As featured in TEQ Magazine:

Nobody wants to be sold to. Instead, they want to buy from us if we solve their problems. In order to truly understand a prospective customer’s problems, we’ve got to talk to them. Well, not talk “to” them, but talk “with” them… openly.

Side note: One of my favorite sales rules: “Remember, you have two ears and one mouth; spend twice as much time listening as talking.” (Frankly, 10-to-1 would be even better but how much of this behavior can you really expect from extroverts?)

The goal of the conversation is to discover your prospect’s “pain”. Before they will share that, you will have to establish rapport. With rapport, you have the opportunity to build trust. With trust, you have the opportunity to make a sale.

Social media helps you establish rapport in so many ways; just pick you favorite.

Rapport building idea #1:

Before meeting with any new prospect, review their LinkedIn profile to identify potential connection points. Look for a shared college, hobby, sport, past employer, industry association, professional acquaintance, or almost anything else (avoiding, say, shared former spouses and the like). Read the rest of this entry »

As featured in TEQ Magazine:

I’m writing this post for the first time directly on my iPad. I’m using this device in places I’ve never used a computer before: On my sofa reading The Wall Street Journal, in my bed streaming NetFlix movies, and presently propped comfortably on my Southwest Airlines tray table flying from the ‘Burgh to the windy city (an allusion to Chicago politicians more than the weather, although tonight 65,000-foot cumulonimbus clouds delayed us for hours).

You don’t have to be a social media expert to know that Southwest is an entertaining airline. Many of their flight attendants are comedians, singers, and rappers (see YouTube for the best safety briefing ever; note to the FAA – it’s something people actually listen to). They’re not at all like United. Ten million people know that “United breaks guitars”.

So to the point of this column: Since buying my iPad, I’ve been increasingly frustrated by having to turn it off until reaching 10,000 feet. What a dumb rule! Since I no longer buy USAToday, The Wall Street Journal, or The New York Times in paper form, every time I fly I’m bored out of my mind for 10 minutes during both takeoff and landing.

If an iPhone or iPad could bring down a jetliner, the terrorists would have already won, right? Who’s the spineless bureaucrat responsible for his policy?

I’ve been contemplating using Twitter or Facebook to start a revolution to demand a policy change. We the people make the rules. We need our iPads 24 x 7. Are you with me? Read the rest of this entry »

As featured in TEQ Magazine:

In today’s crazy, noisy, hyper-accelerated social media world, your choice is to be known for one thing… or none. Social media is fabulous in that, in contrast to your email blasts, newsletters, and direct mail, Google sees your blog posts, Tweets, and Yelps. That helps your business get found at the very moment when someone goes searching for exactly what you offer.

But if you’re Yammering about something different every time you check-in, thousands of other businesses will appear higher in the Google results than you do. Even just a dozen or two above you means that you’re an Internet footnote destined for obscurity. Only Google’s first page, and maybe sometimes their second, has value in attracting customers.

Yes, you could bid for Google Adwords and pay from $0.25 to $100 per click-through (pity the lawyers chasing mesothelioma victims, one outrageously expensive click). Or you could learn to dominate “organic” search by attracting clicks for free. The trick is to talk about one thing early and often; the one thing in which you’re a world expert.

The key is to find a phrase that balances quantity with quality. Select a term too general and few of the myriad people searching for it will be looking for what you do. Choose a term too narrow and few people will be searching for it at all.

To use a real example, I’m currently working with Linear Corp, a company that has developed a new audio-equipment-interconnect-standard called Digi-5. This standard allows different vendors’ equipment to play beautifully together (like a symphony) in an interoperable, whole house audio system.

Read the rest of this entry »

As featured in TEQ Magazine:

On Saturday, April 3, 2010, at 9:00 AM, Apple released the iPad into the world. By 10:00 AM, I was experiencing mine ($599 for the 64GB version). By the end of the day, 300,000 had been purchased. Or maybe “friended” would be a better description. Or “married”. The world has definitely changed.

My first impressions:

The iPad has far greater potential for business than I expected. For one, it runs Apple’s Keynote app ($9.95). To call this their version of PowerPoint would be like calling the Great Wall of China a fence. And because it has an optional VGA connector (yes, I bought that too) and impressive audio, I’m contemplating leaving my beloved MacBook Pro at home in favor of traveling light – as in 24 ounces lite.

