Building a Business

Hello People!

I have a very interesting blog to share with you right at this moment. This will leave a question in your mind that you will bring the whole day. This is if you are the one who is in control of the company. One of the executives! Are you the Sales President or Sales Vice President? Whatever role you play in the company, your opinion counts, especially if you are responsible for the company’s profit. We make business for profit right? Therefore, we are offering a service or a product for the people. It is a must that we make sure that it is something valuable to them and something they can’t resist. Here is a blog written by Mark LaRosa (@mlarosa), CEO of QuotaCrush.

“Building a Business” means something very different to me.

By Mark LaRosa

I saw this post today on VentureBeat about free courses being offered by Stanford to “Build Your Business”

Scan the list… NOT A SINGLE COURSE ON SALES!

It doesn’t matter how much “cryptology” you use, or how good your “graphical models” are, or how “creative you are”  if you can’t get people to buy the product – if you don’t have people who want to PAY you for it.  You will eventually go out of business!    (BTW:  are they seriously trying to teach how to be creative?  isn’t that in your nature or not? of course, I feel the same way about teaching you how to be an entrepreneur, you either are or you aren’t – it can’t be taught).

On the same day, there was a post on Business Insider about how Tumblr ignored revenue for too long and is now feeling the heat.

I say it over and over again, your product does not matter if people don’t want it.  It has to solve a critical problem.  And if you aren’t thinking about sales from day 1, you are already too late.  You don’t build a product for product sake, you build it so that people will buy it – so that you can bring in revenue and make a living for your employees.  Spending some angel’s money or some VC fund’s limited partner’s money just for fun is NOT what being an entrepreneur is about – and it always shocks me that business schools have not figured this out!  There is only one common thread in EVERY company in the world – and that is selling.

In every company that I have started, revenue has always been the main focus in inception.  If I couldn’t think about how the company made money, I moved onto another idea.   The revenue can certainly be indirect, but there has to be a monetization strategy somewhere – otherwise you are just spending investors money “playing company.”

When I have been brought into companies to rescue them, it is always about bringing revenue in- and its certainly much easier when there are plans for this from the get go.

So… certainly take these free classes from Stanford – but don’t forget that “building your product” does not mean “building your business”.  If you are building your “business” then revenue should 100% be a component of that discussion.

How about you? How do you see business? What is your main goal when you are starting up a business? Is it for profit? Of course, it is! Don’t deny it! Though, there are people I know who will answer “to help other people” but in return, the more people they help, the more revenue they get. Do you have any comments? I want to read it on the comment box!

Always,

Jack

Software that Fits your Needs

Hi Folks!

Businesses nowadays need software sales tool. We need this to ensure that all our data is accurate to make an accurate decision as well. However, not all sales software fits our needs. Some tools might be effective to one company but might not fit us. With this I think that I should share every kind of software that I find online and it is up to you to choose which fits your needs. I will share a tool from SuccessFactors Blog (@successfactors) written by Mark Brandau. Study what you need in your business and see if the feature of the tool fits your need.

The Right Fit

By Mark Brandau

I just bought a new coat.
I know, I know – “so what, who cares.”

But here’s the thing— I really like this coat. It’s actually a 3-in-1, meaning I can wear the shell, or the liner each as a separate jacket, and when they are combined – it becomes a warm, full coat. Plus, its water resistant, includes a hidden hood, lots of pockets, and looks equally good over a suit or with more casual stuff. And since I travel a bit, this versatility helps. This is a great coat.

If you’re a learning professional, I’d suggested you should feel the exact same way about your learning management solution/LMS as I feel about my new coat.

Are you excited about using it? Does it provide a tremendous amount of flexibility – for any and all occasions? Does it travel well—ensuring that learning can truly be accomplished anywhere, on any device, with any user, and any content? Does it stand on its own as a best-of-breed solution, and function as a seamless part of the leading talent suite? And does your learning solution deliver measurable results, making you and your team look good, regardless of business climate?

According to Bersin’s new 2013 Learning Management Systems Market Map, “Of all HR technologies, the LMS is the one system that touches every employee in an organization. It is also one of the HR systems with which buyers have been least satisfied.” If you’re feeling like your current LMS or learning solution doesn’t quite “fit” any more—I would encourage you to take a look at SuccessFactors Learning.  For nearly 20 years, we’ve been a perennial leader in every analyst report (including Bersin’s new 2013 Learning Market Map). While we’re proud of this, we’re not content. In fact, our new, February release reaffirms our commitment to lead the market by continuously providing you with learning enhancements and innovations.

