Year: 2006

I was talking with someone at church on Sunday who recently started a new job. This job is part of a start-up company that is beginning to manufacture its own products. He relayed how exciting it was and how much dedication it was demanding. For someone who has held hourly labor type jobs previously, I think he now has a start with a career.

Me, being the conversationalist, related my observation that there is about a three year period with a new house (or new job) where large tasks get undertaken and completed. After that energy and distractions creep in and progress slows…or stops.

In my mind, I extended this observation to what has been bugging me about B2Blog. Over the last four years I’ve explored a lot and written a lot. I’ve found my voice and place in the blogosphere. I don’t want to say I’ve exhausted myself and the subject, but I do feel exhausted. Settled in. Happier sitting on the couch than putting up dry-wall, if you know what I mean.

Well, not happier sitting. My thoughts bug me. They want to be written. But getting off the couch seems so much harder sometimes. Determination gets things done, but tackling those big jobs is so hard. And, quite honestly, my job and home life have similar lulls right now.

I could add to the metaphor that reading other blogs is like watching TV. So much easier to be entertained. But even now that content seems so familiar and vacuous. I leave the couch not energized, but drained.

The fellow at church I was speaking to found his new job only after being laid-off. It was a surprising twist for him and his family, something that they didn’t want. But in the end he is better off and excited to go to work. Of course, I told him, that’s a push off a cliff-edge that I don’t want either.

So, I am left with the nagging question that is the title of this post, “What to do when you’ve settled in?” I could babble on with what could be done, but I’d rather the question linger a little longer in my mind (and yours). (And ‘what could be done’ is different than what will actually be achieved, which would just make this another vacuous post.)

To be continued…

Back in 2004 I posted a couple times about ‘black-hat SEO company’ Traffic Power (later First Place or 1P). I thought I would do a quick refresher, since they are still out there. My last post about them has garnered 19 comments with warnings and tails-of-woe.

FYI: SEO means ‘search engine optimization’ and black-hat means ‘bad’. A good review of the history is here.

Their MO:

1. They do outbound telemarketing for their services, and they bite hard!
2. They make promises to get you to the top of Google.
3. How they do their SEO work is not the point here, but it relies on techniques that have been judged as ‘against the rules’ or ineffective.
4. They operate so many URLs, addresses, and phone numbers they are hard to nail down. (Their current main website 1pfirstplace.com has just one hit in Google right now. This post will make it two.)
5. They wrap themselves in the shroud of the BBB like this.

While the Las Vegas BBB has publicly listed the number of complaints and the Wall Street Journal has written about them, they continue to dodge true legal action, from what I can tell.

I just wanted to remind folks out there that this stuff is still going on two years later. Not sure if there is anything can be done that hasn’t already been tried. Posting this should help those ‘marks’ who are smart enough to search for info on this company/group and dig thru the maze of names and URLs.

When brainstorming, you are supposed to leave all the ‘yea buts’ out and just hammer on making a list of ideas. I agree. But once an idea is being moved forward, all bets are off. And I feel a little guilty about that.

You see, myself and and someone from our finance department were asked to review specific parts of our terms-of-sale. As a marketer and former sales guy, I was hopeful that this would be an opportunity to streamline our process and save us some headaches.

But change is fraught with peril. The greatest peril is opening a can of worms. We had our opening meeting and agreed on what needed to be done and how. And then the worms started coming. It was too much to bare and we soon adjourned.

Instead of meeting again, I instead wrote a long email full of bullet points, trying to put names on each of those pesky worms. It felt silly writing a memo for a committee of two, but those worms needed names and needed to be counted, something that couldn’t be done easily in a meeting.

Road-block?
When I described my memo to one of our sales people, that’s when I started to feel guilty. Did I just create a road-block for our project? Should I have limited the scope so we could move forward? Would it have been better to meet again? Will the project die on the vine? Guilt!

Road-map?
After a weekend to ponder, I still agree with my actions. The memo becomes a road-map of success, with all of the holes in the road marked. Either with it or without, success will be challenging. But moving forward without all these issues addressed would just become a game of “Whack-a-Mole” (or to carry the analogy, wack-a-worm), which is not a good management method, don’t you think?

And if the project dies, it won’t be the memo that killed it, but the ‘worms’ named within it. In that case there shouldn’t be guilt, but only sadness.

One of the features I enjoy in trade publications is ‘from the floor’ trade show reports. Us marketers certainly aren’t there for technical discovery, but I think even the engineers at a show are looking to feel ‘the vibe’ at the show. And publications should deliver that vibe for those who can’t make it.

Here is just such a report that delivers the vibe, from Circuits Assembly editor Mike Buetow:

“If you’ve never walked the Nepcon China trade show, here’s what you have missed:

• Boatloads of attendees.
• Scores of vendors (some of whom actually paid for their booths).
• The potential to buy watches, jewelry and other trinkets from some of the most aggressive salesmen you may ever meet (some of whom are badged!).
• IP theft at its most brazen.”

It becomes a positive, circular relationship, where the show and the publication both raise their relevance to the industry they serve.

Read more: Just for Show – Circuits Assembly

Dana VanDen Heuvel links to a Business Week article titled: Five Words to Never Use in an Ad. Hmm, interesting…what are those words?

1. Quality
2. Value
3. Service
4. Caring
5. Integrity

(I already wrote about the problem with the word quality earlier this year.)

