Google Maps, an Idea

I love Google Maps especially the Satellite feature. This picture is the result of an address search. The "pin" indicates where Google thinks my house is however it's actually the house with the red box around it. This got me wondering about how this type of inaccuracy could be corrected. Wikis allow us to make changes to them why not Google Maps?

Update: Thanks Chris Gurney for pointing out that Google already offers this capability. It seems that it is in "limited release" though. The "how to" video is on YouTube but I can't make an address edit.

Tuned In to Product Management

If you develop complex products and "solutions" then the upcoming book "Tuned In" is worth a read. There are thousands of business books produced every year so how is this one special? The folks writing this book are key leaders from Pragmatic Marketing. They provide a product management framework for companies that develop, support and sell technology products. They offer training and consulting services and boast a client list that includes Microsoft, Cisco and SAP to name a few.

I took a seminar a couple of months back and highly recommend any product manager to take a look at Pragmatic's framework. It is geared for the tech. industry but I think any product manager could benefit from using parts of it. Sometimes it's better to look at things outside of your industry to get ideas and alternative thinking.

Introducing ProductCampToronto

Join us this fall at ProductCampToronto! This event is an "unconference" where you get to choose the topics of discussion not sponsors with "planted presentations" and event organizers more interested in the agendas of sponsors. Hey, don't get me wrong, some shows are great to attend and deliver value. However, no show, asks and empowers you the attendee to set the topics and direction. ProductCampToronto is for anyone interested in the art and science of product management. To register visit the "official wiki" and join our Facebook Group. Subscribe to this blog for updates too.

Importance of Strategic References

I've talked about the importance of having a solid reference program in place as part of your overall branding strategy.

I like to segment reference customers into three types: Strategic, Marketing and Service/Solution References.

Strategic References are created because both you and the customer need/want to work together closely to achieve key business outcomes of mutual value. This common interest is key to a long term "profitable" partnership where you work together to develop new solutions and markets. This is accomplished by jointly conceptualizing, implementing and then promoting the solution to generate awareness, word of mouth and to advance each others strategic objectives (translation: competitive advantage, sales, productivity).

Case Study

We recently attended an industry tradeshow with the Michener Institute, a strategic reference customer, who demo'd a virtual microscopy solution. Simply put, this solution replaces glass slides with digitized ones and the computer screen takes the place of the microscope.

This is at the very early adoption stage but it is now being taught to healthcare professionals in classroom settings to teach microscopic (say that three times fast!) diagnosis. We wanted to show this technology to various healthcare stakeholders to demonstrate its potential in improving healthcare during the education and healthcare delivery stages (by the way we put in the communications and storage technologies that enable this solution to perform properly and securely).

The customer gathered feedback and generated awareness about this solution now being used to teach their students. It positioned them as unique and innovative. From our perspective our customer advocated our company as a key stakeholder in developing, implementing and supporting the technology that enables students to learn using this solution. Prospective customers heard firsthand what it is like working with our company and how we are solving their problems and in this case helping them innovate. The results were positive for our customer and my company both during and after the show. In fact two articles will be written about this solution in Canada's largest circulated Healthcare Technology Magazine.

If you're not measuring ROI start now!

Many marketers and more importantly CxOs are familiar with the quote from a former adverstising executive that went something like this:

" I know that 50% of my advertising is working. I'm just not sure which 50%
it is."

If I was to say this to the owner or CEO of a company, I'd better have something to protect myself!

It can be difficult to measure results however you must find a way to do this, and by the way, the results that matter the most are revenue, gross margin and cash. Sure things like awareness, recall and positioning are important but, if a marketer wants to sit at the executive table and be considered a peer .... hard quantifiable results is what matters....period.

So how do you do that? First of all this isn't a discussion about Marketing ROI systems, CRM applications and web analytics. It's about figuring out what you can do to directly generate sales opportunities for your sales reps, distributors and partners.

