply almost immediately. The book is full of important reminders of simple concepts that we often forget in our busy day-to-day lives.

It’s extraordinarily easy to grow business. Just communicate more with people who can buy from you. It’s no more complicated than that.

 

 

Boss Life: Surviving My Own Small Business Paul Downs, Blue Rider Press (Entrepreneurship)

From our Inside the Longlist post: 

Boss Life is, to say the least, refreshing, in that Downs doesn't pretend he has a blueprint for small business success. Rather, he painstakingly walks readers through his actual experiences, revealing what too many business books gloss over: running and growing a successful small business is really, really hard, full of gut-wrenching decisions, and littered with frustrating mistakes. Aspiring entrepreneurs might glean lessons from Downs' story—both his failures and successes—but the real power of this book is simply that it mirrors not only a select few IPO chasing dreamers, but the experience of millions of business owners just looking for a solid life.

 

Reclaiming Conversation: The Power of Talk in a Digital Age Sherry Turkle, The Penguin Press (Personal Development)

From our Inside the Longlist post: 

Each year we’re discussing the book awards, we see a few trends that rise above the norms of each category that begin to represent an overarching trend. With longlist inclusions of The Rise of the Robots, Geek Heresy, Data-ism, The Smarter Screen, and Reclaiming Conversation, we are seeing a continuing trend of books exploring incursion of digital technology in our everyday work and interactions, and an examination of its repercussions. How often do we hear our own loved one’s voices, when we only need to send them a text from our closest device. When is the last time an intimate dinner didn’t involve taking a picture of your meal and posting it to your 2000 Twitter followers. Sherry Turkle has been studying digital culture and communication for more than 30 years, and in this book investigates a troubling concern that real human conversations, solitude, and self reflection are endangered by digital technology (and provides principles for overcoming that danger):

Self reflection makes us vulnerable. That’s why its traditions so often includes ways of protecting one’s privacy (we lock and hide our diaries) and confidentiality (as in relationships with a therapist or a clergyman). Social media encourage us to play by another set of rules. You share as you reflect; you reflect as you share. And the companies that provide the platforms for all of this get to see and keep it all. Privacy, loosely defined as freedom from being observed, is gone. At what cost?

 

 America’s Bank: The Epic Struggle to Create the Federal Reserve by Roger Lowenstein, The Penguin Press (Finance & Economics)

From our Inside the Longlist post: 

America’s Bank, on the other hand, demonstrates practical politics at its best. The drama throughout the book is as high as in The Full Catastrophe, but it has a happier ending in the formation of the Federal Reserve. Of course, the fact that about half the people reading this will scoff at the idea of the Federal Reserve as a positive result shows exactly how contentious the issues dissected in the book are still today, and why this book is so informative to the present moment even as a work of history. And what a brilliant work of history it is. The Federal Reserve is not America’s first national bank, and Roger Lowenstein documents the first few hiccups, the backwards politics, monetary dysfunction, and uneven financial prospects of America as a young nation. As a rising industrial power in the early twentieth century, at a time when monetary ideas and policy swayed national elections, there was a growing consensus that something needed to be done, that a new national bank must be formed. This leads us to the high drama of bankers and politicians secretly eloping to hammer out the details of such a federal bank that could be acceptable, and the even higher drama of getting those ideas put hammered into legislation and that legislation hammered through the United Stated Congress. It is, as I wrote in an earlier review of the book, drama worthy of an original HBO series.

As the weather gets colder, the days get shorter—one other sure sign of the changing season is the flu. Offices are awash with red noses and kleenex tissues, and sales teams are catching the “rejection-flu” as they wrap up the sales year. If you’re a salesperson, this is the time for you to brush up on your preventative measures and keep your immune system happy, healthy, and fighting back.

What is the rejection-flu? It’s when you start feeling down from too much rejection—day in and day out. And for those who aren’t familiar, sales can be like asking someone on a date and being turned down over and over again. Imagine that as your job.

While you never fully escape the sting of hearing “no,” “no thanks,” or “I chose your competitor,” you do get used to it and you start to build up an immunity. But, like all immunities, it goes away over time if you don’t maintain it. If you go for a few weeks without hearing “no” or engaging in tough conversations, you’ll start to get soft and susceptible. Your immunity will drop and you run the risk of getting yourself and coworkers sick.

What are the symptoms of the rejection-flu?

A salesperson suffering from rejection-flu has unusually low confidence. You can hear the shakiness in their voice and see the defensiveness of their body posture. They’re engaged in negative self-talk like “no one would want to buy from me,” and they’re locked into this unrealistic belief that they or their product isn’t good enough. Here are some specific symptoms:

• Feverish chills about getting on the phone
• Negative coughs about their abilities
• Rejection fatigue or taking the first “no” for an answer
• Sore throat or a knot in their stomach
• Runny questions or adding “tails” to their questions like “Do you see value? It’s totally fine if you don’t, but if you do, let me know…”
• “Mind-reading headaches” from trying to assume they know everything

What can immunization do for me?

It pays to be immunized against rejection because it’s the only way to get to a “yes” and close deals. Rejection is merely a phase in the prospect’s journey and it takes, on average, 5 “no’s” to get to a “yes.” There are a myriad of possibilities for why someone would reject you and most of them have nothing to do with you, although you may feel like it at the time. They could be having a bad day, fighting with a significant other, stressed from obligations, or just plain old hungry.

A demoralized salesperson will think it’s their fault and won’t take “no” well. But once you’re immunized against taking rejection personally, rather than reacting defensively, you’ll become curious and start digging in to find out “why?” It may take encountering a few more rejections before you get to the bottom of things, but this process is absolutely the only way that you can do your job well. They say that the true selling doesn’t really begin until you hear your first “no.”

Want to close deals and get paid? Of course you do, so let’s start by getting you immunized. Here are six ways to build up your immunity to rejection:

1. Don’t procrastinate. If there’s a conversation that you’re dreading having because the client might say no, just get it over with. There’s a reason that this one comes first. Exposure to getting rejected is like diving off of a diving board—the longer you think about it, the more likely you are not going to do it. So get the bad stuff over with and you’ll soon realize that it wasn’t so bad after all. Don’t accept excuses from yourself, like “I’ll wait until the timing is right,” just get to it!

Create a routine to tackle those rejection-flu symptoms before they even begin. Make a few cold calls first thing in the morning. My routine is always the same: I get in early, read a chapter of Og Mandino’s The Greatest Salesman, write down a list of goals I want to accomplish that day, and then make a few cold calls until I connect with someone. I call people on my list, and it’s like ripping the band-aid off before thinking about it. Once I’ve connected and get a response, either positive or negative, I can breathe a sigh of relief and move on with my day free of the fear of people telling me no.

2. Be open with your team. If you think you’re getting sick of rejection, come right out and say it. Share your worries with the team instead of sharing your sickness with them. The flu is contagious and once a few salespeople in the office start feeling the symptoms, others will start to catch it. But you can nip it in the bud by telling your coworkers that you’re having a bit of a tough time and getting their thoughts and feedback. Sometimes talking through it is all you need to put you back on the right track. Give your team permission to stay on top of you to remind you what you’re fighting for if they hear you being negative or making excuses for not having tough conversations. A good team is a network that’s always picking each other back up. With a little support, you can skate right through the early symptoms without really getting sick.

3. Be prepared. A lot of times rejection protection comes down to simple preparation. If you dive blindly into a situation where you’re not sure if you’re right, but you need to convince someone else that you are, it won’t end well. Write out your argument ahead of time. Why should they buy? Why should they commit to a timeline? Practice it aloud, and then try to anticipate their responses or objections and write those down too. It’s a bad idea to script it out word for word; just have the key bullet points in front of you for the call. If you get lost, reference them. By having your rationale in stone, you’ll find yourself feeling much better to be able to carry the conversation in the direction it needs to go

4. Get curious. Get into the habit of answering questions with questions. This keeps you safe from responding flatly with “OK” to a rejection. Instead of accepting someone’s first answer, get used to digging deeper. Play the question game with teammates and get more comfortable coming back from questions or negative responses. You’ll find that if you can shift your mindset away from being offended at “no” to being curious, you’ll start uncovering the real reason the response was a “no.” Do this consistently and you’ll develop a toolkit of default responses to hearing “no” that become second-nature. Your anxiety will subside when you know that you’re better at dealing with these situations.

