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On July 15, Amazon held its first “Prime Day,” which featured a variety of on-site sales exclusive to members of its Prime service.

And a few things went wrong.

So, for a limited time only (i.e., as long as our Web servers last), at a sizeable discount (i.e., free), and without further ado (i.e., unless you’re busy), let’s go over a few customer centricity best practices we can glean from the event.

Work to manage and deliver on customer expectations.

One criticism of Amazon’s Prime Day was the fact that buyers couldn’t find what they were looking for. One reason was the left-to-right, carousel layout of Amazon’s deals section, which looks like this today:

The carousel is serviceable for users casually browsing for items, but not ideal for users actively tracking flash sales.

Let’s say you saw a cheap HDTV in the “Upcoming” sales section, then clicked into the “All Available” section when it became available. Would you be able to scroll through the carousel fast enough to get one?

Probably not, because you’d only have a few seconds before they’d be sold out.

And so you’d sit, faced with a smoldering realization that there are vast numbers of people better than you at buying cheap televisions on the Internet.

Customer have expectations, and they hold grudges when those expectations aren’t met. The more you can remove their barriers to doing business with you, the more they’ll work with you. And the more you can deliver on those expectations and build customer loyalty.

Focus small in your customer experience strategy.

Each customer experiences something different and tangible in their interactions with you. Which is why blanket, public promises to all of your customers are so hard to uphold.

In the case of Prime Day, one customer might have interpreted “more deals than Black Friday” as “I will see better prices than Black Friday.” Another might have interpreted the same to mean “I will buy more discounted goods than I did this past Black Friday.”

It seems like both would have been disappointed.

You can avoid such disappointment by taking time to develop customer understanding in your customer experience strategy. If you can be specific about your customer segments, you can take greater account of them when you’re making decisions. It can also keep you focused on promises you can keep.

Customer backlash comes in bulk.

Perhaps it comes as no surprise the response to Prime Day has been one of disappointment. But still, it’s had its entertaining moments.

The Internet has a funny way of creating communities with common interests. That communal quality works both to facilitate loyal promoters or vocal detractors.

In terms of your customer centricity strategy, consider if you’d like people to unite around customer satisfaction or frustration.

Instead of waiting for a bulk shipment of harsh customer criticism, get proactive with a Voice of the Customer program. By making an operational habit out of listening and responding to customer feedback, you can address issues discover flaws in your customer experience before they snowball.

Want more?

We live for helping companies become more customer-centric. If you’re interested in working with PeopleMetrics, check out our about us section.

For more information about CustomerMetrics, our Voice of the Customer program, click the button below.

Image Credits:

• Elderly woman sits alone at Christmas by simpleinsomnia, CC BY 2.0
• US-ECONOMY-BLACK FRIDAY by Diariocritico de Venezuela, CC BY 2.0
• hanka holding katerina’s hand by nate bolt, CC BY-SA 2.0

Getting a good night’s sleep on a hot day is no easy task, especially without air conditioning, but there are plenty of things you can do to beat the heat. This graphic from the folks at the Sleep Matters Club is packed with tips—some of which we’ve mentioned before —to cool off and get some rest.http://lifehacker.com/5824376/how-do...

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Old liabilities on the government books are ghosts of past government interventions in the economy and stark lessons on the perils of corporate welfare, says Wildrose finance critic.

NANJING, China (Reuters) - Chinese car sales have barely got out of first gear this year, yet a shift in consumer behavior has sent Mazda Motor Corp hurtling out of the pack, posting records and struggling to keep pace only with demand.

Japan's fifth-biggest automaker has found its sporty design philosophy clicked with an emerging class of drivers who have abandoned copycat buying and the widely held perception that only long-established leaders, notably Volkswagen AG , make decent cars.

"Other cars are either too round or stocky, but the CX-5 has more of a flowing character," said Nanjing office worker Xu Duo, 27, who bought Mazda's sport utility vehicle last year.

China car sales grew 1.4 percent in the first half of 2015, the weakest in six years. An industry body last week said a stock market slump exacerbated consumer concern about prospects in an economy expanding at its slowest in over two decades.

Yet Mazda logged its best-ever first half at 17 percent, boosted by sales of the CX-5 as well as sedans Axela and Atenza. Demand has been so strong that supplies have failed to keep up for some models, a Mazda spokesman told Reuters.

Mazda's market share nevertheless remains under 1 percent and the number of cars it sells each month is a fraction of those of rivals like Volkswagen. The German automaker built a leading share of about a fifth over the past 30 years, while Mazda's first major push was as recent as 2007.

SPORTY DESIGN

But the market has been shaken in recent years as more drivers gain experience of cars from a wider variety of makers, and learn firsthand that German vehicles do not necessarily excel above all others as is commonly believed, analysts say.

An influential annual consumer TV show added to the doubt when it picked on Volkswagen in two of the past three years for issues with quality and service, said Yale Zhang, head of researcher Automotive Foresight. Sales practices at Daimler AG's Mercedes-Benz were also targeted.

"The German myth is being broken," said Zhang.

The changing perception has given Mazda the chance to rapidly gain ground while remaining a niche player with its streamlined, sporty design philosophy, dubbed kodo.

"It's impossible to convey our kodo design to all of China's 1.3 billion people," Norihiro Matsuo, president of Changan Mazda Automobile - one of Mazda's two Chinese joint ventures - said in a group interview in Nanjing last week.

"For now, we are focused on increasing our core client base," Matsuo said. "This approach is something Volkswagen or General Motors Co cannot take because they are out to control market share."

As the market matures, drivers will choose cars based on design or perceived uniqueness, rather than the view that certain brands are somehow inherently superior, Matsuo said. Mazda is targeting that segment of the market, he said.

 SIDESTEPPING PRICE WARS

First-half sales may have spiked, but Mazda is maintaining its full-year target growth at 4.3 percent to 220,000 vehicles. Senior company executives have also repeatedly said its strategy is not to rapidly expand in China but to focus on branding.

To boost brand appeal to Chinese consumers, automakers have localized features and aspects of design. Ford Motor Co revamped its Taurus for China in April, meeting a preference for a spacious backseat and conservative exterior.

Mazda's China-focused features include air-conditioning vents for the backseat and double horns given the heavy usage in the country. But the automaker will not compromise its exterior design philosophy to cater to local tastes, said Matsuo.

On pricing, Mazda is similar to its rivals, with the 115,500 yuan ($18,601.43) starting price of its Axela compact comparing with the 109,900 yuan of General Motors' Chevy Cruze. But a niche approach allows Mazda to step back from price wars.

The likes of General Motors and Volkswagen have started to lower prices to counter market slowdown while dealers offer steep discounts to stop inventories building up.

Mazda, however, is not offering discounts and is supervising dealers' inventories to ensure price stability, Matsuo said.

"We are too small a company to get involved in a price war," he said.

(Additional reporting by Norihiko Shirouzu and Jake Spring in BEIJING and SHANGHAI newsroom; Editing by Christopher Cushing)

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Infinit, the Techstars alumnus that’s setting out to become the ultimate file-transfer app, has unveiled the first stage in its plans to make money: premium and enterprise plans.

Infinit’s slick, cross-platform file-transfer app sits in a crowded space alongside the likes of WeTransfer and Dropbox. But Infinit’s main selling point is that it cuts out the cloud to help you send files across the Internet directly between users — it’s peer-to-peer (P2P), and doesn’t require uploading or downloading between servers, thus making it quicker. Although anyone can use Infinit, it’s pitched at creatives who have large digital files to share.

The broader Infinit service does lean on the cloud, however. For example, there’s a “Get a Link” option, which sends a file to Infinit’s servers and instantly gives the user a link that can be shared with groups of people — this could be a screenshot, photo, or any other content. And it’s this that Infinit is now looking to monetize.

While the P2P element remains free and unlimited, users will be restricted to 1GB of online storage — but they can unlock an additional 1GB for every friend they refer to the service. After that, they’ll have to pay $10 a month to unlock 100GB worth of storage on the premium plan, though there is also a “customized” pricing option aimed at larger enterprises which offers more.

Other benefits of the premium plan include being able to set an expiration date for links that you share, create customized backgrounds on the download pages, and even set up a customized domain. It’s basically a white label service.

Additional features will be added soon, too, including embeddable links, commenting, and analytics.

Alongside these new plans, Infinit has also launched its app for Linux, which means it’s now available on all common mobile and desktop platforms. Plus, all of Infinit’s desktop apps now let you create keyboard shortcuts for taking screenshots  — in your Infinit account settings, you stipulate which key-combination you’d like, and when you action that, a link is automatically created on your clipboard which can then be pasted anywhere.

Based out of Paris, France, Infinit has raised just north of $2 million in funding to date, including a $1.8 million round last May.

More information:

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Global emissions are still rising and they have risen faster since 2000 than they were rising from 1970 to 1999

No one at last week’s UN climate conference thought the summit would deliver a deal to stop global temperatures rising more than 2 °C – generally considered to be the threshold above which catastrophic consequences are inevitable.

Instead, some called for Plan B: a global pricing system for carbon that is high enough to kill coal once and for all.

Some have claimed the opposite recently, heralding a report by the International Energy Agency finding that global energy-related emissions had not risen for the first time in 2014, even as the economy grew.

But Edenhofer thinks the 2014 figures could well be revised upwards. And even if they’re right, it was probably a blip rather than a turning point, he told New Scientist: “One year is not a good indicator.”

Even if carbon prices were introduced tomorrow, it is unlikely to be enough. Some politicians are still talking about limiting warming to 1.5 °C, but scientists now regard this as fantasy. “I’m struggling for words to characterise the 1.5-degree target,” said Thomas Stocker of the University of Bern, Switzerland. Even the 2 °C target has become “extremely ambitious”, he says.

Just about every scenario leading to 2 °C either assumes global emissions peaked around 2010 – they didn’t – or requires “negative emissions” (see “The dirty secret of 2 °C scenarios“). So achieving it requires either time travel or geoengineering, Kevin Anderson of the University of Manchester told the conference.

Nextbigfuture has indicated that it is ten to twenty times cheaper to reduce soot (soot darkens ice which increases melting and increases temperature by absorbing more heat instead of reflecting it into space).

Warming from soot is nearly equal to current warming from CO2.

There also needs be a massive scaling of nuclear energy.

City scale geoengineering can also be started and other geoengineering tests.



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China’s stock market has been on a roller-coaster ride over the past year. It more than doubled in value in the 12 months ending on June 12. Then it took a breathtaking plunge, wiping out a third of its value (more than $3 trillion of wealth) within a few weeks. After an extraordinary government intervention, it stabilized and bounced back 12 percent. No one knows where it will go next. If you do, you should be living on your own private island.

Financial markets everywhere are prone to bubbles, and this may just have been China’s turn. But it is also likely that the boom-bust cycle was exacerbated by real reform lagging financial reform.