With our February release, we’re excited to deliver Learning enhancements that include, but are not limited to:  Enhanced support for learning on iPads, a new training and budgeting planner, and new support for Extended Enterprise eCommerce Subscriptions. With our new training and budgeting planner, you get a better idea of the training needs of your organization and can manage your training budget all in the same place. Employees and managers can submit training requests for review and approval. And, you can restrict an organization’s training budget or the number of employees a manager can send to a training course. It’s a win-win — you ensure company compliance with country-specific training requirements, and employees get the training they need for continued business success. Plus, with this release, you can enjoy a new way to monetize your learning investment with e-commerce subscriptions for the extended enterprise. This allows you to offer bundled training content to your customers at a fixed price for a specified period of time.

These improvements certainly provide greater flexibility and help ensure you look good by giving you more ways to increase learning ROI.

As I’ve recently experienced– clearly, all coats are not created equal. And if you’ve outgrown your learning solution, or think all LMS’s or Learning solutions “fit” the same, take a look at SuccessFactors Learning and our new February release. We think you’ll like how it fits.

Thanks for reading! Does the software mention above fits your needs? If so, are you going to use it? If not, what kind of tool do you need for your business? Your thoughts are valuable to us so make sure that you write it on the comment box before you leave.

 

Thanks,

Jack

 

Use Email Effectively by Using Rapportive

Hello People!

I find another software sales tool to share with you. This is not ordinary sales software. It is just a tool that you can use to build rapport with people you like to do business with. This is called Rapportive. Once you installed it in your email, you will find it easy to identify the person who is sending you message and it will be easy for you to connect with that person using the social media buttons such as Facebook, Twitter, Google plus and LinkedIn. Here’s an article written by Rahul Vohra (@rahulvohra) to help you know the tool better!

Write better emails: be astute, personal, and effective

By Rahul Vohra

When somebody emails you, Rapportive is great!

You can immediately see what people look like, where they are based, and what they do. You can establish rapport by mentioning shared interests. And you can grow your network by connecting on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook and more.

But what about when you send email?

When you start a new conversation, Gmail itself doesn’t help at all:

 

 

You’re emailing Conrad, but you are flying blind.

Where is he? What’s he doing? What’s he thinking?

What’s going on in Conrad’s life?

It would be tremendously useful to have Rapportive right here:

 

 

Today, we are super-excited to deliver one of our most requested features: you can now use Rapportive when you are composing an email.

By using Rapportive before you email, you can be more astute, personal, and effective. You can find ways to break the ice, topics to bond over, and reasons to get in touch with people. You can even make small gestures such as liking Facebook posts and following on Twitter.

We’ve been testing this ourselves for a few weeks, and it’s already changed the way we write email. We think you’ll like it too!

We’re gradually rolling the feature out to everybody. But if you can’t wait, feel free to upgrade instantly here: rapportive.com/compose 🙂

Enjoy!

Actually, I downloaded this tool and it is very useful because you can get to know the details of the person you are emailing. It is hard when you are guessing. My question now is, are you going to use this tool in your email? Why and why not?

 

Sincerely,

Jack

Sales Perks

Hey guys!

I love reading blogs and it is so funny that I can relate to every blog I’ve read. There are things that we already know but didn’t need it for a moment and get reminded that we do now. We have heard of sales perks, whether we are salesman or the buyer. This is very familiar to us and very beneficial too! Let us remind ourselves on how this thing can affect our sales. Here is a blog from Changing Minds entitled “Valuable giveaways”. I can relate to that because I am a seller and at the same time a buyer.

Valuable giveaways

One of the ways of persuading people is to give them something for free. Because then the exchange principle says they are obliged to do something for you in return. In fact you can ask for something worth much more than the value of your ‘gift’.

A typical way this happens is when people give you something on the street (such as a flower) and then ask for a ‘donation’ in return (or even somehow convert a gift into a flat-price sale). Charities (and others) have picked up on this and begging letters that come through your door may well include a free pen. Hey, look, you can even use it to fill in the donation form.

