SALES

• Is Your Value Proposition Valueless?

NEWS

• Research finds group brainstorming ineffective
• Study rebuts magazine engagement assumptions
• Are B2B websites chasing away customers?

TRENDS

• The big opportunity

TIPS

• Uncover new ways to grow your business
• Does your new product or service pass the simplicity test?
• Need to collect on a delinquent account?
• Persuade someone with a cup of coffee
• Help your staff retain what they learn
• Much more…
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SALES

Is Your Value Proposition Valueless?

While trying to stand out, salespeople typically just turn themselves and their products into commodities.

WHETHER YOU CALL it value-based selling, feature and benefit selling or value proposition selling, this sales methodology has severe limitations. This classic form of selling, which has served companies so well in the past, no longer works. Companies that have long relied on this methodology to differentiate themselves from their competition to translate their value, maintain their margins and prevent commoditization are now finding that it is backfiring.

Commoditization — the very thing they work so hard to prevent — is what they are creating.

Here’s a good example of how this plays out: Imagine that you are meeting a prospect for the first time. He asks you what you sell, what makes you different and why he should buy from you. Specifically, what would be five things that you’d want to tell him about your company that would leave him with a favorable impression of your capabilities? More than likely you would include: 1) Quality, 2) Service, 3) Reliability, 4) Expertise and 5) Value/Performance.

Now, let’s imagine that you no longer work for your company. You have landed a plum job with your biggest and strongest competitor. You now go back to your former contact, and he begins to ask you about your new company and its capabilities. What can you do to help him? What makes you different? He may prompt you by asking, “Do you know, one of the things we really appreciated and valued about XYZ Co. was their fine quality? Do you have good quality?” Your response is, “You bet, it’s one of the reasons I moved over to ABC Co.” “And how about reliability, expertise and value?” You pull out all the latest industry reports that rate your company number one in its field for reliability, expertise and value.

In all your excitement to create this truly unique value proposition, what you really have created is a definitive and complete denigration of your value-add. You rehearse chapter and verse the exact value proposition your competitors tout. Because you’ve jumped the gun, you have left the prospect with one differentiator, but unfortunately it is the same differentiator by which he will now measure all competitors. You guessed it — price. You are now back to the original problem: You have created commoditization.

Not only have salespeople commoditized their companies’ value proposition, they have also commoditized themselves. They look and sound like everyone else, and that is why it is so difficult for them to get new accounts and to have customers respect their time.

And why should they since they don’t bring any true value to the table? Because we are in an information economy, customers no longer rely on salespeople for the traditional information they used to value. This information is instantly available on the Internet and customers are generally more savvy and better informed than they were in the past. From where the buyer sits, all salespeople and products look frighteningly similar.

What is the answer? Nothing less than a total retooling of your message and the way in which you approach the marketplace. First, companies must stop believing that they have cornered the market on quality, reliability, expertise and value. These characteristics only get you invited to the dance.

Sales are won and lost in the salesperson’s understanding of the value gap that your customer is experiencing. Your job is to get information, not give it. The salesperson who can define the problem most effectively by asking questions that get the customer to talk about the value gap is the salesperson who will consistently outperform the salesperson with the best solutions.

Your job is to give the prospect the freedom to self-discover his problems, his consequences, his priorities and his willingness to act upon them. At the same time, you must assess the likelihood of change and balance it with your own investment cost of acquisition. Your job is to be a change agent: someone who takes a nonselling posture to help his customer understand the cost of change.

It becomes more important for your prospect to actually sell himself and, at a more advanced level, to sell you on his motive to buy from you. This is where sales becomes fun. All the traditional pressure is off you and is transferred to the client.

However, if the prospect is resistant to share information about his company’s value gap, here are some questions to get him to open up:

• You have been using XYZ for two years and you are happy with your service, so can you help me understand why you want to consider changing?
• Since price is your only motive to change, and we are never the lowest, do you still want us to provide a quote?
• I’m not sure if we can help you specifically or if we are a good fit for your company. Is it okay if we ask each other some questions and at the end of our meeting determine if it makes sense for us to proceed? And if it doesn’t, would you be comfortable telling me, so that I don’t waste any more of your time?

Follow up with additional qualifying questions:

• How long has it been a problem?
• What have you done to fix it?
• In relationship to other important initiatives, how does this stack up against them?
• What is at stake for the company?
• With or without us, how committed are you to making a change?

To make this change-agent sales methodology work for you, you must transition from a feature and benefit seller to a strategic seller. The objective of your sales call will now be to ask probing questions to understand your customer’s value gap, get the customer to open up and disclose why he might consider changing and, through skillful questioning, have the customer convince you that he has a problem that he needs you to solve. Your role as a change agent is to transition from telling and selling to helping customers identify their problems and better understand their consequences.

Rick Farrell is Vice President of Selling Dynamics, a national sales and development training company. He can be reached at rfarrell@sellingdynamics.com and at (781) 404-7915.

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NEWS

Research finds group brainstorming ineffective

Company leaders wanting to generate good ideas to build revenue or cut costs often call their team together for brainstorming sessions. But many brainstorming sessions get off to a shaky start because the participants subscribe to a tenet that is false: “There’s no such thing as a bad idea.”

The popularity of brainstorming results in part from the business world’s knee-jerk faith in teams and the desire to give everyone a voice. However, at the University of Texas at Arlington’s Group Creativity Lab, Professor Paul Paulus conducted research on the number and quality of ideas for four people brainstorming together versus four people brainstorming by themselves and found that group brainstormers typically perform at about half the level they would if they brainstormed alone.

Why is this? Group brainstorming often leads to self-consciousness, trying to impress the boss, company politics, criticism or just plain blathering for one’s own enjoyment. In addition, many find that creativity and its muse can’t be scheduled between, say, 9:15 and 9:45.

Group brainstorming can still be effective, but it requires careful planning, strong facilitation and suspension of ego of all involved. Consider asking participants to write down their ideas privately before and/or after the group session to get the best ideas. And limit the size of the team to no more than seven people or you risk ending up with “coblabberation.”

Source: Wall Street Journal, June 14, 2006

Study rebuts magazine engagement assumptions

If you’ve ever purchased magazine advertising, chances are your advertising rep was eager to show how much time their subscribers spend reading the magazine. The assumption is that highly engaged readers translate into better ad performance. However, a study suggests that ads in high-engagement magazines perform no better than ads in magazines whose readers pay a lot less attention.

Starch Communications Research conducted the study by dividing 25 magazines into high-engagement, low-engagement and middling camps, defining engagement by the frequency with which they are read, time spent with each issue and how much of each issue gets finished. When it examined the percentages of readers who remembered ads across magazines, it found no link between those scores and levels of engagement.

Publishers and media buyers said engagement is more complex than the study acknowledges, but the study’s authors said magazines should welcome the implications. New studies are being conducted to verify or rebut the results.

Source: Advertising Age, May 22, 2006
 

Are B2B websites chasing away customers?

It appears business-to-business (B2B) sites offer a less desirable user experience compared to consumer sites. According to a report from the Nielsen Norman Group (NNG), people using B2B sites accomplish what they set out to do only 58% of the time compared to a 66% success rate on consumer e-commerce sites.

The main problem is not enough focus on the customer. This results in bad site design that can cause prospects to downgrade their perception of a company. The elements of bad design and the resulting perceptions detected by NNG included: incomplete product description, which creates skepticism; overwhelming and convoluted content, which creates confusion; convoluted navigational structure, which causes prospects to lose patience; and pushy marketing tactics, which cause annoyance and distrust.

Lack of pricing information was also found to be a major problem because it’s the one thing that customers say they want the most and get the least. At a minimum, providing pricing levels, if not exact prices, would help move the sales process forward. In addition, the common B2B practice of requiring prospects to fill out lengthy registration forms to get access to deeper information is a lead killer. As the report says, “[It] can send sales prospects running.”

Source: eMarketer.com, June 2, 2006

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TRENDS

The big opportunity

Obesity rates in the United States have been accelerating since the 1980s. Today nearly one-third of adult men and more than one-third of adult women are considered obese. Just as the baby boomers have driven business and shaped the economy during the past half century, the plus-size population is likely to dictate marketing trends through much of the 21st century.

Who is this powerful consumer group? Forget old stereotypes: It’s not just people in low-income neighborhoods packing on the pounds at McDonald’s. Obesity rates are rising most rapidly among urbanites who earn $60,000 or more a year.

Already, greater girth is forcing businesses to rethink the way nearly everything is sold. The trend extends far beyond clothing designer Tommy Hilfiger and retailer Old Navy offering plus-size lines. For example, the new Toyota RAV4 comes with seats up to three inches wider than previous models, Select Comfort now offers grand king size mattresses that are 30% bigger than the traditional king and Steelcase, the world’s largest office furniture maker, now offers waiting room chairs designed for heavier builds.

Meanwhile, entrepreneurs are cashing in with new products and services such as Extend-Its.com seat belt extenders, the Big John toilet seat and the Butterfly Lounge in Orange County, Calif., one of many size-acceptance nightclubs popping up across the nation.

Marketing to the obese can be a delicate issue. Large customers want the market to respond to their needs, but products that reflect too much reality — that remind them that they are overweight — often bomb. At the same time, companies don’t want to be seen as enablers to an increasingly fat society. For some, the answer is to offer options for plus-size customers without directly advertising to them or even mentioning them; for instance, Toyota’s RAV4 is simply billed as “roomier.”

Source: Business 2.0, June 2006

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TIPS

• Trying to find new ways to grow your business? Look for these opportunities: 1) When customers buy a product or service, they’re trying to get a critical job done. Is your product or solution providing a complete solution, or are there related job gaps that your company can fill? 2) Who are the industry’s worst customers? Is there a way to profitably sell to these customers, such as “good enough” solutions at low prices? 3) What barriers hold back consumption by certain markets? Maybe the products are too expensive, require extensive training or are hard to access. Break down these barriers and you can expand the market.

