I got this email in my inbox this week from a vendor I have worked with, or researched.  I paraphrased where necessary to keep the email anonymous [in brackets].

Subject: [Vendor] offers end of the quarter discount

If recent news reports are any indication, our country is no longer in a recession, and business should start increasing.  In fact, for many of our customers, sales are already picking up.  As a result, this is a perfect time to implement [Vendor products] or purchase additional product to help streamline your business process.

[summary of product information]

But perhaps you’re thinking about adding a [competing category of solutions] and can’t see the value to adding [vendor solution].  Prior to purchasing [competing solution type] which will have features you might never know about or use, let us show you how you can use just [vendor]’s tools in conjunction with your existing environments and save money vs. [competing solution category].

[save money by buying vendor product].  Contact us.

The total email was about 1 page of text.  I don’t know about you, but I didn’t think this email was very effective.  It seemed to pitch-y and cliche. It definitely didn’t encourage me to buy more product before the end of the quarter.  In fact I thought it was pretty disappointing: long, not very specific, and didn’t really get to the point.

My letter would have been more like:

Subject: Use [vendor] to save [XXX] on [business process] tools

Are you looking for [competing solution category]?  Did you know you can improve [insert business process] with [vendor name]’s tools, and save [xxx]%.  I’d like to schedule a chat with you to give you more details, and we are running a promo through [xx/xx/xxxx] for [$XXX] off our products and services.

Check out this [insert content link] on how to use our tools to solve [business challenge].

What’s your opinion? How would you have rewritten this sales email?

Check out the Reachforce blog for marketing automation vendor profiles.  Each profile, provided by the vendors, gives a great overview on what they do, and how their system works.  Check it out!

Here are links to a few of the posts:

• What is Eloqua?
• What is Genius.com?
• What is Marketbright?
• What is Marketo?
• What is Manticore?
• What is Loopfuse?
• What is Pardot?
• What is Market2Lead?
• What is Silverpop Engage B2B?

Source:  Reachforce’s marketing automation posts

My first job after college was a really strange opportunity that was a little too much like the “Boiler Room.”  Although the job was the wrong fit for me, I received some excellent advice from the president:

“Don’t fall in love with the deal.”

Any of you sales people, marketers or job seekers know the feeling.  Let me recap a few examples for you.

Job seeker: you finish an interview and you aced it.  The people were great, the pay was great.  You were imagining all of the great lunch spots.  The fun business trips.  And you even picked out the outfit for your first day.  Then a week goes by.  Then 2.   And finally after 3 or 4 weeks you give them a call and they have selected another candidate or the job is unavailable.  You finish the call disappointed because you had spent the last few weeks imagining yourself there.

Senior executive: you just finished meeting with a potential strategic partner.  You begin to imagine all of the ways you can work together, tap into their customer base and impress your shareholders.  The only thing left is to work out the paperwork.  In the home stretch they begin to ask for concessions. And they rewrite the legal agreement.  Suddenly what used to be a 50/50 partnership is looking more like 30/70 in their favor.  You are willing to go by their terms, because this organization is extremely influential and you’d rather work with them even if it isn’t on your terms or in your best interest.  The initial euphoria has turned into delusions.

Sales rep: you meet the ultimate propsect.  The one who will cover your quota for 2 quarters, and they are ready to buy next week.  Your product is ideal for their needs and you only need to work out the price.  Unfortunately at the last moment your biggest competitor drops their price significantly to sweep in and seal the deal.  And you were already making travel arrangements for your celebratory trip.

The point of this post isn’t to depress, but here are my tips to protect yourself in case you are falling in love.

• Step back and really evaluate the opportunity you are euphoric about
• Look at the potential risks and challenges involved in the deal
• Note the maximum you are willing to give to make it work.  And what you will do if it doesn’t work.

I’ve seen too many cases where the deal someone falls in live with is the beginning of the end.  In sales and business.

OK, I have been neglecting my blog a bit.  It has been a busy summer.  Transitioning into a new position and a lot of fun over the summer.  Look for more regular posts from me, and I hope to return to 1X/week posts.

I wanted to recount my coworkers experience, over the past week, with Dell.  This was so egregious, I felt is was appropriate to name names.

My coworker has a Dell notebook that is a couple years old.  It has been super slow and flaky lately.  We aren’t really sure why it is misbehaving, but the battery is completely dead right now, and it could be causing a few of the issues.