Another, different way this principle is used appeared through my door this week. I subscribe to a monthly computer (PC Advisor). I started years ago with a ‘free trial’ offer and am still suckered in. It’s ok really as I use the magazine to keep up with what’s new in the marketplace.

Anyway, let’s get to the point. The magazine comes with a free DVD full of trial software. This month, however, it was very slightly different. In the top right corner was an orange triangle (grabs the eye) with the words ‘DVD worth £117’ in it. The magazine has always had other monetary value statements and this was no different with a black circle lower down with ‘free full program worth £35’ marking a bit of utility software.

But I’ve always pretty much ignored the £35 sign and usually quickly scan it for anything useful and throw it away if not. But this time I hesitated and put it on the table next to me. Why was this?

Apart from the more attractive use of colour (orange rather than red), the £117 sign breaks the £100 barrier, at which I start to think ‘hey, that’s a lot of money’. Throwing it away hence seems like throwing away lots of money. So if I leave it there, I am more likely to install the ‘free’ programs. Which actually are mostly things like a ‘three month trial’. And before long, I could get sucked in, just as I was when ‘trying out’ the magazine, many years ago.

Hmm. Excuse me a minute. … There. I have now put temptation firmly in the bin!

We are using our emotions when we are buying and this is so true here. Once the person offers us something for free, we felt that we are obliged to bring back the kindness, so we are really an emotional buyer, aren’t we? Leave your comment below!

 

Sincerely

 

Jack

Online Education

Hey Guys!

I’ve got here a very outspoken blog about the reality of learning. This blog does not talk about school academics. This blog discussed the influence of internet over education which Mr. Keith Ferrazzi (@keithferazzi) addresses as informal manner of learning. The self-analysis here is triggered. The topic is even helpful for people to explore on new things that will improve their lives no matter what industry you are in. Anything about sales can also be learned through the internet like inside sales techniques and the like. You do not need to take a four year course about marketing just to be a successful salesman. Read the entire blog below.

Informal Learning Is Thriving Online

In my last post, I encouraged everyone to become intentional about pursuing the 70 percent of our learning that comes frominformal interactions outside of the training room or classroom. But how do you do that, given the old, informal learning ecosystem that revolved around your manager is on life support? Part of the answer is to seek out informal learning online.

It might seem that online learning is actually a better replacement for formal, classroom learning. More and more formal learning spaces are making the virtual jump each day, as schools and universities realize that it’s a more cost-effective use of their resources. And studies have shown that online learning is as effective as classroom learning. So how does informal learning, the kind of productive conversations that happen over muffins or around the office water cooler, happen in the online environment?

The power of self-reflection

A 2009 U.S. Department of Education report that rolled up more than 1,000 empirical research studies on online learning over a 12-year period concluded that online learning works better than in-person learning in terms of self-reflection, self-regulation and self-monitoring. That would certainly lend itself to informal learning, where you’re in charge and it’s up to you to curate your own curriculum and seek out the information you need.

It turns out we do a better job analyzing and critiquing our own behavior and our own learning when we do it online as opposed to in person. We also regulate and evaluate our own work better than we do in a physical environment.  We’re more productively driven toward our own learning processes, which leads to more positive outcomes. Self-reflection is critical to any learning experience and such reflection is easier in a virtual environment. We can easily review our work, even the work it takes to form relationships: We can go back over emails, see how recipients responded to them, review comment threads – generally, see where we’ve been and where we are going. This self-reflection, stimulated by interactions with others, improves our learning.

Even teachers handle informal learning better online

A recent study corroborated the power of online informal learning when it studied the professional development of teachers in four different environments: formal online learning; informal online learning; formal professional-development seminars; and informal learning happening in the teachers’ lounge. The informal virtual setting was a forum that the teachers used to communicate with each other. The study showed that teachers learned the most from online environments, and they felt the most positiveabout the informal interactions. They had warmer feelings about their interactions with their peers online than they did about their informal interactions with the very same people in the break room.

Challenging and coaching themselves and their community proved easier online. They formed more explicit coaching relationships, where one person would take it upon him or herself to lead others through a learning process, and where everyone felt comfortable challenging and critiquing each other.

Choosing the right technology is important

Facebook and Twitter can yield positive results. If you have friends, mentors or former teachers or bosses on Twitter, follow them and direct-Tweet them to begin constructive discussions that ignite informal learning and help close soft and hard skills gaps. You can also form a Facebook group of trusted friends, colleagues and mentors. Learning a complex body of knowledge requires a community of learners; online technologies, such as social media, can be used to cultivate and support these communities with emotional and professional guidance and encouragement.

