Small Company, Big Image!Small Company, Big Image!Tips and techniques on using new social networking tools and strategies to help small businesses grow by building strong online and offline customer communities. 
Articles
How to Get Customer Input On a Budget: The New Focus Groups: Online Network
2008-01-14 21:00:00 Today’s Wall St. Journal has an article about how big companies are using online networks of loyal customers to gain valuable insights. They are used for collecting customer opinions on ads as well as new products. I think there are great ideas here for small companies putting together lead generation programs. Del Monte Foods established an online community, “I Love My Dog” which helped them launch a successful new product, Snausages Breakfast Bites. This private, online community is made up of 400 handpicked customers. Del Monte uses the group, according to WSJ, to build buzz, create products and test market campaigns. This trend started with technology and videogame companies first. See my earlier post here about how Motorola, Chordiant Software and others shortened research time to determine features for new product releases. The online groups are proving to be less costly and more effective than in-person focus groups or phone surveys. Key reas... More About: Customer , Network , Online , Budget , Focus
Small Business Blog Generates Leads & Sales: Boycott Software Sweatshop
2008-01-10 02:05:00 Raza Imam at Boycott Software Sweatshops blog is an outstanding example of small business blogging at its (humorous) finest. I love his "about Me" bio here--to the point and honest. Raza's blog is a way to win the hearts and minds of small/mid-size and startup companies that could benefit from the services of his offshore outsourcing company (Adaptive Solutions, Inc.). He is focusing on the trials and tribulations (of which there are evidently many) of companies who make bad choices when selecting offshore software partners. Kudos to Raza for investing in this educational, entertaining blog. The blog is helping him to win business. See Raza's comments on a recent post (aptly titled, Blog Dammit) at the award-winning Duct Tape blog here. Here is how he describes his blogging success (in part): "I started it (the blog) a few months ago to liven up my brand and it’s been my main lead generation tool. It’s very hard to differenti... More About: Business , Small Business , Sales
Marketing Strategies to Grow Your Small Business in 2008: My Top 5 Tips
2008-01-04 22:11:00 Now is the time when, among tons of other business and personal decisions (do I just take a room at the local fitness center?), we must decide on the best strategies and tools to generate leads and grow our businesses in the New Year. And by best of course we mean: what is the cheapest, fastest and most successful way to keep new leads coming in to meet our sales and revenue goals? Hum, cheapest and fastest and most successful… How happy are you with traditional direct (postal) mail programs, email newsletters and traditional web site lead generation results? Maybe these types of programs are working for you and you can stay on the same path for 08. If not, you may need to invest more time to find marketing tools that work for you. If you are ready to try something new, and invest time on your marketing, here my top 5 recommendations for a new small business marketing and lead generation program. 1. Increase the number of two-way conversations you have with... More About: Marketing , Business , Small Business , Marketing Strategies , Tips
Small Company Big Image is Blog of the Day Winner!
2007-12-15 01:02:00 What a great way to end the week! I just got an email from my small business blogger pal Bari Lee at SEI Design Group, that Small Company Big Image won Blog of the Day! Thanks to SEI Design Group Blog for nominating me. Thanks also to the Blog of the Day team. This is an incentive to other small business bloggers--blog on. More About: Winner
Exciting Startup Company, Delicious Starters
2007-12-10 04:19:00 One of the benfits of being a small business consultant is that once in awhile I have the privilege of hearing a really exciting startup company make a pitch to potential investors. That was my experience the other day. More about the startup in the future, when they go live… This investor gathering was at a lovely home in North San Diego County. The host and hostess were just gracious. The two entrepreneurs launching the startup were professional, well-prepared and the new company itself is exciting. Everyone blended together and the 16-person event was both social and constructive. Anyway, so much for teasing you about details I cannot reveal as yet. (More on this startup in January.) One detail I can share with you is Chef Scotty (Scott Wagner), Founder of Chile Co. Catering located in nearby San Marcos, California. Chef Scotty and the hostess chose and served the most delightful d’Ouerves. Chef Scotty uses only organic ingredients a... More About: Company , Startup , Delicious
Very Cool Small Business Blogger from Blogworld (Image)
2007-11-20 23:45:00 For my previous post on SEI design group blog, here is a photo of the blog. More About: Business , Blogger , Small Business , Cool , Small
Very Cool Small Business Blogger from Blogworld