Wanted: New engines of growth

For a long time, China’s economy grew well based on exports and investment. Both of these engines of growth are running out of steam. As the largest exporting nation in the world, China cannot expect its exports to grow much faster than world trade. Export growth of 2.1 percent year-on-year in June is about what China can expect going forward. On the investment side, China’s credit-fueled expansion has led to over-capacity throughout the economy. An estimated one-fifth of apartments are empty. Heavy industries such as steel and cement operate at low capacity. And while infrastructure throughout China is impressive, the most recent construction of highways and airports is poorly utilized.

China needs new sources of dynamism, and an obvious place to look is in the remaining sectors of the economy that are heavily protected. In China’s dualistic economy, manufacturing sectors are relatively open to foreign investment and trade. And these sectors have become highly competitive: China really is the factory of the world. But there is little room for those sectors to expand rapidly because exports are constrained and investment yields diminishing returns.

China has reached a stage of development at which modern services naturally take over as the growth engine—as countries get richer, more and more consumption consists of the output of the service industries. These are exactly the industries that are protected and uncompetitive in China: telecommunications, media, airlines, logistics, financial services, health, and education. Among G20 countries, China is the most closed to foreign investment in these sectors.

Another issue for the modern service sectors is China’s household registration system, which limits labor mobility. The system has allowed large numbers of unskilled rural workers to move to cities to work in factories—typically living in dormitories, unable to bring their families and become urban citizens. Service sectors of course generate some unskilled jobs as well, but they depend very much on high-skilled labor. The lack of a national labor market in which people can easily move to their most productive opportunities holds back productivity growth in general and is particularly harmful to modern services.

Put the real economy first

The new leadership under Xi Jinping announced a series of reforms that include opening up the service sectors and gradually dismantling the registration system. But progress on these reforms of the real economy has been painfully slow.

Meanwhile, financial reform can potentially complement these other changes. For a long time, China’s low, controlled interest rates acted like a tax on household savers and a subsidy to industrial investment. Heavy controls on stock and bond markets ensured that they played a minor role in allocating capital. Reforms of China’s financial markets in the past two years have been quite rapid: Interest rates have been decontrolled; there is some scope for private banking; firms can more easily access capital markets; and margin trading for stocks has been introduced.

These reforms contributed to an environment in which a stock market bubble was possible. However, the financial reforms have not been adequately complemented by real sector reforms that would allow for the expansion of more healthy companies into the economy—both domestic private firms and foreign-invested ones.

In the short run, the connection between the stock market and the real economy is not necessarily tight. Even with thorough reform, China might still have had a bubble. But in the long run, the development of a diversified group of healthy companies is needed both for real growth and for the sustainable expansion of the stock market. As the stock market was plunging over the past few weeks, the government moved away from market-based reforms and relied on direct controls—such as banning major shareholders from selling shares for six month and allowing more than half of listed firms to suspend trading.

The important question now is whether this unsettling experience will make the leadership even more cautious about the real sector reforms that the economy needs, or whether they will recognize that China’s growth needs a new model and accelerate reform. My advice to the leadership is to focus on the real economy. If it grows well, then the market will find its level and take care of itself.

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Many bloggers look at Twitter as a way to boost blog traffic. They tweet their blog posts and encourage their visitors to tweet them too. However, most of this results in a small amount of traffic that is not enough to generate and sustain a full-time income.

My blog generates and sustains a strong audience from Twitter. Every month, my blog attracts close to 10,000 visitors from Twitter alone which puts me on pace for over 100,000 visitors from Twitter in 2015. Part of that is a result of my large audience. With over 200,000 Twitter followers at this point, my audience definitely plays a part in how much blog traffic I get from Twitter. However, there is more to getting blog traffic from Twitter than having a large audience. In this article, I will explore six methods you can use to get more people to tweet your blog posts, and as a result, get more blog traffic from Twitter.

#1: Write Better Headlines

When most people tweet articles they find on the web, they tweet the headline. Most of the people who will tweet this blog post will say, “6 Superb Methods To Get More People To Tweet About Your Blog Posts” with the link. Your headlines need to be catchy so they grab other people’s attention, and some of that attention will lead to more tweets. We like tweeting stuff that sounds cool, and if we get value from the article, it’s practically a guarantee that we share the article with our followers.

What does it mean to have a better headline? For starters, you can include a big number. My blog posts 70 Amazing Twitter Tips and 100 Amazing Blogging Tips are both very popular on Twitter, and people have tweeted about those articles over 500 times. The big number of tips indicate high value which makes people want to read the content and eventually share that content with their audiences.

The best way to get ideas for your headlines is to look at examples. Which blog posts are doing exceptionally well on Twitter? These blog posts don’t have to be yours. On the contrary, the blog posts you analyze can be blog posts written by anyone in your niche. See which pull-words they are using and how they encourage visitors to tweet their blog posts.

#2: Twitter Share Button

You can’t really expect people to tweet your blog posts unless you have a Twitter share button somewhere in all of your blog posts. I have a Twitter share button at the bottom of all of my blog posts along with the share buttons for a few other social networks. If you want people to tweet your blog posts, you must make it as easy as possible for your visitors to tweet your content.

That’s why you need a Twitter share button at the bottom of every blog post. There are few people who are willing to go on Twitter, manually copy your headline into a tweet, and then include your blog post’s link in the tweet. Sure, it takes a few seconds, but remember that we have very short attention spans. Clicking a Twitter share button on this blog already gives you a prewritten tweet that you can use or customize. All of the work is done for the visitor. The only thing left to do is click “Tweet.”

#3: Click To Tweet

Click To Tweet is a great tool that makes it easy for people to tweet certain parts of your post. When you write something important, you can include a link that automatically leads to a tweet. Click To Tweet led to hundreds of extra visitors for just one of my articles. It is one of the most underrated ways to get more people tweeting about your blog.

This Twitter tool simply makes it easier for people to tweet your content. The easier it is for someone to tweet your content, the more likely a visitor is to tweet your content.

#4: Tweet This WP Plugin

The Tweet This WP Plugin is one of the best plugins I have on my blog. After getting inspired by Kim Garst to download the plugin, I decided to give it a try. Since I used the plugin, more people have tweeted my blog posts. In fact, I currently use it in every blog post that I write. The Tweet This WP Plugin is so successful because it is practically impossible for a visitor to skip over it while reading your blog post. Downloading this plugin only takes one minute. Using the plugin on one of your blog posts will take two minutes at most. The Tweet This WP Plugin can massively increase the amount of tweets your blog posts get.

Although the plugin is great to get more people to tweet your content, it should not be overused. The Tweet This WP Plugin works like an exclamation point. It grabs our attention if it is only used once or twice in an article. However, if you use the plugin too many times, it will take your visitors’ attention away from your content. You want people to tweet your content, but you don’t want to come out as the person who says, “Please, please, please tweet my content.”

#5: Tweet Your Own Blog Posts

If you are not willing to tweet your blog posts, then there is no point in expecting others to do the same. Whether you have hundreds of followers or thousands of followers, tweeting your blog posts allows those blog posts to reach an audience of people who may retweet and share your blog posts.

Tweeting my blog posts has allowed me to interact with many people, and many of these people  repeatedly share my blog posts. None of this would have happened if I decided to not post tweets about my blog posts.

#6: Grow Your Twitter Audience

This tip may not come to you as a surprise. However, many people stop by saying “Grow your Twitter audience” as if that statement is perfectly understood. There is more behind that statement than the four words you see.

If you want to double your blog traffic from Twitter without tweeting any more than you already do, then you need to double your Twitter audience. This may sound like common sense knowledge, but this knowledge allows you to realize what you have to do in order to achieve a certain goal.

Not only is it important to grow your Twitter audience, but it is also important to grow a targeted, engaged audience. A targeted follower is the best type of follower to have because that person is already interested in the niche you are in prior to following you. Your content will perfectly fit into their interests. These are the people who will account for a majority of the retweets for your blog posts.

In Conclusion

You want as many people as possible to tweet your blog posts. Few visitors start reading a blog post and immediately think of tweeting it. Visitors first get attracted by a headline and want value from the content. Then, you must make it easy for your visitors to tweet your content. Give your visitors multiple opportunities to tweet your blog posts. One opportunity is no longer enough. That’s why I always use the Tweet This WP Plugin in my blog posts, and I occasionally use Click To Tweet too.

Which tip was your favorite? Do you have any additional tip to get more people to tweet blog posts? Please share your thoughts and advice below.

Back in April we wrote that "The Mystery Of China's Gold Holdings Is Coming To An End" as a result of China willingness to add the Yuan to the IMF's SDR currency basket which would require the disclosure of China's gold holding ahead of an IMF meeting on SDR composition which may be held in October.

By way of background, the reason why everyone has been so focused on Chinese official gold holdings is that there has been no official update to the gold inventory of the world's biggest nation, which have been fixed at 33.89 million oz since April 2009, a little over 1000 tons. In other words, the PBOC's gold inventory has been "unchanged" for over 6 years which is in stark contrast to the ravenous buying of physical gold China has been engaging in for the past 5 years.

As we further noted in April, "with China disclosing so little about its hoard, finding out how much the central bank has in its vaults is of increasing interest to traders. Confirmation of bigger holdings would signal the importance of the metal as a reserve asset and boost market sentiment, TD Securities’ Melek said. At a time when prices are languishing, the buying could give support, said Suki Cooper, director of commodities at Barclays Plc in New York."

In a rare comment on gold, Yi Gang, the central bank’s deputy governor, said in March 2013 that the country could only invest as much as 2 percent of its foreign-exchange holdings in gold because the market was too small. The press office of the People’s Bank of China in Beijing didn’t respond to a fax seeking comment sent on April 14.

Well, the long awaited moment has finally arrived and this morning, after a 6 year delay when, China finally admitted that it had been misrepresenting its gold holdings for a very long time, when it announced that its gold holdings had increased from 38.89 million to 53.31 million troy ounces, a 57% increase "in one month."

The amounts to a new grand total of 1658 metric tons, an increase of 604 tons from the 1054 reported last in 2009 and which according to the PBOC was also the May 2015 total.

What is surprising about this release are three things:

First, while we welcome some long overdue "transparency", the number is well below official expectations. This is what Bloomberg said previously: "The People’s Bank of China may have tripled holdings of bullion since it last updated them in April 2009, to 3,510 metric tons, says Bloomberg Intelligence, based on trade data, domestic output and China Gold Association figures. A stockpile that big would be second only to the 8,133.5 tons in the U.S."

Second, China has finally admitted that its official gold numbers were fabricated (alongside all other official data released from the communist country) as it is impossible the PBOC could have bought 600 tons of gold in the open market in June when the price of the yellow metal actually dropped by 2%.

Third, and perhaps most important, is the reasoning behind the increase. While in April it was expected that China will be focused on SDR acceptance of the Yuan, that was subsequently refuted when it became clear that the IMF has no intention of making such a decision any time soon.  So why make the disclosure?

• PBOC SAYS GOLD RESERVE INCREASE AIMS TO ENSURE SECURITY

And from the PBOC:

Gold as a special asset, with multiple attributes financial and commodities, together with other assets to help regulate and optimize the overall risk-return characteristics of international reserves portfolio. From the perspective of long-term and strategic perspective, if necessary, dynamically adjusted international reserves portfolio allocation, safety, liquidity and increasing the value of international reserve assets.

