Amid the Noise and Haste

Graduation Day from Pace University...it finally happened!

I haven't posted in a long, long time.  For the past 23 months, my time has been filled with papers and projects and teams and conference calls.  But it paid of nicely.  I just graduated with my MBA from Pace University's Executive MBA program. 

I can't say enough about how much I got from the program.  It taught me about cohorts, team work, myself, and of course business principles and practices which were immediately practical and useable.

Cycle 9 starts Aug. 16th, and they are always looking for more good applicants. By the way, Module 8 has a record-breaking 28 enrollees. Now's the time to get an MBA! To find out more about Pace's eMBA program, visit www.pace.edu/emba or contact Jim Parker, Director - Executive MBA Program and Adj. Assoc. Prof. of Marketing for the Lubin School of Business, directly at (212) 618-6653 or jparker@pace.edu.

"Communication delivered is not the same as communication received."

I received an email this morning from a vendor who had to issue a me aculpa.  They had sent a previous announcement with errors and with unclear information.  In the email I received today they stated "Communication delivered is not the same as communication received."  It made me think.

We don't always here the message that is being delivered.  More commonly we hear what we want to hear, or we hear what we think was said, but because it wasn't communicated effectively the message became skewed or misinterpreted.  This can happen in personal or business relationships.  It can happen with verbal or written communication. 

Communication isn't easy, and different mediums exist.  Some of the connective threads for good communication across any meduim include: clarity, listening well, and being concise.

Team Building

When it comes to companies with many different deparments the unfortunate downside is silos.  Each department can become so focused on their own tasks at hand that the other departments become secondary in priority.  There are two key things I have seen when this happens:

1. Departments are made up of people (the people part usually gets lost); and
2. Departments need to work together as a team to keep the machine running

The Reforming Project Management Blog had a great list of questions to ask when dealing with "Team Communication and Health."  Asking these questions can help identify gaps in communication that can then be addressed with team building exercises, lessons in communication and development.

• To what extent is the team positive?
• To what extent is honesty and trust evident?
• To what extent is the team learning and improving?
• Is morale improving, steady or declining?
• To what extent are team members being open and honest with each other?
• Are there barriers between trades and professions and if so How high are the silo walls?
• How long or short are tempers?
• To what extent are team members collaborating?

Delays, Timing, Hold-ups

So it has been quite a while since I posted.  It will begin to pick up slowly again...I have recently changed jobs which has taken me away from the blog with preparations, training, etc. 

I hope to be back soon, posting more about customer service and much more.  Please stay tuned!

LSSO launches RainDrops

Hot off the presses from LSSO:

New Year, New Things . . . from LSSO! Now there's another way to see what's hot, find out what thought leaders are thinking and get in on the action. LSSO's blog, "RainDrops", launches today!

You can read and comment on postings from the LSSO team and guest bloggers. We can't claim that we'll always be serious, but we can promise to be blogging about sales and service issues that effect you each and everyday! Please visit http://lssoraindrops.blogspot.com and let us know what you think. If you are interested in blogging with LSSO, please contact us at amy@legalsales.org.

Best of luck with this new project!

Product Review - The LegalBizDev Success Kit™

I was recently asked by Jim Hassett to review his new product The LegalBizDev Success Kit™, "an audio course and set of reference tools that will help lawyers win new business more quickly by applying best practices from other law firms and other professions." 

I have known Jim for a few years now after having met at an LSSO RainDance conference. I've seen him speak for the LMA, and have read his book "Legal Business Development, a Step by Step Guide" (which is also included in the Success Kit). I couldn't say no...so below is the review I sent him.  You can read more about the Success Kit here.

Out of the box impression:

Right away it appears to be a well thought out tool kit. The inclusion of the desk reference and quick start guide is a great way to keep this in front of attorneys, and the note pads with the repeated line “What should I do to increase new business?” is a constant reminder to keep on top of things. 

The addition of the audio CD is another great tool. Since attorneys are always busy and on the go, the ability to upload this information to their iPod and listen at the gym, on their way to work, on a plane, etc. is very smart and makes learning and remembering all the more accessible.

Separate Components:

 The Quick Start Sheet

 Simple and effective. Clear directions and a good tool to have for reference to specific topics and sections of both the Desk Reference and CD.

Desk Reference

 This is an amazing tool. It is practical, usable, and the tips, guides and suggestions are completely doable. The well thought out sections and references, as well as the tools, actions items, and slide make this something that any lawyer at any stage in their career can use.