Source: The Marketing Report, 370 Technology Dr., Malvern, PA 19355

• Does your new product or service pass the simplicity test? If your description is more than a couple of sentences long, you may need to go back to the drawing board. Most customers are in a rush and won’t read through several paragraphs just to figure out what the product or service will do for them. Sometimes the solution is simpler marketing copy; sometimes the product itself should be reconsidered. Test the product and the marketing efforts independently on impartial potential customers.

Source: www.smbiz.com

• Need to collect on a delinquent account? Often, the first delay tactic a debtor will use is the excuse, “I don’t have that invoice. Could you fax it to me?” Catch them off guard by having the invoice loaded in your fax machine, within your reach and ready to transmit when you call. As soon as you have your contact on the line, press send. The invoice will be waiting if and when they make the excuse. Even if they aren’t stalling, the timely fax can be presented as a convenience.

Source: Business Credit, 8840 Columbia 100 Parkway, Columbia, MD 21045

• The next time you want to persuade someone, offer them a cup of coffee. A new study suggests that caffeine makes us more open to persuasion when confronted with a point of view that is logical and well-argued. University of Queensland researchers asked participants their position on the subject of euthanasia. Next, half were served caffeine-laced orange juice and half were served regular orange juice. All subjects were then asked to read a position paper that ran counter to their beliefs. Participants who drank the caffeinated drink understood and remembered the counter-arguments better and were more in agreement with those arguments. What’s more, their changed views were unlikely to revert to earlier beliefs later on.

Source: www.latimes.com

• Help your staff retain what they learn. To teach people effectively, you’ve got to engage their attention in an interactive way, says renowned business psychologist Dr. William Glasser. By his estimates, people remember: 10% of what they read, 20% of what they hear, 30% of what they see, 50% of what they see and hear, 70% of what they discuss with others, 80% of what they experience personally and 90% of what they teach to someone else. The more senses you can involve in the learning process, the more effective training will be.

Source: Manager’s Edge, 300 N. Washington St., Suite 605, Alexandria, VA 22314

• Avoid this common advertising mistake. Many advertisers assume that if they make several offers in a message, at least one of those offers will appeal to each customer and the result will be a better ad response. However, research consistently proves just the opposite. For example, an experiment was conducted in which half of a customer list was sent an email containing four free service offers while the other half was sent an email with only one free service offer. The email which focused on just one service outperformed the other by 464%. These results coincide with many previous studies conducted with other media. So regardless of the medium, the golden rule still stands: one message with one offer pulls best.

Source: www.imediaconnection.com

• Get publicity for your company by being a contrarian. Since the media loves to rile their audience and spur debates, use this to your favor by going against the grain. Here are a few ways to do this: take issue with a survey result, disagree with a common belief, champion an underdog, make surprising predictions, expose flaws in something assumed to be beneficial or describe the underside of something popular. For example, when music marketing guru Bob Baker submitted a press release titled “What’s Wrong with American Idol?” that criticized the popular reality-TV talent show for misleading aspiring musicians about what it takes to succeed in music, he received five radio interviews that highlighted his status as an expert on careers in music.

Source: www.yudkin.com

• When exhibiting at trade shows, how can you attract attendees that are wary of being “sold to?” Consider leaving the booth unattended for an hour or so each day. Some attendees won’t approach a booth if it’s staffed, but they’ll come up and take material when no one is there.

Source: www.skyline.com

• Elicit change in employees with this four-step coaching process: 1) Acknowledge the truth. For example, if an employee missed a deadline on a report, come to a consensus on the facts before proceeding. 2) Analyze what happened without blaming. Try to understand the thought processes and decisions that led to the problem, e.g., “I missed the deadline because I took on too much work, but I didn’t want to look bad by saying I was swamped.” 3) Create an action plan. End the conversation with the employee saying something like “From now on I will do this….” 4) Develop a feedback process so you can follow up. In each step, it is important to be truthful. Most people would rather know the truth than be in the dark.

Source: The Managerial Moment of Truth by Bruce Bodaken (Free Press)

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MANAGEMENT

• The Problem with Praise and Rewards

NEWS

• What impacts word-of-mouth marketing?
• For better leads, aim low

TRENDS

• The end of cold calling?
• Shunning good quality at a fair price 

TIPS

• The surprising source of your best referrals?
• How to make an intangible product more tangible
• Why now is the time to start thinking about Christmas PR
• The secret to selecting the best job candidates
• Does increasing pay increase productivity?
• Much more…
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MANAGEMENT

The Problem with Praise and Rewards

A “recognition gap” exists between what employees want and what employers are giving them.

FOR THE LAST three decades, employee surveys have pointed to recognition as one of the critical ingredients for employee satisfaction and retention. Companies spend more than $100 billion annually on merchandise and cash rewards — accompanied by supervisory praise — in the belief that incentives make their employees feel needed and respected.

Mysteriously, polls indicate that up to 70% of employees are marginally or actively unengaged. The 2005 Employee Recognition Survey reports that 90% of 614 organizations surveyed ran an active employee-recognition program, which included items for employees such as certificates and plaques, company merchandise, office accessories, even jewelry. However, when the Gallup Organization questioned some 4 million workers, two-thirds said they had received no recognition on the job last year. Yet, employers still seem convinced that the delivery of tangible rewards achieves the objective of creating a “positive work environment.”

This “recognition gap” exists because when employees ask for recognition, they are expressing the need for something much more complex than a gilded plaque or a service pin. To employees, the word “recognition” refers to the presence of systems and practices that reaffirm their worth to the organization.

During 30 years as a management consultant, I observed the negative effects of processes that reduced recognition to a series of robotic activities. This convinced me that the crucial step in addressing the lack of recognition in the work force is to listen to employees who are on the receiving end of these misplaced processes.

What Recognition is Not
Praise is not recognition. The practice of using praise to meet an employee’s desire for recognition is neat and tidy — but wrong. Praising employees for work behavior or results leads primarily to embarrassment, distrust and poor management/employee relations. Employees sense the manipulation behind constructed positive comments and feel controlled and devalued by the experience.

Merchandise is not recognition. Do we really think that when employees tell us they want recognition, they are expressing a desire for awards, jackets, cups, hats or pens? Merchandise does nothing more than trivialize employees’ efforts and contributions to the organization. The theater of ceremonious appreciation is rejected by everyone involved — except the reward and recognition industry itself. The whole farce is a misguided attempt to apply an inappropriate solution to a poorly defined problem.

Money is not recognition. Money may be our society’s scorecard, but it is no substitute for dignity and respectful treatment. Despite the argument that money is the most desirable form of recognition and the solution to all performance problems, the fact remains that many people who are well-compensated still feel that they are trading their self-respect for cash. Employees should be well-compensated for their contributions as well as receive respect, appreciation and support.

What Recognition Is
Recognition is partnering. Canned, off-the-shelf performance improvement programs emphasize strategies to get employees to perform. These programs are inherently condescending — and employees know it.

Wouldn’t it be easier for managers to have productive discussions about work with their employees than to continually strive to execute a contrived reward agenda? Performance dialogue acknowledges employee contribution and validates the work as meaningful. In these discussions, employee performance feedback evolves. Whether the feedback is positive or negative is not defined by the intentions of the supervisor; valid feedback is data-based information about performance. If a person has done something that improved an outcome, this will surface during a discussion of the work.

Recognition is involvement. Asking employees their opinions to help solve problems or implement improvements, and providing them with opportunities to discuss decisions minimizes the social distinction of management hierarchy.

Recognition is respect. Much of the turnover in business and industry is created by the inappropriate behavior of disrespectful supervisors and managers. Individuals who have been able to succeed through intimidation — those whose employees will perform to any standard to avoid having to interact with their boss — are all too numerous in management.

Recognition enables individualism. The policies, regulations and procedures that are required to manage some organizations can make employees feel like cogs in a machine. A direct relationship exists between the company’s responsiveness to individual needs and the potential for that organization to engage employees. To truly recognize an employee, the organization must be flexible, supportive and responsive to special circumstances.

A Recognition Solution
Employees feel recognized when — as an outcome of how they are treated by the organization — they consider themselves as partners. Recognition comes as a result of providing employees with opportunity, promotions, equitable pay, safe working conditions and challenging work.

So when employees ask for recognition, they are asking for no more than their employers expect for themselves: honest communications, respectful treatment and acknowledgement that they are people with feelings, personal lives and the desire to truly contribute to the company.

Jerry Pounds is a management consultant with over 30 years of experience in applying positive reinforcement, reward and recognition strategies to business and industry. In his new book, Praise for Profit, Jerry reveals the demotivating and discouraging effects that praise, rewards, awards and incentives can have on employee performance. Visit his website at www.praiseforprofit.com.

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NEWS

What impacts word-of-mouth marketing?

To facilitate word-of-mouth (WOM) marketing, it helps to understand your market’s WOM behavior. A new study sheds light on the likelihood and manner in which consumers spread WOM.

The study examined consumers by gender, generation, employment status and income level. Although the men surveyed made more daily contacts with others than the women, women were more likely to share a positive experience with a business (91% compared to 83%) or recommend an enjoyable product (95% compared to 89%). Women tend to prefer verbal communications to other forms of contact, while men tend to prefer email.

Furthermore, full-time employees make as many daily contacts as part-time employees and stay-at-homers combined. Stay-at-homers tend to make more daily visits to chat rooms and message boards. In addition, those with household earnings of more than $100,000 were more likely to make recommendations than those earning less.

One-quarter of young people visit chat rooms or message boards daily and 17% of their contact activity is done through instant or text messaging. Gen X and Boomers tend to use email more often and are more likely to spread positive WOM. These groups are ripe for viral email campaigns. Surprisingly, seniors visit more message boards and chat rooms than Boomers and nearly equal activity to Gen X. This is likely due to their desire to reconnect with family and friends, and to discuss health and other issues of aging with peers and professionals.

Source: Lucid Marketing, May 2006
 

For better leads, aim low

Which leads are more likely to close quickly — C-level execs and those who say they “authorized purchases,” or the lower-level managers who “recommend purchases”? According a new study, the lower-level folks may be your best leads.

