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Posts from the ‘Marketing’ Category

Apr 11

The top reason you should consider joining (or rejoining) Sage Leadership Association today

http://www.flickr.com/photos/birgerking/3145391821/sizes/z/in/photostream/First let’s start off by explaining something that I think is confusing about Sage Leadership Association (SLA): it’s current incarnation has nothing to do with the software publisher Sage.

I bring this up in case anyone on the fence is worried that there is a hidden agenda to promote Sage Software products, policies or programs. That’s not the case.

The SLA mission is to evolve leadership and promote strategic thinking among professional service firms (or professional knowledge firms if you prefer the new age terminology). This mission has nothing to do with your company’s relationship, or lack of relationship, with Sage Software. If you have a hunger to grow your business and collaborate with other thought leaders, SLA is a great place to be.

(I suggested to the SLA board that they consider a new brand push – including a new, clearer name – as a way to spread the message. We’ll see where that goes.)

Putting aside the name confusion, let’s talk about what SLA has to offer.

If you are like me and love to “sharpen the saw”, you might find yourself on information overload these days. There are an overabundance of books, videos, conferences, retreats, events, etc. these days to help you scratch that itch.

I have a stack of books and attend a lot of conferences and other events so I know how it can be. In fact, sometimes attending these conferences can be stressful because you hear so many great ideas that you simply don’t have time to implement when you get back to your office.

And that’s the difference between SLA and those other options: at SLA, they present the information in a focused workshop format so you can actually work on the topic at hand during the day and a half long retreat.

To me, this is a huge benefit.

You are not just committing the time to learn a great new concept at SLA. You will be given time and guidance to start to flesh out tactics to apply what you’ve learned. And you will hear comments and suggestions and questions from other business leaders doing the same thing.

It’s very interactive, very hands on, very beneficial. Particularly if you are feeling starved for time in your normal day-to-day back at the office.

If this type of event appeals to you, you should consider SLA.

I strongly recommend it.

If you have questions, take a look here or comment below and I will do my best to address the questions.

Aug 9

10 Comments

Business card analysis 2: re-birth of business card analysis

A loooooonggggg time ago (ok – it was just last year but a lot has happened in the last year), I attended the Sage Marketing Academy in sunny Irvine, California.

The class, led by marketing gurus Dan Kraus and Laura Lorenz of Leading Results (if you need marketing coaching, I strongly recommend them), covered many topics and we did many practical exercises. One of these exercises was teaming up in groups of three to critique each others business cards.

This was very useful and telling and led me to reconsider our card design at Azamba. Particularly because our card had a flipping typo in it!

Luckily, I’m not that beholden to my business cards these days since I discovered this thing called the Internet and have found that I can connect to people easily through handing out my LinkedIn, Facebook or Twitter handle. Not a lot of use for cards these days really so it makes it a good opportunity to stretch your creative muscles and do something “fun.”

In that vein and with the upcoming Sage Summit 2012 conference, I thought it was a good time to revist the cards and get a new batch printed.

One route to go with keeping it fun is the collectible, baseball-card like approach with MeetMeme which I was introduced at Sage Summit 2011 by Jess Vento (read more about these cards here).

My group decided to explore a more minimalist version of our previous cards and came up with this:

Since I am not able to avail myself of my peers in the Sage Marketing Academy, I throw it out to you dear readers to let me know what you think.

Good, bad, ugly? What do you like? What do you hate?

While I am deeply in love with the minimalist look and feel, one thing that I somewhat regret is the lack of the LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter handles. The saving grace – in theory – is that our website should have a contact us page that allows people to connect to us via the various social media mechanisms. (We don’t have that page yet but we should before the upcoming Sage Summit conference – stay tuned.)

Hopefully this approach gives others the courage to try something new with their cards. If you have an interesting take on your own cards, stop by and show me at Sage Summit next week. I am always looking for new, creative ideas.

PS. The first 500 to stop by will get a free card as a thank you. You lucky dogs!

Aug 1

3 Comments

On pissing in the punchbowl and NetSuite

ImageDisclaimer: while some of my best friends in the world work at NetSuite, this article is not a paid endorsement of NetSuite or their tactics.

Sage Summit 2012 is mere weeks away and I personally am very excited to once again be meeting up with the diverse and talented pool of people that make up the Sage ecosystem - the employees, the partners and the customers. It’s a necessity for anyone that wants to sharpen the saw and find out what’s coming down the road for Sage.

Looking back to last year, the entire events team really outdid themselves (search this site for the numerous articles – it was a blast) and they set the bar high for themselves.

No worries though!

