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0 0 votes Three Card Monte, Social Media Style by Dave Brock on 03/15/2010 11:51 0 comments , 367 views Categories: Customer Collective Exclusive, Trust Tags: social media, trust, linkedin Everyone knows the classic con game, called Three Card Monte. It’s a card game where the dealer rearranges cards (usually on a cardboard box to aid in escaping) in an attempt to confuse the player on the location of a specific card. The player guesses which of three cards is the designated card, if he is right, he wins the bet. It’s a classic con, in Manhattan, you can see it on virtually any street corner in midtown. It’s an easy game, it’s easy to be sucked in, and the dealer always wins. There are three roles in Three Card Monte. The first is the dealer, that’s pretty clear, his job is to deal the cards, tricking the player (mark) with sleight of hand and deception. A good dealer has a great patter that draws people in to watch and gets the mark to play. Three Card Monte wouldn’t work however, without the shill. That’s someone, seemingly a stranger to the dealer, but actually someone who’s in cahoots with the dealer. Typically, the shill will walk up the game, pretending to play and win. After he’s won a lot of money, he walks off, leaving everyone anxious to “take advantage” of the dealer in the ... read more >>
+1 1 vote Trends shaping 2010: Dang it, we're getting old! by Drew McLellan on 03/15/2010 03:21 1 comment , 459 views Categories: Trust, Online Community, Social Selling, CRM, Marketing, Sales Tags: age discrimination, senior citizens social media, over 65 marketing, baby boomers Back in December, I wrote about some of the trends that would be influencing all of our businesses in 2010. I thought it might be helpful to look at some of these trends a bit more closely. Let's dig into the trend that we've actually been anticipating for the past several years. After all, we've known that the baby boomers are such a huge group -- there's no way their crossing into the 65+ category wouldn't throw our society a curve.Look at these facts: By 2020, people over 65 worldwide will outnumber children under the age of 5 for the first time. By 2020, 22% of western civilization will be 65+. The ratio of workers to retirees will continue to fall. Today it’s 3:1. By 2030, it will be just over 2:1. So what does that mean for all of us? Shifting away from our youth focus  : For so long, mass marketing has been all about the young. As this trend takes hold, marketers are going to shift their attention to those boomers. Remember, this group of seniors is tech savvy, active and has quite a bit of disposable income. Even products that are typically designed for the youth market will be aimed at seniors, like ... read more >>

0 0 votes

Three Card Monte, Social Media Style

by Dave Brock on 03/15/2010 11:51 0 comments , 367 views
Categories: Customer Collective Exclusive, Trust
Tags: social media, trust, linkedin

Everyone knows the classic con game, called Three Card Monte. It’s a card game where the dealer rearranges cards (usually on a cardboard box to aid in escaping) in an attempt to confuse the player on the location of a specific card. The player guesses which of three cards is the designated card, if he is right, he wins the bet. It’s a classic con, in Manhattan, you can see it on virtually any street corner in midtown. It’s an easy game, it’s easy to be sucked in, and the dealer always wins.

There are three roles in Three Card Monte. The first is the dealer, that’s pretty clear, his job is to deal the cards, tricking the player (mark) with sleight of hand and deception. A good dealer has a great patter that draws people in to watch and gets the mark to play. Three Card Monte wouldn’t work however, without the shill. That’s someone, seemingly a stranger to the dealer, but actually someone who’s in cahoots with the dealer. Typically, the shill will walk up the game, pretending to play and win. After he’s won a lot of money, he walks off, leaving everyone anxious to “take advantage” of the dealer in the ... read more >>

+1 1 vote

Trends shaping 2010: Dang it, we're getting old!

by Drew McLellan on 03/15/2010 03:21 1 comment , 459 views
Categories: Trust, Online Community, Social Selling, CRM, Marketing, Sales
Tags: age discrimination, senior citizens social media, over 65 marketing, baby boomers

Back in December, I wrote about some of the trends that would be influencing all of our businesses in 2010. I thought it might be helpful to look at some of these trends a bit more closely.