In other words, China had to wait until its stock market was crashing to present the "systemic stability" bazooka: gold.

Because in revealing a surge in its gold holdings, the PBOC is hoping to finally provide that final missing link that will boost investor sentiment, and get people buying stocks all over again.

And now that the seal has been finally broken after so many years, and since today's update indicates that Chinese gold numbers are clearly goal-seeked with a specific policy purpose - to boost confidence - we await for the PBOC to start leaking incremental gold holding data every month (and especially in months when the market crashes) which will bring us ever closer to what China's true gold holdings are.

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The SAFE's full accompanying Q&A statement with reporters on its latest reserves is below (google translated):

People's Bank of China, the State Administration of Foreign Exchange, the official answered reporters' questions on China's total foreign debts, foreign exchange reserves, gold reserves, etc.

 To further enhance the quality and transparency of foreign data, fully reflects the outcome of the internationalization of RMB recently, People's Bank of China, the State Administration of Foreign Exchange SDDS according to IMF data (SDDS) announced the country's foreign exchange reserves, gold reserves, and other data, corresponding adjustment of the caliber of external debt data, published a full-bore renminbi debt, including the debt included. People's Bank of China, the State Administration of Foreign Exchange person in charge of related issues answered reporters' questions.

First, what SDDS is?

A: SDDS namely IMF (IMF) Special Data Dissemination Standard of, is an international standard on countries' economic and financial statistics published by IMF enacted in 1996, the English name Special Data Dissemination Standard, referred to as the SDDS.

In order to improve the transparency of the Member States of macroeconomic statistics, IMF has developed GDDS (GDDS) and Special Data Dissemination Standard (SDDS) two sets of data dissemination standards. Both the overall framework basically the same, but in actuality, SDDS for data coverage, publication frequency, timeliness released, data quality, and other aspects of the public can get more demanding. SDDS the countries need to adopt in accordance with the requirements of the standard, published data of the real economy, fiscal, monetary, foreign and socio-demographic and other five sectors.

Currently, there are 73 economies adopted SDDS, including all developed economies, as well as Russia, India, Brazil, South Africa and other major emerging market countries. GDDS country had been announced by macroeconomic data.

Second, why should the adoption of SDDS?

A: With the deepening of economic globalization, improve data quality, make up the data gaps and enhance data comparability and enhance data transparency become a consensus. China's proactive response and internationally accepted data standards initiative, in November 2014, the Chairman Xi Jinping at the G20 summit in Brisbane officially announced that China will adopt the IMF Special Data Dissemination Standard (SDDS). After a series of technical preparations, the current standard conditions according to SDDS data published ripe.

Adopted SDDS, in line with our needs further reform and expand opening-up, help to improve the transparency of macroeconomic statistics, reliability and international comparability, promote the improvement of statistical methods; to further find out the macroeconomic real situation, as the country's macroeconomic provide the basis for decision-making to prevent and defuse financial risks; conducive to China's active participation in global economic cooperation, enhance the international community and public confidence in the domestic economy.

Three , according to the SDDS reserves data released specifically what?

A: The foreign exchange reserves, according to data released SDDS carried out, including the "official reserve assets" and "International Reserves and Foreign Currency Liquidity Data Template" in two parts. "Official Reserve Assets" includes the foreign exchange reserves, IMF reserve positions and special drawing rights (SDR), gold, other reserve assets of five projects, including "reserves" This project corresponds to the size of our country's foreign exchange reserves in the past announced ; "International Reserves and Foreign Currency Liquidity Data Template" includes four tables of official reserve assets and other foreign currency assets, the predetermined short-term net outflow of foreign currency assets and foreign currency assets or net outflow of short-term, memos.

On the publishing frequency, two pieces of data are released monthly, including "official reserve assets" not later than the seventh day of general release of the data at the beginning of each month on month, "International Reserves and Foreign Currency Liquidity Data Template" general release in the end of each month data. Since this is the first release, we have also released two pieces of data, to facilitate your control, according to the corresponding time in the future will be published separately requirements.

On statistical methods, in full accordance with IMF to carry out uniform standards relevant statistics.

Fourth, the comparative size of foreign exchange reserves in the past released the recently released data which points?

A: There are three main aspects:

• (1) This announcement is fully consistent with the country's reserves of foreign exchange reserves in the past announced the size of caliber. The size of our country's foreign exchange reserves in the past has been published in accordance with the relevant methods and standards of statistics in SDDS. As of the end of June 2015, China's foreign exchange reserves of $ 3.69 trillion.
• (2) new released other foreign currency assets. As of the end of June 2015, the Bank of other foreign currency assets of $ 232.9 billion.
• (3) adjusted by the size of its gold reserves. As of the end of June 2015, the scale of China's gold reserves to 53.32 million ounces (equivalent to 1,658 tons).

Five , gold reserves according to data released this time, compared with the scale of China's gold reserves since the end of April 2009 increased by 604 tons. Why should our holdings of gold reserves?

A: The gold reserve has been an important element of international reserve diversification countries constituted the majority of the central bank's international reserves have gold, country as well. Gold as a special asset, with multiple attributes financial and commodities, together with other assets to help regulate and optimize the overall risk-return characteristics of international reserves portfolio. From the perspective of long-term and strategic perspective, if necessary, dynamically adjusted international reserves portfolio allocation, safety, liquidity and increasing the value of international reserve assets.

Six , in recent years, international gold prices volatile, the current round of holdings of gold reserves is at what time what channel from holdings? Whether the future will continue to overweight?

A: With the prices of other commodities and financial assets, the international gold prices also ebb. Over the past few years, gold prices continued to rise to a record high, the gradual decline. Our asset-based valuation and price changes for gold analysis, under the premise of impact and influence in the right markets, at home and abroad through a variety of channels, this part of the gradual accumulation of gold reserves. Overweight channels including domestic miscellaneous gold purification, production Shouzhu, domestic and foreign market transactions and other means.

Gold has a special risk-return characteristics, at a particular time is a good investment products. But the capacity of the gold market is small compared with the scale of China's foreign exchange reserves, if a large number of short-term foreign exchange reserves to buy gold, easily affect the market. At present, China has become the world's largest gold producer, is also a big consumer of gold, "hidden gold to the people," the situation has been happening. The need to continue and consider the future of private investment demand and international reserve asset allocation, flexible operation.

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According to Salesforce, 71% of salespeople believe that their role will be radically different in five years. Are you one of them? You should be. When you know what’s coming, you can use it to stay ahead of your competition.

In my opinion, the greatest change our profession has seen -- and probably will ever see -- is the evolution of sales enablement tools to help hack the standard sales cycle.

Your friends in Marketing went through a similar transition several years ago as their jobs shifted and became data-driven. Rather than being dominated by creative types, marketers have had to become half data scientist to take full advantage of the insights now coming their way. Now, the new sales tools under development promise to bring analytics to the customer development and sales processes -- a change that will help every rep maximize pipelines and close more deals.

With marketing automation and CMS platforms, companies can see what prospects have downloaded, if it was read, and what they did next. Marketers take this data and use it to personalize communications, target content, and present offers to move prospects along their individual paths to conversion. Trying to optimize marketing efforts without all of this readily available data now seems like flying blind.

Unfortunately, Sales hasn’t taken advantage of these shiny new toys the same way Marketing has.

There can be no doubt that CRMs provides key data on sales productivity, customer segments, and closing rates. But do these insights really help you move customers through the sales cycle? Because most of the work done at the sales level is conducted outside of automation systems, individual salespeople have little visibility into how successful their work actually is. When you send a quote, you rarely get feedback on what happens next -- whether or not it was read by the lead decision maker, passed around for review or simply left unopened by the underling tasked with vetting vendor responses.

Thankfully, things won’t be this way forever.

Companies are taking their CRM solutions to the next level, integrating CPQ sales quoting solutions, price optimization tools, content management, playbooks, and other applications for more robust functionality. Finally, you’re starting to see the value in moving more of your sales activities online. 

As this trend continues, let’s take a look at how the new generation of sales rep works and the tools they need.

Sales Decisioning Tools: More Effective Pipeline Management

One of the hardest things you have to do as a salesperson is manage the multiple communications and contacts required to effectively move someone through the sales pipeline. Without any insights into your prospects' activity, you are left to “feel them out” over the phone. When do they really need that nudge or next piece of information? Which is the right piece of content that will help move them to the next stage? 

With sales decisioning tools, you can leverage analytics to effectively respond to prospect triggers. Instead of setting arbitrary follow up reminders, reps can see when prospects visit the pricing page, download data sheets, or open the emailed specification information. These sales decisioning tools will not only tell you when to contact a prospect, they will even suggest what content to offer them at each specific stage to keep the sales process moving.

According to Gartner, companies with automated lead management see a 10% or greater increase in revenue after six to nine months. Imagine the gains if you could manage your own sales funnel in a similar way.

Web Analytics and Proposal Journey Mapping: Higher Closing Rates

After you send a proposal, the visibility into who is reading it and who they’re forwarding it to is limited. According to the Harvard Business Review, there are now an average of 5.4 decision makers involved in B2B purchasing decisions. Knowing that the one person you sent it to has opened your sales proposal doesn’t cut it anymore.

With web analytics and mapping tools, reps can track vital information on a proposal’s journey within the prospect’s organization and take steps in real time to ensure it progresses quickly through the review cycle. These tools provide data on who’s reading your proposals and when. They track who read which parts and whether or not they accessed additional company information in the process.

Knowing that the proposal review is progressing “on schedule” is one thing. Knowing when things have stalled is even more important. Being able to identify which decision maker was the last to view the proposal -- and where they left off -- can also help you proactively address objections you would not have otherwise known about.

Predictive Analytics: Increased Upselling/Cross-selling Opportunities

Upselling and cross-selling existing customers is low-hanging fruit to higher revenues. Repeat customers spend an average of 67% more than new ones. But short of the regular touches a sales rep gives their clients, how are you to know when a customer wants more? How can you effectively grow the lifetime value of your current customer?

Predictive analytics tools monitor customer activity and use historical data from your entire sales process to suggest new selling opportunities. Whether a customer read a blog post or looked at a datasheet, you’ll know when and how to best engage with that customer to capitalize on their burgeoning interest. Knowing when a customer will be receptive to your call will ensure the effectiveness of every communication you make.

The leaders in marketing automation, CRM, proposal management, and other areas are already working to provide sales with better tools and increased insights. Last year, HubSpot released Sidekick to give sales reps insights into their prospect’s email activity. While the ability to track opens and clicks has been used on the marketing side for years, it has only recently been put into use to monitor sales engagement. At Valooto, our sales engagement-based CPQ solution will soon allow reps to track the proposal’s journey as it makes its way through the end customer. By providing insight on reviewer behavior, we help sales reps engage more intelligently and close more deals.

Today, customers are more self-directed as they move through the sales cycle. Gartner estimates that by 2020, only 15% of the customer relationship will involve human interaction. Does this mean the sales rep is being slowly phased out of the process? Far from it. It means you now need tools and insights to make all your connections high value ones.