Not content to rest on their success, it seems that the events team took feedback from last year to heart and have made some improvements in key areas. One area in particular that seems to have received a shot in the arm is the formal content. There seems to be a lot more in the way of valuable sessions in all areas – including marketing and business development which are my favorite tracks.

In addition, they are trying out some new, innovative ideas to help attendees actively network and get information from their peers with the Sage City concept. Sage City addresses some of the concerns of networking in such a big crowd and it allows like-minded people to come together to talk and share ideas.

I can’t wait to see how it plays out.

For me, like many who attend, the value is in the informal get-togethers in between the sessions and the structured events to share war stories with other like-minded business owners. If Sage City improves on those experiences, that’s a good thing.

In general, the event itself is always well organized, fast-moving and over too soon.

I struggle organizing lunch for my small business so I can only imagine all the challenges that it takes to coordinate something of this scale and make it seem so effortless. The entire events team deserves a lot of respect for pulling this feat off and continuing to up the ante each and every year.

With all that in mind, I saw that one of the Sage competitors, NetSuite, has decided to crash the party and piss in the punchbowl.

I suppose the management at NetSuite has seen some of the changes at Sage and in the Sage channel and felt that this is a great opportunity for them to pick up some business. I have to ask if this is the impression that they want to make?

In my head, I’m imagining a lawyer chasing an ambulance
… or a desperate fan stalking a celebrity
… or boiler rooms calling on old folks with their latest pump and dump scheme to defraud them of their life savings
… or a used car salesman in their prime trying to fleece an earnest buyer.

Fill in your own image.

It’s not a flattering picture frankly and it’s downright disrespectful to a lot of hard-working folks who have put a lot of effort in to making Sage Summit 2012 a success. I don’t think any more needs to be said about what many are calling despicable actions except to leave off with this:

“We are our choices.”
―    Jean-Paul Sartre

[UPDATE: I have had some individuals approach me via forums and privately and ask me what the beef is here and what is unethical about this behavior. Some feel that all is fair in love and war (and business).

I agree but I also feel - as the final quote sums up nicely - we are defined by our choices and actions. I think this is a question for each of us to decide individually: how do you want to be defined?]

 

Jul 29

4 Comments

The Road Ahead for Sage

http://www.flickr.com/photos/qmnonic/266203795/sizes/z/in/photostream/Recently Dennis Howlett, self-proclaimed no-nonsense purveyor of truth in matters pertaining to enterprise IT, penned an article called “Sage on the road to nowhere.” As a long-time observer of Sage UK, Mr. Howlett makes some tough and mostly accurate assessments of the current situation and the challenges faced by Sage as they shift to addressing new customer expectations in the increasingly Cloud-based world of software applications.

Luckily for all involved, Sage leadership has seemingly woken up to these new, and growing, set of expectations and now it’s a matter of proper, disciplined execution on the road ahead. There is no doubt that this journey of transformation will continue to experience bumps in the road with some painful ramifications for many involved.

But it’s completely necessary if Sage wants to survive in the new economy.

If you don’t believe this, consider companies like Blockbuster Video, RIM, Sears, Best Buy and others that – not waking up in time to the transformations in their particular industries – have been either put out of business completely or dramatically crippled.

Read more

Mar 14

1 Comment

Ignore the 5 Ps of marketing at your own peril

Just wipe it off and good as new!

In the various social networking groups that I belong to I often see people talking about “strong” products. The argument goes that success in the marketplace is reliant upon the importance of having software with strong feature sets using current technology.

I always find this to be an interesting point of view.

Interesting, but wrong.

In general, customers don’t purchase products solely based on strong features and current technology. Most companies routinely select products that are not considered the best on features alone because of other considerations in the decision-making process.

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Mar 9

1 Comment

I’ve got some bad news for you, sunshine

For those not in the know, the title of this post was taken from “In the Flesh” – a song on Pink Floyd’s The Wall album. The Wall resonates heavily with themes of abandonment and isolation and relates the story of a protagonist who steadily builds up a wall to hide behind in response to the negative pressures in his life.

[Here's a link to the video for those interested: WARNING FOR LANGUAGE AND THEMES THAT MAY BE OFFENSIVE TO SOME. Please don't click if you are one of those folks that get offended at such things. In fact, no one should click on it. I'm asking you not to.]

I think the themes are appropriate as the next few articles are going to focus on the Sage Transformation journey.

What exactly is the “Sage Transformation” journey?

From what I can tell (and please understand that the following is just my opinion and is not endorsed, confirmed, approved or in any other way agreed upon by anyone at Sage), at its core, the Sage Transformation journey is a plan designed to help Sage respond to the rapidly changing landscape of software publishing.