Group forums, where topics are discussed in threads, are also a good way to engage informally online (that’s how the teachers did it). Chatting, or instant messaging online, works as well because talking with others is conducive to deep learning.

Beware of trying to recreate the face-to-face experience precisely. Video chat such as Skype can be frustratingly choppy and is a poor substitute for actual human interaction. Make the most of what online technologies uniquely offer, such as allowing asynchronous conversations and the time to reflect before answering.

And don’t engage online anonymously. When people own up to their own identities, it forces them to take the responsibility to be self-reflective.

Keep the differences in mind

To be successful in online informal learning, be cognizant how your approach to professional relationships is different online. Are you reflecting about how you present yourself online? Are you finding yourself rereading and reflecting on online messages? Are you connecting with, and learning from, your peers in the virtual space? If you are, you’ll be well on your way toward becoming a successful informal learner online.

More people can gain knowledge through informal learning or the internet. The online learning content is more appreciated by many as it is very accessible such as Sales E-book which features different modules. What do you think about this kind of education? Do you like it or do you prefer the old style or learning?

Cheers,

Jack

Building Customer Trust

Hi Friends,

Thanks for always dropping by and taking time to read our reviews. The blog that I am going to share is from timetrade (@timetrade). This blog talks about trust. Trust is very important in any relationship. This also applies to client and salesperson relationship. When your client doesn’t trust you, closing a sale is impossible so it is crucial to build trust. This blog is written by Mpuglia which was entitled “How the lack of customer trust killed the sales funnel”. Sales manager, sales representative and any sales people can relate to this. Reading the title can already give you an idea what the content is all about. Come and let’s read it!

How the lack of customer trust killed the sales funnel

By Mpuglia

Forrester Analyst Corinne Munchback recently posted a provocative obituary on her blog with a post titled “Bye Bye Marketing Funnel – It was fun while it lasted.”

In her piece, Munchbach declares “the marketing funnel no longer applies to modern marketing,” and then elaborates that the “customer life cycle” (which she defines as the “customers’ relationship with a brand as they continue to discover new needs, explore their options, make purchases, and engage with the product or service experience,”) is now the right approach to connect with prospect and customers.

As a developer of online appointment scheduling software that streamlines how and when professionals and customers meet, TimeTrade agrees fully with Forrester’s counsel to put “customers at the center of marketing!”

Corinne’s recommendations are a good read, and if you’re a Forrester client, you can dig deeper by reading their new research report “Embed The Customer Life Cycle Across Marketing,” which encourages marketers to focus on the complete brand experience: “particularly customer satisfaction and engagement.”

Taking a page from TimeTrade’s own marketing playbook one observation in Corinne’s blog post really resonates with us:

“A purchase does not always (or even often) equate to loyalty. 
Loyalty is something that has to be earned and nurtured on an ongoing basis. The life cycle emphasizes that goodwill must be built up and continually delivered on to build successful — and profitable — long-term relationships.”

Amen.

Forrester’s take on the death of the funnel echoes a collection of Sales 2.0 articles that TimeTrade president Gary Ambrosino wrote on his personal blog on “Selling at the Speed of Trust.”

Gary reminds us “the traditional sales cycle doesn’t work as well as it used to,” describing that’s “because the power of social media combined with the level of participation of the average buyer has thrown a monkey wrench into traditional thinking.”

In his oft ReTweeted article “Checklist for Launching a Time-to-Trust Sales Campaign” Gary shares “three things to do to modify your sales approach to match the new reality.” There’s lots to learn in the article, and from Gary’s Webinar presentation on “Selling at the Speed of Trust.”

Ding, dong – The marketing funnel is dead!!

As our friend Harry Klein has written, the new era of customer engagement will bring a synchronicity of promises, processes and experiences in which conversations and relationships will drive mutual fulfillment and sales success.

Something to look forward to!

I love the line from this blog put “customers at the center of marketing!” This is very true and self-explanatory. It just so happen that as the year goes by we forgot who the most important person in our business. We think that we are and we forgot that it is our customer because when they are happy with our service or product, they will continue patronizing us. Leave us a comment!

Cheers!

Jack