August 16, 2014
Technology Easy Sell
We examine the costs and the benefits, and it either works and provides us a tangible competitive benefit or it doesn't.
"You can't be competitive without modern technology, you'll simply be out of business."
At the end of the day, you don't want to be sold a worthless bag of goods from a no good (not genuine) salesperson.
Read about it here in my new article in Public CIO.
(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)
March 27, 2014
10 Keys To Influencing And Selling Anything
Brilliant video by Kendra Eash for McSweeney's Internet Tendency.
It is made entirely with stock footage from Dissolve.
What is amazing is how with some great video, nice background music, and a soothing confidant voiceover--we can sell, or be sold on, just about anything.
The 10 Keys to influencing and selling anything, including B.S.:
1. Vague words that show progress (innovation, hope, motherhod, and apple pie--I'll have some of that)
2. Beautiful footage and sound (who wouldn't want to be there type?)
3. High-technology and science (we can solve the world's problems and make money, yippee)
4. Research and development (we're investing in the future and you should invest in us)
5. Global and U.S. (we're beyond borders, but still "made in...", headquartered, or otherwise a U.S. entity)
6. Environmentally conscious (clean water, breathable, air, lush forests, who can argue with that?)
7. High-speed (movers and shakers, we don't stand still, join us or be left behind)
8. Attractive people (this is for real human beings, human kind, we care about you!)
9. Diversity and equality (we love and help everyone--including you and your family)
10. Inspiring (we're thinking big and bringing positive change--buy from us, support our cause)
Throw/superimpose any company, product, country, person, or cause on this video--and poof, you've got an awesome brand--whether you deserve it or not!
This is how we're manipulated one brand at a time, hundreds of brands a day. ;-)
10 Keys To Influencing And Selling Anything
December 10, 2012
I'm Looking At You Looking At Me Looking At You
The EyeSee Mannequin has a camera built into its eye that watches you while you shop.
According to Bloomberg BusinessWeek (6 December 2012), the EyeSee Mannequin sells for about $5,130 and it conducts consumer profiling--using technology to identify criminals--it determines your age, gender, and race and tracks your shopping patterns.
Newer versions of EyeSee will likely have a sensor for hearing you as well, so it can "eavesdrop on what shoppers say about the mannequin's attire."
Next to these mannequins, you have to consider who are the real dummies, when everything you do and say can be monitored.
Next time, you're peering at that mannequin, be careful, it may be peering right back at you--and when it says something be ready to jump. ;-)
(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)
I'm Looking At You Looking At Me Looking At You
August 19, 2011
Supercookies Are Super Invasive
You're alone sitting at the computer surfing the web, you're looking up health, financial, entertainment, shopping, and other personal things.
Supercookies Are Super Invasive
June 15, 2011
Apple Store "Heaven"
Apple Store "Heaven"
May 1, 2011
Social Networking the Pepsi Way
It's a touch screen, networked machine that aside from enabling the purchase of soft drinks and the provision of nutrition information online, it also enables users to "gift" a drink to a friend by entering the recipient's name, mobile number, and a personalized text message (and even has an option to personalize it with a short recorded video).
The recipient of the Pepsi gift simply enters the redeem code at a pepsi social vending machine to get their soda. They can also return a thank you gift to the sender or "pay it forward" and give a gift to someone else.
In addition, the machine makes use of advanced telemetry to remotely measure and report on inventory, manage delivery scheduling, and update content on the machines. This machine is alive with changeable content and interactive communication between users.
As the Chief Innovation Officer of PepsiCo Foodservice states: "Social vending extends our consumers' social networks beyond the confines of their own devices and transforms a static, transaction-oriented experience into something fun and exciting they'll want to return to, again and again."
Additionally, Mashable reports that in phase 2, Pepsi is planning to integrate their Social Vending concept with other social media such as Facebook, extending the reach of product placement and gifting even further through cyberspace and social networking.
While many companies continue to struggle to figure out how to integrate social networking into a companies operations and make it profitable, PepsiCo has a simple formula for how it engages it's customers, promotes sales, and makes it all seem completely natural to the whole transaction--like it belonged there all along.
Great job PepsiCo!
Social Networking the Pepsi Way
October 24, 2010
Pain Points, More Potent Than Wish Lists
Organizations are all interested in what sells—what’s hot and what’s not!
Of course, as advertisers learned long ago, “sex sells.”
What else? Fear sells. All the basic emotions seem to sell—everything from affection and anger to wonder and worry.