2007-11-20 23:38:00 Small business owners are routinely encouraged to follow the advice of marketing folks like me about growing your business. Using blogs, etc. Of course, SMBI (Small Company, Big Image!) and its cohorts live and breathe this stuff. I mean, why to blog (my previous cases are made here and here) and other new media (so called social networking) tools. You would think we would just let you get on with running your small company—a mammoth job in and of itself. But then there is that pesky problem of finding prospects and customers. And having conversations with them about solving problems and improving their lives and businesses. But I digress. So, just when I have admonished you one more time, enter Bari Lee! Bari was one of the many insightful people, speakers and experts we met at the hugely successful Blogworld Expo recently. Bari is the voice of SEI design group blog. SEI is an architecture, planning and consulting group and... More About: Business , Blogger , Small Business , Cool , Small
Business Week Interviews SmallCompanyBigImage
2007-11-07 14:17:00 Yesterday Amy Barrett a journalist with Business Week Small Biz called me to talk about a common question from her small business readers: Should (very) small businesses blog? My answer to Amy is ‘it depends’. There are certainly lots of good reasons for Business owners to launch a blog. 1. Search engines love the frequently updated content on blogs. Notice how often when you perform a search for anything using the keywords that relate to your topic, the first few results are actually blogs. It’s a search engine world. 2. A Blog is another Internet presence. A blog gives your small business another place to be ‘found’ by buyers searching for your products and services. The blog is a powerful tool to build your brand.3. Blogs are conversations. You have the opportunity to talk directly to your prospective buyers. Blogs are not ads. Blogs are not brochures. You are not “selling” on you... More About: Interviews , Business Week
Anticipating New Social Media Ideas from Blog World Expo & New Media
2007-10-06 03:42:00 I'm looking forward to attending the Blog World Expo & New Media Conference in Las Vegas next month. Of the other blogging seminars I’ve experienced, this one has the most intriguing speakers and topics. And I like that the newly launched organization of the same name, is based in my neck of the woods—San Diego (Pacific Beach specifically which was my neighborhood back in the day). For those of us focused on how to generate leads and increase sales for the business-to-business folks, using blogs, social networks, and other two-way dialogue customer communication tools, this promises to be a winner. Key seminars for me include:- How Web Communities Apply To Your Company- How Online Conversations Change Markets- Blogging and Your Brand,( with the esteemed Charlene Li of Forrester Research) In addition to Charlene Li, among the speakers I’m excited to hear are: Arianna Huffington, Founder of the Huffington Post Larry Weber, I’m reading his new... More About: Ideas , Social
Using Social Networking Sites for Lead Generation: Marketing Sherpa Success
2007-10-03 18:38:00 If your company markets and sells to businesses, it is difficult to find examples of successful lead generation campaigns using social networks. Success es using social networking sites by consumer companies abound. Thanks to the intrepid Marketing Sherpa team, we have a rare business-to-business example with the recent case study from Information Builders, an enterprise software vendor. Information Builders markets and sells business intelligence software to enterprises. Social Networking Site Participation Challenge How can a company participate in an industry online group, bulletin board or other social networking site without appearing to be just “selling”? Kudos to companies like Information Builders that do the pick-and-shovel work of commenting and adding to the conversation on these sites. But according to their Director of Internet Marketing, Chris Boylan, “…there’s only so many times you can jump into a discussion without seeming t... More About: Social Networking
How to Keep Up with Your Industry: (Quickly) Following Business Blogs
2007-08-23 20:36:00 This is a follow up from my recent post here. I promised to write about how to more quickly find and follow business blogs that are written by influential people in your industry space. The initial step in developing and launching a blog strategy for your business is similar to that of launching your product or service. You want to become familiar with the competitive landscape by following blogs for a time. It will be important for you to quickly ‘scan’ (read) blogs for a couple of weeks in order to determine which ones are the most credible and relevant to your market, clients and prospects. Secret Weapon for Speed Reading The secret weapon in ‘quickly scanning blogs’ is using a news reader. Clearly, the news readers work for any site that provides updated ‘content alerts’ using RSS—or the ‘universal feed icon’ (see symbol to the left). (That means the news reader only presents to you the newest articles/content.) You do not have to hunt around ... More About: Business , Industry , Blogs , With You , Sine
Turning Blog Readers into Customers: WSJ Covers Successful Small Business B