Technology search resource KnowledgeStorm phoned 11,295 business execs right after they filled out online registration forms to access white papers, webinars or product specs. The purpose of the call was lead qualification. Each lead was rated from 1 to 5 with 5 being ready-to-close and 1 being tire-kicker.

Overall, 17% to 20% of prospects reached by phone turned out to be very hot leads. However, people that described themselves as having “recommendation authority” were much more likely to be in that hot-lead bucket than people who described themselves as having “purchase authority.” In fact, on average the lowly sounding “recommenders” were three points higher in the buying cycle.

This may seem counter intuitive, but it makes a lot of sense. The people with the real power are doing the research as opposed to the leaders who may just be rubber-stamping the results, or perhaps making a final choice from a very small number of options.

Source: MarketingSherpa.com, May 4, 2006

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TRENDS

The end of cold calling?

Entrepreneurs have a new way to address an old problem: how to sign up clients when you have small or nonexistent sales resources. Today, new software tools and online social networks and services are helping small companies generate sales leads without the usual legwork and the often-inefficient cold calling.

For instance, Anu Shukla at RubiconSoft Inc. used an online social-networking service, LinkedIn, to get a foot in the door at two large companies. The service allowed her to search through lists of her contacts’ contacts for potential leads. When she found names at the targeted companies, mutual acquaintances gave her an introduction. For many small companies, services like LinkedIn, as well as Jigsaw, Spoke, ZoomInfo, Plaxo, Hoover’s and iProfile, are much more effective than simply cold calling.

Some tools let you find sales leads through mutual acquaintances. Others are more like beefed-up phone directories, offering exhaustive lists of corporate personnel and their contact information. Still others offer comprehensive background information on prospective clients, culled from press releases, news reports and other sources. Some offer a combination of these features. Most of these services charge a fee for full access to their information — in some cases, hundreds or thousands of dollars. But many offer stripped-down free versions as well.

Source: The Wall Street Journal, May 19, 2006

Shunning good quality at a fair price

If your product’s position in the market is “good quality at a fair price,” you may be positioned for failure in the near future.

“In the U.S. and around the world, the consumer markets are bifurcating into two fast-growing pools of spending,” writes author Michael J. Silverstein in his new book, Treasure Hunt: Inside the Mind of the New Consumer. “At the high end, consumers are trading up, paying a premium for high-quality, emotionally rich, high-margin products and services. At the low end, consumers are relentlessly trading down, spending as little as possible to buy basic, low-cost goods and services.” Between both piles lies a vast range of mediocre, medium-range products that Silverstein claims is doomed to decline.

According to Silverstein’s research, the amount of spending on trading down was approximately twice the amount of trading up. In every category he and his colleagues looked at (30 in all), both ends of each market offered huge opportunities, but the middle appeared to be in decline. For example, the middle market has shrunk 12 market-share points for the car business, 40 points in the television market, 16 points in the U.S. washer market and on and on.

The middle market is still huge, but it has been shrinking over the years and is expected to decline another 5% or 6% a year over the next five years. On the other hand, the top is expected to grow at 10% to 12%, and the bottom is expected to grow at 5% or 6%.

Also, from a consumer’s point of view, they don’t see trading down as really “trading down.” Instead, it is about consumers living a rich, balanced life, being careful with their money, and buying a handful of products where they trade up and others where they trade down.

Source: Knowledge@Wharton, May 10, 2006

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TIPS

• What’s the best source for new referrals? Most business owners assume it’s their existing clients. However, while clients can be a good referral source, they really don’t have much motivation to send you business on a consistent basis. In most cases, the best referral sources are businesses like yours that sell to the same target market. Select non-competing businesses and suggest building a strategic referral partnership network. You likely have something they want or can at least propose a way for them to get more of what they want. This also will allow you to fill in more of your clients’ needs by pointing them to members of your private referral network.

Source: John Jantsch, www.DuctTapeMarketing.com

• Service providers can improve customer retention and gain more referrals by finding ways to make their service more tangible. Think about how you could bundle your service with a product that would be appreciated by clients. For example, a home-insurance agent could provide a labeled videocassette for clients to video their possessions, or a carpet cleaner could provide an effective spot-cleaning kit for sudden mishaps between cleanings. The little things can make all the difference to the person making a purchase decision.

Source: Vicki Clift, Marketing News, 250 S. Wacker Dr., Chicago, IL 60606

• Design brochures and ads that speak directly to your customers’ needs. Legendary direct response writer Herschell Gordon Lewis says one of the most effective headlines is “We’re solving the problem of….” This tactic works best with a highly targeted market with a specific problem.

Source: Sales & Marketing Report, www.ragan.com

• Time to start thinking about Christmas? It is if you have a product or service that can be featured in a holiday gift guide. Due to the long lead times for these special sections, many media outlets start looking for gift ideas early on. Some common deadlines include July for magazines, September for wires and syndicates, October for newspapers and November for television. When pitching your idea, see if you can fit into more than one gift category. Also, always check to find out who is responsible for the gift guide and what type of information they would like to receive. Some may want a press kit and product samples; others may just want the pitch.

Source: www.CherryCommunications.com

• Select the best job candidates by “listening for the electricity.” According to entrepreneurship expert Ray Smilor, after confirming intelligence and competence in candidates, it’s important to look for attitude, for the electricity that is part of the joy of work. In interviews, ask questions that reveal behavior and illuminate feeling. First, rather than ask what someone “would do” if something was needed in the future, ask about how they actually dealt with a real issue in the past. Second, ask questions that reveal motivation, such as what a person is proudest of, what they consider their most significant achievement and where they think they’ve made the biggest contribution. If you listen for the electricity in their answers, you’ll hear not only details about behavior, but also gain insights into their attitude about work and life.

Source: www.eVenturing.org

• Arbitration is not always the answer. Many contracts require that disputes between the parties be solved by arbitration. This helps to avoid a costly legal battle and assures the dispute won’t be made public. But there are disadvantages. While touted as faster, that’s not always true. And there is no appeal from the arbitrator’s ruling. Talk to a disinterested attorney before agreeing to a contract with an arbitration clause and consider the motives of the other party. Chances are, they believe they’ll do better with arbitration than going to court.

Source: Small Business Taxes & Management, www.smbiz.com

• Do you make this critical sales mistake? When a prospect says they’re not interested, do you say “Can I give you a call in six months or so?” Out of guilt, most prospects will say “yes” even though they have no intention of ever buying from you. Of course, you realize this, too. Six months later, you uneasily skip past the contact’s record along with all of the other names you regularly recycle each day. A better approach is to determine up front if these prospects will ever buy from you. Ask, “Mr. Prospect, under what circumstances would you ever see yourself considering another vendor?” Their answer may open the door for a potential opportunity down the road. If they won’t answer your question, write them off, move on and feel good that you got a final decision.

Source: www.BusinessByPhone.com

• Will increasing your employees’ pay increase their productivity? A new study suggests workers receiving pay raises increase their efforts only temporarily. In an experiment, University of Chicago economists promised two groups of data-entry workers a six-hour assignment at $12 per hour, but at the start raised one group to $20. Result: The better-paid workers entered 27% more data — but after 90 minutes, the increased productivity vanished.

Source: www.Forbes.com

• Every page on your website is potentially a homepage. Due to links from natural search engine listings and message boards, visitors may enter from any page on your site. Take a look at each page. Is each designed so that it’s easy for a visitor to navigate the site and make a final purchase or information request? If not, revise the content to ensure that it engages users to learn more and take the next steps to obtain the product or service. Hyperlink key terms within the content that push users deeper within the website. Finally, make sure your company contact form is on every page.

Source: www.MarketingProfs.com

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TIME MANAGEMENT

• Work Smarter and Take More Time Off

NEWS

• B2B customer expectations revealed

TRENDS

• Revenge of the irate shopper
• Direct mail response versus email 
• Marketing to the new ‘metrospirituals’ 

TIPS

• Make a hit with your A-list clients and prospects
• What to do when an employee goofs up
• Get free access to powerful web analytics software
• Dramatically increase response to lead generation letters
• Does your company have “vampire meetings?
• Much more…
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TIME MANAGEMENT

Work Smarter and Take More Time Off

Forget multi-tasking and long hours. Work smart and get the same results in less time.

WORKERS IN THE UNITED STATES put in more hours at work and take fewer vacation days than those in most industrialized countries. But the U.S. isn’t the most productive country in the world. We’re busy, but our important priorities are falling by the wayside as we work hard when we should be working smart.

Working smart means getting the same results in less time. To do that, you must change how you work. But before you read on, I must warn you: Working smart is risky. If you work smart, you’ll have more free time. However, if you use the free time to take on more commitments, you’ll be just as busy as before, but now you are so tightly scheduled that a slip in one project can cascade to many more projects.

Work Faster
Right now, we get more productive by working longer. But how about working faster? To work faster, you’ll have to get into the zone. In the zone, you’re running a marathon. You bring your full focus to one task and build momentum until you’re producing results like nobody’s business.

Key to entering the zone is eliminating distractions such as email, telephone and visitors. One of my clients, a high-tech CEO, blocks out four hours each day for focus time. He closes his door, forwards the phone to voice-mail, and starts working to build up his rhythm. He rarely works the entire four hours, but by having the time blocked out, he’s sure to get a couple of hours of solid work under his belt. And without distractions, he can spend time doing big-picture thinking, instead of being pulled into details. After five years, he considers this one of the best habits he’s ever developed.

Your biggest distractions will come from you, though. You’ll multi-task. And sadly, you’ll believe you’re getting more done as you do. Face reality: People are less productive when multitasking, and that’s been shown in many studies over the last few years. We feel busy, but most of that busy-ness is spent switching from task to task, not making forward progress on any one task.

Increase Focus
If you’re like me, you hardly ever procrastinate — except for the really important stuff. The rubber bands get dutifully sorted by size, but that client proposal? Not so much. Work smarter by distinguishing busy from productive. Oh, we’re busy, and we feel productive, but we’re only productive if we’re producing the results that are most important to moving the company forward.