5. Avoid negative self-talk. If you’re already sick, this is the key step to recovery. Health and immunity are all based on your mental state and a negative narration going on in your head can become a self-fulfilling prophecy. I’ve heard plenty of salespeople say, “I’m about to call this vice president and she’s going to tell me no, I just know it.” Lo and behold, that’s what happens. Their negative self-talk set them up for failure. On that call they probably answered their own questions, like “You don’t need my service, right?”, rather than just, “Do you need our service?” Instead, guide them down the right path and give them a fair chance to tell you “Yes!” To get out of the negative mindset, simply step away from your work and take a break and do something that you love and are good at, and rediscover your self-worth. Savor it, then channel that in the office.

6. Find your totem. Find the thing that gives you confidence and keep it nearby. Maybe it’s having your significant other’s picture on your desk. Maybe it’s reading Og Mandino’s The Greatest Salesman. Maybe it’s Tony Robbins-style positive affirmations and beating your chest while whooping war cries. Or maybe, it’s this video by Nike. Come to think of it, there is probably a lot that salespeople can learn from professional athletes who, while often appearing wacky and superstitious in their pre-game rituals, know a great deal about preparing themselves before stepping into a high-pressure situation where potential defeat looms around the corner. They use totems or rituals to keep their spirits up and avoid getting sick with fear. Michael Jordan wore his lucky shorts underneath his Chicago Bulls uniform. See what thing on your desk can do that for you.

Beat the rejection-flu

While nobody likes rejection, it’s baked into your job and others have suffered it before you. Remind yourself that, ultimately, it’s building you up for much better things. Salespeople who go on to other roles have a massive advantage over coworkers without this experience. It makes you better prepared to ask for raises, and better at being yourself and putting your ideas out there. If you can make it through this rejection-flu season with these six simple steps, you’ll set yourself up for a great end of year, a happy holiday season, and a future that’s full of success.

I’d love to hear how you immunize yourself against the rejection flu in the comments below!

This week, Kathleen and I sat down and discussed the importance of engaged leadership, including:

• Why leaders need to be involved in content creation

• The value of candor and sharing personal stories

• Great examples of leaders (and clients!) who nail content creation

• How business is personal

• And more…

Listen to the episode to hear it all, or read the show notes below.

Listen to Episode 20:

Read The Show Notes:

Today we’re going to talk to you about an engaged leader. In running our own marketing agency, we are lucky to get to work with a lot of different organizations. But while each of those organizations has a leader, no two leaders are the same; they have different styles of leadership. It’s interesting, because we have a unique window into how they function, specifically when it comes to their role in their company’s branding and content.

This is especially important, when it comes to establishing a brand’s public authoritative voice out in the marketplace. This day and age, it’s a given that a company is going to be creating content, trying to establish their digital footprint in the market. And if they’re not, that’s a different story – if they haven’t made that investment, there are larger challenges at play.

What Kathleen finds the most interesting is that many of these leaders understand and recognize the importance of a robust online presence, but only in certain instances does that translate into C-level participation in content creation. It’s quite curious.

This is especially true when you start thinking about how connections are made in this day and age – online. You’re making digital connections today. Probably the most common relationship platform is LinkedIn, for making business connections. To the point where people are now creating content exclusively for use and publication on LinkedIn.

When Kathleen looks at the range of clients that we work with, one of the things she finds fascinating is the outcomes of inbound and content marketing for those who have that C-level participation and buy-in versus those who don’t.

Example 1: Gibson 

We’ve been working with Gibson, an Indiana-based insurance company, for a few years now. They’re a great, independent agency. And their CEO, Tim Leman, is constantly on everyone’s list of top leaders in his area. Even before we started working with Gibson, Tim was blogging, because he already understood the importance of establishing his own personal brand. In fact, has also published a book, and is now working on a second.

He’s probably the best example of a leader who has gone all-in with inbound marketing and putting his time into it. When we first started working with Gibson, their director of marketing wanted to know if they could find a way to allow people to only subscribe to Tim’s blogs, since their blog also includes posts from other writers. Why? They consistently got feedback from readers that they wanted to just read his writing.

What struck Kathleen is this – what percentage of their audience would they not have reached if Tim was not involved?

Example 2: Portal Solutions

Another client of ours is Portal Solutions, a Microsoft partner in the Washington, D.C.-area. Their CEO, Daniel Cohen-Dumani is very involved and really enjoys contributing to their new podcast, Digital Workplace Today. Podcasting is a really great example of an opportunity to share your expertise and get your point across, but since it’s recorded, you can do so in a way that showcases your personality – like we do!

Why Leadership Contribution Will Matter

Keeping the examples of Gibson and Portal Solutions in mind, Kathleen has one prediction for 2016. If you are a leader, and you’re not participating in your content creation in some form or another, it will become a “Why bother?” kind of situation. Leaders will have to become invested, because the inbound marketing field has become crowded. And it’s too easy to just throw up a bunch of article-style blogs and check the box.

If you want to stand out, you have to have a vision, you have to share that vision and you have to be authentic. That’s how you’re going to make connections with your audience.

I agree with Kathleen. If you’re in a position of leadership, and you’re not sharing your vision or your voice, you’re not only missing an opportunity, you’re hurting your organization. Let’s face it, throughout the organization, the things that you do as the leader are going to trickle all the way down through the ranks. Demonstrating that thought leadership and creating content is part of your organization will have an impact.

Marcus Sheridan – known as the Sales Lion – is a huge believer in creating a culture of content.

Who Needs To Be Involved In Content Creation?

So to that CEO who isn’t producing content, you’re sending a message to your employees that content creation isn’t important. That’s a very dangerous message that can ultimately hurt your organization. We talk about this all the time – the need to have people at different levels within your organization involved in the content creation process. And there are certain important conversations and perspectives that can only be captured from the top.

We believe in this for Quintain, as well. Every single person in our organization has to blog twice a month, and Kathleen has committed to blogging twice a week. In addition to the podcast, as well as my own blogging, we’re blogging more than our own employees. It’s so important, because it needs to be part of the culture.

Recently we were looking through the book The Engaged Leader by Charlene Li, and she talks about how it’s not that you have to blog. Maybe your thing isn’t blogging or tweeting. But the point is that you need to find a format that feels comfortable and authentic, and then you need to invest in doing that consistently. To check out entirely, however, is lame. You’re not being a leader.

The Importance Of Being Candid

Sir Richard Branson does this really well. In addition to being awesome, he creates wonderful content. And sometimes his content touches upon sensitive topics. Kathleen will never forget he wrote a blog a year or two ago, in response to difficult labor negotiations with pilots. It was very honest, and there were aspects of it where he acknowledged that readers may not agree with him, and that some of the decision were very difficult. But he addressed everything in a way that was compassionate and, again, authentic.

Everybody respects and trusts a leader who speak to tough issues candidly. And one of the most important parts of that is having a leader produce content. In doing so, you allow your audience to understand the driving force behind your brand.

The one example that comes to my mind is Gary Vaynerchuk, who is a prolific content producer. Thanks to his efforts, if you’re considering the services that Vayner Media provides, there’s no doubt you’ll have a clear picture of the personality of the brand. This is either a wonderful fit, or it isn’t – but at least you know going in. (For those of you who haven’t seen his videos, Gary is very direct, straightforward and with tons of high energy – and he curses like a sailor! Not for everyone, but very raw and very authentic.)

Even though we’re making digital connections, this kind of thing is still personal. And if leadership is absent from the content creation conversation, they’re missing a huge opportunity.

But it doesn’t work if you create content that presents you as something you’re not. Charlene Li mentioned in an interview recently the post Sheryl Sandberg of Facebook published on Facebook, regarding the death of her husband earlier this year. It’s very long, but unbelievably raw and very personal. It’s very hard to read it and not be moved. Especially if you’re Kathleen – she admits she cries at everything.

Business Is Personal

Some say you shouldn’t talk about personal stuff in business, but Kathleen says that’s kind of like the rule of not wearing white after Labor Day. It’s a really old-school way of thinking that isn’t totally true anymore.

To create such a firewall between being personal on public record and doing so in person is short-sighted. But I would also say you share personal stories and your personality when it supports the value that you’re delivering with your message. What you talk about from a personal standpoint, Kathleen says, shouldn’t always be a means to a business end. It should be about sharing who you are as a person and contributing to that rapport.

She admits, however, she’s more of an open book, but for others who are more private in nature, this may be more of a challenge. It’s a hard leap of faith to take – to expose vulnerabilities and share mistakes. But it’s also incredibly empowering. And you can also talk about your successes, too.

So if you’re a C-level executive, Kathleen has a challenge for you. If you’re not involved in content creation, get involved in 2016. Find your medium, whether that be a podcast or traditional blogging. And if you’re not in a position of leadership, challenge those executives to get involved.

We Want To Hear From You

We’d love if you would review the podcast. Your feedback is really helpful to use and we’re always looking to hear from you about what topics you’d like us to cover in future episodes.

