One of the all time marketing all stars on the planet is Seth Godin, author, speaker, consultant and internet guru. I wish I was as smart as him. He wrote an article a while back that I have held for New Years Eve. Its not really about marketing, but in a way it is about "approach"; the way we all view what matters to us, what is important and what works for us. And ultimately how we engage other people. So maybe it really is about marketing. I'll let you decide.
Please enjoy this.
You Matter
by
Seth Godin
When you love the work you do and the people you do it with, you matter.
When you are so gracious and generous and aware that you think of other people before yourself, you matter.
When you leave the world a better place than you found it, you matter.
When you continue to raise the bar on what you do and how you do it, you matter.
When you teach and forgive and teach more before you rush to judge and demean, you matter.
When you touch the people in your life through your actions (and your words), you matter.
When kids grow up wanting to be you, you matter.
When you see the world as it is, but insist on making it more like it could be, you matter.
When you inspire a Nobel prize winner or a slum dweller, you matter.
When the room brightens when you walk in, you matter.
And when the legacy you leave behind lasts for hours, days or a lifetime, you matter.
On this eve of the New Year, I wish all of you love and laughter, health and happiness and peace and prosperity. Thank you for reading my blog and thank you for your comments and good wishes.
Thursday, December 31, 2009
Sunday, December 27, 2009
The Comfort Zone
I took the week off; hardly opened the computer, but still addicted to Blackberry so was able to check messages and send some emails.
On Christmas day, I woke up in Santa Monica California; sunshine and 65 degrees, It was the first time, in many a year, that I woke up in a warm climate on Christmas It seemed strange to be jogging around palisades park, near the ocean, in shorts and t shirt.
This is usually the time of the year I get my winter gear out and jog through central park in the snow. That's when I feel all wintry. Hard to get Wintry in southern California.
Clearly, I was out of my comfort zone. And it wasn't a bad thing.
This change of venue did me good. I thought about new ways to use social networks to promote my clients business; books I want to read and new strategies I want to test and implement.
Want to get out of your comfort zone and get your creative juices going? Try some of these techniques
Listen to a TV news station whose views are opposite your views. See what you can earn. At worst, you'll pick up some ammunition to use in cocktail party chatter
Listen to your teenagers music or watch MTV, VH1 or Spike TV and get some new input about this key bowling segment (15 to 29 yr olds)
Visit different stores and test their customer service; what can you learn from them?
Read "Getting Things Done" by David Allen; a great book about managing your time and working efficiently
Sometimes, getting out of the comfort zone gets us thinking in new ways. Give it a try
On Christmas day, I woke up in Santa Monica California; sunshine and 65 degrees, It was the first time, in many a year, that I woke up in a warm climate on Christmas It seemed strange to be jogging around palisades park, near the ocean, in shorts and t shirt.
This is usually the time of the year I get my winter gear out and jog through central park in the snow. That's when I feel all wintry. Hard to get Wintry in southern California.
Clearly, I was out of my comfort zone. And it wasn't a bad thing.
This change of venue did me good. I thought about new ways to use social networks to promote my clients business; books I want to read and new strategies I want to test and implement.
Want to get out of your comfort zone and get your creative juices going? Try some of these techniques
Listen to a TV news station whose views are opposite your views. See what you can earn. At worst, you'll pick up some ammunition to use in cocktail party chatter
Listen to your teenagers music or watch MTV, VH1 or Spike TV and get some new input about this key bowling segment (15 to 29 yr olds)
Visit different stores and test their customer service; what can you learn from them?
Read "Getting Things Done" by David Allen; a great book about managing your time and working efficiently
Sometimes, getting out of the comfort zone gets us thinking in new ways. Give it a try
Sunday, December 20, 2009
A Day in The Life of The Internet
Some of us never realize how big the internet really is or how big it has become, so being the statistical geek that I am, I thought I would share some of this with you; kind of a friendly reminder of its importance and how much you and I have to learn every day just to stay in the game
Factoid #1: Over 210 billion emails are sent out every day…MORE THAN A WHOLE YEARS WORTH of letter mail. There are only 5 billion people in the world!!