 Basic Principles and Best Practices CDs

 Providing both visual and audio CDs is plain smart; yet another way to learn from the Success Kit. The ability to break the learning into shorter segments, again, makes this more valuable and usable for attorneys.

 The Whole Package:

The Success Kit really is the whole package. I keep repeating the works simple, effective, usable, smart because that is exactly what it is. Jim Hassett has put together tools and tips which any lawyer at any stage of their career can easily take and apply to their business development efforts; and they are easy enough to integrate into the daily work schedule of even the busiest attorney.

On customer service...

From the November 26th edition of DMNews:

"Whoever touches the consumer's experience needs to contribute to the experience."

       - Bobbi Merkel, director of convergence, TPN

Good Vocabulary can Help end World Hunger

For each word you get right, Free Rice donates 10 grains of rice through the UN to help end world hunger.  Dust of that dictionary...

You can also see the total number of donations by day.  Here's a look at the last five days and the cumulative total.  FreeRice began on October 7, 2007.

4 November 2007	48,038,530
5 November 2007	53,847,080
6 November 2007	73,566,480
7 November 2007	75,201,580
8 November 2007	77,126,310
	___________
	1,008,771,910

Thanks to Seth Godin for relaying this to us from Jonathan.

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Strategy taking over

So I haven't posted in quite some time...strategy has taken over.  Business strategy that is; in my MBA program.  It's really fascinating, but time consuming.  I guess it should be.  What company could survive with a slip-shot strategy in place?

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Tools that Make Blogging Easier

Jantsch from Duct Tape Marketing posted awhile ago about a few desktop tools you can use that make it easier to blog.  Here are the ones he mentioned:

• ScribeFire Firefox extension - officially not exactly a desktop client as it works inside of Firefox (I use this and I find it very easy to use)
  
• Windows Live Writer - a great tool and part of the growing Windows Office Live offering
  
• ecto for MacOSX and Windows - created for Mac users and still the king

Basically, these tools let you blog directly from your desktop without logging in to your blog.  I like using ScribeFire because I can click on an icon and it opens up a window on the bottom half of my screen.  This allows me to see what I am blogging about in the top half (see below):

Technorati Tags: blogging, FireFox, Live Writer, Ecto

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Friday Fun: Left Brain vs Right Brain

Are you a "big picture" oriented thinker with spacial perception and maybe a little impetuous?  Or, are you detail oriented, practical and more reality based?  Steven Levitt from the Freakonomics Blog points us to Marginal Revolution to find out.  Which way is the dancer spinning; clockwise or counter-clockwise?  Your answer will tell you which side of the brain you tend to use.

My question is, if I stare long enough I can actually change the direction I see.  So does that mean I'm a little left brained and a little right?  Or, am I just out of my mind?


Technorati Tags: perception reality thinking

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on Customers

From Julie Fleischer at Forrester's Marketing Blog:

"I keep hearing people ask how much control we should give our customers.
What they don't realize is our customers have already taken control and
we'll never have it back"

So true!

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So true!

Google Helps Sort Through the Noise and Haste

Google is a handy resource and we are pointed to some of the helpful tools you can use on a daily basis by two of my favorite blogs, Common Craft and Business Opportunities Blog.

First, Common Craft has released their video about using Google Docs, Google Docs in Plain English which you can watch here:

Click To Play

Next up, the folks at the Business Opportunities Blog gives us a list of 15 iGoogle gadgets to help with productivity.  Here are the first 5 gadgets provided:

1. Today List
2. iReminder
3. Time sheet recorder
4. Google Analytics
5. Google Services

To find out more about these tools and to read the rest of the list, visit the Business Opportunities Blog.


Technorati Tags: tools productivity Google

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Travel Amid the Noise and Haste

John Jantsch over at Duct Tap Marketing has alerted us to a new handy little resource called TripIt.  What does it do?  According to John:  "TripIt allows you to organize these details and does it in simple fashion."  How does it work?  It looks quite simple:

If you've used it, I would love to hear from you.

Technorati Tags: travel, itinerary

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Word of Mouth Marketing - Not Working or Not Worth Talking About?

Seth Godin, by way of Micah, points us to an article about Jupiter's new report about viral marketing, "Viral Campaigns Falling Short, Says JupiterResearch."  The article states, "JupiterResearch...found that only 15% of viral campaigns in the past year achieved the goal of prompting consumers to promote the marketer's message."