Amazon Prime keeps going for your wallet, and it's going hard

The retailer's value-filled and addictive Prime membership — packed with discounts and free shipping — is now looking to disrupt how we watch TV. There's been a lot of conjecture that the Internet would destroy the cable bundle, in which people pay for a large number of channels despite only watching a few

The Internet would be an a la carte world, the theory goes, where people would pick and choose what they wanted. Yes, I'll take Netflix. No thanks, Hulu.

Amazon doesn't quite see it that way.

The e-commerce giant has introduced a new streaming video bundle to its Amazon Prime service that loops in a variety of streaming services including Showtime, Starz and a variety of others. Users will have to pay for these add-ons, so it's not quite a bundle. But Amazon is taking a step in that direction. Read more...

More about Amazon, Business, and Media

This fall, athenahealth launched a campaign called “Let Doctors Be Doctors.” The target of the campaign’s ire, the thing standing in doctors’ way, was the electronic health record, or EHR. It really struck a nerve: The associated video has been viewed 25,000 times, a corresponding hashtag has logged over 4 million impressions, and more than 600 physicians have posted impassioned comments to an online sounding board.

How the EHR, which was in part meant to liberate physicians from the drudgery of paperwork, instead became their chief oppressor is a long and complicated story. What we know is that after $28 billion spent in federal incentives to spur adoption and with 8 out of 10 physicians now using an EHR, physician frustration with their technology platforms is at an all-time high. In fact, the 2015 Medscape Physician Lifestyle Report listed the increased computerization of the practice and the burden of administrative tasks among the top four drivers of physician burnout.

Going back to the days of paper, of course, is not a choice. The digitization and interoperability of health records are prerequisites for achieving healthcare’s “triple aim”: reducing cost, improving quality, and enhancing the patient experience. With the right technology and focused leadership, the EHR can not only enable more efficient and better-coordinated care, but also drive physician engagement and satisfaction. In this post, we’ll describe how we did this at Privia Health, in collaboration with athenahealth.

Insight Center

Privia Health is one of the fastest growing independent physician organizations in the country with over 1,200 physicians in six U.S. states. While these physicians practice across 30 specialties, they are unified by a single EHR platform.

If the typical EHR has become the bane of many physicians’ existence, the EHR implementation tends to occupy its own special ring of hell — the technology equivalent of a heart and lung transplant. But, after two years onboarding more than 600 providers across 200+ locations to an entirely new platform, Privia has learned how to turn the EHR into a tool for supporting physician productivity and engagement, and establish it as a foundation for improving health care outcomes.

Define “the why.”

Unlike many health systems that, in this era of accountable care, find themselves having to re-define their vision and re-align physicians around new performance goals, Privia has the advantage of being “purpose-built” for value-based care. Physicians know from the start, for example, that they’re joining a performance-driven culture. They understand that switching to a common technology platform is essential for achieving quality goals. They know that adjusting to a unified clinical workflow and agreeing on evidence-based protocols will reduce what former Geisinger Health System CEO Glenn Steele calls “unjustified variation” in care. These are concessions for physicians used to independent practice, but they’re made in the service of a shared vision for population health.

Help doctors focus on doctoring.

Tony Schwartz, chief executive of The Energy Project, recently wrote in a New York Times column that “most companies invest in building the skills of their employees. Few of them systematically invest in building people’s capacity to perform at their best.” Medical groups and hospitals are no different. A 2014 study in the International Journal of Health Services found that doctors spend close to 17% of their work week on billing, insurance, and other administrative work. As one California doctor complained it in a comment to the Let Doctors Be Doctors site, “I am one expensive data entry clerk.”

For an EHR to become a tool for physician engagement, it needs to wick away work from physicians so they can focus on patients. This means, for starters, moving administrative work to centralized back-office service teams where it can be automated or executed at scale. With triggers built into the EHR’s workflow, tasks such as the recording of patient medications and the fulfillment of other quality requirements can be flagged for clinical staff to complete before the patient enters the exam room. This frees up the physician to focus more fully on the patient instead of the computer.

Schwartz’s research, done in partnership with Harvard Business Review, found that employees who were able to focus on one thing at a time at work were 29% more engaged. When an EHR can remove distractions and help physicians focus it is more likely to be embraced.

Get visibility down to the mouse-click.

As the adage goes, you can’t manage what you can’t measure. To effectively implement and enhance performance with an EHR, or any system, leaders need to be able to see what’s happening at the individual provider level and to intervene as needed. This level of visibility was a fundamental requirement and a key factor behind the decision to go with a cloud-based platform. As providers are brought live on the platform, a host of role-specific performance indicators are remotely monitored at athenahealth and Privia’s central “nerve centers.” How long are physicians spending with each encounter? Are they being slowed down and clicking around too much? How well is front desk staff capturing insurance information? Are medical assistants following protocols around specific quality measures? Each performance metric can be tracked not only against Privia benchmarks but nationally across the athenahealth provider network. Armed with that data, leaders can identify and intervene early and often with providers and staff who need to improve.

Create a performance “game layer.”

Physicians tend to be competitive by nature. After going through years of medical school battling over the best grades and placements, however, they find themselves in positions where they rarely know how they’re doing. Most doctors don’t know what patients think of them, what their total cost of care profile is, or how they’re doing at managing hypertension cases relative to the best performers. This is where we can learn from the world of gaming. As game designer Jane McGonigal points out in her book Reality is Broken, for work to be satisfying “it must present us with clear, immediately actionable goals as well as direct, vivid feedback.”

At Privia, physicians have a dashboard view of their own KPIs and then come together monthly in regional groups to review data with their peers. Clinical measures are put up on a screen and the 15-20 doctors in the room are listed in rank order. So, if one doctor is doing tobacco cessation screenings 95% of the time and a second is only doing it  10% of the time, the lower-performer not only knows he needs to do better but has a target to aim for next month. For many physicians who have been in independent practice for years, it’s the first time they have a read on how they’re doing and a clear sense of what high performance actually looks like.

Reward outcomes, not effort 

Physicians are motivated, ultimately, by delivering better patient outcomes. Under the traditional fee-for-service payment model, outcomes are neither closely tracked nor rewarded, and the EHR is there to mostly document and bill for services rendered. With the move to accountable care, that is changing for the better. In 2014, the first year it participated in the Medicare Shared Savings program, Privia generated over $5.7 million in savings, putting it in the top 15% of accountable care organizations nationwide. Handing physicians bonus checks for measurably improving the cost and quality of patient care reminds everyone of “the why” and reinforces that everything they did to get there was worth it.

I’ll admit it — I didn’t always put much thought into my sales email signature. Early in my career, my email sign-off was just my name. After reading countless emails from prospects and peers, I realized I often start reading an email at the bottom, with a quick glance at the sender’s signature to learn about them. That’s when it hit me: My bland signature was a missed opportunity to make a stronger impression.

Other than your subject line, your email signature is one of the first things people notice when they open an email. Whether I’m cold-emailing a prospect or reaching out to a new customer, I want my sign-off to grab attention, inform the reader, and even include a subtle call-to-action. Over time, I learned that a well-crafted sales email signature can build credibility and drive action, while a poorly crafted one can confuse the recipient or make your organization look unprofessional.

In this post, I’ll cover some common email signature mistakes to avoid, then share 13 tips to help you create an outstanding signature, including some real examples from my own inbox. By the end, you’ll have plenty of ideas to transform your sign-off into a small but mighty asset.

Table of Contents

• Common Sales Email Signature Mistakes to Avoid
• Sales Email Signature Examples and Tips

Common Sales Email Signature Mistakes to Avoid

Before we look at what to do, let me share a few common mistakes I’ve seen (and made myself) with sales email signatures. Avoiding these pitfalls will ensure your signature looks professional and works effectively:

• Going overboard with design. I remember discovering flamingtext.com as a young middle schooler and putting these garish fonts in a few years' worth of PowerPoint assignments. Luckily, that past is behind us. Using multiple funky fonts, clashing colors, or (my least favorite) a random, usually irrelevant quote can do more harm than good in your sales email signature. Save the creativity for your email body.
• Including too much information. Your email signature isn’t your entire resume. Listing every phone number, physical address, social profile, and the email address you just sent them an email from creates a cluttered block of text. I’ve been guilty of it, but eventually I learned that less is more. Stick to the most important contact info and maybe one key link (like your LinkedIn or a booking link). An overly long signature can overwhelm readers at best and spook email platforms at worst, negatively impacting deliverability.
• Outdated or broken elements. Nothing looks less professional than a signature with broken image icons or links that don’t work, and many unlucky SDRs are furiously prospecting with a broken meeting link in their signature as we speak. Make sure to update your signature whenever your info changes (new title, phone number, etc.) and regularly double-check that all links and images load correctly.
• No call-to-action or value add. A big mistake is treating the signature as just an electronic business card and missing the chance to engage the reader. If you simply sign off with your name and title, you’re leaving an opportunity on the table. I try to include at least one actionable element — whether it’s a link to schedule a call or a resource that’s relevant to the recipient.