Factoid #2: 3 million IMAGES ARE UPLOADED TO FLIKR every day; enough images TO FILL A 375,000 page photo album.
Factoid #3: Every day, information sent over the mobile telephone networks, if SAVED TO DISCS, IT WOULD TAKE 9.2 million disks, 1.7 million blu-ray disks and 63.9 trillion diskettes a day.
Factoid #4: 700,000 NEW FACEBOOK MEMBERS ARE BEING ADDED EVERY DAY; the approximate population of Guyana. 45 million status updates are recorded daily vs. 5 million tweets per day.
Factoid #5: 900,000 articles are POSTED DAILY BY BLOGGERS like me
What it means is obvious – what you actually do about “this new game” is another thing. Having a website and an email address is no longer enough.
The game is changing again. The rules are different.
Read more than ever before. I will pass on some books to you that are great reads for you to “bone up” on and will stimulate your creative juices. When you get finished with them, give them to other people in the center to read. Get them into it. Brainstorm new ideas.
Just remember, this new technology; these social networks that we speak of; they are all about building relationships, trust and honesty.
…and then you can sell them something that you KNOW YOUR NETWORK MAY WANT.
Factoid #1: Over 210 billion emails are sent out every day…MORE THAN A WHOLE YEARS WORTH of letter mail. There are only 5 billion people in the world!!
Factoid #2: 3 million IMAGES ARE UPLOADED TO FLIKR every day; enough images TO FILL A 375,000 page photo album.
Factoid #3: Every day, information sent over the mobile telephone networks, if SAVED TO DISCS, IT WOULD TAKE 9.2 million disks, 1.7 million blu-ray disks and 63.9 trillion diskettes a day.
Factoid #4: 700,000 NEW FACEBOOK MEMBERS ARE BEING ADDED EVERY DAY; the approximate population of Guyana. 45 million status updates are recorded daily vs. 5 million tweets per day.
Factoid #5: 900,000 articles are POSTED DAILY BY BLOGGERS like me
What it means is obvious – what you actually do about “this new game” is another thing. Having a website and an email address is no longer enough.
The game is changing again. The rules are different.
Read more than ever before. I will pass on some books to you that are great reads for you to “bone up” on and will stimulate your creative juices. When you get finished with them, give them to other people in the center to read. Get them into it. Brainstorm new ideas.
Just remember, this new technology; these social networks that we speak of; they are all about building relationships, trust and honesty.
…and then you can sell them something that you KNOW YOUR NETWORK MAY WANT.
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
Enrichment
Rajeh Sety is an entrepreneur, author and speaker based in Silicon valley. His blog is Life Beyond Code.
His recent entry on "Enrichment" is worth reading and I wanted to pass this on to you, given the spirit of the holiday season. So here it is:
"We are all on a search- a search for more meaning in our lives. Through choosing to enrich other people's lives, you add meaning to their life and your own.
Some simple steps to follow:
1. Commit: Commit to lifetime - relationships that span events, companies, causes and geographic boundaries.
2. Care: care for the concerns of others as if they are your own.
3. Connect: Aim to connect those who will benefit and enrich each others lives in equal measure
4. Communication: Communicate candidly. Tell people what they should hear rather than what they want to hear.
5. Expand capacity: Aim to expand people's capacity to help them give and get more from their own lives.
The Litmus Test: If you are truly enriching someone's life, they will typically miss you in their past. They think their lives would have been even better if they had met you earlier.
You are only as rich as the enrichment you bring to the world around you."
His recent entry on "Enrichment" is worth reading and I wanted to pass this on to you, given the spirit of the holiday season. So here it is:
"We are all on a search- a search for more meaning in our lives. Through choosing to enrich other people's lives, you add meaning to their life and your own.
Some simple steps to follow:
1. Commit: Commit to lifetime - relationships that span events, companies, causes and geographic boundaries.
2. Care: care for the concerns of others as if they are your own.
3. Connect: Aim to connect those who will benefit and enrich each others lives in equal measure
4. Communication: Communicate candidly. Tell people what they should hear rather than what they want to hear.
5. Expand capacity: Aim to expand people's capacity to help them give and get more from their own lives.
The Litmus Test: If you are truly enriching someone's life, they will typically miss you in their past. They think their lives would have been even better if they had met you earlier.