Email is a great way to waste time feeling productive. And we get so much of it, so surely those two hours a day reading and replying is time well spent. But if you spend two hours of an eight-hour workday on email, that’s 25% of your time. Unless that 25% of your time is producing at least 25% of your total income, it’s a low value-added activity.

The same applies to any activity. The 80/20 rule says that 80% of your results come from just 20% of your efforts. That is, most of your output comes from a few of your tasks. If you double the time you spend on real-output-producing activities and stop doing the others, you’ll double your output and spend 60% less time! If you started with a 10-hour workday, you’ll get twice as much done, working just four hours.

Consider Nancy. Nancy is a self-employed sales trainer. In a typical day, she might write her electronic newsletter, deliver a one-hour training, make a dozen prospect calls, categorize her receipts and straighten her office. These all must get done, yet only delivering the training and making prospect calls directly bring in business. Nancy’s hidden productivity opportunity is in making more prospecting calls and spending less time categorizing receipts. In fact, she can hire a bookkeeper for a year with the extra money she makes from one additional sale.

Say No
My favorite 80/20 principle is saying “no.” Most of us take on more than we can handle. If you’re working at capacity, say “no” to that new client. If someone proposes a project that will fall in the 80-percent-work-for-20-percent-results category, just say “no.” There’s a limit to how much you can do. You can manage that limit and do things well, or you can ignore the limit and do a lousy job on everything. The choice is yours.

Work in Parallel, But Don’t Multi-task
When you multi-task, you do many things at once. Bad idea. But you can find ways to arrange work so many things are happening at once. Good idea. If you are collaborating on a report and writing a marketing plan, you could write the plan and then work on the report. But look closely! Your colleague must review the report. So first draft your report and send it to your colleague. While she’s reviewing, you get to work on the marketing plan. Work moves forward on both at the same time.

While we all work this way to some degree, a little thought can find golden opportunities for parallelism. Delegation is a great tool here. When you delegate a task, it keeps moving while you’re working on something else.

Combine and Think
Have you noticed a pattern? Working faster, identifying your 80/20 opportunities and using opportunities for parallelism all take thought and planning before you reap the rewards.

So your highest-leverage activity is taking regular time to reexamine and tweak how you work. This year, I’m spending a half-day every two weeks to build a life and business that are productive. And to me, productivity means producing maximum happiness for me, my family and friends. I entreat you to do the same. Give it a shot. You’ll be happier, you’ll get more done and you’ll get to see your kids for dinner. And that’s what I call working smart.

Stever Robbins is founder and president of LeadershipDecisionworks, a consulting firm that helps companies develop leadership and organizational strategies to sustain growth and productivity over time. You can find more of his articles at http://LeadershipDecisionworks.com. He is the author of It Takes a Lot More than Attitude to Lead a Stellar Organization.

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NEWS

B2B customer expectations revealed

Most vendors carefully research what customers expect of their products and services, but few ask customers what they expect of their salespeople. This may be a big mistake because, according to a survey conducted by Infoteam Sales Process Consulting, a gap exists between what customers want and what vendors think customers want.

Researchers interviewed 120 sales leaders in vendor organizations across a wide variety of industries and asked what they thought customers expected of their salespeople. Next, they interviewed 200 of the vendors’ customers to see what they really expected when evaluating potential suppliers.

Customers put salespeople’s subject-matter and solution expertise at the top of their list of important qualities. Vendors, however, underestimate its value, ranking it third among qualities they believe customers want most.

From the customer’s point of view, the greatest need for improvement is in salespeople’s knowledge of the customer’s business and industry (39% of customers expressed dissatisfaction in this area). Vendors are aware of the importance of industry expertise, but less than 25% specifically evaluate customer industry knowledge when recruiting salespeople. Vendors rank professionalism first among the qualities that they believe customers expect of their salespeople. Professionalism is a critical attribute, but customers rank it third behind comprehensive industry knowledge and subject-matter expertise.

Social and communication skills, such as sensitivity, empathy and presentation ability, rank dead last on the customer’s wish list but are first among vendor recruitment criteria. This illustrates the common belief among sales managers that social skills are more important than other qualities and need to be present from the start, while industry knowledge can be gained later. However, this survey suggests that vendors would be wise to put industry and subject-matter expertise ahead of social skills when it comes to recruitment..

Source: Harvard Business Review, April 2006

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TRENDS

Revenge of the irate shopper

A new study by Wharton School of Business and Verde Group shows that negative word of mouth can be even more destructive to retailers than originally thought. Of shoppers who experienced problems with a retailer, only 6% contacted the company, but 31% went on to told friends and family. Each complainer told an average of 4.1 people about their negative experience.

The study revealed that complaints have an even greater impact on shoppers who were not directly involved as the story spreads and is embellished. Almost half those surveyed, 48%, reported they have avoided a store in the past because of someone else’s negative experience. In fact, people told about a friend’s or relative’s negative shopping experience are up to five times as likely to avoid the store in question as the original unhappy customer.

Source: BusinessWeek, April 17, 2006; www.verdegroup.ca

Direct mail response versus email

Whether campaigns are sent to outside mailing lists or in-house files, marketers are seeing higher responses to their email efforts than to traditional mailings, according to two studies by Direct magazine.

Late last year, Direct asked readers what their response rates to traditional mailings had been during 2005. On average, outside lists generated a healthy mean response of 10.1% and house files did even better, at 16.6%. Those are certainly respectable response rates. However, according to a new survey sponsored by Direct and Multichannel Merchant, emailings sent to outside lists achieved 17.8% response rates, while those targeting house files got 18.5% returns. What’s more, the majority of those polled are seeing higher response rates as the years go on.

Why the difference? Most likely, it’s the immediacy of email, or more specifically, the immediacy of response. That is, it takes more time to hunt down a pen, and in some cases a stamp, than it does to click a reply button.

Source: ChiefMarketer.com, April 4, 2006

Marketing to the new ‘metrospirituals’

Variety is out. Virtue is in. That’s the tenet of an emerging new demographic, metrospirituals, who are replacing metrosexuals as the cutting-edge trendsetters most coveted by marketers. Metrospirituals include everyone from celebrities such as Gwyneth Paltrow and Richard Gere to average office workers seeking more meaning in their lives. What they all aspire to, both in themselves and in products, is a socially conscious blend of substance and style.

Metrospirituality parallels many Judeo-Christian beliefs, but has its roots in Eastern philosophies. But unlike adherents of the New Age movement of the late 1970s, metrospirituals are quite comfortable with the materialistic society in which they live. This group pays close attention to the companies behind the products they consume; for example, the Whole Foods grocery chain is a favorite for their support of ecological issues and their ethical business practices.

Of course, not every company can align itself to appeal to metrospirituals, but having some spiritual connection can be good for most companies. However, it is crucial to be authentic since this group is wary of hype. They’re looking for real experiences that enhance their holistic view of the world and take them farther on their path, however they define it.

Source: Fuel, March 2006

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TIPS

• Make a hit with your A-list clients and prospects by taking the time to find out some background on them and personalize your communications with them. Google and Yahoo have both recently launched alert systems that will automatically notify you when any keyword or keyword phrase you select is in the news. Your keyword can be the name of a school, industry, company, sports team, you name it. So when an industry guru makes a prediction for the future of your prospect’s industry or when a college you are tracking signs a blue-chip recruit, you can drop a little note to your client or prospect.

Source: www.ducttapemarketing.com

• When an employee makes a mistake, asking good questions can help you understand what went wrong. But be careful not to vent your frustrations with a patronizing query such as “What where you thinking?” Instead, ask discovery questions that reveal how and why the employee made certain choices, and what shortcomings in your processes might have contributed. For example, “Can you help me understand the process of doing X, Y and Z?” or “These results weren’t quite what I expected. Can you help me understand how you arrived at these numbers?”

Source: Manager’s Edge, 300 N. Washington St., Alexandria, VA 22314

• Powerful web analytics software has been cost-prohibitive for many small companies. But the web analytics firm, ClickTracks, is now offering free access to some of its most popular features including overlay view, path view, page analysis and some basic visitor labeling tools. They also give online seminars about how to use web analytics to improve online business. Find out more at www.clicktracks.com/products/appetizer/
   
• Dramatically increase response to lead generation letters and surveys by attaching a Post-it note with a hand-written request. In one study, surveys that included an affixed post-it request generated a 76% response, compared to a 36% response to surveys without a note. Sticky notes not only grab attention, but they convey a personal request that’s difficult for even strangers to ignore.

Source: The Marketing Report, 370 Technology Dr., Malvern, PA 19355

• Does your company have “vampire meetings?” That is, the kind that sucks the life out of everyone there? Consider these tips: 1) Circulate an agenda before the meeting to help participants prepare appropriately and anticipate the kind of information they might need to produce. 2) Have a theme. Make it clear why this meeting is happening, why each person is participating at a given time and then use your agenda to amplify how the theme will be explored in each section of the meeting. 3) Set (and honor) times for beginning, ending and breaks. 4) No electronic grazing. Laptops closed. Phones off. You’re either at the meeting or you’re not at the meeting. 5) Schedule guests. Do not put 30 people in a room for three hours if 20 of them will have nothing to until the last 10 minutes. In your agenda, make it clear when people will be needed and you’ll encourage the best use of everyone’s time.

Source: www.43folders.com

• Offer a trade show giveaway that provides a real benefit. Rather than candy, pens and squeeze balls, consider giving away booklets. They attract higher quality prospects and help set a company apart from the crowd. Booklets have a lasting value, more than many handouts currently used at trade shows. Yet booklets are not overpowering in any way. The best information to include in a booklet is common-sense, grass-roots, practical “how-to” content on a topic relevant to your business and important to your customers. It heightens your company’s credibility as an expert in the industry and draws the prospect to you when it’s time to purchase.

Source: www.marketingsource.com

• Why do employees leave? With turnover on the rise, exit interviews can provide an opportunity to get an accurate read on the pulse of the company, providing insights that can be used to stem further turnover. The key to getting useful information is to treat the departing employee as a trusted advisor rather than a traitor and to keep the meeting relaxed and conversational. Ask questions such as: If you were put in charge, what are the first things you would change? What could have changed six months ago that would have prevented you from seeking a new job? Describe any areas of conflict that affected your performance or morale, or that you believe affected others. Why didn’t you leave sooner than now?