With real-time triggers and actionable insights, the sales tools of the future will help reps be more productive and efficient in every communication and interaction. The sale will no longer go to the loudest or most personable rep -- it will go to the one best able respond to customer interest.

What sales automation tools do you use today, and more importantly, which of them add real value to your sales processes? Reach out in the comments and let us know.

(Ferenstein Wire) — Self-driving cars will save the average driver about $1,000 annually, or cost $250 a year total, according to estimates from auto insurance startup, Metromile. 

Robotic self-driving cars have a near perfect driving record; thus far, when self-driving cars do get into accidents, it’s because humans were responsible. Since Google began to release details about self-driving car accidents, reports from the Wall Street Journal, the RAND Corporation, and KPMG have all predicted a dramatic shrinking in the auto insurance industry.

So, to put this speculation into a concrete figure that most people would care about, the Ferenstein Wire asked the actuaries at insurance startup Metromile to take evidence from Google’s detailed accident report and construct their own pricing model for self-driving cars. 

Metromile recently partnered with Uber to provide its drivers a special insurance deal. Since Uber is on record for wanting to replace its fleet with self-driving cars, Metromile will likely be among the first companies that must come up with pricing models at scale.

Model Details

The insurance model is based on a 20-year-old single female in the San Francisco bay Area, driving 12,000 miles/year. Most of the cost savings from self-driving cars come from the near elimination of accidental collisions (a 90% reduction). 

So, why do we still need insurance if so few cars get into accidents?

The model estimates that some cars may be vandalized or broken into, which makes up much of the yearly insurance cost for autonomous vehicles. In the future, self-driving cars could just park themselves in a secure garage at night rather than waiting around while their owner sleeps or goes grocery shopping — making the price even cheaper.

To give readers some back-of-the-napkin estimates about how this might change the value of a car, here’s an example. Over the lifetime of the car, assuming about $6,000 in total savings over 5 years, a self-driving Tesla model III could be cheaper than a human-powered BMW 2 Series (~$36,000 vs. $37,000 for the BMW in total costs for each car).

“I would anticipate that in the short and medium term, claims are likely to gradually go down as crashes become less common,” says James Anderson, a behavior scientist at the Rand Corporation, who recently wrote about the long-term impacts of self-driving cars [PDF]. The Ferenstein Wire asked Anderson and other experts to double-check the validity of Metromile’s model. 

“At some point in the future, it is likely that we will get to 90% reductions in savings,” he continues, but images that such savings could be 10 or more years down the road when self-driving cars are near universal. 

Self-driving cars are not yet legal and state governments have been slow to permit them. Self-driving cars face roadblocks from cautious lawmakers and could, eventually, face hurdles from the auto industry. 

But, if consumers know that such laws are costing them $1,000 a year, public pressure could accelerate their legal standing. Nothing gets voters more fired up than their pocket books.

 

*For more stories like this, subscribe to the Ferenstein Wire newsletter here.

SEE ALSO: This investor has an interesting theory on what Google will do with its self-driving cars

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I’m sure there are many of us out there who’ve had those bosses that wanted you to feel as if you were their bestie. In reality you wouldn’t trust them as far you could throw ‘em. In the past, most of my superiors with a brain clearly saw the value in establishing trust with the folks they managed but rarely if ever, dedicated the time to make sure they were reinforcing that feeling with the team. In the end having an open door policy will ultimately help you cut through the crap and give us back the time that we’re all in precious need of during our working day.

Here are a couple of reasons why a REAL open door policy works.

They can confidently tell you what sucks without fear of repercussion.

There are some problems we may be fully aware of, while at the same time there could major issues that you are blind to. Having an open door policy may open your eyes to those areas where you could potentially help. With 400+ inside sales campaigns that we’ve run into over the years, the reps who understand my open door policy feel confident that they can offer up their concerns related to their ability to do the job. Ironically these concerns tend to be very similar. For example, data accuracy, difficulty in carving out the time in their day to make enough calls or have enough quality conversations to gather sales context, are the most common areas that help to either make or break a campaign. If I’m not offering up that circle of trust in my office then I would most likely be clueless to at least one of those critcal business areas.

You get a true sense of their career aspirations (in or outside the company).

There was a long period of time that we would shy away from having the “what do you want to do next?” conversation. We knew that anyone in a sales/business development role would inevitably want to take on the next step in their selling career and that next step could mean a move outside of the organization. What we began to realize is that we’re better off encouraging that discussion. It brings the relationship to a whole new level of trust when you’re both on board with a clear direction and timeframe on when they want to make a transition. I can tell you it has been a refreshing experience for our management team. Think about how much easier resource and process planning becomes when you have a good sense when a rep may want to move to another role in the organization or could be thinking about leaving the organization. Believe me, it’s not like we encourage our reps to leave us, but if we have those open discussions then eventually you’re building an alumni base that has nothing but good things to say about your organization. Shoot, what’s the alternative? They’ll eventually leave anyway and you won’t have a potential back-up plan in place.

You establish a more efficient working relationship.

As I mentioned above, anything that you can do to help to carve more time from your day is definitely good thing. Being on the same page with employees obviously means a lot when you know what’s getting in their way and ultimately what their true long-term goals are. If you know what those things are, then your working relationship with a rep will be a hell of a lot more efficient.
Believe me; I know as a sales manager how difficult it can be to win the trust of everyone you manage. For whatever reason there is going to be that person that won’t trust you no matter how hard you try to win their confidence. I suggest giving the tips I offered up a shot; sure there could some frustration and pain as you work through it, but you have to be willing to take some lumps if that means in the end you can make some REAL progress with your team.

What is your “open door policy” look like and what pointers would you suggest?

Have you ever wondered what it takes to be a Noogler?

Did you say yes, or did you say, “Huh? What’s a Noogler?”

A Noogler is the affectionate term Google uses to refer to new hires. While you may never have heard that word before, you’ve probably heard about Google’s (legendary) workplace culture.

With that said, here are a few facts that probably won’t surprise you. As one of the leading technology companies in the world, Google was ranked number one for the sixth time on Fortune 100’s list of best companies to work for in 2015. More than two million people apply for jobs at the company each year, making it more difficult get hired at Google than it is to get admitted to Harvard.

Working there might sound like an unlikely dream, but just because the odds are high, doesn’t mean they can’t be ever in your favor! So, how can you show Google you’ve got the stuff it takes to be a Noogler? Here are a few things to keep in mind.

1. You don’t need to be one type of person.

You might think: I’m not a tech superstar, so there’s no reason for me to even check out what roles Google is hiring for. But that’s not an entirely accurate assessment.

Google’s Senior Vice President of People Operations, Laszlo Bock, is adamant about looking for something called “role-related knowledge.” So, when you look at the company’s hiring page, you’ll see everything from engineering to finance to real estate and workplace services. And you can bet that the best candidates for each of these roles will have different backgrounds and areas of expertise.

2. You do need to know how to inspire a team.

What do you picture when you think about leadership? At Google, being in a position of power is not about fancy titles, prime parking spots, or shaking hands and kissing babies.

In an interview with Quartz, Bock points out that when people are hired for management roles at Google, they have to shift from being the boss in the stereotypical sense of telling a team what to do to supporting their employees’ ideas. He says, “…the trick isn’t making the decisions as a leader, but figuring out how to get best out of the team. It’s a really big pivot for a lot of people.”

In the same interview, Bock continues:

In other words, Google is not for the power-hungry. If you want to be hired as a manager, highlight how you’ll inspire and support your team, rather than talk about personal ideas that you’d like to have your minions execute.

3. You have to be tough.

What’s a four letter word for perseverance? A little something called “grit.”

Google really likes people who can stick it out when challenges arise and there isn’t an obvious right answer. You can show your grit by including an example of a time you didn’t give up in your cover letter, or use an interview answer to discuss a challenge you overcame.

Eric Schmidt, Executive Chairman at Google, explains that he sees attitude and smarts as a package deal. He has said, essentially, that what distinguishes talented students who will succeed from those who won’t is “their persistence.”

4. You should have Googleyness.

Despite how it sounds, Googleyness has nothing to do with Christopher Walken’s 2008 SNL skit for the Googley-eyed gardener.

Googleyness is another term the company coined to describe what it means to be the right cultural fit. Bock explains Googleyness as “people who are comfortable with ambiguity, have intellectual humility, and can bring something new to the mix.”

Googleyness is also mentioned on the “How We Hire” page. Some who has it is an innovator who work well with others.

Yes, the competition to get hired at Google is fierce. But if you really want to work there, you can achieve your dream by showing that you have what it takes to succeed at the company.

SEE ALSO: Google is the 'world's most attractive' employer — here are the other companies people dream of working for

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As a small business, you’re always looking for new ways to increase your revenue stream and add to your client base. From one month to the next, you can’t always guarantee how business will go–but you can help build your business up, increase your revenue stream, and solidify your position in your industry. If 8 out of 10 businesses fail within their first 18 months, you want to be in the twenty percent–and that means that you need to constantly be on the lookout for new opportunities.

Diversify Your Product Offering

Depending on your business, there are several ways that you can accomplish this. You can seek out related products, offer “professional” and “hobby” versions of the same item, increase your online market, or adapt to advances in your chosen field. All of these are valid strategies for diversity. Consider the one that works best for you and take advantage of it. Offering more diverse products will increase your sales per client and reach a broader audience–exactly what a small business needs to stay afloat.

Reach Existing Clients on a New Level

You’ve worked hard for your clients, and you’ve gone out of your way to make sure that they’re happy with your work. Now is the time to take advantage of that. By expanding your offerings to your existing clients, you’re pitching to a group of people who are already satisfied with your work and appreciative of what you do. That means that when the time comes to choose similar services, you’ve already done half the work of marketing to them.

Make It Easy

These days, it seems as though everyone is pressed for time. Customers don’t want to be bogged down with a rewards process that takes an hour to get through or a checkout process that takes longer than choosing the item or service. The easier you can make things on your customers, the more you increase the odds that they’ll come back–or that they’ll go through with their intended purchase in the first place. It’s also important that you make it easy to contact you with complaints or concerns: email, social media, and phone contact should all be carefully monitored, and attention should be paid to detail in these areas.

Make Customer Service a Priority

It takes 12 positive experiences to make up for one negative experience. People are always more likely to talk about bad customer service than good: negative customer service experiences reach twice as many people as news about an excellent experience. In 2008, 87% of customers had stopped doing business with a company due to poor customer service–a number that keeps going up, not down. Simply put, customer service has to be a priority for your business. It starts the moment a potential customer has their first contact with your business, and it doesn’t end until they’re satisfied.

Customer service trumps everything else. High quality and competitive prices are important, but ultimately, it’s your customer service that will make or break your business. Be friendly and attentive to customers whenever they interact with you; keep lines of communication open; and handle any issues that arrive efficiently. The more important the customer feels that they are to you, the greater the likelihood that they’ll become a returning customer.

Improve Sales Team Efficiency

Teach your sales team how to get the best possible price from each customer without sacrificing that vital element of customer service. There are a number of negotiating tips to consider:

• Listen to what the customer is offering and what they expect first
• Negotiate with the person who will actually make the final decision
• Remember to talk value, not just money.