By sidestepping these mistakes, you set the stage for a winning signature. Now, let’s explore some best practices and examples of great sales email signatures that get it right.

Sales Email Signature Examples and Tips

Below are 13 sales email signature tips, including some examples and key takeaways. These aren’t ranked in any particular order — what works best for you will depend on your role, industry, and personal style. As you read through, think about which elements you can adopt from each to improve your own signature.

1. Use a signature generator for personalization.

I made the signature below in about 60 seconds using HubSpot’s free email signature generator. I plugged in my info, linked to a headshot I use on LinkedIn, and instantly got a pretty professional design. There are a bunch of different templates you can use to make it your own, which is why this kind of tool is a great place for anyone to start.

Source

Best for: Anyone setting up their first sales email signature or looking to quickly create a polished, on-brand sign-off without wasting a day of actual work.

2. Tout your accomplishments.

If you or your company earned an award or special recognition, consider featuring a small nod to it in your signature. Whether you’re an “Inc. 5000 Fastest-Growing Company” or you just got recognized by the local paper, showcasing an accolade can instantly boost credibility with prospects. It signals that you excel at what you do without you having to say a word about it in the email body.

Best for: Anyone with a notable achievement that prospects care about, or someone working at a company that’s received recent accolades. Awards reassure new contacts that they’re dealing with a proven, reputable professional or organization.

Pro tip: Make sure any accomplishments you list are recent enough to still be relevant, and always consider your audience. Showcasing that you’ve made the President’s Club three years in a row is great when you’re applying for a new position, but it rarely adds value for your prospects.

3. Keep the branding consistent.

Your email signature is an extension of your company brand, so make sure it looks the part. I use ZoomInfo for prospecting, and through all my interactions with different individuals, their email signature format has remained very consistent.

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Pro tip: Particularly if your company hands contacts from one team member to the next (sales > onboarding > account management, etc.), consistent branding is crucial to delivering a great customer experience.

4. Add a link to collect reviews.

Social proof is crucial, but even the most customer-first companies often forget to ask for feedback and testimonials. That’s why my company’s co-founder puts the request right in his signature, so happy customers are a click away from telling the world. It’s earned us quite a few reviews and has become standard practice on our account management team.

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Best for: Customer-facing roles like account management, customer success, and more. If you’re doing a home run job, make it easy for your clients to spread the word.

5. Include a calendar scheduling link.

Tired of endless emails to set up a meeting? Include a calendar link in your signature to let people book time with you in just a few clicks. I’ve historically included a link to make things convenient for prospects and avoid any unnecessary back-and-forth, although I’ve recently heard more that some recipients find this pushy. To me, it’s a way to be respectful of everyone’s time, but that doesn’t mean you have to agree.

Best for: Busy salespeople who frequently schedule calls or demos. It streamlines the process and makes it super easy for interested leads to engage with you.

Pro tip: Consider holding the meeting link until the second email. Many CRMs make it easy to choose different signatures for different occasions, so testing this shouldn’t be a major lift.

6. Have a few options on deck.

In HubSpot, it’s very easy to set up multiple signatures and then choose the right one for a given recipient. For example, just by clicking my signature before I send an email, I can adjust from my basic default signature below to a different one depending on the industry I’m prospecting in at the time.

In commercial construction, for example, many of our clients come to us for our recruitment marketing capabilities, so I’ll include a link to a popular blog post on optimizing websites for recruitment. Prospects click it, see what we can do, and only then do they respond and set up a meeting.

Best for: Anyone who values personalization in outreach, which should honestly be everyone at this point.

7. Share your latest content or publications.

Your signature can do more than just provide contact info — it can showcase your expertise and build your credibility. In the example below, Venture Asheville Executive Director Jeffrey Kaplan links his TEDx Talk, How to Build a Better Entrepreneur. I was curious enough to check it out and learned a lot.

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Pro tip: If you’ve got some published thought leadership, consider linking to it — just make sure you think about who will be reading your emails and make sure the content will be relevant for the majority of recipients.

8. Highlight product announcements.

Keep contacts in the loop by using your signature to promote new products, features, or content. A sales rep from Canva did this well: Her signature included a short note and link about their new mobile app. It subtly informed me of their latest offering without a dedicated email.

You can do the same by linking to your newest blog post, a product update, or an upcoming feature launch. It’s a low-key way to spark curiosity about what’s new at your company.

Best for: Teams with frequent updates or launches. Every email becomes a chance to share a bit of news and drive traffic to your latest content or product page, without any extra effort.

9. Include a slogan or value proposition.

A one-line value proposition or mission (even paired with a small award badge or certification) acts like a mini elevator pitch, giving recipients a quick sense of what you or your company delivers beyond just your job title.

Best for: Entrepreneurs, consultants, or reps with a strong value prop. A good slogan is an effective way to reinforce your key message or promise on every single email touchpoint.

10. Promote events or webinars.

Your signature can be a great way to boost attendance for upcoming events, helping you generate additional leads without additional work. I’ve had plenty of contacts sign up for an event after noticing the invite in my email signature, and it can make the invite feel more personal than the ones in your formal marketing emails. Just remember to update or remove the line after the event is over!

Pro tip: UTM links are a great way to track any signature CTA, including how much event attendance your signature is generating.

11. Include your photo.

Business is personal, but email often isn’t. That’s why including a small, professional headshot in your email signature can be so powerful. In the example below, Donald Kelly, founder of The Sales Evangelist, includes a sharp photo, a link to his website, and social media icons to guide his peers to other channels of connection. This signature is friendly and invites the reader to connect over more than just email.

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Best for: Sales reps who want to build trust and personal connection, especially when working with clients remotely. A photo humanizes your outreach, making you both more memorable and more approachable.

12. Embrace a minimalist design.

Sometimes, less is more. A minimalist email signature — just your name, title, company, and perhaps one contact method or link — can look clean and professional. It also eliminates any risk of images not loading, since pure text will always show up.

Best for: Professionals who prefer a no-nonsense approach or work with executive-level clients. A clean signature is universally appropriate and keeps the focus on the content of your email.

13. Add a video or interactive element.

On the opposite end of the spectrum from minimalism, I’ve seen GIFs included in signatures that were eye-catching and effective. When a colleague of mine embedded a clickable thumbnail in her signature that opened a 30-second intro video, she saw an uptick in responses. You could do something similar by linking to a short welcome video or a one-minute product demo.

Best for: Reps who want to create a more personal connection or showcase their product directly.

Pro tip: This innovative touch can set you apart in an industry saturated with plain text signatures, but pay close attention to deliverability to ensure you’re not getting dinged.

If you’re hungry for more ways to improve your sales emails, HubSpot has a handy resource with 23 sales email templates proven to get high open rates.

Signing Off on the Sign-Off

After years of tweaking and testing my own email sign-offs (and admiring others’), I’m convinced that this little block at the end of our emails is valuable real estate. In fact, I occasionally have prospects schedule a meeting with me directly from my signature link without even replying to the email itself. Each time these meetings result in closed deals, it proves that the email signature can move business forward.

My advice: Treat your sales email signature as an evolving part of your outreach strategy. Don’t set it and forget it. I periodically update mine with new content or tweaks based on my goals (more demo bookings, event signups, etc.), and I always keep it authentic to my voice. It only takes a few minutes to refresh your signature, but that small effort can pay off in a big way.

So go ahead and give your email signature a little TLC this week. You might be surprised at the results. Good luck putting your newly revamped signature to work!

We’re racing toward the finish line, with year-end in sight, and that means it’s time for sales reps to make one final push. If you want to finish the year as a top-performer, don’t let the busy holiday season slow you down. Let’s take a look at three techniques that will help make sure you are at the top of the rankings in 2015, and poised for greatness next year!

Be First.

Sometimes it pays to be first — literally. A study from InsideSales found that 50% of deals are won by the rep who responded first. Getting in early gives you the chance to influence the entire buying process. You can frame the conversation around your strengths and challenge your competitors’ weaknesses. If someone else beats you to the punch, you may find yourself playing defense. Being first means that you need to operate like a well-oiled machine, with protocols, systems, and alerts in place to make sure you reach out with a quickness — at just the right time.