Source: Inc. Magazine, 375 Lexington Ave., New York, NY 10017

• Does your company use email to market to prospects? If so, make sure your employees know and follow the CAN-Spam Act. Even though this law has been in place for more than two years, a recent poll indicates that 81% of responding companies said they were unaware of the law even though 75% of them were conducting email marketing campaigns! Considering that violations can cost you up to $250 per message sent, it makes sense to know this law inside and out. Find out more at http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/conline/pubs/buspubs/canspam.htm

Source: www.internetretailer.com

• Make a difference in the life of an entrepreneur in an impoverished nation with a loan of as little as $25. Kiva.org is the first microlending website designed to provide individuals with the ability to browse business plans and make personal loans to qualified small businesses in developing countries. The loans do not draw interest; however, these flexible six-to 12-month loans have a repayment rate of 96%+ and can help people dramatically improve their lives through entrepreneurship.

Source: www.kiva.org

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MARKETING

• Ubiquitous Marketing

NEWS

• Is technology reducing productivity?
• Pay-per-action ads ready for the big time

TRENDS

• America in 10 years
• Separating the rich from the ultra-rich

TIPS

• A simple way to boost email readership
• Make sure your employees know what matters most
• What to do when your regular buyer leaves their company
• Why newspaper advertising is still a good bet
• A great source for hiring qualified employees 
• Much more…
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MARKETING

    
Ubiquitous Marketing

As marketing becomes more challenging, discover how to apply new tactics to some timeless principles.

NOT SO LONG AGO marketing was a lot simpler. One broadcast or print buy was enough to canvass the entire market with a new product or steal share from a competitor. Life for marketers was good.

Then came the media explosion — dozens, even hundreds, of channels, magazines for every conceivable niche, the Internet bringing world connectivity to the individual, to name just a few. All aiding and abetting the destruction of traditional market channels. Consequently, life for marketers became what is today, put mildly, hellish.

What can you do to recapture some of the golden age marketing magic even though the playing field has changed? How can you create a ubiquitous presence in the minds of your target audience when you can’t even reach them as a collective whole?

Bundle Your Media, Boost Exposure
Repetition is still king for getting results. But to get repetition these days, you have to reach an audience that’s constantly on the move.

Bundling your media choices allows you to reach the same audience at different times in different places. If you’re running radio spots, for example, invest in a companion outdoor effort. Imagine someone listening to your radio spot in the car only to see your billboard a few seconds later. That’s impact. Or if you send a direct-mail piece, follow up with telemarketing. The second will drive home the message of the first.

Some media work better together than others. But make no mistake, combining two mediums together creates a far greater impact than investing the same amount in just one.

Two’s Great, Three’s a Crowd
You’d think if two mediums combined spelled success, three or more would be divine. That’s the idea behind integrated marketing -— running the same basic advertising message no matter what the medium.

Integrated marketing may work for the Fortune 500 with ad budgets to die for. But the same message across the media spectrum loses its intimacy. It lacks the relevancy of a promotional message created exclusively for a particular medium and target consumer.

For companies looking to optimize their marketing investment for maximum impact, it would be far more profitable to integrate their marketing with sound strategic thinking instead. Like targeting your media and messages in ways the golden age of marketing never could. Technology has made it possible to customize media buys by region, parts of the city, even individual zip codes.

And by tapping into powerful databases, you can create personalized marketing pieces targeting loyal customers, first-time customers, new leads, whatever. So while you can’t reach your target audience all at once anymore, you can make the most of your capability to reach out and sell to prospective consumers one-on-one.

Make a Great Impression and Leave Your Calling Card
The media explosion — along with advancements in information technology — has created a world bent on catering to the consumer. Entertainment 24 hours a day. Products purchased, shipped and delivered overnight. Services that can intuitively anticipate the customer’s needs.

The result? High-maintenance customers and fickle prospects. They have zero tolerance. If they don’t like your marketing pitch because it’s too self-serving, too crammed with information or simply impertinent, they’re on to the next one in a matter of seconds.

As such, today’s marketing, the successful kind anyway, is less obtrusive, more relevant and increasingly interactive. Campaigns offer compelling ideas, evidence to support them and customer- friendly methods for contacting the company. The more you can push yours in this direction, the more in tune you will be with your market.

We’re in a new age for marketing. Examine it closely and the golden era loses its luster. This one is more challenging with greater opportunities. All one has to do is dust off timeless principles and apply new tactics. Do that and all the right people -— present and future customers -— will think your marketing is everywhere.

Mike Ogden works in the creative department at Bernstein-Rein Advertising in Kansas City, Missouri. He can be reached at (913) 485-8434.

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NEWS

    
Is technology reducing productivity?

Most U.S. workers say they feel rushed on the job, but they are getting less accomplished than a decade ago. Last year, workers completed two-thirds of their work in an average day, down from about three-quarters in a 1994 study, according to research conducted for Day-Timers. The biggest culprit of this shift is the technology that was supposed to make work quicker and easier.

Because of the increased pace in today’s workplace, workers never concentrate on just one task at a time anymore, making it harder to feel a sense of accomplishment. Today’s workers are bombarded with email, computer messages, cell phone calls, voicemails and the like.

Six out of 10 workers say they always or frequently feel rushed, but those who feel extremely or very productive dropped to 51% from 83% in 1994. Put another way, in 1994, 82% said they accomplished at least half their daily planned work but that number fell to 50% last year. A decade ago, 40% of workers called themselves very or extremely successful, but that number fell to just 28%.

Expectations that technology would save time and money largely haven’t been borne out in the workplace; however, the existence of technology increases the expectations that people have for productivity, leading to increased stress.

Companies that are flexible with workers’ time and give workers the most control over their tasks tend to fare better against the sea of rising expectations, experts said .

Source: Wired.com, February 23, 2006

    
Pay-per-action ads ready for the big time

Imagine if you only had to pay for an ad if a customer bought something? That’s the idea behind pay-per-action ads. And while the technology has been around for some time, the service is finally ready for practical use.

Unlike pay-per-click ads, pay per action requires that the advertiser’s customer take a significant action like make a phone call, sign up for a newsletter or even make a product purchase.

The appeal of these new services is easy to understand. Some 30% of calls lead to sales compared with a mere 3% of clicks, according to Jupiter Research. At an average of $1.95 per click, pay per action appears to be much cheaper even though one provider charges an average of $5.50 per call. Plus, pay per action is less likely to suffer from the same fraud problems that pay per click does.

So far, the technology is best suited to local merchants such as plumbers, electricians and mortgage brokers. However, as pay per action moves beyond just calls, it should appeal to a much wider range of advertisers. For example, Snap advertisers pay if a customer makes a purchase, logs on and requests additional information or registers for a sweepstakes.

There are currently only a few players in the pay-per-action market right now — Ingenio, Jambo and Snap. However, Google, Yahoo and MSN are all expected to roll out their own versions of pay per action later this year.

Source: Inc., March 2006

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TRENDS

    
America in 10 years

The United States of 2016 will find itself in the throes of demographic shifts that will upend our economic, political and technological priorities and redefine our lifestyles and markets. In the coming decade, “average” in American will tend to be older, browner and more female.

The demographic concentration of senior boomers, backed by their vast reservoirs of disposable income, represents the next American gold rush. The successful companies of tomorrow will be the ones that unlocked the hearts, minds and wallets of elder boomers. For example, consumer electronics firms are investing in designs tweaked to the needs of older consumers. IBM has even developed a computer mouse that compensates for hand tremors. The biggest profits will come from companies helping boomers to hold on to their youth.

As America grays, its skin will become more polychrome. Minorities will make up one-third of the U.S. population in 2016. In the decades to come, Hispanics, now one of every seven Americans, will be one in four, becoming a mass market in its own right. High schools will soon routinely offer Hindi and Mandarin as Asians become a still more influential slice of the populace. The rise of these new blocs will change American diets, tastes and cultural references — but it will also redefine the notion of race itself, perhaps permanently.

Gender demographics will change, too. Women currently make up approximately 58% of the undergraduate college population, and that figure is rising. Because educational and economic achievement are so strongly correlated, those gains will inevitably translate into cultural influence, purchasing power and corporate leadership. Already, the percentage of single female home buyers in the past 20 years has nearly doubled. And the number of women buying high-end consumer electronics like plasma televisions is growing faster than the number of men.

Finally, the American family will undergo tremendous change. Many boomer retirees who’ve outlived their income — or failed to save any of it — will move in with the kids. As those boomers move back in and millennials live at home longer, families will change from a two-generation “nuclear” family to a three- or even four-generation affair, a return to the beginning of the 20th century.

These new multigenerational families will be a fertile new market for everything from new senior-plus-family transportation to travel, entertainment, cooking and shopping. 

Source: Fast Company, March 2006

    
Separating the rich from the ultra-rich

What can the very wealthy do to distinguish themselves from the new masses of millionaire commoners who buy the same clothes, automobiles and vacations? Stop consuming? Why, yes, as a matter of fact.

In recent years, merely wealthy status seekers have been cutting costs on things that don’t convey status or style, in order to splurge on items that make a personal statement or communicate position. In what The Economist calls “selective extravagance,” they shop in the same stores as the super-rich, buy a piece of the good life via a timeshare in an exclusive resort or purchase “fractional ownership” in a private jet.

As a consequence, the very wealthy must find other ways to draw a distinction when such luxuries alone no longer indicate exclusivity. Some dress down or drive old cars as if to say “I have more money than I know what to do with.”

But the very richest give their money away. Philanthropy is more than fashionable among the very wealthy — it’s now mandatory. In one instance, Bill Gates, George Soros and Warren Buffet took out ads to announce their opposition to proposals to abolish estate taxes, and encouraged the government to tax them to help meet the needs of the economically disadvantaged.