Let's dig into the trend that we've actually been anticipating for the past several years. After all, we've known that the baby boomers are such a huge group -- there's no way their crossing into the 65+ category wouldn't throw our society a curve.Look at these facts:

By 2020, people over 65 worldwide will outnumber children under the age of 5 for the first time.
By 2020, 22% of western civilization will be 65+.
The ratio of workers to retirees will continue to fall. Today it’s 3:1. By 2030, it will be just over 2:1.

So what does that mean for all of us?

Shifting away from our youth focus  :

For so long, mass marketing has been all about the young. As this trend takes hold, marketers are going to shift their attention to those boomers. Remember, this group of seniors is tech savvy, active and has quite a bit of disposable income. Even products that are typically designed for the youth market will be aimed at seniors, like ... read more >>

Recent Posts


0 0 votes The Power of Follow Up by Kelley Robertson on 03/15/2010 15:36 0 comments , 85 views Categories: Sales Process Measurement, Sales Tags: sales best practices, follow up calls It never ceases to amaze me how few sales people make the time to follow-up after they have made initial contact with a prospect or customer. In the last few months, I can think of at least eight different situations in my own life (business & personal) when a salesperson did not bother taking this initiative. These included a landscaper who designed plans for our property, two different people who spoke to me about creating a promotional piece of literature for my business, a sales rep for a pool company, and a men’s fashion salesman who was asked to send information. In each of these situations I was very interested in the product or service offered by the vendor. This got me wondering…why don’t people follow-up? I believe there are several reasons. They don’t want to appear pushy. It may be true that following up too frequently will come across as being pushy. However, very few salespeople ever come close to crossing this line. In fact, one the few times, I left a salesperson was pushy was more because of his tone, rather than fact he actually followed up. As a sales professional, I believe it is our responsibility to keep following up with our prospects ... read more >>
0 0 votes Who Are Sales Process Metrics For? by Dave Brock on 03/15/2010 09:03 0 comments , 283 views Categories: CRM, Sales Process Measurement, Sales Tags: sales 2.0, sales process metrics, sales personal performance Over the past several weeks, I’ve sat in on a number of interesting webinars on sales productivity. Inevitably the focus is on tools the sales manager can use to monitor their teams, track performance and improve effectiveness. Whether it is a new Sales 2.0 tool or using CRM, the focus is on sales managers. While I think this is terrific, where is the Sales Person in the discussion? Don’t get me wrong, key aspects of the manager’s job is to track performance, coach for improvement, and manage the business. But I think we miss a major opportunity by not focusing on the sales professional. Every sales professional needs to have personal metrics, by which they measure their progress. The metrics aren’t necessarily different from what a manager looks at, but each sales person should monitor a few key metrics against which to track their own performance. Each sales person should be able to evaluate their own performance, looking for ways to improve. Sales managers, don’t keep the metrics to yourselves. Help each person in your organization internalize them, there maey be a different set of metrics that each person may need to look at. ... read more >>
0 0 votes Too Big to Trust? Or Too Untrustworthy to Scale? by Charles Green on 03/15/2010 07:33 0 comments , 245 views Categories: Trust, Social Selling Tags: social virtues, fukuyama books This will be my fourth week on the road; more on that later in the week. At least all that plane time (and waiting in lines time) makes for good reading time—thanks to the iPhone Kindle Reader app. (and no they don’t pay me for saying it). I’m re-reading Francis Fukuyama’s 1995 classic Trust: the Social Virtues and the Creation of Prosperity. It’s the perfect companion for Andrew Ross Sorkin’s Too Big to Fail: The Inside Story of How Wall Street and Washington Fought to Save the Financial System—and Themselves. Here’s why they belong together. Fukuyama’s View of Trust Fukuyama makes a compelling case that economic development is strongly affected by the cultural norms of a society—in particular, the propensity to trust. In this, he is up against both neo-classical economists (who argue people are rational utility-maximizers), Marxians (who argue it’s all about the money), and a ton of management theorists (who pretty much believe both). As Fukuyama puts it: The Chinese, Korean and Italian preference for family, Japanese attitudes toward adoption of non-kin, the French reluctance to enter into face-to-face relationships, the German emphasis on ... read more >>