But here's the thing: isn't viral marketing supposed to be about the product?  I mean, if you like the product, or not, you tell people about it.  The campaign is secondary.  I have to agree with Seth here:

Excuse me... the most effective technique is making stuff worth talking
about in the first place. True viral marketing happens not when the
marketer plans for it or targets bloggers or skateboarders or pirates
with goatees, but when the item/service/event is worth talking about.

Here is a true example of viral marketing.  I have a friend who uses a credit union in New York.  She lives in Florida.  It's extremely inconvenient for her to go there, but she LOVES their service.  In fact she raves about it.  She loves them so much she sent out the following email to her list of friends with no prompting from the credit union, and it wasn't part of a "viral marketing campaing."  Here is her email in full (I've removed any personally identifying information):

Hey, gang,

As most of you know, I've been an insanely happy member of the same NYC credit union for about ten years. Well, the Entertainment Industries Federal Credit Union just opened up their membership to the general public (it used to be employee-only), and I wanted to pass that info on to everyone I possibly could. While they aren't the flashiest (as you'll see from their website), they truly take care of their customers. If you are even vaguely dissatisfied with your bank, you should check them out.

This is a Manhattan bank that knows my name when I call from Florida. We're talking small-town hi-[name]-how-is-the-new-car-working-out kind of conversations, while they approve loans, consolidate my debt, and work with me on mortgage information. And, trust me, I'm one of those customers who can't add, doesn't understand decimals and asks the same damn question over and over. They never make me feel like an idiot...I LOVE THIS CREDIT UNION!

The only downside I found when I lived in NYC was that they only have one location, Madison and 55th, but since most of my banking is electronic anyway, I never thought that was a huge problem...So, visit the website - www.eifcu.org - or call Joe Reyes at 212.833.5533 to get membership info. And feel free to pass this on to your friends. It's really nice to know the name of the person handling your money.

And, yeah, I'm kind of nuts about them!

When someone is brand loyal because they truely believe in a product or service, they tell people about it.  That is viral marketing.

Technorati Tags: viral marketing, word of mouth

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Seth Godin on Labor Day

Well said Seth.

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Contrary to Popular Belief, it IS Easy Being Green!

Snap.com has made it really easy to be green with their CO2 Saver.  What is it?  I'll let them tell you:

CO₂ Saver is a lightweight program that
manages your computer's power usage when it's idle, saving energy and
decreasing the demand on your power utility.

The less electricity produced, the fewer harmful emissions and greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide (CO₂) are released into the atmosphere.

What's cool is you can see how much CO2 you have saved as well as how much other snap users have saved.  Smart. Simple. Free. Oh, and no adware or spyware. Well done Snap.com.


Technorati Tags: CO2, green, carbon dioxide

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Is Price Your Only Differentiator?

John Jantsch over at the Duct Tape Marketing Blog points out a key flaw in many business descriptions - and how to break out of that mold!  Here is the exercise he suggestes

Go to the web site of your four biggest competitors, copy the
introductory paragraph from their home page and paste each on a
document. Now add the same from your own web site. Lastly, black out
any mention of the names of the firms and pass this page around the
office or to anyone familiar with your business.

Now what can this show?  Can you even pick your company's description out from the competitors?  As John points out, "what is usually painfully obvious is that each of the companies is saying essentially the same thing."

Can your customers really read the difference, the reason why they should pick you instead of their customers?  If not, all they can do is choose by price.

Instead of dollar signs as a differentiator, I suggest that you describe your company with the most simple words - no jargon!  Amid the noise and haste of business-speak and language, filter the noise and simply tell your customers what you do.


Technorati Tags: marketing

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Free SEO Tools

seomoz offers a toolbox on their site full of free tools to help you with search engine optimization.  Really cool.  Check out tools to help:

• Determine the strongest pages on your domain
• Find out what other websites are hosted on your IP address
• Check whether your URL has been indexed by Google, Yahoo! and MSN
• Check your page rank

There are more too.  These are great tools for small companies with tight budgets to hop on the SEO bandwagon and help your website get found on the world wide web.

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Am Law 200 Firms are Becoming Social

By way of Doug Cornelius of KM Space and Kevin O'Keefe over at LexBlog, I found out that 8 of the top 10 Am Law 200 law firms, those with the highest gross revenue, have social networks on Facebook.  That's pretty big news.   Law firms have traditionally been slower to adopt less traditional means of marketing and business development.  But as Kevin points out, "Lawyers, amongst others, should focus on how examples of new media can
help instead of disregarding them because others use them in an
unprofessional or non business-related way."