Source: Trend Letter, March 13, 2006

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TIPS

• Use graphics to boost email readership. Previous studies have shown that most people focus more on text than graphics when reading online content. However, that doesn’t mean that only text should be used when marketing by email. New research shows that when a graphic is added to an email, the readership increases dramatically compared to the same message without a graphic. Surprisingly, people spend little time actually looking at the graphic, but its presence appears to raise the engagement level of the reader.

Source: www.marketingsherpa.com

• Do your employees know what matters most? On a one-on-one basis, ask your employees these questions: What is the one thing that is most important about your job? What are your most critical responsibilities? What do your customers need from you? What seems like a waste of time to you? Why is your job important to our company? Listen carefully to what your employees tell you. Any disconnect between your perception and your employees’ can be costly.

Source: www.judywhitehouse.com

• When you can pinpoint customer demographics, such as location, type of company, age, gender, income, etc., a direct-mail campaign may be your most cost-effective method for triggering new business. Without charging you a dime, InfoUSA.com allows you to find out how many potential customers exist in the set of categories you specify. For example, men and women who move to somewhere in Connecticut: about 415. Before buying such a list, find out if your nearest public library subscribes to a database called ReferenceUSA.com. If so, you can download your list from the library for free.

Source: www.yudkin.com

• Your regular buyer has just left the company — what do you do now? Don’t assume that the new contact person will be eager to buy from you; he may have existing vendor relationships. Start with a low-key approach. Send a handwritten welcome note congratulating him on his position. Do not sell in the card. Just mention that you look forward to speaking with him and sign your name and company name. Snoop around and find out where he came from and any personal interests. Then call to introduce yourself, keeping the focus on him, not you. Briefly mention how your company has been providing value to their company. Then request setting up a specific time to discuss his preferences for working with vendors or anything else that you can do to make his job run more smoothly.

Source: www.businessbyphone.com

• With all of the talk about the decline of newspapers, you might think that newspapers are a poor choice for advertising. This isn’t the case, especially regarding inserts. A recent study reveals that advertising insert readership levels are consistently at 85% or above. Additionally, the study finds that even Web-savvy individuals still rely on ad inserts, as 88% of Sunday newspaper readers surveyed via the Web said they read Sunday newspaper inserts, while 79% of those surveyed by phone read them.

Source: www.vertisinc.com

• A great source for hiring qualified employees is to rehire your previous employees. But how likely is it that they would want to return? According to a survey by Korn/Ferry, 64% of the more than 4,000 respondents said they would consider returning to their previous employer. Rejoining a previous employer may seem safe, comfortable and lucrative, because most companies allow you to resume benefits at your previous level. Companies often like to rehire people because little or no additional time and money may be needed to train them. Plus, it’s been estimated that hiring a former employee costs companies about half as much as hiring someone new.

Source: www.meansbusiness.com

• Give your salespeople an edge by developing a “battle card.” This card is more than just a cheat sheet for product specs and features. Instead, it goes beyond the basics and helps salespeople anticipate objections they might encounter while trying to close sales. Consider including: info on common competitors; features of competing products, along with key differentiators; common sticking points that other salespeople have encountered; profiles of typical decision makers who bring up certain objections; responses that have worked to overcome the objections; and responses that have failed to overcome objections.

Source: www.siriusdecisions.com

• Here’s a low-hassle way to build credibility: Post customer satisfaction data on your company’s website. That’s what CustomInk, a Virginia-based screen printing and embroidery company does. It uses an entire sidebar on its home page to tell prospects about its 98.87% (as of 3/1/06) satisfaction rate. It then offers links to unedited and uncensored customer reviews so prospects can read about others’ experiences for themselves.

Source: The Marketing Report, 370 Technology Dr., Malvern, PA 19355

• It’s hard to sell to an unhappy person. Recent research indicates that emotional states like happiness, gratitude, anger and guilt can directly affect how much someone trusts others. The research showed that happy participants in the experiments were more trusting than sad participants, and said participants were more trusting than were angry participants even though they considered their impressions of others to be completely rational. For example, our anger over a speeding ticket is likely to affect how we judge someone later that day. Good salespeople instinctively know this and will use positive small talk or amusing stories to ensure that their prospect is in a good mood before continuing through the sales process.

Source: knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu

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MARKETING

• Making the Most of Your Core Message

NEWS

• Paying too much for search ads?
• Good design, better sales
• Small firms unaware of available assistance

TRENDS

• Factoring gets a makeover
• Job hopping on the rise

TIPS

• How to improve a customer’s perceived experience
• Add power to your network with this idea
• Using case studies to their fullest potential
• Give praise immediately, but wait to criticize
• Do this when targeting large companies with direct mail
• Much more…
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MARKETING

Making the Most of Your Core Message

Most marketing bounces right off prospects. Develop a powerful core message that hits your target and sticks.

How much of your marketing is reaching your prospects where it counts? Are they acting upon your call to action? Are they thinking about your message - at least a little bit? Are they even reading it, at all?

A lot of what passes for advertising and marketing today bounces off your prospects because the messaging is weak. “Messaging” is a fancy marketing term for the guts of what you are trying to tell people. Your core message announces to the world all the wonderful things your product, service or company can do for them, why it’s a great thing they cannot live without and why they absolutely must choose you instead of someone else.

Your messaging is impotent when it just isn’t saying anything anyone cares about. It is falling upon deaf ears and missing the mark by a mile. The following seven cost-effective steps will help insure that yours hits your target.

1. Personally revisit your core message with fresh eyes and ears. Do this even if you’ve done it recently. Think about what you are saying and make sure it is the message you want to communicate. Read it aloud to make sure it sounds the way you want it to.

2. Test your message on real live people. Make sure it gets across what you want to communicate. Have them feed it back to you, in their own words. Is it something they care about? Something they have a passion for? A need for? A desire for? Do this with a mix of existing customers and not-yet customers in your target market.

3. Look at the methods you’re using to communicate that core message. Focus on the benefits, and the benefits of the benefits. Often a lot of good communication gets lost in products, features and functions. Clarify and eliminate all distractions.

Use this tactic: Examine your website, one sheets and brochures - print them and yellow highlight the words that speak to your core message. Most people are shocked to see they don’t communicate that core message very well…or they do it almost as an afterthought, like a little phrase under the logo or something like that. Your core message has to permeate your documents. Don’t be too subtle!

4. Launch an assault on your marketing materials. Don’t change them all - focus on those that most frequently get used in your business. The marketing idiots who say “We have to redo all our literature!”? Fire them. Replace them with someone who says, “You know, I think that we can get our message across if we just re-work this one and that one, and leave the rest alone.”

5. Set up a system that gives feedback to let you know if your message is reaching home. The simplest way to tell is if people are “taking action on your call to action.” (If they aren’t pursuing you, you know you are not getting through to them.) This applies to any medium, even “in-store.” If you have a retail location, you have to test in your store, using whatever marketing you have available. Continually test and hone your message so that it does work.

6. Stay in contact via email. Create an email capability that lets you communicate with your clientele on a continual basis in a way they will value. And just as in “off-line” marketing, don’t send them self-aggrandizing garbage! Only send meaningful communications that provide something real for your clients and prospects.

7. Develop a customer communications calendar. A mixed media marketing calendar will ensure your audience is receiving your message often enough to keep you in mind. If your goal is to touch your clients monthly, every six weeks, or quarterly, maybe even weekly - make sure you are mailing, emailing, calling, visiting, throwing-a-party-for, even sending them flowers - doing something, touching them some way-on that basis.

 By following these seven cost-effective steps, you can develop a powerful and meaningful core message that reaches your target market and impacts them in a way that gets results.

Paul Lemberg is the President of Quantum Growth Coaching, a business coaching franchise system built from the ground up to rapidly create more profits and more life for entrepreneurs. Paul is also Executive Director of the Stratamax Research Institute, specializing in helping entrepreneurial companies increase short-term profits for sustainable long-term growth. He is available for keynote speeches and workshops and can be reached via Lemberg.com

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NEWS

Paying too much for search ads?

Paid search advertisers who bid what they’re actually willing to pay end up paying more than they need to, according to research by economics scholars at Stanford Business School. The researchers blame both the naiveté of bidders and the “generalized second price” (GSP) auction mechanisms used by Google and Yahoo!

The problem arises when an advertiser bids the maximum amount they can afford. Under the current bidding system, advertisers are charged only a penny more per click than the next lowest bid, with some adjustments depending on the quality of the ad. This leads to a more volatile auction in which advertisers try continually to outsmart one another, rather than placing bids based on what makes sense for them.

“Position one is not always the optimal position to maximize search ROI. This is true in cases where incremental return from position one, such as traffic or sales, does not justify incremental investment,” said Andrew Levasseur, senior search manager of Avenue A|Razorfish Search. “Advertisers battle for top placement needlessly because they have not successfully defined search ROI, or do not have a way to track, report and optimize search ROI.”

“Companies would be much better off using such resources to enhance their products, improve customer service or what have you,” said Michael Ostrovsky, one of the authors of the research report. It would be possible to implement an auction model that eliminated this effect, but this would be less profitable for the search engines, he added.

Source: www.ClickZ.com, January 20, 2006

Good design, better sales

According to a report by Web development firm Questus, good website design is good for business. Price is the main determining factor, of course, but according to their  survey, a number of design factors are also crucial in helping online customers make a purchase decision.

The survey found that a majority of the respondents felt that the appearance of a site affects the degree of trust they have in shopping on the site. “We find that websites have three seconds to make an impression,” said Jeff Rosenblum of Questus. (His statement is supported by a second recent study indicating that people make aesthetic judgments about a website in just one-twentieth of a second.)

However, while appearance is important, how a site actually works is what determines how well it sells. Consumers want clean, obvious site design coupled with simple choices. “Information overload is a consistent problem,” said Mr. Rosenblum, “and in this study we found that Web users were more likely to say that a site had too many links as opposed to too few links.”

Too many choices are likely to confuse shoppers, and confused shoppers do not become customers. Furthermore, respondents said they actually left sites because they didn’t want to go though the bother of registering.