You are only as rich as the enrichment you bring to the world around you."
Monday, December 14, 2009
"TRYITVERTISING
One of my followers dropped me a comment that this was originally a blank post. I am not quite sure how that happened, but no doubt it did, because I am editing it as I'm thinking.
I was going to write about an idea I had called "tryitvertising".
Simply stated, every 3 months, you sell your customer, via email, a pass for $5. This pass entitles the customer (and up to x# of people?) to get1 hour of bowling and shoe rentals.
Why would you do this?
Because it just might activate someone who has not been in the center in a while (remember, the average open play customer only comes to your center twice in one year!!) and you just might get the opportunity to sell that customer on the benefits of a specific short season league you are trying to form or get their interest on a about a special event.
Each pass would have a 3 month expiration and once it was gone, it is gone. This would be set up as an automatic bill that hits the customer's credit card every 3 months. No hassle for you, easy for the customer.
The customer must sign up for a minimum of 4 passes. So lets assume that 500 customers sign up for this; that would be $10,000 annually coming in over the internet? Bang, you have a money making machine while you sleep!
Any "triers" out there?
I was going to write about an idea I had called "tryitvertising".
Simply stated, every 3 months, you sell your customer, via email, a pass for $5. This pass entitles the customer (and up to x# of people?) to get1 hour of bowling and shoe rentals.
Why would you do this?
Because it just might activate someone who has not been in the center in a while (remember, the average open play customer only comes to your center twice in one year!!) and you just might get the opportunity to sell that customer on the benefits of a specific short season league you are trying to form or get their interest on a about a special event.
Each pass would have a 3 month expiration and once it was gone, it is gone. This would be set up as an automatic bill that hits the customer's credit card every 3 months. No hassle for you, easy for the customer.
The customer must sign up for a minimum of 4 passes. So lets assume that 500 customers sign up for this; that would be $10,000 annually coming in over the internet? Bang, you have a money making machine while you sleep!
Any "triers" out there?
Thursday, December 10, 2009
Lessons from Apple
With a friend, you can talk for hours about health care, recession, housing, taxes and the environment. With all these issues (oh yes, don't forget the eye of the Tiger fiasco), is it any wonder that we seek more and more information to be more informed; to make better decisions; and to be more responsible).
But something is happening out there. Our need for information is completely and totally saturated by the volume of information we receive knowingly and unknowingly. "Enough", we say, yet our email box continually runneth over.
And we are blaming Google. A 21 billion dollar company that some claim is the most successful in the history of the world. That's quite a claim!
The anti-Google people have emerged saying that the all consuming search engine is not only eating the world, but is eating itself. Its very strategy of SEO (Search engine Optimization) drives a finite market to an ever increasing number of messages which are ultimately sold at lower and lower prices.
What got me thinking about this was a link to an MSNBC article "Why Apple Does Everything Wrong", sent to me by Wood Foss, Proprietor of Alley Katz in Westerly RI. Apple is not a great internet marketer. It doesn't blog, has a limited presence on face book and believes more in brand focus.
They also makes great products.
Ask anyone who owns Ipods, MAC computers, Iphones; zealots everyone. Thy proclaim the sanctity of their purchasers...and they tell everyone who asks and some who don't.
They also build their brand with very cool television advertising combined with dimensionally hip billboards and exhaustive and credible sales training (check out an Apple Retail store, whew!! and let me know your experience with the sales people) they rock. So here is the irony. A new media company spending more money on traditional forms of old media than on new media internet based platforms.
Whats going on?
I think its the backlash that is making Apple cool. They are doing what everybody talks about, but no "new media" company has had the guts to do except Apple; and that is to not flood the finite market with seemingly "another email" or "another blog" or even "another face book posting"; established by the SEO genies.
