Strategy + Solutions

BBC News Poll Regarding Leading Innovation Economies

The U.S. recently lost the top position in technology innovation globally according to an article in the BBC News.  According to the article:

"The Networked Readiness Index, the sixth of its kind published by the World Economic Forum with Insead, the Paris-based business school, scrutinised progress in 122 economies worldwide. Despite losing its top position, the US still maintained a strong focus on innovation, driven by one of the world's best tertiary education systems and its high degree of co-operation with industry, the report said."

NETWORKED READINESS INDEX RANKINGS 2006 (2005)

1: Denmark (3)

2: Sweden (8)

3: Singapore (2)

4: Finland (5)

5: Switzerland (9)

6: Netherlands (12)

7: US (1)

8: Iceland (4)

9: UK (10)

10: Norway (13)

Source: WEF

What are you thoughts about this poll and technology innovation in the U.S.?

Smartsheet.Com- SaaS

Check out the Smartsheet tool for your organization.  This new SaaS tool can be used for tracking tasks, projects and processes and enables real time and scheduled collaboration for your team.

The Gratitude Effect

Since I live in Austin, TX I closely follow the technology scene and what successful companies are talking about on the ground.

Powered is a company on the move and it provides online consumer education.  While reviewing their website I found this nugget of marketing information.  Please check out Powered and especially read this part of their website:

"As consumers' media consumption habits evolve -- and their aversion to traditional marketing techniques (like the 30 second spot) skyrocket -- many industry experts predict the future will produce a new "Golden Age" for education-based marketing, sponsorship, product placement, long-form content, and branded entertainment. And it's ironic that many of these "new marketing" tactics are currently being touted when they were the original form of advertising on radio and television.

The re-emergence of these strategies speaks to marketers' desire to find permission-based ways to connect with time-constrained, ad-weary consumers, and create marketing that consumers will seek out and find valuable. As these strategies increasingly become adopted, marketers will need to measure the impact on their ROI.

Enter "The Gratitude Effect"

The Gratitude Effect is a term coined by research firm Next Century Media (NCM) <http://www.nextcenturymedia.com/> in 1999 and developed based on a number of studies about the persuasive power of brands' sponsorships of desirable content, particularly as delivered through the Internet. These sponsorships offer exclusivity (meaning no other brand is presented) and an emotive connection to the content (meaning the free content is related to the brand's products). NCM has found that a no strings attached "gift" of content produces powerful outcomes for brands around:

• Inclusion in consumers' consideration set
• Increases in purchase intent
• Improved consumer opinion of the brand and attributes of a product

To learn more about the Gratitude Effect, download the NCM study Measuring Sponsorship Effectiveness.

With the help of NCM, Powered has found a strong Gratitude Effect at the heart of the ROI in our online consumer education programs. Increasingly, our clients are finding our programs to be a cost-effective and efficacious way to connect with the consumers they need to reach "

Highrise

This is a home run solution for professional service firms and small and medium businesses.

Highrise "helps you track communication and conversations with leads, employees, clients, colleagues, vendors, or anyone else that matters to your business."

Check out this great new technology tool and see how you can leverage it to help you increase your productivity, communication and sales effectiveness.

Putting Your Customer To Work for You (Part 2)

Customers ask me why market research based strategy and solution implementation?  The challenge facing traditional market research firms is that they only conduct market research and usually provide you with a report that collects dust.  Ultimately, a pure research firm has no skin in the game in terms of implementation.

This can happen especially with surveys since the questions you help them generate to ask usually reflect the current thinking of your company.  Your company should never ask your customers what they want, your team should use customers (put them to work) to understand what the problem is with your brand, product or service.

Customers are not going to provide the solutions; solutions need to be built by a skilled team that has a deep understanding of the problem. 

What is the best feedback you received from a customer and how did you implement a solution?

Criteria for Evaluating Innovative Solutions

If you are trying to evaluate an investment in a new Web 2.0 solution for your business you might consider using the list below to guide your decision making process.

Peter Drucker's book Innovation and Entrepreneurship really does a great job of distilling criteria for any new venture or business idea you are considering but it also does a great job of helping you evaluate any technology solution you are considering implementing within your business.  The following ideas represent solid ways to evaluate whether or not a solution will help your business meet its needs:

1. It creates new utility for you the customer

2. Price is related to the value not the cost to produce

3. The product/service responds to your unmet realities/needs or problems

4. Delivers attributes not products

5. Reasonable speed to market is possible (How long will it take to implement?)

6. Simple and focused- does one thing, satisfies one need

7. Obtains a leadership position in the market or niche quickly (Important that the company is built to last so that you can count on solid customer service and a long term relationship with the vendor.)

8. Not too clever for market or too far ahead of market

9. Consistent with your organization's strengths, customer focused and not too diverse.  (Bottom line: Does the vendor's solution enable you to improve your business and productivity and care enough to be there for you when something isn't working with the technology and help you fix it?)

Yugma- Online Meeting Solution

If you are in need of an online meeting solution check out Yugma.  I haven't had a chance to take a demo tour of the company but it appears to be a great solution to evaluate for your business.

Yugma (pronounced "yoog-ma"; Sanskrit word meaning "together") is a next generation real-time web conferencing and desktop sharing service that is free forever. Users can use the service as often as they wish and invite up to 10 other people to each web session.

Yugma enables users to share their desktop real-time, annotate, whiteboard and change presenters – with Mac and/or Windows (Linux coming soon).

Does Twitter Have Legs?

Twitter was the "big thing" at the most recent SXSW conference in Austin, TX.  The question is how can marketers, salespeople or businesses benefit from this new Web 2.0 technology.  Is it a flash in the pan that will fizzle or does it have proverbial "legs."

At least one blogger has an application for salespeople:

"Travelling salesmen who want to communicate in a group whilst on the road - again, in a way that is recordable."

Please share your thoughts on how businesses can leverage this new technology.

Similar technologies are heading to the web like Jaiku so someone will win this battle but who?

Planypus - New Viral Marketing Platform

Planypus is an exciting new way to promote your venue or event in order to increase attendance.  This new form of viral marketing will be interesting to follow.  Obviously the concept will help restaurants, sports teams, music halls, convention centers, hotels and the like to promote large events to a broad audience.

Savvy marketers within small, medium and enterprise businesses currently notify current and potential customers that they are attending XYZ convention, trade show, or association meeting to speak or exhibit their products or services via print, phone or email and measure results.

This is yet another tool to accomplish this goal and will enable you to build customer relationships, increase retention with existing clients and promote your brand to new potential customers via word of mouth marketing. 

This solution is an actionable and measurable tool for your business to build a buzz for your speaking event, seminar, product launch at a conference, webinar, grand opening or any other event you need to promote and market.  Please check it out and let us know how your marketing team or business is leveraging and benefiting from Planypus.

Evolution of Email

Will email and consequently email marketing become extinct?  I read an interesting blog by the Web Worker Daily regarding the various tools that may replace email in the future.  It is hard to imagine that my blackberry will become obsolete but it is always interesting to think about what new innovations and technologies will do to change our consumer behavior.  The question becomes is there a better mousetrap than email?