Source: eMarketer.com, February 3, 2006 and CNN.com, January 17, 2006

Small firms unaware of available assistance

Many small-business owners might not know what they’re missing. More than nine out of 10 owners of small firms haven’t worked with any federal agency to receive support of any kind, according to a survey by Suffolk University and American Management Services.

The majority of owners said they didn’t contact federal agencies for assistance because they didn’t know which ones could help, what they could offer, or if their businesses would qualify for help. Less than a fifth of those polled said they had no need for help.

Others thought it would be too much trouble, with 18% saying they didn’t have the time or resources to apply, and 14% that there would be too much paperwork.

There are numerous services provided by the agencies that small businesses are simply unaware of - everything from finding overseas partners and loans to training for everyday tasks. Interested owners should start their research with the U.S. Small Business Administration (www.sba.gov).

Source: Wall Street Journal, Feb. 14, 2006

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TRENDS 

Factoring gets a makeover

In years past, factors - which pay businesses up front for their accounts receivables and collect payments from customers when they’re due - were often thought of as one step above loan sharks. Today, however, many factors are behaving more like business partners than moneylenders.

Borrowing from a factor is more expensive than taking out a traditional bank loan. Unlike banks, factors extend credit to businesses without assets or proven track records. In exchange for taking on extra risk, they charge a premium. But competition from a new breed of small and midsize factors has forced the industry, once dominated by a few large firms, to focus on customer service. To that end, some factors now offer custom-tailored financing, flexible credit limits and advice on everything from global expansion to customer relations.

Before signing a factoring contract, determine how much of your receivables will be withheld; if you will be fined for breaking the contract early; if there are any hidden fees, such as wire transfers or administrative costs; and if you can increase your line of credit before the contract expires. To search for a factor, visit the International Factoring Association’s website (factoring.org).

Source: Inc. Magazine, February 2006

Job hopping on the rise

It’s more important than ever to keep employees satisfied. The risk of employee defection is rising, according to two recent studies. A Salary.com survey reports that 65% of employee respondents plan to look for a new job in the next three months. What’s more, the percentage of employees who describe themselves as “very likely” to leave their current job increased more than 50% in the past year, to 38% of employees.

According to MetLife’s annual Employee Benefits Trend Study, 22% of all employees changed jobs over the past 18 months, up from 17% in 2004. Among young families with children under 6, the churn is even greater - 31% of employees in this life stage report a change of employer over the past 18 months, up from 26% in 2004.

The two reports contain different lessons for how employers can hang on to talent. The MetLife study found that employees’ top consideration when deciding to join or remain with an employer is “the quality of co-worker and/or customer relationships,” followed by the opportunity for work/life balance and “working for an organization whose purpose/mission I agree with.” Salary.com, meanwhile, finds that inadequate compensation is the top reason dissatisfied employees cite for leaving. No opportunity for advancement is second, followed by no recognition for work.

Source: Workforce.com, February 22, 2006

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TIPS 
   

• Improve a customer’s perceived experience by finishing strong. Behavioral science studies show that it’s not the beginning of the customer’s interaction with your business that is most important. It is the end of the interaction that leaves the biggest impression. For example, a consultant may want to save his big idea for last or repair personnel who leave a place cleaner than when they arrived. If you sell products, put a little something extra in the bag or box. The final customer interaction is what resides in the memory of your customer.

Source: sbinformation.about.com

• Add power to your network with this idea. Identify a party or two that you would like to have in your network and find a way to send them an unsolicited testimonial. You can point out what you like about their product, service, book or their contribution to the community. Of course, never hand out flattery in a way that is not genuine, but if you can honestly take this approach, it may help you get a person’s attention.

Source: www.ducttapemarketing.com

• Although providing case studies can be a great way to convince prospects of your company’s selling points, they are rarely used to their potential. To get the most out of this marketing tool, try the following: Write multiple versions (including an extremely long one), positioned to the job level of the prospect, so folks get the info they care about. Focus on marquee-name clients and forget the small fry. Take the golden-glow lens off your camera and write with more realism. No one trusts gee-whiz case studies. Give your sales reps a “Top 10 Questions Answered” cheat-sheet to use when presenting a case study to a prospect.

Source: www.marketingsherpa.com

• Give praise immediately, but wait to criticize. When you praise employees for their performance, avoid the temptation to tack on suggestions for improvement at that time. Psychologist William Deterline says the best time to offer a critique is just before the next performance. Consider the difference between two gymnastics coaches: During practice, one coach tells a gymnast after performing a vault, “That was good, but next time try to push off harder.” A second coach handles it differently. He immediately shouts, “Good!” but waits until the vaulter is ready to vault again before saying, “This time, try to push off harder.” This may seem like a minor difference in coaching technique, but Deterline says the second approach is much more effective for motivating people, whether in sports or business.

Source: Manager’s Edge, 1101 King St., Alexandria, VA 22314

• Targeting large companies with direct mail? Consider mailing to multiple contacts within the organization. This allows you to cover decision-makers along with influencers who may have something to do with the buying decision. This can be particularly useful when selling high-ticket items to a business market that, unlike a consumer audience, can typically spend a long time making purchasing decisions. The more people who receive the communication within an organization, the more impact it is likely to have.

Source: www.targetmarketingmag.com

• Increase the focus and impact of your next PowerPoint presentation, by applying the 10/20/30 rule. Most people can’t follow more than 10 concepts in a meeting, so limit your content to 10 slides. Then aim to give your 10 slides in 20 minutes, leaving plenty of time for discussion. And use no font smaller than 30 points. This limits the amount of text you can use on a slide, forcing you to find the most salient points and know how to explain them well. Plus, this helps you avoid the temptation to simply read text from the slides - a surefire way to hurt persuasiveness.

Source: The Marketing Report, 370 Technology Dr., Malvern, PA 19355

• Not finding the employees you need from those big online job sites? Consider niche sites instead. Recent research reveals that niche sites that specialize by career field or industry, and those that specialize by geographic focus, are favored by 78% of corporate employment specialists over the big sites or even their own company website. Examples include www.vetjobs.com for military veterans, www.netshare.com and www.execunet.com for senior executives, and www.retiredbrains.com for retirees who want to keep working. Also, look at www.constructionjobs.com, www.salesjobs.com, www.marketingjobs.com and www.computerwork.com.

Source: www.hermangroup.com

• Thinking of taking legal action against a customer for a past-due account? You might want to think again. A new study by Aceva Technologies finds that 90% of disputes are settled in the customer’s favor. Moreover, the average length of time to resolve each dispute is 4 weeks - time spent mostly on researching what went wrong.

Source: CFO, 111 W. 57th St., New York, NY 10019

• Sending a lot of proposals, but keep getting beat out by the competition? Chances are, your prospect already made up their mind prior to your first contact. Before investing more time in another proposal, uncover whether a competitor already has the inside track. To do this, inquire about similar or related purchases made in the past. Find out which vendors they bought from and why they were awarded the contract. Are those vendors bidding for this deal? If so, ask, “Why don’t you just buy from ABC Company? They did a good job last time.” This will allow you to uncover if there is a real opportunity for you or if they are just gathering bids to document that they have performed a competitive evaluation.

Source: www.industrialego.com

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SALES

• Profiting Within the Customer Buying-Cycle

NEWS

• You really do get what you pay for
• Email marketing hits and misses
• SBA cuts will hurt small business

TRENDS

• Understanding the Boom-X market

TIPS

• Get new clients off to a strong start
• Dealing with a common problem in negotiations
• Find out how well your website is optimized for search engines
• Use “persona” marketing to develop marketing materials
• An easy way to get glowing customer testimonials
• Much more…

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SALES

Profiting Within the Customer Buying-Cycle

Trying to force buyers to shorten the buying cycle is almost always ineffective and can result in alienation.

ANY DISCUSSION OF customer buying-cycles is an unpopular topic with management, sales managers and salespeople. We all want to believe that by using the right words, making the right offer and displaying the right sales personality, just about any buying-cycle can be cut to one meeting. Whether they admit it or not, many a sales manager dreams of hiring “buying-cycle slashers.” In lieu of such a rare creature, they urge the sales force to do whatever’s necessary to shorten the cycle.

Yet, every salesperson knows buying-cycles are getting longer and longer. The executive vice president of sales for an organization that markets products to banks reports that the average buying-cycle for his company is 21 months. The president of a manufacturing company described the buying-cycle for his product in one word, “years.”

Trying to force buyers to shorten the cycle is almost always ineffective and, in some cases, results in alienation. The task for every company is to recognize the nature of the extended buying-cycle phenomenon and to use a strategy that leads to getting the order.

Here are components of a buying-cycle strategy:

1. Don’t quit too soon. This is the biggest mistake salespeople make when it comes to dealing with prospects. Salespeople get in their heads that someone is “just a tire kicker” or “all they wanted was to pick my brain.” Of course, that happens. But these are often the ones who say six months later, “After all the time I spent with them, they up and went with someone else.” After investing time and effort, salespeople often give up and move on, a tactic that opens the door wide for a competitor to walk through and get the order. Persistence and patience help to keep the door open.

2. Recognize that the sale is made before the final presentation is given. Promises of great service, a positive relationship and reliability don’t count with today’s customers. They want assurances. While testimonials and references can help, they pale in comparison to first-hand experience.

This is why the time between an initial contact and the customer saying “yes” can be the most crucial period in the entire sales process. A salesperson told me about a sale that took more than six months of discussing the issues and developing and refining the proposals. It was during this time that the salesperson was really being tested and it paid off. When the company president called and said, “We want to work with you,” the salesperson sensed a solid commitment in the prospect’s voice. “There was nothing tentative about it,” he reported. “He was firm.” Once satisfied, the decision was made. In other words, no one today wants to take chances. Being confident in making the right decision takes time.

3. Build the prospect database. There are those in sales who still describe selling as “a numbers game.” Just make enough calls and it’s payday. While this view of selling seems appealing, it’s nonsense. Each year, surveys show that about 75 percent of salespeople fail to “make their numbers.”