Here are the firms with the current number of network members from each firm from Kevin's post:

1. Skadden, Arps 379 Members
2. Baker & McKenzie 728 Members
3. Jones Day 286 Members
4. Latham & Watkins 291 Members
5. Sidely Austin 199 Members
6. Mayer Browne No Network
7. White & Case 370 Members
8. Weil, Gotschal No Network
9. Shearman & Sterling 225 members
10. Kirkland & Ellis 192 Members

Scott Glavin from Enterprise 2.0 wrote about this, tipping off Doug Cornelius, and pointed out a few business uses of using a social networking site such as Facebook:

• exploring who else in your organization has the same interests and connecting.  Professional networking, but via the net.
• sharing media and updates with colleagues such as photo’s and business travel plans
• general exploration of how web2.0 can be supplemental to company goals

I think one of the biggest hurdles of adopting this new technology is eduction.  Scott's points are a fantastic entry point for why networking within a firm or company has benefits.  Internal communication is key to helping grow a business and social  networking enables this communication.  I encourage other firms and companies to adopt social networking as well. 

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Test Your Company's Customer Focus

From the department of common sense:

Shannon Holman over at If You See Something Say Something points us to A Three-Question Test of Your Company's Customer Focus from John Hagel of Edge Perspectives.  As yourselves this:

1. Who in the organization holds real decision-making power? Is it the organization that manages relationships with the customer or is it some other group?
2. What are the primary measures of performance for the firm?
3. What is the primary focus of the brand promise of the company?

From John:  "The companies that really succeed in the customer relationship business will have no trouble meeting this test.  All the rest had better decide which of the other two businesses they really want to focus on."

Pecha Kucha - "The Sound of Conversation"

You have a meeting, the conversation goes round and round, nothing is accomplished and worse yet people go off point, get distracted and you walk out wondering how to get that last hour of your life back.

Enter Pecha Kucha, Japanese for "the sound of conversation."

• 20 slides
• 20 seconds per slide
• Power point off!

That's it.  As Seth Godin so aptly states, "Tell me a problem that can't be outlined in six minutes and I'll show you a problem it's probably not worth having a meeting about."

Read more about Pecha Kucha in this month's Wired from Dan Pink. 

Social Resources Galore!

John Jantsch over at Duct Tape Marketing points us to Mashable's exhaustive resource list ONLINE MEDIA GOD: 400+ Tools for Photographers, Videobloggers, Podcasters & Musician.  All you could want and then some!

Shannon Holman at If You See Something Say Something points us to TechCrunch's comparison chart of white label social networking solutions for your enterprise.

Social Volunteering - Making a Difference

If you haven't heard of SixDegrees.org, I urge you to check them out.  Here is a description from their about page:

You've probably heard of the Six Degrees concept. Any one person (including me, Kevin Bacon) is connected to any other person through six or fewer relationships, because it's a small world. SixDegrees.org is about using this idea to accomplish something good. It's social networking with a social conscience. Through this web site, you can support your favorite charities by donating or creating fundraising badges — as well as check out the favorite causes of other people, including celebrities.

I set up my own badge which you can see in the right hand column just below the fold of my main blog page.  I choose Hands Together Inc., an organization which is close to my heart.  I worked with Hands Together in 1992 and travelled to Haiti with my high school, Cathedral High in Springfield, MA.  We brought medical and school supplies to different poverty stricken areas such as Cite Soleil and Brunette.  And I am pleased to see how far the organization has come since then.  Here is a bit more about their programs:

Hands Together carries out its mission through projects and programs aimed at improving the quality of life for the very poor - primarily in Haiti.

Through schools, orphanages, nutrition and feeding programs, medical clinics, sustainable development projects, and partnerships with local leaders and communities, Hands Together is building a better world for thousands of suffering people in Haiti. Hands Together volunteers contribute to this work through organized delegations and programs for those with specialized training like doctors & medical professionals, builders, water well technicians, mechanics and teachers.

You can learn more about Hands Together on their site www.handstogether.org.  You can donate to Hands Together by clicking on my badge or you can find your favorite charity by going to sixdegrees.org.

Are You Engaged?

Forrester has released the results of a new survey on engagement (this is a product).  Not the kind that leads to marriage, but the kind that keeps you in touch with your clients.  As they defined it, engagement is the level of involvement, interaction, intimacy, and influence an individual has with a brand over time.

As they see it, these four components of engagement - involvement, interaction, intimacy and influence - can help you learn how to make better marketing decisions.  Their argument is the following:

...that companies need to start tying these metrics together to make sense of how engaged their customers actually are—and then make product and marketing decisions based on that knowledge.