0 0 votes Pew Study Affirms Paywalls a Bad Move by Andy Beal on 03/15/2010 01:32 0 comments , 331 views Categories: Online Community, Social Selling, Newspapers, Publishing (Online), Publishing (Print), Public Relations, Customer Experience Tags: pew paywall study, paywall business model There are certain things that anyone can hear and automatically say “I don’t think that’ll work very well” without doing any real research. You hear something and you have a visceral reaction that just makes you go with your gut because it makes sense. Even in those kind of no-brainer situations it helps when your “gut” is validated by a reputable source who actually did a little research. The latest case of this occurrence comes from the Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism. As reported over at ars technica the prestigious group has done the research to help us all say that our collective gut is right on the money when it comes to paywalls for news: the idea pretty well sucks. Advertising remains the primary means of support for online news outlets, and there’s a long uphill battle facing anyone trying to forge new business models, at least according to a report produced by the Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism. The extensive report on the State of the Media examines numerous aspects of the media world, but emphasizes that, when it comes to online news, getting people to pay for content they otherwise value is “like ... read more >>
0 0 votes March Madness Update... The Quickest Way to Build Your Team by Kevin Eikenberry on 03/14/2010 04:38 0 comments , 359 views Categories: Trust, Online Community, Sales Tags: sales training, team building, motivation, inspiration, sales best practices, john wooden John Wooden, the great basketball coach (and Purdue graduate) once said, “The worst thing about new book is that they keep us from reading the old ones.” And we have all heard that one of the best ways to find a new idea or understand a concept is to borrow from another discipline or business. From these two profound truths comes today’s post. On Twitter (thanks@evantheshow) this morning I was reminded of an older quote: “The best way to revive a church is to build a fire in the pulpit.” – Dwight L. Moody Moodywas a 19 th century evangelist and spoke a lesson not just to those building churches. While you might be reading and thinking about a church, the lesson is much broader. Consider this: “The best way to revive a team (or organization) is to build a fire in leadership.” – Kevin Eikenberry, adapted Note that Moody (nor I) am suggesting that the leader must be replaced. While that might be required to create the “fire”, don’t start there. Start with who you have; start with the fire. If the word fire doesn’t connect for you, try passion. “The best way to revive a team (or organization) is to build passion in leadership.” – ... read more >>
0 0 votes Spinning Yarns The E Way by Todd Schnick on 03/13/2010 05:26 1 comment , 734 views Categories: Trust, Presentations, Social Selling, Marketing, Sales Tags: storytelling cartoon by @gapingvoid In my examination of what makes for intrepid marketers, it is clear to me that they are simply master storytellers. They can take complex issues, and make them simple. They can take ordinary people, and make them legends. They can take boring things, and make them scintillating. In other words, they are master storytellers. They talk about things that matter. They keep you riveted. They make you believe. They are master marketers. They are intrepid marketers. There are many tools at their disposal. But what most intrepid marketers utilize in their quest to do something remarkable, is a blog. It is amazing to me how many individuals and small business people still do not blog. But the list of people who are achieving big things and living big dreams because of their blog is a steadily growing list. But just why is that happening to that select and intrepid group? Here are a few reasons… The free form of a blog is liberating, and conducive to storytelling. There are relatively few constraints on a blog, and spirited, creative thinkers thrive in this medium. But ordinary people can make something happen too. I mean, look at me for chrissakes… Blogs . ... read more >>
