'Tis the season to be incompatible

I have a huge problem with Christmas. Why don't any of the Christmas light bulbs fit in the other light bulb sockets? I went to Target today and bought some rope lights, exactly like the kind I bought two years ago, to extend my current lights. Too bad the ropes don't connect. They lineup, screw together because the plugs are virtually the same, except not exactly. They aren't compatible.

Here is a question. Is there a portion of your business that isn't compatible to something you did two years ago? One year ago? Six months ago? If so, why not? Sure, you might have made improvements but when you stop supporting your current customers for new customers you will eventually lose more than you gain.

Out with the old... in with the other stuff

What is new? With the economy on the fritz you have to wonder what will come of marketing. Will everyone go grassroots? GM doesn't have the money to spend to blitzkrieg the world with commercials. Budweiser is cutting back. Will large companies do what small companies have had to do for years and go directly to customers?

It's not impossible. You go to Borders and buy books--they have your email address--they send you email with specials. But that isn't grassroots enough. Wal-Mart could do send me emails, too. They could build a profile of me every time I walk through their door. They could send products geared towards me the same way Amazon can. They don't. GM could. Budweiser could. They just never had to. Grassroots marketing is harder than carpet-bomb marketing because you have to know your customers. Really know them--not just a name and email. You have to create a relationship. That's hard. But the pay-off can be huge.

You've really made it baby?

When do you know your product or service has really made it? When people write books about it. Especially if they write a manual. Then again, if your help documents aren't good enough and someone else has to write a manual you have to wonder: are you doing a good enough job helping your customers?

Sometimes a product creates an entire cottage industry. Google search anyone? SEO started because of Google. Then again, as soon as an industry starts the company for which a cottage industry has sprouted could put your industry out of business.

Business 2.0, 3.0, or whatever.0

If you were in charge of marketing yourself what would be the first thing you'd work on? Your personality? Resume? Network? Social network? All of these? None of these?

The answer is all and none of the above. You market yourself every day when you come in contact with people like the person you meet on the plane or the guy who dropped his napkin at the restaurant that you picked up or the person at work that you went out of your way to help. If you believe that the moment you walk out the door until the moment you come home you are marketing yourself then think about your business for a moment.

Does everyone at your company think this way from the moment they wake up until the moment they go to bed? Every person who works for your company markets themselves and in turn markets you.

And if you believe everything above--then do you also believe that every minute of the day your business does a great job interaction with customers and potential customers? The answer lies in whether your employees do their best to represent their company?

Marketing isn't always about spending money on advertising. Sometimes its the small things that have the biggest impact.

Do you know if your customer service sucks?

I had an experience with Sirius satellite radio and their subpar customer service. The issue was with a home radio not detecting an antenna. I ended up getting bounced around after sitting on hold for 30 minutes. Sure, its me complaining so what? But a search online and will find thousands of complaints. That isn't a good thing.

When a search for "sirius customer service sucks" shows over 17,000 results there is something wrong. One thing I've always loved was when companies like this get active on message boards and blogs to answer customer issues. Also, when a customer service or tech person fixes something put up a website to help others with the same problems find a solution. You'd save your company a lot of calls and create a better relationship with your customer.

I love being rewarded

We've all experienced the teenager at the grocery store pushing a huge line of shopping carts back to the store. The guys at Target even have a cool machine that helps push the carts. But it all seems like such a huge waste of employee time and energy just because we, the customers, are too lazy to bring the carts back ourselves.

What if instead of a few teenagers retrieving carts stores gave customers rewards for bring the carts back into the store? If you grab a cart swipe your store card, and perhaps a cart card as well, and when you bring the cart back and reswipe your card and the cart you recieve rewards from the store. I'd take the extra few minutes to return my cart if it meant a few cents off a gallon a gas or a free gallon of milk.

The beauty is a double positive effect: Less employee hours spent to retrieve carts and happy customers who might decide to shop at your store rather than your competitors.

Why are tires so boring?

Automobile tires have looked the same forever. Sure, the size, tread, quality and such have changed. But what we see hasn't. Tires are black. Tires are boring. Tires have never been exciting. Rims and hubcaps have changed but not the tire. It's sort of like toilet paper. The same old boring thing.

The question is: are tires already perfect and beyond the need for change? I don't think anyone believes toilet paper as is does the best for what we need it to do. Same goes for tires.

We can make white walls and white letters so why not white tires? Why not pink tires. Why not tires that have your favorite sport's teams logo on them? I'm not going to try and come up with the next generation of tires and how to make them cool, but right now they are the least cool thing on your car. And cars are things we like to decorate with all sorts of unnecessary things--things that make companies lots of money.

Is there something at your company that is the tire? If there is how do you fix it and take a really big leap forward? The first thing is to recognize its a tire. The second thing is taking a risk and making it something exciting and great.

How to turn free into making money

Arena football teams have a tough time filling arenas made for NBA, NHL and other franchise teams. The problem is most people haven't experienced these teams. Not everyone will enjoy it, but there are ways to still make money while giving game tickets away for free.

How about the first game, or first few games, giveaway all the tickets for free. Money will still be made from concessions.

I'd also force those who want free tickets to enter into a lottery online. Potential winners would be forced to give correct demographic information because tickets will be mailed. Entrants would also have to give an email address so that they can get emails from the team throughout the season. I'd make this email a forced opt-in for the entire season if you give them free tickets.. that's part of the deal. This allows you to offer them ticket deals and sell a highly targeted advertising spot in the emails. Of course you shouldn't send this email more than once a week or you risk it getting deleted before its ever read.

Alliances can often be better than taking on the world alone

CNN recently announced that they are going to start offering a wire service to newspapers. Having experience working at a newspaper I know that CNN will be in for the fight of their lives for two reasons.
1. Newspapers don't have much money to spend
2. They will be competing with AP--which newspapers have an ownership interest in. (even though I blogged that AP might be ready to go down for the count--don't count on it any time soon)

If I were CNN I'd partner with local papers rather than be a syndicate. Here's how I'd do it and the benefits.
1. Work with local paper and provide them with world/national articles for print and the web. This offers CNN local branding in print and links/branding online.
2. Provide CNN video for newspaper websites. Another branding opportunity and links. Also, if a local newspaper affiliate has interesting video then use theirs on the CNN website with link back.
3. Provide a much needed commentary for newspapers.
4. Put those newspaper articles of national interest on the CNN website with links back to newspaper.
5. Link back and forth as much as possible, thus bringing a larger audience to both companies.