2007-08-21 01:23:00 The highlight of today’s Wall St. Journal small business blog article is about how Sequence, Inc. is now finding customers from their web site, based on the owner’s blog. The excellent article covers the pluses and minuses of business blogs launched by entrepreneurs and small business owners. This article highlights a few small business owners that have had success turning their blog readers into customers. Now there’s a goal we all aspire to—and by ‘we’ I mean business owners venturing into using a business blog as a marketing tool. The best example for business owners is an insightful mini case study. Tracy L. Coenen, owner of a private, forensic accounting practice, Sequence, Inc. Tracy launched her blog, FRAUDfiles, in November 2005 and has experienced a significant boost in revenue as a result. She credits a 31% boost in revenue last year from 2005 to her blog and expects a 50% revenue increase this year over 2006. This... More About: Business , Small Business , Readers , Customers , Blog
A Company Blog: Not Ready To Start One? You Can Still Tap Into the Power
2007-08-11 03:24:00 In the age of Google and search engine marketing, getting your name or your company’s name out on the Web is crucial. Online public relations is a great way to pump up your word of mouth marketing. Search engines like lots of things that are common to new media (blogs and Podcasts): Why? New media, blog, web sites typically provide: frequently updated content inbound links, or link popularity ability to register with directories to get the content out on the web You can accomplish all of these things for your business with a company blog. And starting your own company blog is best. If you’re not familiar with why a business blog is an important tool to execute your marketing strategy, see my earlier posts here and here. But if you’re not quite ready to take the plunge and launch the corporate blog, here’s another two-step option. 1. Find key business blogs in your industry. 2. Just as you would establish a relationship with an editor or b... More About: Power , Company , Blog , Start , Ready
Why (A Few) Executives Use Blogs to Communicate with Their Customers
2007-08-03 20:59:00 The eyes of most (and by most I mean all) CEOs, owners and executives of the small to mid-size companies I know still glaze over when I say the words “blog”, “online community”, or “social media marketing”. My personal challenge is to find a way to explain the "new marketing/public relations” two-way dialogs and authentic conversations vs. the old, traditional marketing--one-way, interruption marketing/advertising. But I digress. Dan Greenfield (blogger and corporate spokesperson for Earthlink) did a great post quoting Peter Kim, analyst from Forrester Research, about so-called, client side blogs. These 13 client side blogs are people blogging that are not consultants, service providers (like yours truly), etc. The client side bloggers are folks that only represent their company—not multiple clients. I like to think of them as company blogs. These bloggers were asked why they blog and why they think there are so few client side bloggers (company... More About: Customers , Blogs , Communicate , Executives
Using Buyer Personas to Improve Sales, Conversions, Reduce Help Desk Inquir
2007-07-24 04:30:00 Today I listened to a MarketingProfs’s webinar from March 7, 2007 and heard a different view point of the uses of Buyer Personas to really understand your customers (my earlier post here on personas) from expert Tamara Adlin. She talked about marketing successes companies have had using personas—like increasing sales, improving use of a web site and reducing help desk inquiries. Very insightful content for all of marketing, though targeted at product design. Tamara co-authored a book The Persona Lifecycle, Keeping People in Mind Throughout Product Design. Here’s my summary definition of personas gleaned from Tamara:- Fake people (or concrete representations) based on real data- Focused on goals and behaviors- A tool to make customer data come alive You gain at least two key benefits from developing/using personas according to Tamara Adlin: Focuses you clearly on customer goals: The basic exercise of building personas helps you focus on the experienc... More About: Sales , Reduce , Improve , Desk
How to Use Buyer Personas to Find Customers and Prospects
2007-07-16 21:10:00 Small companies and business owners are missing new customer acquisition opportunities by not clarifying who their customers really are. Sure, we all say we know our target audiences and customers. But how well do we really? I always say that I feel like I am starting at square one when a business owner or marketer tells me “I know who my buyers are. They are women (or men) between the ages of 45 and 60.” The end. Humm…Since this description covers a massive portion of the population, let’s try to narrow it a bit. (I say smiling…) Building Buyer Persona s is the (new) marketing approach to what we called (back in the day) profiling customers. David Meerman Scott, the well-known and respected author, blogger, speaker and my favorite evangelist of “The New Rules of Marketing and PR” (the title of his newest book) does a fabulous job of explaining why small businesses, really all businesses, can benefit from building “The Buyer ... More About: Customers , Find , Custom