Now, this doesn’t mean you should hound every lead with endless calls until they answer. But it does mean that you should know immediately which of your leads is displaying strong buying behavior.

Be Relevant.

Don’t be so eager to be reach your prospect quickly that you flub your first impression! What you say (or write!) matters just as much as when you say it. In fact, it can even turn what might have been an unwelcome sales conversation into an valued interaction. A 2015 study conducted by IDC in partnership with Salesforce found that 83% of decision makers appreciate being approached by a vendor if the interactions are relevant and contextual.

How can you make sure your message is relevant to each individual buyer? A lot of data and a little bit of auto-magic. Make sure that sales is armed with the full activity history for each prospect, so that they can understand how their customers are interacting with your brand and where their strongest interests lie. Reps can use this information to tailor conversations and choose the right follow-up messaging. Marketing can assist by creating approved email templates, making it easy for sales to send out targeted mini-campaigns with just a click.

Be Productive.

We asked our own sales reps what their biggest challenge was, and over and over again they said TIME. There simply aren’t enough hours in the day. Luckily, there are ways the leverage technology to help you work a little smarter.

One quick wins to get you started? Implement a scoring and grading strategy for new leads to help you understand where to focus you efforts. When you know which leads are ready to engage, and which ones need more education, you can automate the warming up process for early stage leads while focusing manpower on hot leads.

Want more hear more about how to put these strategies into action? Join us on Wednesday, December 9, for a live webinar featuring sales leaders Daryl Mason, AVP East Sales at Salesforce Pardot and Mike Grotell, Sr. Director, Sales & Marketing Operations at eMarketer.

In the digital age, the idea of heading to a trade show may seem a little old-hat – but there’s no doubt about it; they still offer incredible potential.

The numbers don’t lie. CEIR’s recent ‘The Changing State of Exhibitions’ report revealed trade shows to be almost unanimously beloved by marketers, with 99% stating that they offered ‘unique value’ that couldn’t be unlocked via other marketing mediums.

But, with trade shows making up such a large commitment in both time and resource, the challenge is clear: you need to do everything possible to maximize your return.

So, in our latest article, we want to talk about how to make the very most of your trade show presence.

Follow these steps and you’ll get the right types of leads flocking to your booth, unlocking the many advantages of trade show marketing – networking, building new relationships, generating valuable, impartial feedback and, of course, driving more sales!

1. Do the work in advance

One of the most common (and avoidable) mistakes you can make is to simply rely on random traffic heading to your booth.

Did you know that 7 out of 10 show attendees actually plan their booth visits before the show? They usually know who’ll they be visiting, and in what order.

45% of attendees visit only one exhibition per year and – while the good news is that this clearly offers you access to a unique audience – it also means that they’ll typically be just as focused as you are towards getting a return from the event. So, in all likelihood, they aren’t just going to turn up at the show and head to the booth that looks prettiest!

The bottom line is that you’re taking a huge chance by simply assuming the right people will find you on their own.

That’s why it’s really important to conduct pre-event outreach.

The first step is to get the word out to your existing contacts and prospects. Tell them that you’ll be heading to the event and that you’d love to meet up with them if they’re in the area or attending themselves.

But you also want to liaise with the event organizers to target confirmed show attendees who might not have heard of your brand yet. Often, you’ll find that event organizers are happy to help you promote your presence at the show, and – if you’re lucky – they may even share the attendee list with you. This allows you to reach out directly via email, phone calls and direct mail. One tactic that often works well is to send out postcards with exclusive offers or discounts – but only if the lead brings the postcard to your stand. This encourages them to hold onto the postcard and to actively seek you out when they arrive.

Start the conversation before the event – social media is a great way to do this – and continue throughout the show. Trade shows are a great platform to generate visual content and great photos – share pictures of your stand, your team, and attendees on Facebook and Twitter.

By taking this approach and essentially ‘making appointments,’ you can ensure that – even if you enjoy less foot traffic than you were expecting – the event is far from a bust for you and your business.

(Image source: Growsales.com)

2. Location, Location, Location

Having said all that, a high volume of quality traffic at your booth clearly has the potential to turn a good event into a great one. And one of the key deciding factors is where your stand is actually positioned.

Clearly, the best location will vary by venue, but there are some positions that tend to be highly coveted – particularly main aisles, entrances, ends of rows and corner spaces, which give you access to traffic from intersecting aisles.

Interestingly, experts have suggested that, while Europeans tend to first visit booths positioned on the left, Americans go first to those located on the right. It sounds like a mediocre joke, but, remarkably, yes, this is linked to the side of the road we drive on! This is definitely worth considering.

Of course, as we’ll touch on in more detail shortly, it’s not all about driving huge crowds to your stand. You want quality foot traffic and qualified leads, not congestion and chaos. So stay away from exits and entrances, concession stands and restrooms. Instead, you want to be at the heart of passing traffic. A good way to do this is to aim to be positioned along the major route to seminar rooms or exhibitions.

3. Invest in look and feel

It’s not the single most important factor, but the look and feel of your booth definitely matters. Of course, an awesome stand will help attract passing traffic, but – more fundamentally – that booth is a direct reflection of your brand, and needs to send the right message – welcoming, professional, slick, and on-message!

There’s plenty of exhibit design inspiration out there to help, and a plethora of stand design companies who can create solutions to fit most budgets. It’s interesting to note that modular exhibit systems have become particularly popular in recent times, largely since they weigh 60% less than a traditional custom exhibit, making them much cheaper to transport.

The look and feel of your stand extends, of course, to those who work on it. And here, it’s all about common sense; stay stood up, ready to greet your prospects. Smile. Make eye contact. These rules should apply across everyone manning your booth.

Images: Skyline.com

4. Demonstrate your products

Trade shows offer a great opportunity to physically demonstrate products to potential customers. 92% of trade show attendees say that their primary reason for attending is to look for new products – and, in fact, it’s been the number one reason for 25 years.

As an online merchant, this is clearly a rare and powerful opportunity to show off your products in person.

It’s particularly powerful if you have a new, exciting product to launch. Many attendees see trade shows as an opportunity to keep on top of what’s happening in the industry, and you can create a real buzz by rolling out a new product in front of a potentially huge audience – boosting brand awareness and drumming up orders.

Image: MPG Events

5. Harness the power of technology

Technological advancements have changed many areas of business in recent years, and trade show marketing is no exception.

The potential for technological additions to your trade show are almost limitless, and can help you deliver an unforgettable experience – from basic stuff like social check-ins and digital signage, through to interactive touch screens and even proximity marketing.

A trade show represents a great opportunity to represent a demo of your website or product on a large LED monitor, or even provide a walkthrough demo – always a successful tactic at a trade show. If you carry electronic products, you’ll want to have a demo of the actual products on hand.

6. Offer promotional giveaways and perks

While you want to avoid cheap gimmicks (see point 7!) promotional items remain a go-to technique for many trade show exhibitors. After all, who doesn’t love free gear – pens, t-shirts, bumper stickers et al?

Clearly, there’s a risk of handing out items to freebie-seekers who have no interest in buying your product – but industry stats suggest these people are generally in a clear minority. Apparently, across the board, as many as 81% of trade show attendees have buying authority and 46% occupy Executive or Upper Management roles.

Ultimately, these are generally very inexpensive items. And, because they can give you a valuable head start when it comes to establishing conversations and building relationships, offering them is a no-brainer. They’ll usually pay for themselves and that’s why they’re enduringly popular.

There are other creative ways to bring people into your booth. You could consider offering working space and laptop charging points – always in short supply at a trade show – to bring people in. This seems counter-intuitive but will be appreciated by attendees and is an unlikely way to make a positive impression.

7. Avoid gimmicks

Having said all that, you really do need to tread carefully when it comes to established trade show ‘gimmicks.’ ‘Booth babes’…free popcorn stands……ugh.

You have to remember that it’s not just the size of the crowd, but the number of prospects in it. You may attract a crowd of hundreds wanting to get some free popcorn, but will they remember what you were exhibiting? Do they even care – or do they just want popcorn?

Gathering a crowd at a trade show is very similar to running a competition online. You really need to structure and craft it carefully to reach the right type of people.

8. Generate Leads

It’s a great feeling when the traffic is flowing to your booth. But the next step is every bit as important – you need to get their details and turn them into leads. We could write another article altogether on this topic – but here are a few ideas to get you started.

Of course, there are trade show staples like the business card in the bowl. Contests are a great way to entice people to part with their details, and choosing a tailored prize will help ensure you gather the right type of leads.

One of the quickest and easiest ways to capture this information is by using badge scanning software. Many exhibitions provide attendees with badges which contain their essential lead information – this can easily captured either by stand-alone badge scanners or using badge scanner mobile apps.