0 0 votes Why Managers Don’t Ask Better Coaching Questions – Stop Coaching In Your Own Image by Keith Rosen on 03/12/2010 10:23 1 comment , 362 views Categories: Trust, Sales Tags: sales best practices, coaching best practices A few posts ago, someone posted a fair and relevant question which I thought was important enough to re-post front and center. It was in reference this post: Coaching Questions Part 3 – Questions To Get People into Action That Drive Desired Results, which you can read here. Here is her question and my response follows. “Keith- I’m a huge fan of yours, let me say that first so you don’t get mad at me, but every single one of those questions above 1-12 would infuriate me if I ever had my vp of sales ask any of them. And I would feel dumb asking my reps too! I don’t get it.” The truth be known, many managers don’t get it – at least initially; until the blind spot is exposed and placed in their line of vision for them to see. And please keep in mind, their inability to see this blind spot has nothing to do with their acumen, experience, abilities, commitment to their team or intelligence and everything to do with one of the common traps that management has tendency to fall into. Here was my response: Thanks for the comment! Much appreciated. Why would I get mad? Keep your comments coming! I don’t expect everyone to agree with everything I write. ... read more >>
0 0 votes Companies Spend More on Email Than PPC; 39% Have No Clue of ROI by Andy Beal on 03/12/2010 02:12 1 comment , 1027 views Categories: Online Community, Direct Marketing, Sales Tags: email marketing, ppc campaigns Wouldn’t it make sense that if you spent more money on email marketing than pay-per-click marketing, you’d have a reasonable explanation for that choice? Well, according to the data discovered in Econsultancy’s 2010 Email Marketing Census, companies are spending more on email marketing (17% of online budgets) than PPC (16%) despite not fully understanding the return on investment (ROI) achieved or taking advantage of one of the most important benefits of email marketing: segmentation. When you run PPC campaign, you attempt to segment your target audience by using different ad creative and targeted landing pages. You wouldn’t bring a “window shopper” to a landing page that displayed only one product, would you? So it’s a shock that many companies are still not using segmentation to target their email campaigns and deliver messages, or offers, that are tailored to their customers’ known interests and buying habits. Think about that. When you email your existing customers, you already know at least a little about their buying preferences, so why would you not segment them so that they receive tailored email messages? With this ... read more >>
0 0 votes Social Media is Content at the Speed of Change by Ardath Albee on 03/11/2010 17:28 1 comment , 825 views Categories: Customer Collective Exclusive, Twitter, Social Selling, Customer Service, Branding, Marketing Tags: social media, b2b marketing, content marketing, kodak, jeffrey hayzlett I was monitoring the Twitter feed for the Sales 2.0 conference when I saw the thread about the speech being given by Jeffrey Hayzlett, CMO of Kodak. Here are some interesting snips posted by conference attendees that show just how fast markets are changing and how social media is playing a role: @Sales20Conf: "How many of you bought a roll of film this year?" 2 hands go up "Thank you, you made our quota"-- @JeffreyHayzlett #s20c @ fogfish: Change or die: Kodak film sales went from $15B to $2M in 5 yrs. Saved the business by going into printing. #s20c #adapt (via @clarashih) @ConnectdMarkter : New Kodak paradigm 70% digital revenues, 60% B2B #s20c 75-85% of their business will come from B2B @ larrybenet: how do you handle change? @jeffreyhayzlett cmo of kodak says you need to do it fast #s20c @Rinidas : Kodak Social Media Strategy 4E's Engage Educate Excite Evangelize #s20c @agaffney : Jeffrey Hayzlett, CMO of Kodak, twitter posts have gone from 40% customer complaints to less than 7% by engaging, responding. #S20C @annekeseeley : @jeffrehayzlett at #s02c: added mic jack to recorder after getting a suggestion on Twitter, which is a huge ... read more >>
0 0 votes Social Media in the Fortune 100 by servantofchaos on 03/11/2010 16:14 0 comments , 1759 views Categories: Social Selling, Marketing, Customer Experience Tags: corporate social media adoption, social media fortune 100 If social media is about levelling the playing field between businesses and consumers, then you would think that the largest businesses – the Fortune 100 – would be steering well clear. However, this infographic from Flowtown, based on a recent Burson-Martseller report shows that social media uptake and engagement is well and truly on the agenda of the world’s largest corporations. Having said that, the uptake figures are quite low. These companies would obviously have more employees than they have subscribers to their YouTube channels. So perhaps there is some work to do around employee engagement/activation. It is good to see, however, that a certain level of experimentation is taking place. How does these figures tally with your own experience? How engaged is your company with social media? Are you better/worse than the Fortune 100? ... read more >>

