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The Prospect’s Protest and The MarketingExperiments Creed

Just an update about "Revolutionizing the way you communicate"  from the recent MarketingExperiments webinar.  The notes were published in the MarketingExperiments blog:

"Yesterday, during one of our most widely attended webclinics ever, Dr. Mcglaughlin passionately talked about marketing to the post-modern consumer in 2008. In it, he stated a problem, puting it in the form of a protest to marketers from today’s average Internet consumer. He then proposed a response, which he put in the form of a creed, that he believes all marketers would be wise to adopt.

During the call and since then, participants and subscribers have been asking for copies of both documents. So, I have the permission and privilege of posting them here"

View the full posting:  The Prospect’s Protest and The MarketingExperiments Creed

No Travel Required for this Kind of Trade Show

You may have heard of the term "Virtual Tradeshow" and been interested to learn more.

I visited Unisfair, a provider of virtual tradeshow environments, and had a look around their virtual showcase. It had an exhibition hall, where I found virtual exhibitor booths. In the booths there were flash presentations, webcasts, pdfs, and even live chat (and soon to be internet phone capabilities). The conference hall also had presentations. During a live show, there might be live video presentations. A virtual trade show usually takes place live on a certain day, but can remain on-demand for weeks (or months) after the live event.

Unisfair says that they have registered up to 3000 people for an event, and that the average visitor stayed for two hours. They say that there are two main reasons that people go to the virtual tradeshows (similar to real trade shows), one is for researching, the other for networking. They have built certain features to facilitate both. For networking, they have a networking lounge where you can chat and meet people. You can also create a profile, and browse others.

It seems like an interesting concept. Some of the unique benefits of a virtual tradeshow vs. a real-life one include:

· people don't have to leave their desk (that includes participants, speakers, and exhibitors)

· everything is track-able – this is very interesting for lead generation, you can track who visits your booth, how long they stay, what they view or download, you can rank the leads based on behavior, and send them directly to sales

· event can remain on-demand - so that you can continue to drive leads from it

Now don’t expect virtual graphics or entertainment sophistication like Second Life. But I think they have tried to make it an exciting and fun environment. Again, I only saw the on-demand showcase, which is more like a sample. I’m sure a live event will be much more interesting. You can also read a bit more about this in a NY Times article, “Cyberspace Trade Shows Bring Action to the Desktop”.

 I registered for a live virtual trade show that runs on November 8^th called “Selling to the Mid-Market”, by CMP Channel (Unisfair is hosting it).  I can kill two birds with one stone, experience a virtual trade show, and do some learning and research on the mid-market. And I think I can live without scoring any real-life chachkas…I wonder what virtual chachka might be….perhaps a free screen saver or desktop (hmmm), or maybe if you are qualified, online credit for something (yay!).

Mixed Media Strategies

Zentation is a tool you can use to upload your slides and sync with your video which I posted previously about. Another web 2.0 site for presentations is slideshare (but there is no video, just slides).

I was browsing Zentation today and came across this brief and entertaining presentation:

Mortality and User Experience - 5:53 5 min talk on why I think of user experience as something sacred.  Given at the first Ignite event in Seattle, WA.

Viewing this presentation reminded me of an article by John Jantsch from Duct Tape Marketing about content and a mixed media strategy where he states:

"On the web, it’s simply not enough to write hard hitting sales copy and call it content. Content, content that educates and builds trust, has become much more active than that and requires a strategic view to be truly effective."

The 25 Basic Styles of Blogging ... And When To Use Each One (from slideshare.net)

| View | Upload your own

Guy Kawasaki - The Art of Innovation (view presentation)

In previous post I mentioned that I had seen Guy Kawasaki speak at CA World 2007. I came across a presentation very similar to the one I saw live. Thanks to  Garr Renoylds  at Presentation Zen for writing about a site called Zentation which provides you an easy way to show your slides in sync with your video.    

Guy Kawasaki - The Art of Innovation 55:38 Guy Kawasaki at the 2007 Event Marketer Conference

CA World Update - Guy Kawasaki, Don Peppers, Ryan Morris

I apologize for not posting in the past few weeks. I was on vacation, and then in Las Vegas for CA World. Below are some comments on a few of the sessions that I attended.

GUY KAWASAKI - The Art of  Innovation (10 tips)
As I mentioned previously I was looking forward to seeing Guy Kawasaki's keynote. It was an energetic, and inspiring speech on "The Art of  Innovation". I was already familiar with Guy Kawasaki from reading his blog and book (The Art of Start), but it was great to see his passion on stage in front of about 5000-6000 people.  I could also tell that the audience was very engaged - it felt like he was really talking to us. His presentation was easy to digest (he broke it down into 10 points), and for each point he had a great story.