All of these ideas increase your selling power and improve the odds that you’ll end up making more out of the transaction. For example, if you can add customer-perceived value to the negotiation without cutting into your sale, you’ve increased the business’s overall income while still leaving the customer feeling as though they’ve accomplished something.

Improving your small business’s revenue stream is a process, but it’s one that’s well worth the time and effort. By building a strong customer base, you’ll ensure that your business will be standing for a long time to come.

FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Shockwaves from a drop in Chinese car demand are reverberating in Wolfsburg, Germany and Detroit, Michigan, where VW and General Motors are feeling the effects of a slowdown in a market that has been their big profit engine.

Both Volkswagen and GM are heavily exposed to China, which remains a growth market, but last week cut its 2015 forecast for vehicle sales. The two car makers depend on the country for large parts of their profits and cash flow, and neither has a convincing story to tell about how to offset a slowdown in growth in the world's largest car market with other parts of their business.

Barclays downgraded GM's stock to "equal weight" from "overweight" on Thursday, saying it was likely to face the sharpest of the China headwinds among the U.S. autos and auto part makers it covers.

"It has a lot to lose in a Chinese decline ... There are few catalysts on the horizon," its analysts wrote in a note downgrading the entire U.S. sector to "negative" on China risks.

Volkswagen depends on China for more than half its net profit and 71 percent of its free cash flow including income from joint ventures and royalties, according to auto industry analysts.

GM made 40 percent of its net income from China equity income and 20-30 percent of its operating cash flow last year, according to Barclays.

China's passenger car market, the world's largest, is dominated by foreign players led by VW and followed by GM, Hyundai , Toyota and Nissan, but the share of domestic players such as Great Wall is rising.

Volkswagen is vulnerable to a shift in demand towards more frugal cars as Beijing cracks down on displays of wealth and first-time car buyers in second-tier cities favor cheaper local models.

VW's profits have largely depended on its premium brand Audi , whose performance in China has worsened over the past seven months, while the VW brand lacks a fresh range of sports utility vehicles, China's fastest-growing vehicle segment.

On Thursday, Audi said it was reviewing its 2015 Chinese sales target in the latest sign that the downturn is more severe than expected.

IHS automotive analyst Henner Lehne said: "Audi's status as the brand of choice for Chinese bureaucrats used to be a boon but is now turning into a snare."

The luxury downturn has already hit German premium brands BMW and Audi. Audi, BMW and Daimler's Mercedes-Benz command between 70 and 80 of China's premium market, where they earn 30-50 percent of their profits.

Now the malaise for foreign car makers is spreading to the mass market, where local players are gaining share.

Last week, the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM) cut its 2015 vehicle sales growth forecast to 3 percent from 7 percent.

Volume brands like General Motors have already responded by cutting prices for vehicles and increasing discounts, squashing profit margins.

Barclays wrote in its note: "We think the pricing environment is likely to deteriorate sharply as dealers are forced to clear excess inventory and capacity growth outpaces sales growth."

But GM is not considering lay-offs or big production cuts, a Shanghai-based spokeswoman for automaker said in response to Reuters questions.

VW together with its local joint venture partners in the country have pledged to invest 22 billion euros through 2019 in new plants, models and equipment in China, reflecting the German group's commitment to future expansion.

STRUCTURAL ISSUES

The problems in China threaten to expose structural issues at both VW and GM that have been masked by the Chinese boom.

VW is already trying to realize 5 billion euros ($5.5 billion) in cost cuts it has promised at its core brand, with a high cost base in Germany. It is also failing to make significant inroads in the North American market.

The departure in April of long-serving chairman Ferdinand Piech was considered a catalyst for change but chief executive Martin Winterkorn has yet to present a new company structure.

Without the China effect and in the absence of any meaningful operational improvements, VW would have difficulty to pay a dividend, Credit Suisse analysts said.

"Our analysis shows that Volkswagen would struggle to cover its dividend without any contribution from China," its automotive analysts wrote on Wednesday.

Barclays said GM was now unlikely to meet its targets for the region, and it expected a decline of 1 percent in volume sales this year versus a company forecast of an increase of at least 6-8 percent.

The bank said it expected GM management to pull its mid-term target of a sustainable 9-10 percent profit margin in China, adding that it saw little room for GM to compensate in other regions such as North America or Europe.

"With little offset from the rest of the company, we see a cheap valuation and rich dividend as largely irrelevant," Barclays said.

Japanese car makers made smaller inroads in China and so are not as exposed to the effects of the slowdown.

"Even as Germans were having parties, we (Toyota and other Japanese companies) did some belt-tightening and other trench work," a senior executive for Toyota's China operations told Reuters.

"After dealing with a big sales slump in 2012 because of the soured bilateral relations between Tokyo and Beijing, we’re used to slow growth." 

(Reporting by Andreas Cremer, Edward Taylor, Jake Spring, Norihiko Shirouzu, Joe White and Georgina Prodhan; Writing by Edward Taylor and Georgina Prodhan. Editing by Jane Merriman)

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One of my favorite visits as a young person was to the House Of Mirrors at the amusement park. It fascinated me how the mirrors distorted the way we looked and how they reshaped our faces. Having fun with facial and body gestures to make myself look even more different.

Companies today, if not intent on understanding their buyers, can fall victim to their own House Of Mirrors. Having a very distorted view of buyers than that of reality. The buyer becoming a reshaped reflection of the way people internally view and think about customers.

Corporate-Referential View Of Buyers

Corporations today need to be on guard for viewing the world of customers and buyers only through internal corporate eyes. Unintentionally engaging in a corporate-referential view of buyers. Seeing the world, both theirs and that of customers, in terms of how the corporation may view the world.

Many organizations struggle with customer-focused initiatives and programs due to this very reason. Unable to recognize the significant gap that can exist between how customer-focused they think they are and how customer-focused their customers perceive them to be in reality.

As organizations adapt to an expanding global and digital economy, cultural differences in how customers and buyers view the world will become more impactful. Requiring companies to understand the cultural context of the world in which their customers and buyers live in. While digital technologies help bring uniform ways of connecting, they may have little impact on bringing uniformity to cultural elements.

Mental Framing Of Goals

As customers and buyers engage in goal-directed behaviors in making buying decisions, they are often accompanied by the mental framing of their goals and decisions. Mental framing is related to how customers and buyers see the world. Developing mental frames and models of how the world is supposed to work.

How buyers mentally frame their goal-directed behaviors and buying decisions is often a melding of many elements. These elements typically pertain to attitudes, perceptions, experiences, norms, culture, protocols, and values – among the many possibilities. Melding together to form a view of the world, which directly influences how and why buying decisions are made.

Implications Matters

The implications to an organization and to marketers, sellers, and product management can be significant. For instance, how a marketing team may view the world may be very different than how a customer base of supply chain managers and executives may view the world. In one particular buyer persona research and development effort with a supply chain application provider, mental framing proved to be a big factor in the utility industry.

While the product marketing team believed efficiency and inventory control were what mattered, utility supply chain managers viewed the world in terms of two critical elements. These two elements were, one, the ability to respond quickly to a disaster and the second being that of ensuring the safety of emergency repair personnel. Thus, goal-directed behaviors and the mental framing of buying decisions were filtered through these powerful mental elements.

The problem marketing and sales can run into, in cases like the one mentioned, is how they present and converse about their offering can mismatch the world view of the customers and buyers they are trying to reach.

Avoiding The Mismatch

To avoid such mismatches, organizations will need to learn the capabilities of looking at the world through the eyes of their customers. This is very different than concepts related to the voice of the customer or just listening to your customers. Just listening alone can lead to a false sense of an organization believing it is customer-focused when, in fact, there is a significant gap between how customers view the world and how organizations see the world.

How does this look? For instance, many customer-listening efforts, as well as buyer persona efforts, are framed within corporate-referential views of customers. Whereby what an organization wants to hear or listen for from customers is predetermined. Thus, an organization is only listening for the things it wants to hear.

This is currently running rampant in the misrepresentations of buyer personas. Whereby “insights” are predetermined and efforts are designed to “listen for “ insights, which are informational facts instead. Listening for already established information such as initiative, risks, criteria, and etc. instead of hearing and seeing the world through the eyes of the customer. Ending up with very corporate-referential buyer personas contributing very little to informing an organization on how to draw closer to the customer.

On The Other Side

To see the world through the eyes of customers and buyers requires organizations to literally get on the other side. Meaning, engaging in qualitative and ethnographic-based research with an emphasis on uncovering often unarticulated mental frames and models. Which, have a direct impact on how and why buying decisions are made – and should be an essential element of buyer research and buyer persona development.

Organizations can be ill-equipped to “get on the other side” with their customers. Lacking in the skill sets and experience required. And, what can often be the case is to achieve true unfiltered objectivity means the use of a neutral third party. This, however, should not be a reason to forgo such an increasingly important aspect of understanding customers and buyers deeply.

Organizations who can achieve looking at the world through the eyes of their customers can attain another important benefit. They will be able to empathize by walking in the shoes of their customers. But, when they do, they will not walk blindly with a false sense of a customer walking in their world. They will walk with a customer in the world in which they live and see.

(What follows is a talk by Fabian Sixtus Korner, an architect and documentary film-maker, who talks about what he learned through his travels – and – seeing the world through the eyes of others.)

Sellers have an incredible opportunity to learn from their losses by asking their buyers a series of simple questions, in an authentic manner, during the post-mortem process

Finding good fit sales leads for your product or service can be a bit like digging for gold (the other meaning of the term "prospecting"). One company could be the right size, but in the wrong region. Another matches your ideal customer profile perfectly ... but they're in an industry your company doesn't serve.

And how do you find these leads? LinkedIn is undoubtedly helpful, but reps who are selling into industries that haven't embraced social media might be out of luck. Time to go on an internet wild goose chase.

It's no wonder sales reps often push off prospecting. 

However, it doesn't have to be this way. HubSpot's totally free CRM not only solves for contact organization, it also fast tracks prospecting and finding ideal sales leads.

Here's how you can generate a list of sales leads in under a minute.

(P.S. I timed it. It really is that fast.)

1) Download HubSpot CRM (free)

2) Click on the "Companies" Tab

3) Click the "Find Companies" Button

4) Choose "HubSpot Database"

(or "Company Visits" if you want to follow up on prospects who've already demonstrated interest)

5) Enter Your Target Prospect Specifications

6) Prospects Ahoy

Pretty easy, right? Well, the fun doesn't stop there.

If you decide to work a lead, simply click the company's name, and add it to your CRM. Kiss data entry goodbye.

Bonus: Transfer Lead Information to CRM Automatically

If generating sales leads is a thorn in your side, give HubSpot CRM a spin. It's free -- what do you have to lose?

Researchers at Oregon State have patented a new strain of seaweed that tastes like bacon when it's cooked.

The seaweed, a form of red marine algae, looks like translucent red lettuce. It also has twice the nutritional value of kale and grows very quickly. Did we mention it tastes like bacon?

