Well this was the longest clicking session I've had in a while, 263 clicks to be precise. Thanks to our friends at We Are Social, I clicked through this entire presentation this morning on the 'Intention Economy'. It's long, aimed at technology and media companies and very high level, so it's not for the faint hearted. But I had a couple of my own light bulb moments as this presentation proceeded. I thought I'd quickly share my favourite in the context of what we're trying to do with CloudProfile: Getting out of the way! Here's why...
I'll use the Apple example: It is of course everyone's favourite example right now of an innovative company, creating great products. But they're also well known in the industry for being 'closed' as an organisation. They don't have hundreds of employees blogging, like Microsoft. They don't have executives Tweeting away, like Richard Branson. But what they DO do is consistently try and 'get out of the way'. They try to make technology disappear, to get if out of the way of you doing what you need to do.
Many of the hundreds of thousands of small businesses we've worked with over the past few years provide amazing services, and create awesome products. So why get in the way of small businesses telling their own story? Why not create a tool that allows business owners to quickly and easily get photos of their latest products out to the world, immediately announce a new deal to customers, or just respond to customer queries in whatever form is best, whether that be e-mail or SMS. Sounds like a plan :-)
The postal service is on strike in the UK today. Industrial action always makes me angry, but as this is just 'mail' I don't really care, we generally use e-mail to keep our business turning. But there are of course thousands of small businesses that completely rely on a postal service. And I was reminded of a small company I spotted years ago when I saw them on Sky News this morning: Wiggly Wigglers! They were one of the first companies in the UK to record a podcast and they've continued on to be a very web-savvy business, which is actually a small team of gardeners and packers in a rural village in Herefordshire.
Seeing the owner on national television this morning, largely thanks to their recognition through using social media, it made me ask myself....why do some people 'get it' and others not? Why does the founder of an online 'worm' shop start recording podcasts and blogging every day? Why does the next business down the road, selling timber, not bother at all? Mmm, I'm seeing an opportunity here....an X Factor for social media...how about an "Internet's Got Talent"??
Congratulations to the team at Money Dashboard for securing a new round of funding....since meeting James Varga up in Edinburgh at a Microsoft event a year back, I've been dying to get my hands on the tool. About ten years ago, my wife and I tried using Microsoft Money to manage our finances and about five years ago we swore never to touch it again, after our bank turned off the automatic feeds.
Well, come 2010, Money Dashboard should make the idea a reality. Good luck guys...(and please invite me to the beta!)
Thanks to the guys at DJargon ( http://www.djargon.com/b2b-marketing.htm ) for reminding me that LinkedIn isn't just for personal networking, it's THE major social networking site for business-to-business collaboration, research, sales and marketing. With another major release under our belts here at CloudProfile (more details here: http://bit.ly/1nkCJY ) we're now making updates our customers make on their own sites more visible across the internet than ever before!
Web sites created on CloudProfile are kind of nice (see two of our favourites in the Links section below), but that's only a small part of the story. Every time you or I post an update, it shows up on Facebook, Twitter...and yes, LinkedIn! How? Well, like most things, you have to do one small piece of work to get this working: Here's how in three easy steps....
- Log in to www.linkedin.com
- Click on 'Blog Link' in the 'Applications' section at the top left, see image below
- Follow the instructions to add your CloudProfile (e.g. http://murfin.cloudprofile.com ) and you're done!
It's amazing isn't it, that with all this technology at our fingertips, after years of people inventing stuff to make life better or easier, we're actually just juggling more and more in our day. More computers, more mobile phones, more internet, more digital TV, more IM, voicemail, facebook updates, twitter, sms, mms, fans, profiles, e-mail, nudges, photo galleries, operating systems, apps....ok, enough already!
And what about all this 'your business MUST do social media' stuff? Quite honestly, it's a waste of time. It's another industry fad, it's simply another way of talking about what the man on the street has always known: That looking after customers, finding new ones, and running your business is all about people. Responding to people who make enquiries. Explaining your product or service to people who are interested. Discussing contracts, or haggling over a price. Arranging flowers, or packing a box. Going to a site meeting. Asking for your money.
Being told that social media is something you MUST do in order to 'survive' is of course a load of rubbish. A more fair statement however, might be: The internet could help solve the odd client problem, or make it easier for clients to find out about you. So why not find someone, or some tool to give all this social internet stuff a go, and you're business will probably benefit from it.
And that might NOT mean new customers. It might actually mean LESS enquiries. What?! Well, sometimes, 100 enquiries, with 6 resulting sales is a bad thing. Because maybe, just maybe, this 'social media' stuff means you only get 75 enquiries, but actually now get 9 sales. Because 25 customers, read about you on one of these social media things, and thought, "oh...no, that is soooo NOT what I need", and each one wastes 5 minutes less of your precious time. And 3 more potential customers, read a bit about you on your blog or CloudProfile and feel they've found exactly what they need. Great.
So don't waste your time on social media. Find a tool, or even a person, who can keep customers up to date, announce special offers, publish opening times, FOR YOU. We built a service, CloudProfile, that does this for you. (From my list above, we take care of all that Facebook, twitter, SMS stuff for you. Sorry, we can't get rid of Operating Systems for you...yet).
We'd love you to use it. Give it a go: http://www.cloudprofile.com Or mention it to someone that 'get's all this stuff', and get on with your business.