UPDATE (Jul 28, 1007):  View a similar presentation to the one I saw live at Zentation.

Denise Dubie from NetworkWorld covered  Guy's 10 Tips on Innovation.  There was actually a bonus  tip called "Don't let the Bozos grind you down" which Guy wrote about earlier in his blog. This was probably the most entertaining part as he used an example from his own life about an idea that he didn't get at the time, but he also provided some interesting quotes by other people such as:

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers" - Thomas Watson, Chairman IBM [1943]

Relating his own experiences in life and at Apple and Garage Technology, he made the points very personal, relevant and entertaining - the crowd broke down into laughter several times!   If you ever have a chance to see Guy speak, don't miss it!

DON PEPPER - Who Moved My ROI:  Building the Value of the Customer & the Company
Don Pepper from Peppers & Rogers gave an interesting presentation on ROC (Return on Customer):

"Today's most forward-thinking companies are focused on creating enterprise value by getting the greatest return on their scarcest resource - their customers. By measuring Return on Customer(ROC), the rate of change in customer equity, these companies are actively demonstrating a calculated choice between immediate earnings and permanent value creation. " [CA World Session Description]

I thought this was an interesting perspective and was shocked to hear that 4 out of 5 CFO's are willing to give up their customer equity for immediate gain to meet their numbers. Ok I'm not shocked but disappointed. He said that bad management decisions and marketing can bring down Customer equity -- or the lifetime value of all current and future customers. Learn more about ROC
 

RYAN MORRIS - Adapting to the Evolution of the Technology Market (IPED)
This was my 2nd time seeing Ryan speak and it was just as awesome. His presentation was so relevant to today's Solution Providers. He spoke about how the market had changed because of what customers demanded. In the old model, customers wanted better technology and vendors and solution providers knew all about features and technology, but now, customers want better business results. Thus the Solution Provider's most important skill is translating what we sell (from technical products) to what customers want (business value). Ryan described a 5-step systematic approach to becoming a Best-in-Class Solution Provider (from IPED Best-In-Class Methodology). He also provided key performance indicators (KPI) on the Best-in-Class vs. Average Solution Providers based on a benchmark study.  These figures (such as EBITA, Gross Margin, Investment in Services etc.) are very interesting. To learn more about the 5-step approach and the KPI's -  view the presentation.

IPED (The Institute for Partner Education & Development) is the professional services division of CMP Channel group. Through access to exclusive data and expert analysis, they apply proven best practices to deliver recommendations and that accelerate channel  revenue. To learn visit IPED's website.

I was very impressed by the attendance and organization of CA World. I wasn't expecting 8000 people (customers, partners, media) to be there. It was great that they had a Partner Track, and a focus on Marketing Intelligence (with 3rd party Industry speakers such as Don Pepper, and Ryan Morris). I was able to learn not just about the products but came home with ideas on how to market them.

Seth Godin's presentation to Google

The other day, I was at the grocery store buying a tiny can of gourmet cat food in turkey and sweet potato flavour and thought; oh my cat is going to love this! ! I couldn't help but chuckle remembering a point that Seth Godin made in his presentation to Goggle. Cat food isn't marketed for cats. If it were, it would all be mouse flavoured <chuckle>, as Seth says.

Be a fly on the wall at Google, and watch Seth Godin's presentation to Google. Seth talks about why Google has been so successful and how they can keep being successful. Advice we can all gain from! This video also ties into Seth's book All Marketers are Liars which is all about the power of storytelling.

One point that really stuck me was what Seth said is the core of what’s driven revenue for Google. It is the ability for Google ads to deliver anticipated, personal and relevant messages to people who want to get them, when they want to get them, at the right place, in the way they want to get it. This is what he says is permission marketing – selling to people that want to be sold. 

I will follow-up on how this point translates to B2B Marketing later. It translates very nicely!

The video is 45 minutes, but worth every minute of it.

Good stock business images

In the mid-nineties, I worked for a company that represented commercial illustrators. Most of the work was commissioned by advertising and design firms who needed illustrations for their client's advertising, packaging, and corporate communication projects.

Back then the word “stock” had a very negative connotation because it devalued creative work. It wasn’t very common for companies to buy stock photography or illustration. As well, since stock images were not in great demand, the selection was limited.

Today is a different story. Companies are still commissioning new work for certain projects, but stock images are in great demand. Especially for online projects where there is no time or money to create new images.

Working for a small B2B company, my creative resources are scarce. A few years back I purchased a photo service subscription for my marketing collateral needs. I liked the photos at Getty Images but found it too expensive as a pay-per-photo model. I wanted the freedom to download as many pictures that I wanted for a set yearly subscription.