According to Oregon State researcher Chris Langdon, his team started growing the new strain while trying to find a good food source for edible sea snails, or abalone, a very popular food in many parts of Asia. The strain is a new type of red algae that normally grows along the Pacific and Atlantic coastlines.

But Langdon realized he had his hands on something with a lot more potential when his colleague Chuck Toombs visited his office and caught a glimpse of the growing seaweed. Toombs said he thought the bacon-seaweed had "the potential for a new industry for Oregon," he told Oregon State in a press release.

Toombs then began working with the university's Food Innovation Center, which created a range of foods with the seaweed as its main ingredient.

Langdon said no US companies grow red algae for people to eat, but the seaweed had been consumed by people in northern Europe for centuries.

"This stuff is pretty amazing," Langdon told OSU. "When you fry it, which I have done, it tastes like bacon, not seaweed. And it's a pretty strong bacon flavor."

Though no analysis has been done yet to find out whether commercializing the bacon-seaweed would be practical, the team thinks the vegan and vegetarian markets may be interested. Toombs' MBA students are hard at work on a marketing plan for a new line of specialty foods.

Some red algae is sold in the US now, but it is a different strain from the one harvested at OSU. Langdon says he is growing about 20 to 30 pounds of the stuff a week, but he plans to more than triple the production.

SEE ALSO: Scientists have figured out why we're obsessed with bacon

NOW CHECK OUT: Scientists just discovered a simple way to eat healthier and potentially curb cravings, no diet required

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At this point, Wall Street is just playing along with China.

"You can't trust the numbers," Bill Miller, CEO of LMM Investments, told a room full of investors at CNBC's Delivering Alpha Conference this week.

Miller spoke on Wednesday, just hours after China announced that it once again hit its gross-domestic-product growth target of 7%.

This despite the fact that its economy seems to be experiencing a major slowdown.

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60% of twitter’s 200 million users use twitter on their mobile device at least once a month. If you’re not creating at least some content, that’s a potential 120 million person market that you’re missing out on. In other words, this is not very smart. According to twitter, mobile users are 79% more likely to be on twitter several times per day, and are 47% less likely to access twitter on a desktop. That means that your desktop optimized content is flying by these mobile users unnoticed (actually it’s probably annoying them). So how do we make mobile specific content on twitter? Check out these tips!

1. Target a Younger Audience

Mobile twitter users tend to be younger. 18-34 year olds are 21% more likely to use twitter primarily on mobile. That means you may have to adjust parts of your message and media. Millennials want catchy headlines and appreciate humor (for instance memes) – after all social media to them is primarily a place to be social. Images and GIFs are also a great way to pull them in. If you ever need inspiration just read a few headlines on Buzzfeed and Elite Daily – these sites are run by and for Gen Y. Be careful, because this digital generation is extremely critical, so screw one thing up and you could have all of Reddit laughing at your technological incompetence. Check out our guide for marketing to millennials to learn more

2. Smaller, Smoother Look and Feel

Twitter’s 140 character limit is even more restricting on a small mobile screen. You need to be very sleek with your body and hashtags, as according to Dazeinfo mobile users scroll 4x faster than desktop users. If your tweet looks too long or too clunky, users will scroll right past it. Social media guru @brentertainer advises putting hashtags into the text body, instead of tacking them on at the end like a purely promotional afterthought. Keeping your tweets under 140 characters also allows people to easily retweet you.

An example of a good tweet:

An example of a bad tweet:

Use twitter cards to create highly professional and media rich tweets. Twitter cards are also automatically resized for mobile, so you don’t need to worry about optimizing each image size. You’ve got two clicks (or taps) before a user is disinterested, so don’t waste any of them forcing a mobile user to zoom in and out on an image made for desktop.

3. Use Mobile Friendly links

No one likes a clunky link. Using a long link on twitter adds no value to your tweet, and shows that you don’t know what you’re doing (remember what I said about critical millennials?). A link shortener like bit.ly frees up characters in your tweet, and allows for useful analytics (not quite as useful as Crowdbabble’s analytics of course). Popular social media management platforms have their own shorteners – Ow.ly for Hootsuite and Buff.ly for Buffer are examples. You can even customize the links using bit.ly pro, or this guide.

4. Tweet from your phone

Tweeting from your phone allows you to view the tweet as it will appear on mobile. A quick acid test to use before you tweet is “would I read this tweet if I saw it?” Tweeting on mobile also allows you to take advantage of mobile specific features, such as the ability to embed tweets in other tweets, like this:

This also smooths out your look and feel.

Happy tweeting, and remember to measure!

Earlier this week, Forrester Research, Inc. published its latest take on how data technologies are changing B2B marketing and sales in the report: “New Technologies Emerge To Help Unearth Buyer Insight From Mountains Of B2B Data” (July 13, 2015). What we know is that, for the moment, the technology has outpaced B2B marketers’ ability to leverage these tools. Those business decision-makers, who get to the starting line first and start making fully data-driven decisions, will be the ones who will take the spoils of predictive intelligence in business.

What Can Predictive Do For You?

According to Forrester, the true value of predictive marketing occurs when you apply a data-driven approach across the customer life cycle, from prospect all the way to long-term, rebooking client. Optimizing demand generation processes and prioritizing your sales pipeline are the first steps of truly taking advantage of data technologies and predictive.

The advanced implementation of predictive technology will allow marketing to “increase the precision and relevance of sales interactions.” By optimizing ad spends to align with account-based campaigns, marketing can help sales open conversations with individual buyers and influence committee buying plans.

Truly predictive tools can also identify in-market buyers whose intent data, gathered from a large data ecosystem of B2B buyer behavior activity, can signal a buyer who is on the brink of making a purchasing decision. This will allow businesses to “target more directly, increase close rates, and shorten sales cycles, which collectively lowers acquisition costs.”

Getting Ready For Predictive

Data-driven technologies will have the biggest business impact on B2B marketers who prepare their organizations and workflow processes for data analysis and predictive intelligence. So what do you need to get started?

1. Understand your ideal accounts and leads! To do this, you’ll need to sit down with sales, customer success and product teams to understand how your customers use your product and what features define the business challenges you help solve.
2. Ask your marketing team a question. Effective data use comes from a desire to understand customer behavior – “What content is the best predictor of a sale?” – and use data analytics to help answer the question.
3. Work across teams to capture and present relevant industry data. Successful marketing and sales organizations will work with customer success and sales teams to capture customer data in a systematic and normalized way. They will then work with their technology management teams to visualize and make that data available across functions for data-driven decision-making.
4. Use data to have better conversations. Predictive isn’t just about finding the right prospect, it’s about reaching the right prospect with insightful “account specific” recommendations and with “empathy for buyers’ challenges.” Data offers the promise of growing your business, but you have to use it first and foremost to help your customers.

Regardless of whether you’re just figuring out your marketing technology stack or optimizing sales and marketing processes to align with your CRM and marketing automation tools, it is never too early to think about data analytics and predictive intelligence. It’ll be here before you know it.

Have questions about how your company can get ready for predictive intelligence? Share them with us on Twitter.

No matter what Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella says the company's new mission is — to vaguely empower people "to achieve more" — he's focused on one thing: owning cloud computing.

Not only is Microsoft competing head-to-head with market leader Amazon to encourage programmers and corporations to run their apps on Microsoft's cloud service, it is also rolling out all kinds of its own apps on its own cloud and selling those. This is beyond Office 365 (its cloud version of Microsoft Office) and Microsoft Dynamics (its cloud sales app, that competes with Salesforce).

One of those cloud services is called Enterprise Mobility Suite, and on Wednesday, speaking at the company's Worldwide Partner Conference in Orlando, Florida, COO Kevin Turner told the company's thousands of of resellers that he thinks this product will become a billion-dollar business in the future, reports CRN. He wants them to be selling it now, and adding their own apps, services on top of it.

Enterprise Mobility Suite is a combination of three of Microsoft's cloud services:

• Azure Active Directory Premium, which manages passwords for employees for Windows and for thousands of other cloud apps, and can help a company detect if its being attacked
• Microsoft Intune, which manages and protects the mobile devices themselves, from Windows PCs and laptops to Android/iOS/Windows smartphones
• Azure Rights Management, which can password protect the data itself so sensitive documents can't be seen by unauthorized people.

Each of those can be sold separately for $6/employee per month but Microsoft bundles them together for $7.60/employee per month. Note that companies

That seems to be be a winning combination so far. In April, when Microsoft announced earnings, Nadella told analysts that Enterprise Mobility Suite is growing fast and had at that time more than 13,000 enterprise customers.

He used it as an example of one of the "premium" services where Microsoft can profitably zoom ahead of the competition in the cloud, without getting dragged into the "race to zero" price wars going on in other areas of cloud computing between Google, Amazon and Microsoft.

That said, there's a lot of competition in all areas of software and mobile management already, including established companies like SAP, IBM and VMware, and specialists in the market with a more specific mobile or cloud focus, like Good Technology, MobileIron, and Okta.

SEE ALSO: Google just took the lead in the dangerous game called 'Race To Zero'

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NOW WATCH: This drummer created a whole song by only using the sound of coins

When I first came across Twitter Advanced Search, I was absolutely blown away. The advanced search makes it easy to find targeted individuals to interact with and/or market your products to. I learned about Twitter Advanced Search a few months after it was made available to the public, and ever since I learned about it, I used it often in my Twitter strategy. The advanced search allows you to filter out specific tweets and accounts based on what you type within the advanced search, but it can look confusing to a beginner. In this article, I will dispel the confusion and share with you 10 different ways you can use Twitter Advanced Search for your strategy.

#1: Search For Certain Keywords

The Twitter Advanced Search allows you to search for tweets containing specific keywords. You have the choice to decide whether a tweet must include multiple keywords (in the advanced search, that option is “All of these words”) or if a tweet contains one of the keywords that you specify (in the advanced search, that option is “Any of these words”).

Since I am a digital marketing expert, I will occasionally search for tweets about digital marketing to strengthen my knowledge. When I search for these tweets, I use Twitter Advanced Search to find all tweets with one or more of the following keywords: Social media, digital marketing, and blogging. Retail stores can search for keywords based on what they sell and then interact with people who sent relevant tweets. With hundreds of millions of tweets getting sent every day, it won’t be difficult to find a series of tweets with the keyword(s) you are looking for.

#2: Search For Specific Languages

One of the concepts few people recognize is how many timezones and languages fill up our planet. When you are used to hearing the same language in your neighborhood, your community, and in your every day life, it can be difficult to acknowledge that people talk and speak in other languages. On social media, it is easier to understand this concept, but there is an important connection between someone’s language and our brands.

Want to know why language matters for our brands? Here is an example. I am a blogger who writes blog posts in English. If you are with me at this point, then you are most likely read and speak English like it is second nature. However, there are some people who don’t understand English. If you don’t search for the specific language that you use to communicate with your audience, then you risk coming across someone who speaks in a different language and won’t understand yours. If one of my visitors has neither spoken nor read English in his/her lifetime, then I know it is practically impossible for a relationship to build. How can a visitor appreciate my content if that visitor does not understand the language I am using? Searching for a specific language prevents you from running into this problem. If you are an international brand with locations in different countries, then this won’t apply to you, but for most of us, the language a person understands impacts whether that person could possibly appreciate what we do or not.