Many of the principles of online lead generation can be re-thought slightly to make them potent offline tools too. Most of us would accept that one of the best ways to generate leads online is to trade free knowledge for user details – and there’s no reason why this same principle can’t work at your trade show.

If you’re already investing in content creation – ebooks, white papers, guides, etc. – then why not hand them over to leads you generate at the trade show? You can send them the content by email or put it on a USB drive and hand it out physically.

Final Thoughts

In recent years, we’ve seen an explosion of new, fashionable ways to market your business. But trade shows – an old favorite – remain as successful as ever.

Following the basic rules in this article is going to give you a great head start in driving relevant, targeted foot traffic to your booth.

Make sure to spread the word about your presence at the trade show, both before and during the event – ‘build it and they will come’ is never the best policy! Do some research into the ideal location for your stand, and create a physical presence that is befitting of your brand. Show off your products. Use technology to deliver memorable experiences that really help you stand out. Give out freebies – but be sensible, and remember that, generally, quality comes before quality. Finally, share knowledge at the event.

Check out our free downloadable checklist to make sure you’re ready for the trade show!

Mapping out the evolving relationship your prospects have with your organization in a way that makes sense to service, sales, HR, executives, and stakeholders is a powerful tool.

Most marketers view the customer experience as a traditional marketing funnel with stages such as Awareness, Consideration and Purchase, but I consult on executing a much more modern and effective approach in this “customer centered era” we live in today: Awareness, Education, Sample, Purchase and Refer.

Before you get started on the Customer Journey: 

Step 1: Define the characteristics and behaviors of your ideal customer

Step 2: Discover or create your difference 

Step 3: Document your vision, mission and goals

Map the Customer Journey: 

Now that you’re thinking about interactions and touchpoints you can start to fill in the your customer journey with the initiatives, campaigns, processes and touchpoints that will lead to a great experience.

Awareness – This is the phase where sales, social media, content, networking, public relations will do well and even search, advertising and referrals start here.

• Do your online and offline ads communicate the brand positioning? Do they target and offer to begin the relationship process with your ideal customers?
• Do your social media outpost have consistent images and messages?  Are they promoted on your website?
• Are your collaborative or partner marketing efforts targeted towards your ideal audience base?
• Are your keywords consistent and focused on the phrases that actual prospects search for?
• Do you have a systematic process to handle referrals that come in?

Education – This is the stage where once you attracted prospects to your website you have give them reasons to come back, reasons to relate and even reasons to like your team and also provide reviews, success stories and client testimonials.

• Do your online content assets include your message and brand identity?
• Do your business email signatures and cards include your positioning?
• Is your vision documented on your website for your ideal customers to relate to?
• Is your website mobile responsive?
• Are your newsletters consistent with your website branding? Does the newsletter go out on a regular basis and include valuable content for your audience?  Is there an opt-in incentive for your newsletter?

• Are your email campaigns consistent with your branding?
• Do you follow a content creation system to establish your company as an expert on focused topics?
• Do you regularly promote and monitor review sites?

Sample – Now that prospects are wondering how your solution might work for them it’s time to demonstrate to them with reports, ebooks, webinars and very detailed how to information. You might also have an assessment, audit, seminar, evaluation, trial version or low cost offer here.

• What is your offering for prospects to sample your expertise, product or service?
• How do you encourage people to sign up for the offering?

Purchase – For this stage the focus is still on educating but from the standpoint of a new customer.

• Do your kits, contracts and invoices match your branding and communicate key information?
• Do your new customer gain access to key personnel or content?
• Do your new customer become part of a exclusive club?

Refer – The customer journey is ultimately about referrals.

• How do you encourage or motivate your current customers to refer?
• Does your incentive for referrals connect with your culture in some way?

The point is to get you thinking not only about how to generate and convert leads but how to create the best possible experience as part of the customer journey plan.

A few weeks ago we talked about the Death of the Sales Funnel with buyers calling the shots for how, where and when they want to talk to sales. The flip side of the coin is the transformation of marketing and their role in the buyer journey.  Now Marketing owns a quota to bring the right prospects in the door and deliver sales-ready leads that are more likely to convert. With this new reality of Modern Marketing, marketers are looking at how to measure their business impact with the goal of definitively proving Return on Marketing Investment (ROMI). Content is designed to fuel conversion from anonymous to known leads—first to attract, then with the support of marketing automation, to nurture prospects along their buyer journey. According to Forrester Research, sales is looking to marketing to increase the productivity of customer acquisition by targeting the right accounts and helping sales pursue them—finding smarter ways to prospect and build account-based strategies. With powerful marketing technologies, digital acumen and a little foresight you can get there, but you can’t get there alone.

All the technology in the world can’t help you in your quest to evolve into Modern Marketing unless you mind the golden rules, and in particular, make friends with sales. Sales and marketing now have a common goal to drive revenue. Sales and marketing are now speaking the same language and are motivated to assist each other in attaining their collective goals. The path from anonymous to qualified lead becomes a well-orchestrated dance where marketing goes deeper into driving engagements while sales becomes an active player in cultivating leads. The line between the two disciplines is blurred and both are responsible for bringing the right prospects in the door.

For more information on modern marketing and lead gen, read more about Using Predictive Analytics and Marketing Automation to “Catch” Prospects.

If You’re Not In, You’re Out

Blogging has come a long way from its web-logging heyday on the likes of Geocities. Nowadays it seems like every person, corporation, and animal has their own blog. But why do we blog? How do we blog? What’s too long or too short? How long does it take? How long should it take? So many questions and seemingly so few answers… until now.

Andy has 15 years of web design experience under his belt, a tome of research from hours spent surveying 1,000 bloggers, and a burning desire to share his knowledge with the world. His blogging insight and analytical tools will arm you with the requisite information to elevate your blog and get it on the fast track to success.

In This Episode

• How the time spent on a blog post can be related to quality of content, depending on your blogging goals and timeline
• Why the addition of visuals means a shift in content density of blogs
• How properly tracking the success of your blog posts, not just number of entries, leads to higher conversion rates
• Why keeping a scalpel at hand will mean more relevant material for all blogs

 

Quotes From This Episode

“The challenge is quality.” —@crestodina

“Always align your frequency with the length of your sales cycle… and the length of your buying interval.” —@crestodina

“What’s missing in blogging today is that people are trying to be an encyclopedia… and what they lose is the emotional ‘this is just my opinion’ side of it.” —@crestodina

“People are learning it’s not successful to hit somebody with a wall of text.” —@crestodina (highlight to tweet)

“The definition of the word ‘blog’ is growing to cover more topics and mean more different things.” —@crestodina

“Once you know the conversion rate from visitor into subscriber for each of your posts, that moment will completely change your content promotion strategy.” —@crestodina

“There’s no ROI if all you’re measuring is the amount you’re putting in.” —@crestodina (highlight to tweet)

“We need to look at it as social assist and value social as a first touch point or top-of-funnel visitor.” —@crestodina

“I live in fear, as all content marketers do, that my audience will quit paying attention.” —@crestodina

Resources

• Andy Crestodina on Twitter
• Orbit Media Studios
• Research Reveals Success Tactics of Top Bloggers: 11 Trends
• Content Chemistry: An Illustrated Guide to Content Marketing
• Relevance
• Medium
• How Little Do Users Read?
• What You Think You Know About the Web Is Wrong
• Content Shock
• Content Pros

 

The Big Two:

Andy Crestodina

What’s your one tip for becoming a social pro?

Nobody will ever go to your testimonials page, which is why it’s key to make every page a testimonials page and the key to this is utilizing your social streams. Listen carefully for the good stuff and repurpose it throughout your content. Furthermore, make sure that every marketing claim in your content is supported with some kind of evidence and the easiest evidence will come from accolades or conversations pulled from your social streams.

If you could do a Skype call with any living person, who would it be?

Regardless of your politics, you’ve got to admit that Barack Obama is a very significant person historically and a Skype call with the current POTUS would be fascinating.

See you next week!

In my previous posts — Sales Process? You Should Probably Call It a Pursuit Process  and Dynamic Sales Process Leads to Dynamite Results  — I talked about the value of a dynamic sales process that helps sales professionals pursue opportunities in an optimal way.

In this post, I take the discussion a step further by talking about validation of the sales process. After all, if your sale process isn’t valid, if it doesn’t reflect the way your sales team should be pursuing opportunities, or if it doesn’t engender confidence about opportunities in the pipeline, then it really doesn’t matter if the salesforce uses it or not.