Here's a "to list":

• The first thing you need to do is come up with a sustainable campaign (should last six to twelve months, but this depends on what you sell, how you sell and the length of your sales cycle. Hint: if it's $50k or more expect a longer sales cycle) that is aligned with what your sales reps need AND ARE incented to sell.
• Get the pieces together, establish your budget and expected ROI
• Socialize the campaign with your reps, sales manager(s) and then the CEO. If the reps see that this campaign will help them retire their quota and make their jobs easier you have a better chance of this being a success and yielding a return.
• Define what a "qualified lead" means to the sales team (don't miss this step).
• Tweak the campaign based on feedback and execute and begin measuring!

In terms of ROI you should aim for a 10-1 return as a minimum. For every dollar spent on marketing $10 should be created in revenue or better still gross margin contribution. The size of the opportunity pipeline would depend on the quality of the leads, average size of a sale and your sales reps closing skills.

Measurement should be as simple as possible and all sales opportunities must be tracked by you! You'll need help from your sales reps to ensure that all eligible sales are tagged to the campaign. This requires diligence, persistance and follow up on your part. If your reps aren't using a CRM system and/or you don't have a public sales pipeline you can review you'll need to create a campaign pipeline and manage it with the sales manager. This is critical. Reps are the engines that close deals. They sometimes keep things very close to the vest. You cannot rely on this approach when measuring a campaign. You need to manage and monitor the campaign pipeline with the sales team.

Make The Most of Every Marketing Dollar

In my previous post Building Your B2B Brand, I emphasize the point that a brand is build on reputation. References are an integral part to building your reputation. This article on Forbes gives a good overview of the Reputation Institute's approach to measuring a company's reputation. In a nutshell it boils down to treating your customers and employees well.

Building your B2B Brand (it's all about your reputation)

Don't be led to think that branding and advertising are the same thing. Branding isn't about what you say it's about what people think and feel about you, your people, your product and your company.

Whether you sell to consumers or to businesses the most important "brand attribute" is your reputation. I'm amazed at how companies pick mascots, have stupid characters, use silly slogans that don't tie back to the companies value proposition/customer experience.

Let's take a look at examples from each extreme:

Pets.com
During the .com/.bomb craze we all had more money then sense and branding meant superbowl ads, "eyeballs", and business plans on PowerPoint. So, let's benefit from hindsight shall we?

What does this sock have anything to do with the benefit of shopping online at Pets.com? Nothing! The fact that they couldn't come up with something that represented the value/benefit of shopping online should have been the first sign that Pets.com was doomed!



Red Bull
Drink a few of these puppies (pun intended) and your heart beat is racing! Whether you agree with taking external stimulants to increase energy or not, Red Bull gets it from a branding perspective.

They sponsor sports performers including drag racers, F1 drivers and daredevils. These "hero endorsements" (a term coined by my 10 year old daughter) represent people at the razors edge of speed, performance and exhilaration. I sure hope nobody overdoses on this stuff though!

Tylenol
Years ago some idiot decided to poison some Tylenol tablets in a US city. What did Tylenol do? They pulled every bottle off the shelves across North America (maybe globally). Tylenol then began producing tamper proof packaging. To this day I trust Tylenol.

"Branding" is not a fad and not something you do with a creative director at an ad agency. It is a sum of all the experiences and interactions your customer has with you! Here are some things to think about as you build your "brand" (reputation):

1) What is it that your company or product does for your customer?

2) How do customers feel and think when they use your product or service?

3) What do they experience when working with your professional services organization?

4) What is unique about your service experience over your competition? Do your customers view it as unique?

5) What is it like for your customers to conduct business with your company?

6) What do your sales and services people think are the most important things we should do for our customers?

If you can't answer these questions, find out!

Build your reputation and your brand will look after itself. How do you do this? The key building blocks to building your reputation are the following:

1) A customer reference program - a formal corporate program that tracks customer satisfaction and builds a pool of reference accounts that will endorse your company.

2) Word of Mouth - buyers of B2B products and services seek advice from people they know and trust. Your reference program will help create word of mouth but you'll need to think about how you can also get unbiased mindshare from industry leaders.

3) Thought Leadership - producing value add content and experiences that position you as an expert in your field.

4) Feedback loops - talk to your customers, talk to your sales reps and talk to the founder of your company...regularly. Learn what is working well and what isn't. Find out why.

Building your reputation occurs one day at a time and it depends on customer interaction, input and doing the right things to help your customers be successful. That's what you advertise.