It includes many different elements including re-branding, introduction of subscription pricing, re-organization efforts, direct sales, closer interaction with end user customers, improved cross-selling, connected services and many more. We’ll cover some of these topics in the coming days but for now, let’s keep our focus on the big picture.

Read more

Mar 2

Wilzoch leads Sage CRM Group on roadshow

The checkered flag is mine!

Dan Wilzoch, Head Honcho of the Sage CRM Group, has been making regional visits lately to meet with Sage channel partners and to discuss the future of the Sage CRM solutions – Sage CRM and Saleslogix.

I was fortunate enough to attend the roadshow in Chicago on 02/23/12. Dan was accompanied by Frank Downes, Brian Potter and Brian Neirby for the well-attended event (roughly 40 attendees).  While there were some points of contention, overall, I was pleased with what I heard.

Most impressive was the bold, take no prisoners attitude expressed by Wilzoch. To me, this is a breath of fresh air and gets my blood flowing.

I am a big believer that attitude, not aptitude determines your altitude (thanks to Max Sacks for that quote).

A fundamental truth of software applications: there is no perfect solution for every business. Shocking, right? If you accept that truth, then success comes down to the team with the better strategy and execution.

Sage has a great strategy – working with a strong channel of extremely talented individuals to market and sell and support the Sage CRM products.

There have been some hiccups lately in execution of this approach by Sage but overall Wilzoch’s message was strongly partner-centric. The last 60 minutes or so of the roadshow consisted of Dan fielding questions and queries with refreshing directness. After responding to each point, he would re-state “Ok – what can we do for you?”.

I greatly appreciate Dan’s “Ok – what can we do for you?” approach. He wasn’t making bold, outrageous comments or suggesting sweeping changes. He was talking about a fundamental connection between human beings that resonated nicely.

It goes further than that though.

Asking a question like “ok – what can we do for you?” over and over like that begs the reverse question “ok – what can we do for Sage?”.

Maybe I’m alone in that thought but if we are partners – true partners – we have to ask that question of ourselves.

As a partner, what can we do for Sage? How can we help them sell more software? After all, doesn’t helping them, help us as well? And, more importantly, if we believe in the software, doesn’t it help our customers?

I believe in Sage CRM. I believe that small and medium-sized businesses are struggling to do more with less. I believe CRM is the answer to these problems.

How can I do better at getting that message out there? Helping more customers? Helping Sage? And, of course, helping my firm?

I don’t have all the answers to that one but leaving the roadshow left me more determined than ever to get my ass in gear with my own marketing efforts and spreading the gospel of Sage CRM.

We’ll see how it goes in the coming months and years but, one thing is for certain, my future will be in my hands and not anyone else’s. And isn’t that why I started my own business? And why I’m proud to be a part of a small business? I’m sure many of you reading this feel the same.

In summary, Dan Wilzoch clearly drew the line in the sand at the roadshow: we aren’t settling for where we are – we are going to kick it up a notch and start to make sales.

I applaud this attitude and encourage Sage to have more of these types of events.

Mar 1

2 Comments

A no-cost way to improve customer and prospect satisfaction

Anything missing from this before I drop it in the mail?

I’m going to keep this one short and sweet.

Like a lot of folks, I’m drowning in information every day – phone calls, emails, appointments, meetings, social networks, you name it. I’m sure regular readers of this blog are in the same boat.

So …

If you email me and ask me to call you … or even if you aren’t asking me to call but there might be a chance that I will call … how freaking hard is it to include a signature line that includes the best way to contact you?

Preferrably a phone number – right there at the bottom of your email.

It could not be any simpler and it takes no time to set up.

Oh yes … I could pull up my favorite CRM system and look up your record and your phone number but why should I have to? If I’m staring at your email, it should be there.

I can’t think of a single reason why it wouldn’t be.

All businesses serve two functions: marketing and innovation (thanks to Peter Drucker for that truth).

Your email is a form of marketing and it says a lot about your character and how easy you want to make it for others to reach you and work with you.

Do yourself – and your prospects and customers – a favor. Include your damn contact information.

Feb 7

Drowning in email? Try this simple trick

And every day the paperboy brings more ...

If you are like me, you probably get way too many emails each day.

Some of them – from co-workers, customers, prospects, your spouse – absolutely need to be reviewed. Ok … maybe “absolutely” is the wrong word for some co-workers, customers and prospects, but you get the idea.

A lot of them, again if you are like me, are digests, summaries, information from various sources. Personally, I’m subscribed to more than a few blogs, marketing lists, LinkedIn Digests, Facebook feeds, Google Alerts, etc.

And I shouldn’t forget about the three (more?) different feeds from Wayne Schulz’s different properties!