There are several ways to validate a sales process, and the one I can speak to most effectively is the methodology we use here at Richardson when creating a customized and dynamic process for clients. Over four to six weeks, we collaboratively work through a multiphase methodology:

• Phase 1: Data Collection – We begin by meeting with the company’s top performers, sales leaders, and other stakeholders who can provide insights into the sales or account management cycle.
• Phase 2: Development of the Branded Sales Process – We develop a customized sales process that aligns with the company’s sales cycle and buying patterns, and we map it out in a matrix that identifies specific accountabilities.
• Phase 3: Validation and KPI Phase – We validate the sales process itself with line stakeholders in a workshop setting, honing and finalizing the methodology and then transferring accountability to internal champions.
• Phase 4: Executive Review – We conduct a session with company leaders to gain full buy-in and commitment, raising their support in modeling the common language and process for sales and reinforcing accountability.
• Phase 5: Operationalizing the Sales Process – We identify the elements of the company’s talent lifecycle that the sales process touches, including performance management, selection and hiring, skills training, onboarding, integration with CRM, branding, and marketing of the process, among other interventions, in order to successfully operationalize the sales process and accelerate adoption.

What this entire process does is validate the assumptions, methodology, culture fit, and commitment around the sales process. Going through each phase allows Richardson to tap the expertise of senior leaders and top-performing sales professionals, introduce best practices, and construct a process that can be embedded into daily practice, providing the right guidance to both sales professionals and sales leaders.

With such a process, companies learn to focus on the few tangible things that really matter in order to gain insight into the accuracy and quality of sales forecasts. Verifiable outcomes at each stage provide leading indicators of customer engagement, allowing sales professionals and their managers to make significant changes in results while also building greater confidence in the pipeline and, ultimately, business results.

Learn more!

Click the following link or the image below to learn more about Richardson’s Sales Process Consulting Services.

The post How Valid Is Your Sales Process? appeared first on Richardson Sales Enablement Blog.

TORONTO – A new report says Canada is one of five countries most exposed to China’s slowing growth.

Geneva-based asset manager Unigestion says Canada’s reliance on commodity exports makes it vulnerable as Chinese demand for oil, metals and other raw materials falls because of structural shifts in its market.

Canada, where commodities make up roughly half of exports, is facing lower prices for its goods and falling demand from China, which accounts for five per cent of its total exports.

Unigestion says China is maturing from an investment-led economy into a services and consumer-based economy, meaning annual GDP growth of around seven per cent rather than the average of 12 per cent that the country posted between 2000 and 2010.

An aging population, over-investment, a slowdown in the European Union and the rise of the U.S. dollar are also weighing on the country’s growth.

The Chinese yuan is pegged to the greenback, meaning gains in America’s currency push up the value of the Chinese currency and make its exports more expensive for buyers.

Unigestion says the country most exposed to the Chinese slowdown is Malaysia, followed by Australia, South Korea and Switzerland.

The post Canada one of the top five countries most exposed to Chinese slowdown: report appeared first on Canadian Business - Your Source For Business News.

China needs advanced robotics to help balance its economic, social, and technological ambitions with continued growth.

China is laying the groundwork for a robot revolution by planning to automate the work currently done by millions of low-paid workers.

The government’s plan will be crucial to a broader effort to reform China’s economy while also meeting the ambitious production goals laid out in its latest economic blueprint, which aims to double per capita income by 2020 from 2016 levels with at least 6.5 percent annual growth. The success of this effort could, in turn, affect the vitality of the global economy.

President Xi Jinping has made it clear that robotics would be a major priority for the country’s economic future.

Many of the robots on show at the World Robotics conference in Beijing’s exhibition hall were service or entertainment robots such as automated vacuum cleaners, cheap drones, or quirky looking machines designed to serve as personal companions. But there were also many industrial robots that signaled the real impetus for China’s robot push: its manufacturing sector.

China is already the world’s largest producer of everything from clothes to electronics, but much of it depends on low-cost, low-skill labor. And even as economic growth has slowed, wages continue to rise across the country as the economy evolves. The Chinese government is also eager to see its workforce diversify and its manufacturing industries become more technologically advanced.

The scale of this robot revolution could be enormous. Two years ago China became the world’s largest importer of robots, and the International Federation of Robotics, an industry group, estimates that China will account for more than a third of all industrial robots installed worldwide by 2018. Yet the number of robots per worker in China is far lower than in many industrially advanced countries, indicating a huge potential for growth.

China may soon become not only an important market for more advanced robotic technology, but a producer of more advanced robot systems itself. Many international robot makers were present at the Beijing conference, including the German giant Kuka and the Swiss company ABB. But dozens of Chinese robot companies were also present, including some companies that have only been around for a few years.

The latest robot from China’s Siasun has six joints, making it more dextrous.

There are five major markets representing 70% of the total sales volume in 2014: China, Japan, the United States, the Republic of Korea and Germany.

57,096 industrial robots were sold in 2014 in China, 56% more than in 2013. Thereof, Chinese robot suppliers installed about 16,000 units according to the information from the China Robot Industry Alliance (CRIA). Their sales volume was about 78% higher than in 2013. This was partly due to an increasing number of companies that reported their sales data for the first time in 2014. Foreign robot suppliers increased their sales by 49% to 41,100 units, including robots produced by international robot suppliers in China. China, by far the biggest market for industrial robots, is also the fastest growing market worldwide. This rapid development is unique in the history of robotics. There has never been such dynamic rise in such a short period of time in any other market. A wide range of industries have been increasingly investing in automation. Between 2010 and 2014, total supply of industrial robots increased by about 40% per year on average.

Almost 29,300 industrial robots (+17%) were sold to Japan reaching the highest sales level in that country since 2008. Since 2013, Japan is the second largest market regarding annual sales


Worldwide operational stock of industrial robots increased again considerably in 2014

The total worldwide stock of operational industrial robots at the end of 2014 increased by 11% to about 1.5 million units. Since 2010, the stock has been increasing considerably.

Value of the global market was up to US$10.7 billion

In 2014, the sales value increased by 13% to a new peak at US$10.7 billion. It should be noted that the figures cited above generally do not include the cost of software, peripherals and systems engineering. Including the mentioned costs might result in the actual robotic systems? market value to be about three times as high. The worldwide market value for robot systems in 2014 is therefore estimated to be US$32 billion.

High potential

The most automated markets are the Republic of Korea, Japan and Germany. In 2014, the Republic of Korea had again the highest robot density in the world by far due to continued installation of a large volume of robots in recent years. 478 industrial robots were in operation in 2014 per 10,000 employees. The robot density in Japan further decreased to 314 units, and in Germany it continued to increase to 292 units. The United States which is one of the five the biggest robot markets regarding annual supply has a robot density of 164 units in 2014. The robot density in China, the biggest robot market since 2013, reached 36 units in 2014 unveiling the huge potential for robot installations in this market.

If China matched South Koreas 2014 robot density (478 robots per 10,000 employees) then China would have 4.8 million industrial robots.

If China matched South Koreas projected 2018 robot density (700 robots per 10,000 employees) then China would have 7.5 million industrial robots.

If China matched South Koreas projected 2023 robot density (1000 robots per 10,000 employees) then China would have 11 million industrial robots.

If China's entire industry matched Japan's Automotive industry 2014 robot density (1400 robots per 10,000 employees) then China would have 15 million industrial robots.




Read more »

More Americans shopped online last Monday (November 30) than braved Black Friday in-store sales, and that can teach us a lot about how the Buyer’s Journey has evolved since “Cyber Monday” was inaugurated 10 years ago.

The Internet analytics company comScore reported that Cyber Monday 2015 set a record as the biggest US shopping day of all time, with sales topping more than $3 billion. The online onslaught led to outages and snafus for some retail websites, including Target, Neiman Marcus, and Amazon.

And while $3 billion is a big deal compared to my checking account, the Chinese online retailer Alibaba Group nearly doubled that amount in the first 90 minutes of its single-day shopping event, called Singles’ Day, on Nov. 11.

Singles’ Day, which started in the 1990s with the fun intent to celebrate singlehood, has been embraced by Alibaba as a day to buy something nice for yourself. This year, shoppers spent $5 billion on themselves in the first 90 minutes, and more than $14.3 billion on themselves during the day.

Alibaba Group reported $14.3 billion in sales for its Singles’ Day shopping event on Nov. 11 (Image source: Alibaba Group)

What Does This Have To Do With The Buyer’s Journey?

What do these shopping events have to do with the Buyer’s Journey? And what does that mean to you, in your marketing role?

Well … everything. The explosion of online sales in events such as Singles’ Day or Cyber Monday are snapshots that reveal how much the Buyer’s Journey has changed, as well as who is now in control.