0 0 votes

The Power of Follow Up

by Kelley Robertson on 03/15/2010 15:36 0 comments , 85 views
Categories: Sales Process Measurement, Sales
Tags: sales best practices, follow up calls

It never ceases to amaze me how few sales people make the time to follow-up after they have made initial contact with a prospect or customer. In the last few months, I can think of at least eight different situations in my own life (business & personal) when a salesperson did not bother taking this initiative.

These included a landscaper who designed plans for our property, two different people who spoke to me about creating a promotional piece of literature for my business, a sales rep for a pool company, and a men’s fashion salesman who was asked to send information. In each of these situations I was very interested in the product or service offered by the vendor.

This got me wondering…why don’t people follow-up? I believe there are several reasons.

They don’t want to appear pushy. It may be true that following up too frequently will come across as being pushy. However, very few salespeople ever come close to crossing this line. In fact, one the few times, I left a salesperson was pushy was more because of his tone, rather than fact he actually followed up. As a sales professional, I believe it is our responsibility to keep following up with our prospects ... read more >>

0 0 votes

Who Are Sales Process Metrics For?

by Dave Brock on 03/15/2010 09:03 0 comments , 283 views
Categories: CRM, Sales Process Measurement, Sales
Tags: sales 2.0, sales process metrics, sales personal performance

Over the past several weeks, I’ve sat in on a number of interesting webinars on sales productivity. Inevitably the focus is on tools the sales manager can use to monitor their teams, track performance and improve effectiveness. Whether it is a new Sales 2.0 tool or using CRM, the focus is on sales managers. While I think this is terrific, where is the Sales Person in the discussion?

Don’t get me wrong, key aspects of the manager’s job is to track performance, coach for improvement, and manage the business. But I think we miss a major opportunity by not focusing on the sales professional.

Every sales professional needs to have personal metrics, by which they measure their progress. The metrics aren’t necessarily different from what a manager looks at, but each sales person should monitor a few key metrics against which to track their own performance. Each sales person should be able to evaluate their own performance, looking for ways to improve.

Sales managers, don’t keep the metrics to yourselves. Help each person in your organization internalize them, there maey be a different set of metrics that each person may need to look at. ... read more >>

0 0 votes

Too Big to Trust? Or Too Untrustworthy to Scale?

by Charles Green on 03/15/2010 07:33 0 comments , 245 views
Categories: Trust, Social Selling
Tags: social virtues, fukuyama books

This will be my fourth week on the road; more on that later in the week. At least all that plane time (and waiting in lines time) makes for good reading time—thanks to the iPhone Kindle Reader app. (and no they don’t pay me for saying it).

I’m re-reading Francis Fukuyama’s 1995 classic Trust: the Social Virtues and the Creation of Prosperity.

It’s the perfect companion for Andrew Ross Sorkin’s Too Big to Fail: The Inside Story of How Wall Street and Washington Fought to Save the Financial System—and Themselves.

Here’s why they belong together.

Fukuyama’s View of Trust

Fukuyama makes a compelling case that economic development is strongly affected by the cultural norms of a society—in particular, the propensity to trust. In this, he is up against both neo-classical economists (who argue people are rational utility-maximizers), Marxians (who argue it’s all about the money), and a ton of management theorists (who pretty much believe both).