An iPad app called LogMeIn Ignition ($29.95) makes this infinitely more practical. It turns my iPad into my MacBook, or even into my Windows 7 PC, through the magic of screen-sharing. It’s unbelievable. Read the rest of this entry »

This week, I actually did it for the first time. Yes, I presented my 3.5 hour high-end Keynote presentation to three groups of CEOs in Birmingham Alabama and Southern California using just my iPad. It’s unbelievable.

Me and Steve - best buddies

It didn’t exactly start out that way. Here are the gory details:

I went to the Apple Store in Shadyside, PA to buy my iPad on Day 1, not even realizing that I could get a VGA adapter ($29) or Keynote ($10) (Apple’s version of PowerPoint, only 100X better). I purchased both on the spot.

Then it got harder! To move an existing Keynote file to the iPad, connect the device to your Mac, open/click into iTunes (on the Mac), select the iPad from among “Devices” in the left column, click the “Apps” tab, scroll down to “File Sharing”, click “Keynote” then click the “Add” button and find your .key file. Simple and intuitive so far, right? That’s when the trouble begins (read on — it’s a  happy ending).

Then you “sync”. Or maybe it’s more like “sink” (as in “going under”). There we more errors and exceptions than could fit on the screen. It wouldn’t scroll to show them all, not that I was much interested after seeing the first 20 “exceptions”. While some errors related to unsupported appearance actions, transitions, and fonts, none of those were that painful as Keynote on the iPad still has plenty of options. It was actually fun learning how to set new actions and transitions, and resizing fonts, all using my fingers on the touch screen.

Side note: One month later, I now find myself so wanting to touch my MacBook Pro screen. This method of interfacing with a computer is the first nail in the coffin for the trusty mouse. Read the rest of this entry »

Here are my best discoveries for the first quarter of 2010 in social media for business. Actually, it’s just one incredibly valuable idea…

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The Best Sales People Aren’t Working for You (Yet)!

The best sales people don’t work at your company. Fighting words? Read on and decide for yourself.

The Internet recently marked its fortieth birthday. For the first, say, thirty-eight years, it brought us an exponentially increasing tsunami of information with one big caveat. The source of much of that information was unknown, suspect, or worse.

I recently learned that 63.2% of statistics are made up. That stipulated, it turns out that only 14% of us trust the advertising and marketing being trumpeted by businesses. Shocked that people aren’t buying as soon as they discover your website? You are among the 14%.

We know what companies’ motives are (there’s no shame in capitalism) and this makes their information, well… not necessarily objective.

On the other hand, 78% of us trust peer recommendations. Some of us probably have lying, cheating friends, but on balance, apparently they’re a good lot.

During the last two Internet years we’ve seen an explosion of social networking. What’s different is that people are using their real identities now and they’re connecting principally with people they “know”, and only when there’s bidirectional agreement. Facebook has recently surpassed 400 million members (making it the world’s third largest country), while LinkedIn is approaching 60 million business professionals. Read the rest of this entry »

As featured in TEQ Magazine:

The best sales people don’t work at your company. Fighting words? Read on and decide for yourself.

The Internet recently marked its fortieth birthday. For the first, say, thirty-eight years, it brought us an exponentially increasing tsunami of information with one big caveat. The source of much of that information was unknown, suspect, or worse.

I recently learned that 63.2% of statistics are made up. That stipulated, it turns out that only 14% of us trust the advertising and marketing being trumpeted by businesses. Shocked that people aren’t buying as soon as they discover your website?

On the other hand, 78% of us trust peer recommendations. Some of us probably have lying, cheating friends, but on balance, apparently they’re a good lot. Read the rest of this entry »

Here are my best discoveries for fourth quarter 2009 in social media for business. Not every discovery necessarily originated during the quarter; that’s just when each hit my radar…

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Best Employee Training Program for Social Media

Telstra, the 40,000 employee Australian telecom company has definitely set the bar for training its employees in social media. If you don’t have the resources to go this far, at least visit SocialMediaGovernance.com and develop a policy for your company based on your favorite model (click image to read):

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Best Example of Twitter IRL (In Real Life)

Very funny but if this approximates your company’s Twitter strategy, you’re on the wrong track. FYI, this video is not embeddable (yes, that’s a YouTube option); just click the image to view it there.

Read the rest of this entry »