Why not use them?
The author of the article, Steve McKee, says “Using common words that have become empty cliches is a shortcut to nowhere. Just because you sell it doesn’t mean people will buy it.” Dana says they are okay to use if they are backed up with specifics.

B2Blog says:
I think these words are actually buckets that the prospect needs to fill up with answers and information before they buy from you. In that sense they ARE powerful words. Dana’s right that you need to give them specifics to put in the bucket. And Steve is right that just mentioning the words only reminds prospects that the bucket is empty–you can’t fill the bucket with the word ‘best’.

So go ahead and use these bucket-words in planning your marketing, but I’d go with Steve’s recommendation and not actually use them.

Last Friday I finished my 5th session teaching one of my twin’s 3rd grade class. I had volunteered to teach a program called “The City” via Junior Achievement. The note from school looking for volunteers may-have-well had my name on it, I felt so compelled to volunteer. Why?

• I love teaching
• I’d love to meet Robert’s classmates
• I’d get to share my business knowledge
• One of the bloggers I read had posted about teaching their son’s class (forgot who, sorry) and said it was an opportunity not to pass up.
• And I knew I would learn more than they would.

The JA material covered some basic business/school/life skills and integrated those into what goes on in a city. My favorite, and one of the most grown-up lessons:

The kids divided into small groups, each opening their own restaurant. We walked thru several decisions that had to be made. It was interesting how most of the groups went for the lowest pricing. Then, when they all wanted to hire the same chef, I told them the team with the higher pricing could offer to pay him more and would get him, a surprising lesson to some. The last task was to come up with two sentences to tell people why they should come to their restaurant–it was interesting to hear how they positioned their business.

Be decision makers:
The lesson I tried to impart over the five sessions was that business is fun and interesting. I told them that I wanted to be a park ranger when I was a kid because who would want to be in an office all day. But over time, business is a whole lot more interesting and satisfying than keeping an eye on a park.

More men:
I’m little disappointed that more men weren’t leading these sessions for the other classes. (Elementary kids see almost exclusively female teachers.) Hopefully I can inspire someone else out there to share their passion for business with kids thru JA…or scouts or church. These kids really need to be prepared for their future in the information economy, and the decision making skills that it requires, and some role models to help set them in the right direction.

Okay, I still link to Seth even though I have to assume everyone who reads b2blog would read Seth. But, remember, I write this blog to/for myself. And this one, called I’m Too Busy, certainly resonates with me.

“But marketers, it seems, have a long list of things they do … that is technically marketing … but is hardly in the sweet spot.”

My personal reaction is to think about the Seven Levels of Change and how we hover around 1-3 (effectiveness, efficiency, and improving).

“Once an organization is up and running, it’s almost impossible to carve out the time to find the marketing vision that will make all the difference.” (Impossible he says? That’s level 7, BTW.)

I’ve got a product-line that’s in the process of a major revision. Despite my interest in GTD (Getting things done), I had a mental list of things I had to do on my end. Update price list, post specifications, send emails to the sales reps, etc. Not a big deal.

Then the boss asks for a written plan. Um, yea, coming right up.

I ended up spending almost a half-a-day writing down the plan. I also made more work for myself by adding a few things. I also documented the things still outstanding that I needed (decisions about certain details, mostly).

So I feel a little sheepish to say that: the boss was right; must use plans and action lists ala GTD; and written plans are easier to get input on.

With that lesson in my brain, I set to tackling the website to update that model series, which means splitting one webpage into several. This is a case where I would normally make a written plan, but this task defies doing so. I could try wire-framing it, but splitting the content up is such detail work that I can’t see any other way than doing on-screen. It allows me to balance my need to explain our product with the user’s experience in learning about it, too.

So I’ve spent several hours staring at my screen, moving things around, and hoping it all comes together…and wishing it was easier. This is real knowledge work, I guess.

This time someone else saves me effort in whining about poor sales techniques. WebProNews caught my attention with Sales Mistakes to avoid Jack Yoest Speaks Out:

“I sat through a conference call/web based sales pitch by Brand X … The presenters made a number of mistakes. I stopped counting at 7.”

Here are the seven, although read the whole story for the dirt:

1. Start the presentation on time.
2. Never let ‘em see you sweat.
3. Don’t tell me how smart you are.
4. Never introduce yourself.
5. Never discuss religion or politics.
6. Never provide backup/proof unless the client is skeptical.
7. Do as I say; Not as I do.”

The CEO was the star of this presentation, but isn’t it the job of his staff to make him look good? Details, details, details. Only commit to the strategy if you can commit to the details, IMHO.

Dogbert: “I like to con people. And I like to insult people. If you combine con & insult, you get consult!”

I won’t go into the details (it wasn’t my project tho), but we’ve been con-sulted, perpetuating the belief that consultants are evil. Said hired gun committed the following crimes:

• Significantly over budget
• Did work out of the scope (the part that we can do ourselves)
• Failed to learn our needs
• Solutions provided weren’t usable as-is
• Sat on information that would have ended the project early

Its cool to be the client calling the shots, but you seem to spend so much time teaching the consultant and they never really ‘get it’ because they don’t have to deal with the results. Sometimes its so much easier (and safer) to do it yourself. Plus your skill-set grows.

We’ll have to check if the next consultant we talk to is wagging his tail before agreeing to anything.

UPDATE: In response to comments, I wanted to say a little bit more. I think what I really blame the consultant for is not managing the project. They weren’t evil, just sloppy, bad listeners. And we were naive enough to think that they would be in control of the process. (And to John, it was an hourly deal with a SOW.)