#3: Search For Tweets Mentioning Certain People

Twitter Advanced Search allows you to see a bunch of tweets that mention other people. I use this feature to find people who interact with other social media thought leaders. Why is this important? Well, think of why a Twitter user would meaningfully engage with a social media thought leader’s tweet. Twitter Advanced Search follows up with tweets from people who all share a passion for social media and engage with other tweets about social media. These people are, by definition, people who interact with other social media thought leaders.

As a digital marketing expert, I want these types of followers. If these people see my tweets, then they will engage with my tweets all the same because I am passionate about digital marketing and send numerous tweets about my niche.

Brands can use this feature to see what other users say about their competitors. If certain users express frustration that your brand could fix, you can offer your services as a solution. Successful products and companies solve other people’s problems. You can build a successful brand solely around solving other people’s problems that the other brands couldn’t or wouldn’t solve.

#4: Search For Specific Tweets Posted By Specific People

The feature of getting a list of tweets from a specific group of people allows you to create a temporary Twitter list filled with your favorite (or least favorite) tweeters. When I am in the mood for a good laugh, I will use Twitter Advanced Search to search for the tweets posted by humorous accounts. I use this feature more often to learn more about digital marketing. I will type social media thought leaders’ usernames and then see a variety of tweets all about digital marketing, social media, and other tweets along those lines. If you find yourself using Twitter Advanced Search solely for this feature, it would be more advisable to create Twitter lists instead.

#5: Search For People By Location

Since my business is on the web, I don’t always use this feature. Retail stores and restaurants would benefit more from this feature because they could locate Twitter users close enough to stop by (and hopefully make a purchase). The advanced search also accounts for keywords, so if a restaurant was using Twitter Advanced Search to find ideal customers, that restaurant would search for a nearby location and then keywords like “food, hamburger (if the restaurant offers hamburgers), restaurant (maybe competing restaurants will show up. Your restaurant can say, “Come give us a try” but in a meaningful, non-sales-y way). For bloggers and web based businesses, you can search for people by location when you host an event or envision yourself hosting an event in a particular part of the world in the future.

#6: Search For Recent Tweets

Twitter Advanced Search shows an array of tweets written from the first days of Twitter to today. You should only opt to see the most recent tweets. If you own a restaurant and are looking for more customers, and you see a tweet written a few years ago in which a nearby individual wanted to know of a good restaurant, then that person’s past needs may no longer be relevant. So many things can happen in a few years. Maybe the person found a restaurant. Maybe the person lived somewhere else during that tweet and moved nearby after the tweet. Maybe that person is already a customer (you don’t want to tweet to a loyal customer asking them to give your restaurant a try).

I always search for tweets within one week, but depending on your brand, you may find it better to search for tweets posted in the past three months. Try it out and see what works for you.

#7: Search For Positive Tweets

When I look for people to follow on Twitter, I look for people who actively engage with other social media thought leaders. However, not all of these tweets are positive, and I don’t want to follow someone who I know is very likely to not appreciate what I do. When I do these searches, I make sure these are positive tweets. Some people like to express how much they enjoyed an article, and those are the only types of tweets I see when I check in the Positive option in Twitter Advanced Search. If people positively react to the leaders within your niche, and you provide value in your niche, then these people will positively react to your tweets, but only if these people see your tweets. I get these people to see my tweets by following them, and many of these people are highly likely to follow back based on their follow ratios and because I tweet digital marketing advice.

#8: Search For Negative Tweets

You can search for negative tweets about your competitors and look for common patterns. These common patterns will detect where your competitors fall short, and your brand can become the solution that leads to you helping others while making a profit. Successful brands try their best to help others, but some customers fall through the cracks. Searching for negative tweets allows you to find the customers who have fallen through the cracks. With this knowledge, you can fill up those cracks so more customers can find the advice or product they are looking for.

#9: Search For Questions

Some people will have a question about your niche, but not everyone who has a question gets an answer (FYI: if you want your question answered, the first step is to ask the question in the first place). Some people will ask their questions on Twitter, but not all of those questions will get answered. You can be the person who answers other people’s questions about your products and similar products within your niche. Some people may ask about your customer service or someone else’s customer service. When you provide your meaningful answer, the person who asked the question will be grateful for your reply, and that’s one of the ways to build a relationship between you and a potential customer.

#10: Search For Retweets To See What Is Popular

When you search for retweets, you will get an idea of what is popular within a certain niche. If you look for patterns, you will discover what patterns you can use to make your tweets more desirable so more of your followers retweet them. If you only tweet desirable tweets, then people will come back to your profile often to read your tweets. When someone reaches this stage of the relationship building process, it will be difficult for that person to forget about you.

In Conclusion

Twitter Advanced Search is one of the most sophisticated search engines on the entire web. It effectively filters the billions of tweets on the web and allows you to find the exact tweets you are looking for based on keywords, people who get mentioned, people sending the tweets, language, emotion, and other essential filtering methods.

Do you use Twitter Advanced Search? Has it become a vital part of your business? If you did not use Twitter Advanced Search before reading this blog post, do you plan on using it now? Please share your thoughts and advice below.

Are all your B2B sales leads ready to buy from you right now? Really? If not, here’s how to romance your prospects toward a sale with content.

If I could wave a magic wand for a B2B salesperson and grant a wish, many would ask to spend their days closing inbound sales qualified leads. All day, every day.

But the problem is most prospects are not ready to buy.

According to Brian Carroll, author of Lead Generation for the Complex Sale, up to 95% of qualified prospects on your website are there to research and are not yet ready to talk with a sales rep, but as many as 70% will eventually buy from you or one of your competitors.

Most leads need to be nurtured along their buying journey with useful information until they have educated themselves and know, like and trust your company.

Unfortunately, many companies do not understand or have patience for content marketing. As a result, their sales process resembles what Gary Vaynerchuk calls “the 19 year-old dude move.”

This “move” is based on a horny, clueless, 19 year-old dude who is looking for some serious romantic action on a first date.

(Message to 19 year-old dudes: If you try this approach, buy lottery tickets too. Your chances of success will be roughly equivalent.)

From a B2B sales perspective, the 19 year-old dude move manifests itself where, upon initial contact with the prospect, the salesperson or website offers only information very specific to their product or service. Examples include demos, product sheets, pricing guides.

Dude, slow down!

While that kind of information should be available on your website and at the salesperson’s fingertips, other information that more closely maps where the prospect is in her buying journey is what’s going to get you to second base.

If you frame the buyer’s journey into three stages, the types of content that are most effective become easier to understand.

1. Awareness

This is where a buyer is expressing the symptoms of a problem (or an opportunity). The buyer isn’t sure what her problem is. She probably needs more educational research to understand the problem.

An example would be one of my prospects whose company has declining sales. She has a gnawing feeling that her marketing efforts are not generating the number and quality of leads it once did. She might start to research things like “improving sales lead quality” or “modern lead generation methods.”

The type of information that is most helpful at this stage is vendor-neutral and helps identify problems or symptoms. Examples include analyst reports, research reports, eBooks, editorial content, educational content, etc.

What she doesn’t want at this point is lots of information about my marketing agency (e.g. pricing, testimonials, case studies, etc.). She doesn’t even know what options exist to solve her problem and she probably doesn’t understand how a firm like mine could help.

2. Consideration

Once the buyer has given a name to her problem, she then starts to consider all the available approaches/methods to solving it.

An example for this business owner with declining sales might be to hire a marketing person, re-assign roles of existing staff, or outsource to a marketing agency or consultant.

Content that is most relevant to the buyer at this stage would help her weigh her options such as comparison white papers, expert guides, webinars, videos, etc.

3. Decision

The buyer has reached this stage when she has defined her solution strategy, method, or approach. She is starting to compile a list of available vendors and products within her solution strategy.

Here, she will need supporting documentation, data, benchmarks or endorsements in order to make or recommend a final decision.

The right content for this stage includes vendor (or product) comparisons, case studies, trial download, a live demo, product literature, etc.

Conclusion

Offering content to your prospects that reflects their buying journey is becoming more important. That’s because the way your customers buy has changed. While in the past, your prospect might contact you early in their purchase research to get information, they now go online and don’t contact you until they are much closer to making a decision. If you don’t offer them information that helps them through the buying stages, you’ll rarely get to first base with them.

photo credit: trainwreck via photopin (license)

When social media was first introduced, it was very clear it would enhance our social lives and make communication easier. Fast forward to over a decade later, it’s proven to have fueled political movements, business growth and innovation. Social media is now an acceleration tool that any business or individual can use to spread a message. Social media automation emerged, where set processes can take place without repetitive and manual work. Most people operate this way, however elite businesses are understanding the opportunities behind automation. Not only is automation excellent for efficiency, it also makes sense when making a big impact to a targeted audience. This report doesn’t look at the technical aspect of social media automation but more so the strategy. It covers how to increase profit, productivity and further build your brand online.

Profile Management

The first place to start is the organization of your online infrastructure. This doesn’t just look at social media but all of your online profiles, including email lists. You must organize your followership to further understand what kind of campaign and strategic messaging is required for each audience.

Once the profiles are consolidated, they’re ready to be implemented on a social media dashboard. This will give you a full 360 degree view of all your social media activity, allowing you to take prompt action.

Designing Your Campaign

You can choose to design your campaign strategically and automate it in advance. This allows you to save time and think through all the content before it goes out. Scheduling content on a monthly basis saves you from looking at your content every week (or even worse every day). Then you can adjust the content with whatever product or service you’re campaigning for during those months. Not only does this make perfect sense, it allows you to plan your business plug and adopt a seamless sales process.

Once you’ve put together a campaign that runs itself, you can always plug it in the future again. All you have to do is make sure the timing is right and understand how each social medium is used for whichever content needs to go out.

Tracking Engagement

When running campaigns, marketers need to look for the indicators of interest. These include clicks, retweets, forwards, shares, etc. Any action that demonstrates interest from your prospect is a reason to qualify them further. The more conversations you have, the better your sales rolodex performs. Consistent engagement from prospects will help you better rate them as leads; you can use a lead scoring system to define them as a prospect.

Automating Conversations

There’s only so many people you can talk to which is exactly why you must create an automated process to spark conversations with potential buyers. With those that respond, you can further pursue the conversation and close the sale. The key here is to have an excellent starting script to get the highest amount of responses. Twitter is an excellent tool to make this happen, through which you can implement algorithms to start conversations with your followers.

Reputation Management

When you have an online brand, an online reputation comes with it. The brand image will depend on how well you treat your customers. Despite what they might say on the web, how prompt you are when responding will determine the perception of your followers. Addressing both positive and negative sentiment gives you the opportunity to build loyalty and retain followers. Having a system that tracks what is being said about your brand 24/7 can improve reputation and credibility. It’s also a fantastic way to manage customer service.