Smart B2B Marketing: Small Business Shows How to Differentiate
2007-06-26 20:12:00 Small businesses looking for lessons in how to differentiate their products from competitors, can take a quick lesson from an article about small business Magnatag Visible Systems in today’s Wall St. Journal, Taking the 'Common' Out of 'Commodity' Custom Whiteboards Set Tiny Factory Apart From Generic Rivals. The company sells a highly commoditized business office product—the erasable white board. We can all relate to the humble white board. If you’ve spent any time working in corporate America, you have (fond) memories of hours and marathon ‘brain storming’ meetings huddled around the white board. A Magnatag whiteboard had a recurring role in early episodes of NBC's 'ER.' Source: Wall St. Journal, June 26, 2007 Magnatag whiteboards are customized by industry and contain printed customized grids and graphics for each vertical market. The boards also include industry-specific supplies like magnets, lettering, symbols and card... More About: Marketing , Business , Small Business , Smart , Small
Indirect Sales Channel Small Business Lessons from Facebook
2007-06-24 23:17:00 If you’re a small business or mid-size company that sells through a dealer, rep or VAR (value added reseller) channel, there are some key lessons from Facebook . Right. The online social networking site that your college-age kids are using. Your challenge with sales channels is to keep your products top of mind. Among other things, you want to make sure that they are using the most-up-to-date customer collateral, have the latest answers to frequently asked questions, can easily keep up with the most successful customer applications … the list goes on. Below is an excerpt from a post by Tom Evslin on his blog that is spot on for explaining how you can link (work) online more closely with your sales channel."Facebook’s mission statement tells the story once you look at it carefully:Facebook is a social utility that connects you with the people around you.Facebook is made up of many networks, each based around a company, region, high school or college.You can u... More About: Business , Small Business , Sales , Small
Top 10 Ways to Add Social Media to B2B Marketing
2007-06-21 19:37:00 Social media marketing is emerging as a viable business-to-business marketing, public relations option. It is even becoming a useful so-called Web 2.0 tool for executing business strategy, as companies obtain valuable customer preferences and opinions from their online communities. Here is a PowerPoint (definitely not a Web 2.0 tool) I created to explain to a group recently how B2B companies can apply the new social networking, social media concepts and tools. (Here is my earlier post on social networking.) Download smallcobigimage_only_the_paranoid_blogb2b _primer.pdf Does anyone have other social media, social networking tips for business-to-business marketing? More About: Marketing , Social , Media
Marketing Success: Social Networking Insights from Josh Berman, MySpace Fou
2007-06-07 04:18:00 Business owners and business marketers in the audience gained some key insights from a talk today at the San Diego Venture Group’s 5th Annual Venture Summit (a gathering of California venture capitalists). The keynote speaker (actually, interviewee) was Josh Berman, Co-Founder and COO at MySpace.com. MySpace is the largest social networking site (my earlier post on social networking sites) on the planet according to Media Metrix (comscore) who tracks such things. (Talk about a small company success!) The interview was compelling, informal and meaty. Hats off to the interviewer, Michael Montgomery, President of Montgomery & Co. Montgomery has brokered many key media transactions (deals) including the recent sale of MySpace to News Corp. Here is a pic I found of Josh Berman from Sundance Film Festival. He is a very, very smart, authentic, knows-his-market guy. Berman talked about the lean days of growing a startup and while working at (other) startups.... More About: Marketing , Social , Social Networking , Networking , Myspace
How (Why) To Spend Quality Time with Customers
2007-05-15 20:38:00 The Wall Street Journal’s Carol Hymowitz in her ‘In the Lead’ column yesterday shares some great findings about how business to business (B2B) sales is changing with more CEOs and top executives actively participating in the actual sales process. Gone are the days of CEO, high-level ‘say hello’ customer meetings. I think there are important insights here for B2B marketing also. CEOs at the major companies (Intel, Sun Microsystems) are listening to customer needs for issues such as speedier product development and training, and becoming the buyer’s advocate back at their own company. The article says in part: “Top executives like Mr. Otellini (Intel) find they are working more closely than ever with their customers, and listening and responding to their requests for product customization or service and training. They are becoming involved even in the nitty-gritty of contract negotiations.” This article reinforces the markets are conversations realit... More About: Customers , Time , Quality , Custom , Ality
What Is Social Media & Why Should Small Businesses Care?