As Fukuyama puts it:

The Chinese, Korean and Italian preference for family, Japanese attitudes toward adoption of non-kin, the French reluctance to enter into face-to-face relationships, the German emphasis on ... read more >>

0 0 votes

Pew Study Affirms Paywalls a Bad Move

by Andy Beal on 03/15/2010 01:32 0 comments , 331 views
Categories: Online Community, Social Selling, Newspapers, Publishing (Online), Publishing (Print), Public Relations, Customer Experience
Tags: pew paywall study, paywall business model

There are certain things that anyone can hear and automatically say “I don’t think that’ll work very well” without doing any real research. You hear something and you have a visceral reaction that just makes you go with your gut because it makes sense. Even in those kind of no-brainer situations it helps when your “gut” is validated by a reputable source who actually did a little research.

The latest case of this occurrence comes from the Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism. As reported over at ars technica the prestigious group has done the research to help us all say that our collective gut is right on the money when it comes to paywalls for news: the idea pretty well sucks.

Advertising remains the primary means of support for online news outlets, and there’s a long uphill battle facing anyone trying to forge new business models, at least according to a report produced by the Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism. The extensive report on the State of the Media examines numerous aspects of the media world, but emphasizes that, when it comes to online news, getting people to pay for content they otherwise value is “like ...

March Madness Update... The Quickest Way to Build Your Team

by Kevin Eikenberry on 03/14/2010 04:38 0 comments , 359 views
Categories: Trust, Online Community, Sales
Tags: sales training, team building, motivation, inspiration, sales best practices, john wooden

John Wooden, the great basketball coach (and Purdue graduate) once said, “The worst thing about new book is that they keep us from reading the old ones.”

And we have all heard that one of the best ways to find a new idea or understand a concept is to borrow from another discipline or business.

From these two profound truths comes today’s post.

On Twitter (thanks@evantheshow) this morning I was reminded of an older quote:

“The best way to revive a church is to build a fire in the pulpit.” – Dwight L. Moody

Moodywas a 19 th century evangelist and spoke a lesson not just to those building churches.

While you might be reading and thinking about a church, the lesson is much broader. Consider this:

“The best way to revive a team (or organization) is to build a fire in leadership.” – Kevin Eikenberry, adapted

Note that Moody (nor I) am suggesting that the leader must be replaced. While that might be required to create the “fire”, don’t start there. Start with who you have; start with the fire.

If the word fire doesn’t connect for you, try passion.

“The best way to revive a team (or organization) is to build passion in leadership.” – ... read more >>

0 0 votes

Spinning Yarns The E Way

by Todd Schnick on 03/13/2010 05:26 1 comment , 734 views
Categories: Trust, Presentations, Social Selling, Marketing, Sales
Tags: storytelling

cartoon by @gapingvoid

In my examination of what makes for intrepid marketers, it is clear to me that they are simply master storytellers. They can take complex issues, and make them simple. They can take ordinary people, and make them legends. They can take boring things, and make them scintillating.

In other words, they are master storytellers. They talk about things that matter. They keep you riveted. They make you believe. They are master marketers. They are intrepid marketers.

There are many tools at their disposal. But what most intrepid marketers utilize in their quest to do something remarkable, is a blog. It is amazing to me how many individuals and small business people still do not blog. But the list of people who are achieving big things and living big dreams because of their blog is a steadily growing list.

But just why is that happening to that select and intrepid group? Here are a few reasons…

The free form of a blog is liberating, and conducive to storytelling. There are relatively few constraints on a blog, and spirited, creative thinkers thrive in this medium.

But ordinary people can make something happen too. I mean, look at me for chrissakes…

Blogs . ... read more >>

0 0 votes

Why Managers Don’t Ask Better Coaching Questions – Stop Coaching In Your Own Image

by Keith Rosen on 03/12/2010 10:23 1 comment , 362 views
Categories: Trust, Sales
Tags: sales best practices, coaching best practices

A few posts ago, someone posted a fair and relevant question which I thought was important enough to re-post front and center.

It was in reference this post: Coaching Questions Part 3 – Questions To Get People into Action That Drive Desired Results, which you can read here.

Here is her question and my response follows.

“Keith- I’m a huge fan of yours, let me say that first so you don’t get mad at me, but every single one of those questions above 1-12 would infuriate me if I ever had my vp of sales ask any of them. And I would feel dumb asking my reps too! I don’t get it.”