Analytics & Data

All your online infrastructure has tracking that can be converted into data. All this data comes together in the form of reports. Through these reports you’re able to find insights that can help further grow your brand and business. You’re also able to spot new opportunities for leads and conversions. By understanding the behaviour of your prospects, you’ll be a step ahead of your competitors. In addition, you can collect valuable intelligence on your competitors by using the right software. You can watch their growth and understand the keywords their prospects are using.

Sourcing Content

Finding and creating valuable content for your networks is always a challenging task. This content must be shared through social media and must be valuable to generate responses. Thankfully, this entire process can be automated by including the keywords your prospects use and the social media profiles they engage with. By understanding this, you’re able to share content that’s relevant to your direct prospect which can attract targeted followers.

Being able to use technology to generate leads is something I have spent over 5 years working on and perfecting. I have helped hundreds of SME’s use technology for lead generation, with one in particular who used a social media campaign to generate 2,700 leads in 7 days.

Let me help YOU generate leads like the above case study with my 10 tips below.

1. Understand Your Target Customer

I talk about this step in various blogs of mine over the years as it is so important. Without knowing who yourtarget customer is, where they like to hand out, their personality and behaviours you are going to find it extremely difficult to effectively use a lead generation strategy.

2. Competitions on Social Media

Giving something away free of charge to your audience in exchange for their name and email address is one of the most popular to attract quality leads. Like I have shared above, a client of mine generated 2,700 leads in 7 days and it only cost her £100 in total meaning that every potential customer cost her 24p. Don’t forget to follow up after a competition has ended. Whilst there may be only one winner, it doesn’t mean that every entrant won’t spend money with you. Offer those who entered a “thank you” discount and you will not only have new leads, but sales as well.

3. Allow the Sales Process to Happen Naturally

There is nothing worse than walking down the street and being physically stopped by a salesperson or having a flyer shoved into your hand. If you wouldn’t do this offline, don’t do it online.

Customers have become more unreceptive to cold calls or rehearsed sales pitches. Make sure you are sharing information, building your brand awareness and allowing your customer to naturally consider a purchase from you.

4. Be Intelligent With The Content You Share

Did you know that on average, a customer will “touch” a business online 8 times before purchasing? You need to make sure that the information you are sharing online and specifically social media is interesting, unique and relatable. If you run a beauty business and your target customer are women who love to look and feel good, talk about beauty treatments. Talk about find the perfect tanning specialist or facial that will make their skin glow.

5. Treat Lead Generation Like a Marathon, Not a Sprint

As I briefly mention above, attracting the lead is just one part of your lead generation strategy and your communication does not stop there. You must continue the lead generation journey so that a two-way conversation can happen. Nurture your lead and wait for them to feel comfortable opening up to you as a business. I sometimes have to wait around 2 years from the first time someone comes to see me speak, to becoming a client or attending one of my bootcamps.

6. Don’t Neglect Your Leads

It is estimated that more than 80% of the leads which get passed to a salesperson are rarely ever contacted. Be aware that 70% of your leads who do get neglected will purchase at a later date from a competitor of yours. They are interested in what your business has to offer however, if you don’t follow up with them, they will go elsewhere.

7. Make Sure You’re On The Same Page As Your Team

The job of marketing has been described as a way of developing a lead generation process that matches the readiness of the customer with the expectations of your salesperson. Take your target market and form a consensus regarding what a “sales ready” lead is. Make sure your leads don’t get lost in translation.

8. Recapturing Leads

If a lead comes into your marketing funnel and is deemed not “sales ready” by your salesperson, there needs to be a system in place to make sure they are still in the marketing loop and don’t disappear. Always touch base with your customers at least once a month through email marketing.

9. Automation

Using marketing automation software is extremely popular among businesses that are time short and want to effectively reach their target market. There is technology that allows you to track and analyse your target markets online behaviour. Using automation software may also help you improve your predictability around how your customer may behave online.

10. Focus On Getting Your Lead Generation Strategy Right

It may take some time for you to work out your lead generation strategy so that it can be implemented with success. There is no right, or wrong way to approach your customer as they all act and react differently.

All of the above tips cannot be used as a stand-alone activity. Take what you can from each of the 10 tips and build a lead generation strategy that is going to work for your business.

Most B2B lead records are incomplete. That’s the big takeaway from The 2015 State of Marketing Data, an annual report by Dun & Bradstreet and NetProspex. The report shines a light on the fact that B2B marketing data is “questionable” at best and often hazardous. With missing phone numbers, outdated email addresses, and incomplete company information, it’s a wonder any B2B demand generation team hits their goals. Marketers have been working hard and investing heavily in technology to rectify the situation, but maybe it’s just time to take a fresh approach to lead generation.

Bad Data Threatens B2B Demand Generation

Marketers use data to bring efficiency and quality to their demand gen programs. In fact, “improving the depth and accuracy of our database” was ranked as a top 2015 priority among 59 percent of survey respondents. Likewise, 74 percent of marketers say lead quality over quantity is their main focus for 2015.

Accurate data and lead quality may be a priority, but marketers are fighting an uphill battle to make it happen. According to B2B Enterprise marketers, demand generation programs and campaigns are “not effective” at achieving their primary goals. And marketers are “not effective” (a.k.a. failing) because of bad data.

The Gaping Holes in B2B Lead Records

Online forms are a huge source of marketing data. The only problem: more often than not, they have incomplete data. Let’s look at the numbers according to the 223 million records that were analyzed for the report:

• 54 percent of lead records lacked a phone number
• 66 percent of records had “questionable” email deliverability
• 66 percent of records were missing revenue and industry data

Such dismal phone connectability is one of the most startling problems. NetProspex states, “when it comes to improving the demand generation funnel, the ability to reach buyers by phone is fundamental to closing the loop between sales and marketing.” This means that more than half of B2B lead records are missing fundamental data and those leads are more than likely, going in the trash.

This data is telling a scary story and should be a loud wake up call. You can’t effectively score leads with missing company information like revenue, size, and industry. You can’t nurture leads without a valid email address. And you can’t get your foot in the door with that all-important phone call if you don’t have a phone number.

How To Improve Connectability with Inbound Phone Calls

The state of data isn’t necessarily the marketer’s fault. In a marketing saturated environment, B2B buyers are reluctant to give out all their information –who wants to be on yet another emailing list?

The easiest way to avoid the problem altogether is by rethinking the way we connect with leads. Instead of trying to gather necessary information through online lead forms, give buyers the option to call you when and how they want.

Inbound phone leads are not only a great way to connect with prospects, they come with rich data that will enhance and fill in the gaps of your digital records. Try getting a sense of competitor threat, interest level, top objections, and demographic data from a web form.

Digital lead forms and databases are vital to B2B lead generation, but no amount of technology can force a prospect to give up their information, and incomplete data records will always be a problem. Demand generation doesn’t just have to mean generating digital leads. If your prospects want to call, let them. These will be your highest converting leads, and with call intelligence, they’ll be your richest source of customer insights.

If you want to learn about bringing phone calls to your B2B demand generation strategy, download the eBook, Calls are the New Clicks: How B2B Marketers Can Tap into the Power of the Phone.

While many demand generation experts focus on things like targeting the right audience and developing an appropriate offer for that audience, this is only part of the equation for what’s needed to really succeed with demand gen.

Here are four critical steps that contribute to the success of demand generation. It’s no surprise that they all involve coordinating with Sales.

Secret #1 – Connect the Dots between Sales & Marketing

It’s surprising that in many large organizations, the Marketing team overseeing demand generation isn’t involved much with the Sales team. We have seen many marketing teams focus on delivering MQLs, and stop there. While they may recognize that the Sales team is the ultimate recipient of their efforts, Marketing rarely takes the initiative to bring the two teams together to collaborate.

However, the most successful demand generation teams build a close working relationship through regular meetings with Sales. This creates an open line of communication and helps both organizations understand each other, finding common ground.

For example, if Sales is focused on account-based selling, is the demand gen team working with them to do account-based marketing? Another area to explore is the MQL “hand-off”. How well does the demand gen team understand whether or not the sales team is really getting what they need?

Sales teams tend to be open to working with the demand gen team. Don’t be surprised if the Sales department asks for more — not fewer — meetings to enhance that working relationship.

Secret #2 – Plan & Collaborate Together

Once you have established a close working relationship between Marketing and Sales, Marketing can begin an ongoing planning discussion. While Marketing may initiate the conversation, it’s key that both Marketing and Sales contribute to the brainstorming and planning process. Marketing team members are often surprised by the fact that the Sales team has valuable input. After all, the Sales team talks to customers every day, so they may understand the issues customers care about much better than Marketing does.

For example, we have seen situations where the Sales team has a better feel for how to position a solution against a competitive offering. A collaborative effort will result in Marketing creating more powerful messaging, and a better overall strategy to bring in qualified leads.

A marketing campaign developed by both Marketing and Sales will not only have more impact with the buyer, but will also be better accepted by Sales when the leads flow in.

Secret #3 – Educate the Sales Team

Once Marketing and Sales have developed a marketing strategy together, it’s time to focus on education and communication. Marketing should present everything it knows about an upcoming campaign to the Sales team. Once the Sales team understands the messaging, approach, logic, and timing, it can provide valuable feedback about tweaks the team would like to make to the marketing campaign.

For example, if the Sales team believes a particular approach results in lower-quality leads, then Marketing can show the data that either agree or refute that hypothesis.

From there, keep the lines of communication open by maintaining visibility with the Sales team throughout the campaign, so Sales reps are reminded about what the brand is doing, why they’re doing it, and when it needs to be done. It’s important that Sales feel like a part of the process.

Secret #4 – Close the Loop

Once a campaign is complete, the Marketing team should discuss what worked and what didn’t work with Sales Management and individual Sales reps. What you’ll uncover in closing the loop can be extremely valuable. Ultimately, both Marketing and Sales want to know the impact the campaign had on pipeline and revenue. By reviewing the results together, you can make improvements the next time around.

When all parties are in the same room discussing the same objectives and measuring the same data, it’s easy to get on the same page and acknowledge what didn’t work, as well as brainstorm on how to make improvements.

When a campaign doesn’t meet expectations, but you don’t meet as a single collective, it’s easy for people to start blaming each other, instead of working together to come up with a better solution.

What are some things you have found in working with the sales organization on demand generation?

As a marketer, I know that my fellow colleagues are always looking for ways to generate more leads. More importantly, we are looking for techniques, tools, and best practices that will allow us to generate the most quality leads for our company.

Actually generating quality leads is a major challenge many marketers face. According to a survey from MarketingSherpa, 73% of b2b marketing leads are not sales ready. If marketers are going to help their company drive revenue, then the leads they generate must be of value. In other words, the lead should at least be in-market for what your company is selling.

With the growing amount of information being created daily, big data is providing marketers a means to find consumers who are in-market for the products or services your company sells. However, since this data is growing so rapidly and is stored in so many places (i.e. social networks, blogs, forums, public records, databases), it is near impossible for marketers to quickly find all the data they need on in-market prospects without expertise and tools.

I created an infographic that briefly explains how leading marketers are using a service such as Data-as-a-Service (DaaS) to find and target prospects who are currently in-market for products and services their company sells. You can view the infographic below:

This infographic was originally posted here.