2007-04-28 00:35:00 I spoke to three different business people today (two small business owners & one mid-sized corporate person) who had a similar so-called pain point in common. (Honest, I didn’t even ask them.) Email marketing is not working. Prospects are not responding to email pitches. Even members/customers that have “opted in” to a company’s email list aren’t responding. To say that everyone is inundated with email newsletters, announcements, offers, etc. is the understatement of the century. So here’s my rant. What businesses can use more of are—wait for it—not customers, but customer relationships. We can probably agree that it’s really tough to try to start a customer relationship with an email pitch. Even a clever email pitch. Or even a enewsletter. Especially if the prospect doesn’t know who your company is, or how you can solve their problems better than anyone else. That’s why I think that the... More About: Social , Media , Care , Small , Small Businesses
Understanding RSS: Excellent Article by Plant Services Magazine Editor
2007-04-25 09:36:00 Small business owners—well all of us—need to save time. Especially if you (wish to) follow blogs or other frequently updated sites online. RSS, or Really Simple Syndication, is a little understood time-saver. Many of us associate RSS as a complex “Web 2.0 term” if at all. My friends say, …yeah I’ve heard of RSS…” Though recent surveys indicate that executives are catching on to its use. RSS and a Feed Reader help me read dozens of blogs and other frequently updated web sites without ever opening my web browser, Internet Explorer. I can read/scan the blogs very rapidly. When I open my ‘mini-web browser', or news reader, it displays the most recent articles posted on the blogs/news sites I follow. Michael Ermitage, Senior Web Editor of Plan t Services Magazine , has published a thorough article at PlantServices.com about RSS. How to ease into using RSS is well worth a read. His explanation is comprehensive &nb... More About: Article
Building Blogger Relationships: MarketingProfs Webinar
2007-04-12 23:57:00 MarketingProfs produced a great online seminar today titled, Social Media 2.0: Building a Blogger Relations Program. Josh Hallet, social media consultant and voice of HyKu blog, delivered a lively and info-packed presentation. He provided plenty of from-the-trenches insights and tips useful for small business owners and marketers trying to reach out to business blogs and business bloggers. Well okay, for businesses of all sizes really. This approach really is the way to go for small business to business companies on small budgets, a.k.a., public relations 2.0. Josh provided a tight overview of the basics that apply during business blogger interactions when you’re interested in getting help from an editor, journalist, blogger or industry analyst. He also offered smart suggestions for those of us working to help companies boost their online public relations such as how to develop meaningful (fruitful) relationships with bloggers in your industry. Som... More About: Relationships , Webinar , Logger
Social Networking Sites: Ideas for Marketers
2007-04-11 17:33:00 ClickZ covers a study about how adults visit social networking sites online. Enid Burns wrote the article 'Marketing to Social Networking Sites ', Targeted, and provides some interesting takeaways for marketers. The study found that, “One in four adult Internet users in the U.S. regularly visits popular social networking sites, according to “iProspect Social Networking User Behavior Study,” a report sponsored by iProspect and conducted by JupiterResearch”The article defines a social networking site this way: “one that allows Internet users the ability to add user-generated content such as: comments, review, feedback, ratings, or their own dedicated pages.” Sites such as MySpace, YouTube, and Amazon.com fit the study's classification of social networking sites. I will add for that for business to business audiences two social networking sites are, LinkedIn and Ryze. These two sites help business folks identify others with similar interests and ... More About: Ideas
New Business Marketing: Web 2.0 Ecosystem
2007-04-02 23:34:00 A picture is worth a thousand words. Or a gazillion dollars. This view of Web 2.0 , created by Yael Elish, CEO of eSnips (a cool social content sharing site) and posted at Down the Avenue Blog, is intriguing. The original intent of the Web 2.0 ecosystem image and the posts by a Business 2.0 editor and others, was to demonstrate the market value in relationship to Alexa rankings of the fast-growing companies in the Web 2.0 space. I like the image because it shows us the future of communication, advertising, public relations, marketing, reaching people. (Click on the image to make it larger.) Here is Down the Avenue's complete post. More About: Marketing , Business Marketing , Ecosystem |
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