Let’s begin with a quick recap of the Buyer’s Journey, which are the steps a purchaser takes before making a purchase. The Buyer’s Journey typically flows along what marketers also call the sales or marketing funnel. That typical journey has three main parts:

• Awareness (top-of-funnel, or TOFU)
• Consideration (middle-of-funnel, or MOFU)
• Decision/purchase (bottom –of-funnel) BOFU)

Now let’s look at Black Friday, which has its roots in the 1960s. Back then, purchasers followed a time-worn Buyer’s Journey.

They were made aware of a product through traditional advertising on television and radio, and in newspapers or direct mail.

They were alerted to special sales the day after Thanksgiving mostly through coupons and advertising inserts stuffed into newspapers. Armed with their ads, they hopped in the family car and drove to the nearest Sears or Woolworth to get the kids a Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robot or Chatty Kathy Doll. Even more complex sales, such as buying a car, put most – if not all – of the buying information in the hands of the salesman and company to be doled out to the buyer as bread crumbs to a sale.

Fast forward to today, and you’re hard pressed to find a newspaper in a household, let alone one stuffed with ads. This was true in my home this past Thanksgiving weekend, where we had nary a newspaper but did count more than a dozen smartphones, half a dozen laptops, and at least three tablets among us.

From the comfort of our couches and arm chairs, we could purchase one of 2015’s hottest toys, the remote control robot from the upcoming Star Wars movie, with just a few clicks.

In fact, mobile spending accounted for nearly one third of the Cyber Monday sales, increasing more than 53 percent from 2014 to $838 million. Mobile accounted for about 70 percent of the Singles’ Day sales.

We – that includes you, me and the general shopping public – no longer want to set alarms to wake up at 5 a.m., drive to a store, and then wait in line to get a discounted TV set we could have ordered online for the same price – and had shipped to our home for free. Today, buyers are enjoying the freedom that comes with online shopping, which let them shop wherever they want, whenever they want.

ABC News interviewed Diane Boral from Oxnard, California on why most of her shopping was going to be online this year. Her reply: “Because I have more time to browse for items.”

Buyers willingly, happily spend a considerable amount of time online researching their options. This is the new norm for B2C sales, as seen on Cyber Monday.

And Yes, B2B has changed too

It’s true for B2B sales, too. The Consumer Executive Board (CEB) surveyed more than 1,400 B2B customers and found at least 57% of a consumer’s purchase decision was made before they talked to a sales rep.

Back in the traditional Buyer’s Journey, would-be purchasers followed the path laid out for them by a company. Today, the buyer is empowered through technology, Internet search engines, review websites, and social media platforms to blaze their own path to your product. This graphic from Forrester shows how the buyer now moves freely (and unpredictably) throughout the Buyer’s Journey.

The New Buyer’s Journey (Image Source: Forrester)

What Does That Mean To You?

Basically, it means you can’t afford to be lazy. Today’s buyer is better educated and more empowered than ever before. They lead busy lives, and when confronted with a pain point (e.g., needing a new furnace or a new logistics vendor) they will begin their research online and, increasingly, will make their purchase online.

If you are not ready online and on mobile for today’s shoppers, they don’t terribly mind. They have other options: Your competitors .

So, my advice is to use Cyber Monday and Singles’ Day as models to how you can prepare your business for the new, every day, Buyer’s Journey.

“Every Day is Your Cyber Monday” Checklist

1. Understand your customers, what they want, and when they want it

First, begin with the end in mind. Take a look at your products or services and work backward to determine the seasonality of your business, as well as begin to better understand your customers’ demographics, interests and pain points. Your seasonality might have nothing to do with holidays and everything to do with buying cycles, such as end-of-quarter or end-of-financial-year.

Buyers like to have information ready and waiting for them to get when they feel they need it, not on your schedule. Publish content that will help them choose you as their solution. You want to be the business that gets called when they’ve finished the first 57 percent of the decision-making.

Consistently publishing value-added content will also increase how many people find you on their buying journeys. The more relevant content you have on your website – i.e. content that addresses the consumer’s pain points – will increase your visibility to Google and the other search engines.

2. Content Audit & Planning

Next, audit your existing inventory of marketing collateral, matching it with the information you gained above. You want to match the collateral with the different stages of the Buyer’s Journey, as well as identify who would be consuming that content (managers, C-suite; B2B or B2C).

With your audit complete, you next step should be to identify any holes or redundancies you may have. In our experience, many businesses have tons and tons of content aimed at the top of the funnel and targeted to a general audience (insert frowny emoticon here). Read more on building a content library.

Now you should know what you have and what you may need. The next step is planning when you’ll create and publish this content. If you’re B2C, and your “Cyber Monday” is the start of the school year, then you should be making sure all the content is created and ready to be published before the end of spring. If you’re B2B and selling software to financial analysts and tax preparers, your content should be ready to go no later than the start of Q3 for Q3 and Q4 sales. Download the white paper on Six Best Practices for Creating a Content Marketing Strategy.

3. Prioritizing Content & Lead Scoring

Not all white papers are created equal; you need to understand which content has the most value for your customer. Review your existing business data analytics. Interview your sales and marketing teams. Ask your current customers. Determine which content help the buyer move through the buying funnel.

Once you have this information, associate a value to the content. You could start by giving a clicked-on email a value of five. A downloaded white paper could be worth 15 points. A product demo is worth 40 points. And so on. Your marketing automation platform can do this automatically, making it feasible to track a volume of prospects as they move along on their own idiosyncratic journey. Read more about the importance of lead scoring.

Remember, that it is no longer a linear one-way journey. A buyer may first come to your business after an Internet search resulted in a white paper or webinar offer. If you know it takes a score of 80 points for a prospect to become HOT, then encouraging them to download white papers or attend a webinar can get them there faster than having them retweet a post, which may only be worth one or two points.

4. Testing & Technology

You have now created amazing content targeted to your very own buyers, and you would be happy to have online sales land somewhere between Amazon (500+ transactions per second) and Alibaba (85,900 transactions per second) on their respective big shopping days.

Well, you’d better make sure first to test all the moving parts. One organization recently moved its website to a new server and never confirmed all its online forms still worked – they didn’t. A sure fire way to lose potential customers is to not be ready for them once they have made the decision to come to you online – especially if they’ trying to buy via mobile (read about Google’s emphasis on mobile).

Make sure your PPC advertising is updated for the season or current campaign. Make sure the links actually link to the correct landing pages, not your home page. Make sure there is a call to action on the page (“register right now to learn something important at this fabulous webinar’). Test the call to action. Test every link and form, on different screens (laptops, tablets, smartphones), on different operating systems and Internet browsers. Is the form hard to navigate? Is any of the language confusing? When you’re ready to launch, A/B test your headlines, buttons, and offers.

Innovations in technology make it easy to segment your buyers. You can segment by attributes such as title or location; you can segment by actions (e.g., attended a webinar); by purchased product (they bought a printer, so you send emails about ink); by engagement; by where they are in the journey (top of funnel? Mid-funnel? Almost closed?); or any other factor that mkes sense in your unique marketing environment.

You can also consider purchasing retargeting advertising or use programmatic advertising to deliver your snappy videos to customers. Sell direct to buyers online? Consider creating a secure way for existing customers to store purchase information, or incorporate Apple Pay or Google Pay to your shopping cart options to speed up the process. Be transparent about this to enhance trust.

Read Act-On’s ebook on Marketing Tech 101 to better understand the landscape and how you can plan your technology investments.

5. Promotion

The night before Singles’ Day, Alibaba hosted a big television show filled with celebrities. They spent the time highlighting all the specials that would be available during the sale.

Unless you know a Kardashian, you’re not likely to land a TV special. But you can and should consider all the avenues you have to promote your campaign. Consider creating short product videos that can be included in an email newsletter. Or create a video announcing your “Cyber Monday” sales event that can be featured on your website and newsletters. You can also create special edits of this content to share on the social media platforms your customers care about. Download our eBook “10 Tips for Creating Engaging Social Content.”

One other promotion you should be doing is letting others throughout your organization know about your campaign or sales event. This includes the sales team, as well as engineering, customer service, and accounting. You want folks ready to respond should a potential customer call or email them, or meet them at a holiday party.

Communicating with customers has never been easier. Or harder. There’s a ton of content out there, much of it just regurgitated noise. Remember that buyers are more savvy than ever, that they are researching information about your product or service before you even know it, and – if you are not ready for them, they will go elsewhere. Take a tour of Act-On to see how you can effectively engage your prospects throughout their buying journey by providing the right content, at the right time.

But if you’ve followed our “Every Day is Your Cyber Monday” Checklist you’re already separating yourself from the competition. Good luck on your journey.