Now I am not saying that these tools are not important. Any one in their right mind knows that. It's just that we have become addicted to this "digital crack", so much so that we may have forgotten about human behavior. In fact, a Nasdaq listed company called eXelate has just completed a study that shows 80% of all advertising clicks are done by 16% of the total audience. Sounds like the old 80/20 rule to me.
As new as the new media is, it should teach us that new gets old pretty quickly these days. More importantly, we all need to know how to mix the new media and the old media together to get to our customers with our "message of opportunity" for him
Oh yes, a great product would help too.
But something is happening out there. Our need for information is completely and totally saturated by the volume of information we receive knowingly and unknowingly. "Enough", we say, yet our email box continually runneth over.
And we are blaming Google. A 21 billion dollar company that some claim is the most successful in the history of the world. That's quite a claim!
The anti-Google people have emerged saying that the all consuming search engine is not only eating the world, but is eating itself. Its very strategy of SEO (Search engine Optimization) drives a finite market to an ever increasing number of messages which are ultimately sold at lower and lower prices.
What got me thinking about this was a link to an MSNBC article "Why Apple Does Everything Wrong", sent to me by Wood Foss, Proprietor of Alley Katz in Westerly RI. Apple is not a great internet marketer. It doesn't blog, has a limited presence on face book and believes more in brand focus.
They also makes great products.
Ask anyone who owns Ipods, MAC computers, Iphones; zealots everyone. Thy proclaim the sanctity of their purchasers...and they tell everyone who asks and some who don't.
They also build their brand with very cool television advertising combined with dimensionally hip billboards and exhaustive and credible sales training (check out an Apple Retail store, whew!! and let me know your experience with the sales people) they rock. So here is the irony. A new media company spending more money on traditional forms of old media than on new media internet based platforms.
Whats going on?
I think its the backlash that is making Apple cool. They are doing what everybody talks about, but no "new media" company has had the guts to do except Apple; and that is to not flood the finite market with seemingly "another email" or "another blog" or even "another face book posting"; established by the SEO genies.
Now I am not saying that these tools are not important. Any one in their right mind knows that. It's just that we have become addicted to this "digital crack", so much so that we may have forgotten about human behavior. In fact, a Nasdaq listed company called eXelate has just completed a study that shows 80% of all advertising clicks are done by 16% of the total audience. Sounds like the old 80/20 rule to me.
As new as the new media is, it should teach us that new gets old pretty quickly these days. More importantly, we all need to know how to mix the new media and the old media together to get to our customers with our "message of opportunity" for him
Oh yes, a great product would help too.
Monday, December 7, 2009
The Voice
You know, its hell when you're sick and when you lose your voice like I did this past week, it's hell especially if you are a marketer.
But how many of us occasionally lose our marketing voice?. Look at companies like Caldor, Montgomery Wards, Woolworth and other big box retailers that have lost their voice. They just didn't know how to talk to their customer about satisfying their customers changing needs. More recently, GM and Chrysler lost their voice and we all know what happened to them.
The voice, as I call it is our marketing mantra; it is who we are, it is how we communicate; it is the tone we set. It is the trust we have built.
If you are not reacting to your customers needs, they won't hear your voice. Here is an example. To us, a short season bowling league may be 12 to 24 weeks, but to today's open play bowler who may want some more competition and camaraderie that league bowling offers, their idea of a short season is 6 to 8 weeks. You may not like to hear that, but that's what they are saying. And they are also saying they only want to do this once a month or every other week. What's our voice going to be? Will it be "yes we hear you, but you can only have a 12 week or 16 week product because well, gee, its easier for us and besides you'll really like it?" Or are we going to say "We hear you and well, gee, we have a dynamite short season adult child program on a weekend day (when they want to bowl)that you are just going to love?"
Get your message strong in January; its the best time to start short season programs and the best time for our customers to hear our marketing "voice".
And take your Tami Flu.
But how many of us occasionally lose our marketing voice?. Look at companies like Caldor, Montgomery Wards, Woolworth and other big box retailers that have lost their voice. They just didn't know how to talk to their customer about satisfying their customers changing needs. More recently, GM and Chrysler lost their voice and we all know what happened to them.