When people experience an emotional drive, their internal (biochemical) and external (environmental) states elicit a psychophysiological response that drives mood and motivation.
The result is that when effectively selling to people’s emotions, we address or meet their explicit or implicit “pain points.”
Fast Company (November 2010) has an interesting article called “The Felt Need” that differentiates wants from genuine needs.
A want is one thing, but a genuine need or “pain point” is something entirely different. Getting something we want may be satisfying a nice to have on our wish list, but getting rid of a pain point is something that we literally crave to fulfill from physiological and/or psychological motivations.
A good analogy to satisfying people’s wants versus needs is that it’s better to be selling aspirins than vitamins, because “vitamins are nice; they’re healthy [and people want to live healthier]. But aspirin cures your pain…it’s a must-have.”
Similarly, the article tells us that just building a better mousetrap, doesn’t mean that customers will be beating down your door to do business, but rather as organizations we need to figure out not just how to build a better mousetrap, but rather how to get rid of that pesky mouse. The nuance is important!
In technology, there is a tendency to treat almost every new technology as a want and almost every new want as a need. The result is vast sums spent on IT purchases that are unopened or unused that perhaps looked good on paper (as a proposal), but never truly met the organizational threshold as a must-have with a commensurate commitment by it to succeed.
There are a number of implications for IT leaders:
1) As service providers, I think we need to differentiate with our internal customers what their genuine pain points are that must get prioritized from what their technology wish list items that can be addressed in the future, strategy alignment and resources permitting.
2) From a customer standpoint, I’d like to see our technology vendors trying to sell less new mousetraps and focusing more on what we really need in our organizations. The worst vendor calls/presentations are the ones that just try to tell you what they have to sell, rather than finding out what you need and how they can answer that call in a genuine way.
In looking at the emotion, the key to long-term sales success is not to take advantage of the customer in need, but rather to be their partner in meeting those needs and making the pain go away.
Pain Points, More Potent Than Wish Lists
May 1, 2008
“Glocalization” and Enterprise Architecture
Glocal is a combination of the words global and local. It is a best practice in business where organizations conducts business operations globally, but tailor their offerings to meet local tastes and needs.
Essentially doing business glocally means that you are architecting your business to perform operations both effectively and efficiently—i.e. your business is doing the right thing by growing without geopolitical constraints and you’re doing it the right way, by being sensitive to the customers’ specific needs wherever they are located.
The Wall Street Journal, 1 May 2008, reports that “Kraft became the No. 1 biscuit maker in China by tailoring the Oreo to local tastes.”
“The Oreo has long been the top-selling cookie in the U.S. Market. But Kraft Foods, Inc. had to reinvent the Oreo to make it sell well in the world’s most populous nation.”
“Unlike its iconic American counterpart, the Oreo sold in China is frequently long, thin, four-layered and coated in chocolate. But both kinds of cookies have one thing in common: They are now best sellers.”
40% of Kraft’s revenue is internationally-based, so their strategy to go glocal is critical to improving their market share and profitability.
To increase growth at Kraft, the CEO “has been putting more power in the hands of Kraft’s various business units around the globe, telling employees that decisions about Kraft products shouldn’t all be made by the people at the Northfield, Ill. headquarters.”
Similarly, to market the Chinese Oreo’s, one of innovative things Kraft did was to have Chinese university students ride around on bicycles outfitted with wheel covers resembling Oreos and handing out cookies.
The CEO stated this was “a stroke of genius that only could have come from local managers. The more opportunity our local managers have to deal with local conditions will be a source of competitive advantage for us.”
Glocalization, the customization to local markets, is far removed from the original Ford Model T (the most influential car of the twentieth century according to Wikipedia) set in 1908 that was based on standardization and assembly-line production, rather than individually hand-crafted.
From an enterprise architecture perspective, going glocal and customizing (or tailoring) business products and services to local tastes is also quite the opposite of what most enterprise architects try to do, which is to standardize their products and services to increase interoperability, simplify the infrastructure and operations, and achieve cost-efficiencies.
So what is more important, standardization or customization?
I suppose it depends on your perspective. If you’re in operations, then standardization is the dominant factor in order to streamline business processes and achieve cost-efficiencies. However, if you’re in sales and marketing, then customization is key to market penetration and customer satisfaction.
This leads me to the role of the enterprise architect, which is to balance the conflicting needs of the organization and simultaneously drive standardization in business processes and technologies, but customization to local requirements for sales and marketing. So EA serves Oreos to everyone!
“Glocalization” and Enterprise Architecture