Here is a fascinating survey regarding customer service from large companies. The article is from ManageSmarter.com – Return to Sender: Responding to Customers. I think you will find the format quite clever: Every year, our organization conducts a customer service survey by sending the following one-sentence e-mail to our list of respected and admired companies: What is your corporate policy regarding the turnaround time for e-mails addressed to customer service? The subject of the e-mail is “Customer Service.” The goal of the research is to see who actually answers the question, which is different that simply responding and how long it takes them. The results: Here are highlights from this… Read More
Continue ReadingInc. 500 Companies Monitor Social Media
It’s true. Do you? Reading this blog would apparently qualify based on Inc.com’s article To Gain Competitive Edge, Companies Turn to Blogs, Video, and Social Networks. A study by the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth’s Center for Marketing Research found that 51 percent of Inc. 500 companies are monitoring social media, and they are doing so by various methods, including reading RSS feeds, looking at Web statistics, tracking video downloads, and watching online competitive activity. Interesting. The article isn’t overly descriptive of the methods, but the blog piece is certainly worth noting. “Inc. 500 companies are saying that not only is it important for us to communicate in an outbound… Read More
Continue ReadingA Sales Manager’s Biggest Responsibility
SellingPower.com offers a terrific how-to article regarding the sales manager’s role in developing his or her team. How to Ace Your Most Important Responsibility is a must read for any sales manager. The article categorizes the sales manager’s approach into 5 straight-forward stages: 1. Set the schedule 2. Pre-call planning 3. During the call 4. Post-call critique 5. End of the day A perfect breakdown of what has to happen to coach your team: To ensure the call remains in the rep€™s hands, sit further away from the buyer than your rep does. Lean back rather than forward in your chair. If the customer directs a question to you, turn… Read More
Continue ReadingWhat Is A Fuzzy Phrase?
The Rock Star posted on fuzzy phrases just about a year ago. I believe I have uncovered a pristine example from an email I received this morning: The deadline is mid September.
Continue ReadingThe IM Wave
We had a rather robust discussion at Select Metrix yesterday regarding corporate uses of instant messaging (IM). I, being a self-proclaimed techno-geek, believe that IM will replace email in the near future. Well, according to a CareerJournal.com article titled Instant Messaging Is Invading And Changing the Workplace, that future may be now (emphasis mine): But tech consultant Gartner Inc. projects that instant messaging will be the “de facto tool for voice, video and text chat” for 95% of employees in big companies within five years.
Continue ReadingRecruiting Process Affects Your Marketing Efforts?
Yes according to a recent study by Capital Consulting in London. I came across this short little article from Workforce Management in a newsletter. It is a short artice so I will reproduce it in it’s entirety (emphasis is mine): At Least Say Thank You: Shoddy recruiting does more than chase away potential high performers. New research suggests it also may cost companies in the marketplace. Capital Consulting in London says nearly one-quarter of job seekers have been poorly treated when applying for a job, and they frequently take out their frustrations by broadcasting the news far and wide: 31 percent share the bad experience with three to five people,… Read More
Continue ReadingCorporate Blogging Violations
From Podcasting News – Nearly One Out Of Ten Companies Has Fired A Blogger: Nearly one out of ten large companies has fired an employee for violating corporate blogging or message board policies, according to a survey conducted by Proofpoint, a company that specializes in corporate messaging security. 19 percent of the companies have disciplined an employee for violating corporate blogging or message board policies. It would be interesting to know what some of the violations entailed. We’re not familiar with what companies use for their blogging policy but we would be most interesting to know what is a typical policy.
Continue ReadingTwo Weaknesses That Lead To Discounting
SellingPower.com offers an excellent article titled End Those Last-Minute Negotiations. The article quotes one of our favorite trainer/authors – Jeff Thull. Thull rightly ties together two critical pieces of closing a sale – value proposition and money. Many salespeople are clumsy with putting the right value proposition in play. If the salesperson is not asking the right questions, he or she will not know whether the value they offer through their solution is valuable to the prospect. To make matters worse, many salespeople struggle with the need to discuss budgets (money) with the prospect. Combine these two weaknesses and you have trouble. Thull€™s team conducted informal research of about 10,000… Read More
Continue ReadingDeath By PowerPoint
I have read many posts about the scourge of PowerPoint and how it derails presentations. Being a PowerPoint fan, I have resisted these barbs. That is, until this morning. I sat through a presentation in which the speaker used PowerPoint during his 60 minute talk. Here’s what I experienced in the audience: -His laptop was turned perpendicular to the screen so he spoke mainly to his laptop with his shoulder facing the room. I was on the “backside” so I spent the majority of the time looking at his back. -He used animated bullets that would fly in, sweep in, float in, etc. On one slide, a bullet point slowly… Read More
Continue ReadingThe Downside Of Blogging
Obviously we are strong supporters of blogging and encourage everyone we can to join the Blogosphere. However, some people may not benefit from blogging about their company since some things are better left unsaid, or unknown. Foxnews.com’s Blogging Gone Bad at Bear Stearns reports on a hedge fund manager’s blog that went wrong in a big way. The manager seemed to have more than enough self-esteem to discuss his cratering funds in an unconcerned manner. Here’s where the perception created by a blog can have a negative effect: The blog, full of alpha-male inspired phrases likening the demise of his funds to the attack on Sparta would have provided comic… Read More
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