There is no problem with all these information sources … if you are actually reading them and getting value from them.

If there are certain feeds that you read religiously and rely on as great information sources to guide your actions (think of them as a new world version of reading the daily newspaper), then these are keepers.

But what about the rest of them?

You know … the ones that just seem to pile up in your inbox and give you that twinge of “man … I really need to make time to read those”.

I was recently given a great suggestion by the one and only Ed Kless.

It was so simple, so damn stupid simple that I almost blew it off.

Here it is: Unsubscribe.

Shocking, right?

Just unsubscribe from those sources that you don’t rely on and don’t regularly read. Most of them are available at the originating  source so … let go.

So you miss a post or two? So what? Life goes on.

Besides – you are probably missing them anyway as they stack up in your inbox.

Getting rid of them will do nothing but boost your productivity and will have a side benefit of eliminating the twinges of remorse of not finding the time to read them.

You no longer need to find a lazy Saturday to go through them. Reclaim your days and peace of mind!

Some might suggest that it’s no big deal to delete them. I would suggest that attitude is much like having a newspaper delivered that you never read. Sure – you can just take them out to the recycling bin every once in awhile but, in the meantime, they pile up and clutter up your space.

Unsubscribe – save yourself the hassle.

Part of the reason why this simple suggestion took a bit longer than necessary for me to act upon was the old view that unsubscribing from a list lets them know that you are a legit email address. The concern is that will bring more and more junk to your inbox.

I think that was true years ago but with new and improved spam guards and spam laws, it is no longer true.

So … take this simple advice and free yourself by unsubscribing from those distracting sources.

PS. If you found this article of interest, please subscribe in the box on the right. :)

Feb 5

6 Comments

Are you guilty of killing your business without realizing it?

I'm the guy with the white t-shirt - do I stand out?

I recently read a great article by Jason Blumer on the importance of creative pricing and getting out of the time and materials business.

It was a tad overlong for my infant-like attention span (think: “and to summarize my position, I would like to say … oooh something shiny! Pretty! Uhm, what was I saying?”) but well worth the read and I encourage everyone to give it a shot.

Jason drives home some great points about the importance of aligning goals through strategic pricing (aka pricing on purpose, aka value pricing, aka goal-oriented pricing) and all of the surrounding issues.

With me, he’s preachin’ to the choir and, of course, the choir always loves the good preachin’. Lay it on me, Mr. Blumer!

It got me thinking along a tangent though.

All the folks out there in service firms that are still billing by the hour are killing their businesses. In fact, it’s even worse than that.

Billing by the hour is killing the service industry.

How can I make such an outrageous claim?

It’s somewhat a matter of perspective. I help businesses become more profitable through effective and efficient usage of CRM.

In that role, I work with a lot of small and medium sized businesses and get a first-hand view into what’s happening out there. And it ain’t pretty.

The internet has changed the game for all of us. I’ve written about this previously so I won’t re-cover it here except to add one sobering thought for all of us:

Even if you have a one in a million idea, there are at least a thousand other folks out there on the internet – just a click or two away.

There’s little to no differentiation out there.

Most service firms have visions, missions, values and messages that are completely interchangeable. You could swap corporate names in and out of their marketing literature like some kind of demented fill in the blank, Mad Libs exercise designed to point out how similar each firm is to their competitors.

Combining this lack of differentiation with pricing by the hour guarantees a slow and steady drive toward a competitive landscape filled with “me too” solutions at increasingly lower prices.

Oh, I can hear some of you saying “But damnit, we ARE the best service firm and we do truly partner with our customers! Those other guys are just saying that but we really do it!” or even “But damnit, we ARE the experts in this particular field!”

Ok, ok … I believe you.

But – you don’t need me believing you. You need the customers and prospects to believe you.

And just like driving by a block full of McDonalds, each one looking nearly the same, how can your customers and prospects tell which one is going to provide the best experience? The best value for their dollar?

Hint: they can’t.

Pricing projects based on value received and offering a money back guarantee is a good start to standing out from the “me too” crowd.

Again, it’s a good start. It’s not an end game solution.

When done correctly, pricing projects based on value will change your culture and change what drives you. It enables you to discover what you really love to do and are good at and can make money at.

*This* is the start of true differentiation and will serve you well in the coming years.

If you aren’t prepared to do it, don’t be surprised as customers steadily start going to the low cost provider over the next five to ten years as they can’t figure out any other reason to choose you over your competition.

I’ll leave you with this quote (first introduced to me by confidant and fellow game-changer, Ed Kless):

“If you don’t like change, you’re going to like irrelevance even less.”  General Eric Shinseki, Chief of Staff, U. S. Army

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