Lately however, I’ve been disappointed at the selection of images at my service (especially with Information Technology themed photos). I started to see a lot of other sites popping up. Garr Reynolds at Presentation Zen has an excellent list of sites in his post “Where you can find good images”. I had a quick look at iStockphoto.com, one of the sites that Garr mentioned, and was very impressed with the quality and prices.

Interestingly iStockphoto.com is owned by Getty Images. In Business 2.0 I found an article about the giants of the stock photo business, Getty Images and Corbis. They are being challenged by a flock of tiny "microstock" agencies. In the article it explains that:

“Klein's [CEO of Getty] initial plan for dealing with the microstock revolution was to buy into it. In early 2006 Getty purchased iStockphoto for $50 million. As he tells it, the revolution is a blessing in disguise. Most of iStockphoto's customers could never have bought an image before, and many probably simply copied what they needed. If Klein can bring them in the door with iStockphoto, he might get some of them to consider Getty's better images, and to this end he'll introduce a new line of photos that is more expensive than microstock but cheaper than the company's other offerings.”

"Our aim is to provide imagery for every budget," Klein says. "I want as much share of each customer's wallet as possible." 

iStockphoto is interesting as anybody can submit their photographs and earn some revenue. They also have user reviews and ratings. As well you can see how popular images are from downloads and view statistics.

If you have the budget, you might go with the bigger guns like Getty Images, but for smaller companies, or smaller budget projects, the microstock agencies provide a great option. I’m looking forward to researching my options for good images!

Incidentally, the company that I used to work for have since changed their business to remain competitive. They expanded into the US that still commissions a lot of new creative work, and they have made a business from selling their own stock images.

Got a great B2B presentation to share?

Guy Kawasaki mentioned a contest today in his blog, called the World's Best Presentation Contest. The comments in the blog brought up the point  - how can you judge a presentation without the presenter?  The contest and site slideshare (it is like a youtube for presentations) is worth visiting. If you have a good presentation, take a shot, you'll get some views and there are also some cool prizes :)

Guy's 10/20/30 rule which I wrote about previously, has greatly improved our sales presentations but I still feel like I'm continuously trying to improve presentations. I don't give them much, but I prepare them for events and our sales folks. I've found some good information on Presentation Zen. I've been looking for a book about presenting information visually for marketing and sales (more from the concept side rather than how-to in powerpoint). I recently ordered Envisioning Information by Tufte. If you know of any good books on this, please let me know.

An expected B2B presenter - David Suzuki

I had been greatly anticipating the CMA B2B Conference 2007. It was my first time attending this conference and I thought I’d come back with fresh new ideas and perspectives. Either my expectation was off, or something was amiss. I spoke to a few other attendees during lunch and our comments were:  learned nothing new, no practical information, failed to engage or inspire, irrelevant content, and felt like we were being sold to.

So was it a big miss? Well almost -- there was an unexpected surprise. It was the keynote speech (which ironically didn't seem to have relevance to B2B) by David Suzuki, who is an award-winning scientist, environmentalist and broadcaster. I was excited to see him, mainly because I remember him from my childhood days when I used to watch “The Nature of Things”. He is currently on a cross Canada tour, and spoke to us about the environmental crisis. An issue that as of late I have been putting aside, thinking that it is a big unsolvable global problem that even if I did do something about, would be too small to make a difference.  It was a mind blowing presentation and here’s why:

1. He told us an incredible story
2. In terms we could understand (if the world were a basketball, then the biosphere would be like  a thin sheet of plastic wrap)
3. He evoked emotion and thought
4. He backed up his story with interesting facts
5. His passion was undeniable and authentic
6. He inspired us to learn more and act

By the end of the speech, people were lining up to buy one of his books and get it autographed. A lot of people were eager to sign up for the Nature Challenge which are a few changes we can make in our daily life to make a difference.

So while I didn’t come back with new B2B strategies, it didn’t seem to matter…because I walked away with something completely different and unexpected, and moving. I also have a new book to read, and I've signed up for the Nature Challenge.

In terms of B2B,  think about the above 6 things in terms of your communications or events (I know I will).  If I had to name a 7^th, it would be relevance.  After the conference, I  came across an article , that explained the relevance between B2B and David Suzuki. I am a little more aware and "greener" than when I woke up this morning, and it turns out that I got the fresh perspective I was looking for after all.

A simple rule for better powerpoint presentations

Guy Kawasaki captures the essence of grueling presentations - ones that make people want to flee (or fall asleep). I came across a simple rule by Guy Kawasaki called The 10/20/30 Rule of PowerPoint. It sounds like a simple method to make any presentation better. The rules are 10 slides, 20 minute presentations, and 30 point fonts. This might make for a more memorable presentation rather than a memorable snooze.