The truth be known, many managers don’t get it – at least initially; until the blind spot is exposed and placed in their line of vision for them to see. And please keep in mind, their inability to see this blind spot has nothing to do with their acumen, experience, abilities, commitment to their team or intelligence and everything to do with one of the common traps that management has tendency to fall into.

Here was my response:

Thanks for the comment! Much appreciated. Why would I get mad? Keep your comments coming! I don’t expect everyone to agree with everything I write. ... read more >>

0 0 votes

Companies Spend More on Email Than PPC; 39% Have No Clue of ROI

by Andy Beal on 03/12/2010 02:12 1 comment , 1027 views
Categories: Online Community, Direct Marketing, Sales
Tags: email marketing, ppc campaigns

Wouldn’t it make sense that if you spent more money on email marketing than pay-per-click marketing, you’d have a reasonable explanation for that choice?

Well, according to the data discovered in Econsultancy’s 2010 Email Marketing Census, companies are spending more on email marketing (17% of online budgets) than PPC (16%) despite not fully understanding the return on investment (ROI) achieved or taking advantage of one of the most important benefits of email marketing: segmentation.

When you run PPC campaign, you attempt to segment your target audience by using different ad creative and targeted landing pages. You wouldn’t bring a “window shopper” to a landing page that displayed only one product, would you? So it’s a shock that many companies are still not using segmentation to target their email campaigns and deliver messages, or offers, that are tailored to their customers’ known interests and buying habits. Think about that. When you email your existing customers, you already know at least a little about their buying preferences, so why would you not segment them so that they receive tailored email messages?

With this ...

Social Media is Content at the Speed of Change

by Ardath Albee on 03/11/2010 17:28 1 comment , 825 views
Categories: Customer Collective Exclusive, Twitter, Social Selling, Customer Service, Branding, Marketing
Tags: social media, b2b marketing, content marketing, kodak, jeffrey hayzlett

I was monitoring the Twitter feed for the Sales 2.0 conference when I saw the thread about the speech being given by Jeffrey Hayzlett, CMO of Kodak. Here are some interesting snips posted by conference attendees that show just how fast markets are changing and how social media is playing a role:

@Sales20Conf: "How many of you bought a roll of film this year?" *2 hands go up* "Thank you, you made our quota"-- @JeffreyHayzlett #s20c

@ fogfish: Change or die: Kodak film sales went from $15B to $2M in 5 yrs. Saved the business by going into printing. #s20c #adapt (via @clarashih)

@ConnectdMarkter : New Kodak paradigm 70% digital revenues, 60% B2B #s20c 75-85% of their business will come from B2B

@ larrybenet: how do you handle change? @jeffreyhayzlett cmo of kodak says you need to do it fast #s20c

@Rinidas : Kodak Social Media Strategy 4E's Engage Educate Excite Evangelize #s20c

@agaffney : Jeffrey Hayzlett, CMO of Kodak, twitter posts have gone from 40% customer complaints to less than 7% by engaging, responding. #S20C

@annekeseeley : @jeffrehayzlett at #s02c: added mic jack to recorder after getting a suggestion on Twitter, which is a huge ... read more >>

0 0 votes

Social Media in the Fortune 100

by servantofchaos on 03/11/2010 16:14 0 comments , 1759 views
Categories: Social Selling, Marketing, Customer Experience
Tags: corporate social media adoption, social media fortune 100

If social media is about levelling the playing field between businesses and consumers, then you would think that the largest businesses – the Fortune 100 – would be steering well clear. However, this infographic from Flowtown, based on a recent Burson-Martseller report shows that social media uptake and engagement is well and truly on the agenda of the world’s largest corporations.

Having said that, the uptake figures are quite low. These companies would obviously have more employees than they have subscribers to their YouTube channels. So perhaps there is some work to do around employee engagement/activation. It is good to see, however, that a certain level of experimentation is taking place.

How does these figures tally with your own experience? How engaged is your company with social media? Are you better/worse than the Fortune 100?