Now, there's no clean and beautiful equation like e = mc². But as we continue this research on the topic and gather feedback (we've already seen some extremely polarizing reviews of the report), we'd love to get your take on the matter.

Sifting through the noise and haste, can you see how to better engage your customers?  If you don't have definitive metrics, I suggest open conversation with your customers.  Talk to them, or better yet listen.

 

Social Bookmarking - Video from Common Craft

The folks over at Common Craft have done it again.  Another great little tutorial video explaining social bookmarking and how easy it is.  I hand over the mic:

We made this video because we want others to feel the power of social bookmarking and how it works to make web pages easier to remember, organize and share.

This video is focused on Del.icio.us, but you could also try social bookmarking sites like Magnolia or Furl.

Click To Play

I have my del.icio.us bookmarks set in the right hand column of this blog, take a look!  You can also read more about social bookmarking in a few of my other posts:

• Social Bookmarking as a Knowledge Management Strategy
• Social Bookmarking to Generate Traffic for your Blog

SEO Tips and Tricks

The folks over at SEOmoz continuously provide great information about search engine optimization, link building and more on their blog.  They are always smart, on point, and relevant, though somewhat technical.  Here are some of my favorite posts:

• Answers to Ten SEO Questions
• Ever wonder what bounce rate, click rates or indexed pages really are?  Read A Complete Glossary of SEO Jargon
• Tracking your website click thrus and more?  Refer to the List of Every Website Statistic Publicly Available

Amid the noise and haste of trying to track website usage and development, these tools are invaluable.  Thanks SEOmoz!

iDon't Care

Why has everyone latched on to the "i"?  Aside from Apple's i-line, we now have iGoogle, iBloglines and a plethora of other companies latching on to the"i".  iget it, it's supposed to make their product or service seem more personalized; just for me.  But the problem is over saturation.  There are so many i's there is no longer differentiation. What iwould like to see is more creativity in the branding because frankly, i've had it.

Now that's Service!

I use Netflix. I don't have a lot of time to rent videos at the store between work and my MBA program. The videos I get are my little two-hour escapes. Imagine my surprise when I received an email with the following notice:

They actually lowered my subscription price.  I did nothing.  Have to do nothing.  That's it.  Lower price.

That's a great way to compete.  Blockbuster has one service advantage over Netflix right now in that you can return the videos you rent at the store or through the mail.  But I don't have a Blockbuster near me, so I use Netflix.

How can you give back to your customers to show them that you appreciate their business?

Seth Godin wrote a while ago about Buy One Get One Free. Tom's Shoes donates a pair of shoes to  a child in a developing country for every pair you buy. As Seth says, "I like several things about this approach. The simplicity of the offer, first of all."

Ideas, marketing campaigns - they don't need to be overly complicated. Make it easy for your customers to see what they are getting, without needing the small print, just like Netflix did. I don't have to do anything:  the next time my bill comes, it will be lower. Done deal.

Customer Service: A Continuous Cycle

I like to post about customer service because I think it is encompassed in every aspect of a business, from marketing to sales to IT.  Customer service is internal and external.  If your customer service isn't up to par well then your business suffers.

But customer service I think is cyclical pattern.  Coming in is customer feedback, good and bad.  Going out is not just the services provided but the partnership that is formed when customers and business work together to develop the best possible products and services that not only serve the customers but make the business better.

Jim Hasset speaks to this on his blog post, "How to turn customers into partners."  One of the points made here is that this cycle must be continuous because businesses are going global and changing constantly.  I hand the mic to Jim:

Clients must grow into partners. Partners expect solutions, trust and value-added service – exactly what David Maister described in his classic book, The Trusted Advisor. Wilson warns that any relationship – whether a marriage, a friendship, or a business partnership – is dynamic and always changing. You’d better plan to keep working at it, so that the change is in the positive direction.

What changes is your business making?  How are you working with your clients to turn them into partners?  A few key questions Jim Hassett provides come from Larry Wilson’s book Stop Selling, Start Partnering:  The New Thinking About Finding and Keeping Customers (p.96):

“What are your [client’s] goals?
How do they make money?
What can you do to help them expand their business?
Who are your [client’s] customers?
How can you help add value to your [client’s] customer?”

Notice most of the questions are about your clients, not about your business.  But asking questions like these help you to look internally to help develop solutions which will help grow your business.  The cycle continues.