The voice, as I call it is our marketing mantra; it is who we are, it is how we communicate; it is the tone we set. It is the trust we have built.
If you are not reacting to your customers needs, they won't hear your voice. Here is an example. To us, a short season bowling league may be 12 to 24 weeks, but to today's open play bowler who may want some more competition and camaraderie that league bowling offers, their idea of a short season is 6 to 8 weeks. You may not like to hear that, but that's what they are saying. And they are also saying they only want to do this once a month or every other week. What's our voice going to be? Will it be "yes we hear you, but you can only have a 12 week or 16 week product because well, gee, its easier for us and besides you'll really like it?" Or are we going to say "We hear you and well, gee, we have a dynamite short season adult child program on a weekend day (when they want to bowl)that you are just going to love?"
Get your message strong in January; its the best time to start short season programs and the best time for our customers to hear our marketing "voice".
And take your Tami Flu.
Thursday, December 3, 2009
A Coupon Cornucopia
Package goods marketers describe the distribution of free product as a way to get trial - the ability to get new purchases from non users or low users. In our industry we describe the process of getting trial as the distribution of free games.
In our business, free games are a marketing staple. We use it as a reward, as an incentive, as a gift, as a donation and as an apology.
When we get people to join a have a ball league, we might give them 5 free games or 10 free games at the end of the program. When we want to generate additional traffic we can distribute thousands of free games within our community, via shoe leather, via direct mail and now via email, facebook or twitter. If the lanes break down during open play, we will give free games to those unlucky participants too. Overall, it is a very useful tool.
What is not as well used is the bounce back coupon and if it is being used, it is stuck at "just one offer". The purpose of the bounce back is to give the customer an incentive to return to our business again by offering a reduced price offering for one of our products.
However we should be testing a series of offers. Test a "$5 off when you spend $15". Put a 1 month expiration on it. "This coupon valid 30 days from (date)".
Then after the month is over, test a straight $5 offer, valid Monday through Thursday from 9a to close. Again put a 30 day expiration on it.
The following month, test another offer. Maybe a FREE pizza. After 3 months test them all by distributing one of the three to a different customer every day. at the end of the fourth month you will know which one "pulled better".
You can even distribute bounce backs for a specific program. Give your cosmic bowlers a reason to come in on Wednesdays at 930pm. What incentive can you give them to bring a friend. Dollars off? Free Games? Food? Contributions to a Charity?
Why go through this process?
Because what you or I think is a great offer does not mean a lot.
In fact, it means nothing.
We need to let the customer tell us what offer motivates him off to get off his apathy and into our center.
Every day in every way.
In our business, free games are a marketing staple. We use it as a reward, as an incentive, as a gift, as a donation and as an apology.
When we get people to join a have a ball league, we might give them 5 free games or 10 free games at the end of the program. When we want to generate additional traffic we can distribute thousands of free games within our community, via shoe leather, via direct mail and now via email, facebook or twitter. If the lanes break down during open play, we will give free games to those unlucky participants too. Overall, it is a very useful tool.
What is not as well used is the bounce back coupon and if it is being used, it is stuck at "just one offer". The purpose of the bounce back is to give the customer an incentive to return to our business again by offering a reduced price offering for one of our products.
However we should be testing a series of offers. Test a "$5 off when you spend $15". Put a 1 month expiration on it. "This coupon valid 30 days from (date)".
Then after the month is over, test a straight $5 offer, valid Monday through Thursday from 9a to close. Again put a 30 day expiration on it.
The following month, test another offer. Maybe a FREE pizza. After 3 months test them all by distributing one of the three to a different customer every day. at the end of the fourth month you will know which one "pulled better".
You can even distribute bounce backs for a specific program. Give your cosmic bowlers a reason to come in on Wednesdays at 930pm. What incentive can you give them to bring a friend. Dollars off? Free Games? Food? Contributions to a Charity?
Why go through this process?
Because what you or I think is a great offer does not mean a lot.
In fact, it means nothing.
We need to let the customer tell us what offer motivates him off to get off his apathy and into our center.
Every day in every way.
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