Allowing chance to be the primary component of the selling process is perhaps the most inefficient way to go about developing consistent sales. Instead, develop a profile of the desired type of customer and then identify prospects that fit the profile. Whether they come from salespeople, referrals or lists, they must be tested against the qualified prospect profile. Only certain fish get into the tank.

4. Develop a prospect relationship development strategy. A large regional insurance broker lists its top 50 prospects on a display board in its meeting room. Every week, the sales manager reviews each one with the agency’s producer team. This is prospect relationship development and it’s the heart of the sales process. It’s not about software as such; it’s about constantly focusing on one simple but critical question: “Who’s going to do what to whom and when?” In other words, where are we and what’s the next step? Prospect relationship development is about getting inside the customer’s head and staying there until the moment of readiness arrives.

5. Create testing opportunities. Internet sales continue to grow and companies that meet customer expectations get more business. Not surprisingly, eBay and Amazon.com lead the pack by demonstrating consistent performance. When making a purchase on the Internet, we’re quick to evaluate the quality of the service. Was there good communication? Did they do what they said they would do? Was the delivery efficient? In other words, we “test” sellers to see if they deserve additional business.

Giving customers similar testing opportunities can create confidence if the performance lives up to the expectations. Before asking them to make a major commitment, give customers several smaller occasions that together communicate the message that your company can deliver on its promises.

6. Never stop working. After trying all the gimmicks, it’s easy to conclude that nothing really works. What does work is persistence in staying close to prospects using a constellation of tactics that include personalized communications, seminars, solution-centered newsletters, informational e-bulletins, relevant advertising and public relations activities that are designed to connect with prospect needs.

Whether a company’s prospects are consumers or businesses, there is a similar “buyer mentality” that includes these qualities: 1) Everyone wants to feel in charge of the sale; 2) No one wants to be rushed; and 3) Everyone wants to make the right decision.

Selling today isn’t just about making calls or trying to psych-out prospects to find their “hot buttons.” It’s about creating an environment that gives them an opportunity to discover, evaluate and appreciate the value that a company or business can bring to them. That takes a commitment to be persistent. All of this suggests that it’s essential to give close attention to both understanding a prospect’s buying-cycle and to use it as a way to create an environment that ultimately results in the sale.

John R. Graham is president of Graham Communications (www.grahamcomm.com), a marketing services and sales consulting firm. He is the author of The New Magnet Marketing and Break the Rules Selling. He can be contacted at (617) 328-0069 or j_graham@grahamcomm.com.

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NEWS

You really do get what you pay for

If two brands of aspirin are side-by-side on a store shelf and one is on sale for 25% off, the customer will most likely select the discounted one. However, the fact that a product is discounted may make it work less well for the customer. Recent research at Stanford Graduate School of Business found that marketing actions, such as pricing and advertising, can actually alter the efficacy of products.
It has long been known that consumers’ beliefs and expectations influence their judgment of products and services. Consumers often judge lower-priced items to be of lower quality. What makes this new study different is that it shows marketing actions can go so far as to create “placebo effects” regarding product effectiveness.
In three different studies, participants were given energy drinks that supposedly make consumers feel more alert and energetic. Some participants paid full price for the drinks; others paid a discounted price. They were then asked to solve a series of word puzzles. The people who paid discounted prices consistently solved fewer puzzles than the people who paid full price for the drinks. The people had no idea that price was actually influencing their performance, signaling that this was largely a non-conscious effect.
Advertising also can impact the effectiveness of a product. For example, promoting the efficacy of a medication can have significant improvements to a consumer’s health. Advertising, if done well, can give rise to a positive placebo effect.

Source: Stanford Knowledgebase, Jan. 2006

Email marketing hits and misses

Consumers request plenty of product information by email. Unfortunately, many do not get what they ask for.

According to a Harris Interactive Poll compiled by Quris, although 77% of consumers report wanting to receive special offers from select companies, only 8% report receiving them. Moreover, 69% report wanting to receive regular updates on products and sales specials; however, only 19% are receiving these types of email communications.

On the other hand, a majority of respondents said that permission email is doing a good job of providing other wanted information, such as shipping and transaction information, as well as electronic statements.

As a result, consider combining service and marketing messages into one email, providing service information first and then targeting receptive customers with relevant offers within those messages.

Source: eMarketer, Jan. 17, 2006

SBA cuts will hurt small business

Small firms will feel the pinch this year from federal budget cuts at the Small Business Administration, a situation that is expected to worsen in 2007.

Loan guarantees will be pricier and other aid will be harder to get. Borrowers and lenders in the 7(a) guarantee program will face higher fees by fall. Beginning in April, the SBA will back only 50% of 7(a) loan amounts, down from 80% now. In addition, small contractors will soon pay more for the surety bonds they need under and SBA program that guarantees the bonds. Premiums for bonding will rise in April, after the SBA increases its fees for surety companies by more than 50%.

Equity capital will be scarce. The program that funded Small Business Investment Companies – private firms the SBA licenses to invest in start-ups or small-firm expansions in exchange for a piece of the company – was eliminated by Congress. Existing SBICs can still operate, but they’ll likely run out of capital by 2012.

Unfortunately, more cuts are likely. President Bush is expected to propose killing the SBA’s MicroLoan and Small Business Innovation Research programs when he submits his next budget.

Source: Kiplinger Forecasts, Dec. 30, 2005

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TRENDS

Understanding the Boom-X market

The Baby Boom generation is typically defined by a period of high birth rates, but this isn’t really a helpful way to predict the attitudes and behavior of this market. After all, the world view of younger baby boomers may not be as hopeful and confident as their protest-marching, idealistic, older siblings. In fact, it’s thought to be more accurate to place younger boomers with the older end of Generation X regarding a common culture.

So what defines this group of 35- to 54-year-olds that could be called the Boom-X market? For one, they spend a lot of money, but they spend it carefully. This group is feeling the pressures of raising families and worrying about their financial futures. But rather than reining in spending, they want to spend more. They need to indulge themselves a bit, as if thinking, “If not now, when?”

They want to get a deal and feel smart, but not be taken on quality. They may prefer the Kirkland cashmere sweater from Costco instead of a designer name. They’re also willing to pay more for products that perfectly meet their needs, so offering highly differentiated options should pay off.

Finally, they are very concerned with fitness and well-being, but this has more to do with health than narcissism. They do not want to be defined in terms of how old they are, but, instead, by their attitudes and education, health and wellness, adventure and excitement.

Source: Advertising Age, Jan. 2, 2006

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TIPS

• Get new clients off to a strong start with a “new client kit.” Once a client says “yes,” have a crystal clear process in place to teach them how to get the most from your relationship. The kit might include pages that explain: what to expect from us next, how to contact us if you have a question, how to get the most from your new product/service, what we need from you to get started, what we agreed upon today, how we invoice our work and a copy of our invoice. Having a system in place that communicates crucial information demonstrates a high level of professionalism and lessens the possibility of failing to meet initial expectations.

Source: www.ducttapemarketing.com

• In highly complex negotiations, some opponents might “forget” concessions they made earlier in the process. Help them remember by writing down any agreements as you go along. Before you start negotiating, say “I’m writing down the points as we decide them so I won’t forget. I think that will save us time later on.” Then each time you agree on something, say “Hold on. Let me jot that down. We’ve agreed that you will do X and I will do Y. Did I get that right?” By asking your opponent to take part by approving what you’re writing, it’s tough for them to forget or disagree with details later on. It also suggests that you’re trying to work with – instead of against – them.

Source: www.briefings.com

• How well is your website optimized for search engines? Find out at www.linkvendor.com. This site offers an extensive list of free tools to measure link value, domain popularity, Google page rank, keyword density and more. It even has a “SEO Challenge” that allows you to compare your website against a competitor’s to see whose site is better optimized.

• When pursuing big companies, most sellers want to ensure that decision makers know the full range of solutions that they provide. Proudly, they brag that they provide customers with “one-stop shopping” or that they can “handle all your ____ needs.” They hope prospects will be impressed with their vast capabilities, or that maybe something – one thing – will interest the decision maker. However, according to sales strategist Jill Konrath, this approach can backfire. Corporate decision makers today don’t want to deal with the “jack of all trades.” Instead, they prefer dealing with experts who really understand their business and needs. When you dump your entire offering on them, you’re not connecting with any urgent or compelling business need. With no focus, there’s nothing there for prospects to grab on to. Use a foot-in-the-door strategy that revolves around only one subset of your entire offering. Once they’re a client, you can present your other products and services.

Source: www.sellingtobigcompanies.com

• Hire recruits that are a good fit for your company by determining what kind of work environment they find motivating. Ask the following questions: Describe the work environment or culture in which you are most productive and happy; What goals, including career goals, have you set for your life?; How would you define “success” for your career? At the end of your work life, what must have been present for you to feel as if you had a successful career?; Describe a work situation that demonstrates how you motivated another person.

Source: Manager’s Edge, 1101 King St., Alexandria, VA 22314

• Get glowing testimonials from customers – even if you are too shy to ask for them directly. An easy way to collect testimonials is to create a customer satisfaction survey and include a space for comments. Be sure to ask “May we use your name and comments in our marketing materials?” Include a space for them to check “yes” or “no,” along with their signature. Most people are delighted to have you use their comments.

Source: www.businessknowhow.com

• Use “persona” marketing to develop marketing materials around your customers’ personalities. This technique was originally used by top Web designers, but can effectively help in all areas of marketing. Persona-based Web design means the Web team creates detailed profiles of fictionalized typical users. The profiles, which include a headshot, psychographic and demographic data, guide everything from copy to navigation to graphics so the site appeals to real individuals instead of missing the mark by trying to appeal to an averaged mass. Personas help you create marketing materials that are relevant at the gut level for prospects. However, it requires you to have an intimate understanding of your market.

Source: www.marketingsherpa.com

• Need to rally the troops to get through a slump? Watch the language you use. If your idea of inspiration is to gather your team and tell them “Now’s the time to pull together, folks, or we could go out of business,” think again. Vague, panic-ridden language only heightens employee anxiety without providing clear suggestions for how to cope. Instead, engage t