He decided to contact Dell to order a replacement battery.  He calls Dell support, sits on hold (typical) and eventually places an order for a replacement battery.  His computer was no longer under warranty, so he had to pay for the battery with his credit card.  The customer service representative said “we’ll ship this overnight, so you should have it tomorrow.”  My coworker was happy, because it looked like the resolution was on the way.  This was last Thursday.

On Monday he comes into the office, no battery arrived on Friday or over the weekend.  He calls the Dell team to check on his battery. This time around customer service wasn’t so friendly:

• My coworker: Hi, I called last week and ordered a battery, the service rep told me to expect it in 24 hours.  It has been three days and it is not here.
• Dell customer “care”:  Please check with UPS, here is the tracking number.  [End Call]

My coworker calls UPS to find out where his package is:

• UPS customer service:  Dell did not use overnight shipping.  The package is currently in IL, and there is nothing we can do to expedite this, it will arrive on Thursday.

My coworker, obviously irritated, since he has a dead laptop and needs to wait 3 more days for a possible solution.  He decides to call the Dell support team again.

• Coworker: I am disappointed that my package did not ship overnight as you promised.  How can we resolve this?
• Dell: Sorry sir, there is nothing I can do.
• Coworker: Your team did not set my expectations appropriately, if the package was going to ship ground the rep should have told me that.  I am without a computer now, and you did not keep your promises.  Can we expedite my request.
• Dell: Sorry there is nothing I can do, please check with UPS on the shipping status.
• Coworker: Can you please overnight a replacement battery to me, if you ship it now, it will still get to me before this package.
• Dell: Our policies do not allow us to do anything like that.
• Coworker: Since you guys messed up, don’t you feel that it is your responsibility to make this situation right, by delivering me a battery sooner or something else?
• Dell: Sorry sir, we cannot do anything like that.  We do not feel it is necessary.  The package has already shipped, so we have resolved this situation.

This goes on for a few more minutes with the same negative result.  The “customer care” refuses to acknowledge the inconvenience this situation has caused, refuse to do anything, even a 10% discount to appease the customer.  They proceed to say: “Nope, we don’t need to help you.”

So at this point my coworker has decided to never do business with Dell again.  The “customer care” could care less.  They were completely unhelpful and unwilling to offer the tiniest of gestures to make the customer feel better.

On Tuesday my coworker made a second failed attempt to get some compensation.  Denied.  Some people think asking for compensation is out of line, and a ploy to get some extra $$.  I am sure if you were in the same situation, you would be P.O.ed too.  It really wasn’t about the amount here, more about the gesture.

How much would it have cost Dell to do the right thing here

• A discount on the order? $5-10
• Expedited shipping? $10-15
• Coupon/or discount towards a future order? $2
• A free battery? $50

Ask yourself, how much is it worth to retain a customer?  Do you empower your service team to make the customer happy?  Or is your customer care team a roadblock on the path to customer happiness?

Today is Thursday, and there is still no sign of the battery.  It turns out the customer service representative didn’t bother to note my coworkers requested shipping address.  When he checked in with UPS he found out the package was delivered to a former address,.  The package was not delivered, it was only an attempt, luckily.  UPS of course, couldn’t adjust the address, so it was back to Dell.

• Dell:  Sorry sir we cannot change the delivery address.
• Coworker: You did not use the address I requested when I placed the order.
• Dell: Sorry sir there is nothing I can do.
• Coworker: Would you like me to facilitate a call between you and UPS to get this straightened out?
• Dell:  No sir, that will not be necessary, I’ll adjust your address now and we’ll get this out for delivery for tomorrow.

I know this entire account sounds absolutely ridiculous.  I personally heard all of the exchanges during the course of this unending transaction (paraphrased here).  At no point in time was my coworker overtly rude or condescending towards the support team, so I really have no idea why this incident played out the way it did.

How do you lose a customer in 3 easy steps?

1. set expectations incorrectly
2. refuse to correct your mistake
3. refuse to acknowledge the negative impact to the customer

And that is one easy way to lose customers in a flash.

At this point, I don’t foresee a happy ending.

Good article with a few ideas on how to incorporate social media in your marketing efforts.

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My coworker sent me a link to these free Ballroom classes: http://www.lindendance.com/calendar.html

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Saw this in SF over the weekend with @leedya.

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NPR: Drunk German Demonstrates How Not To Get Home

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Everyone is trying to go green.  Here a few easy ways your business more green.
1.  Minimize the number of individual printers on employees desks.  It is amazing how much less people print when they need to walk further.  ;)
2.  Convert to digital paystubs, if you haven’t already.  I imagine many employees review, scan, shred.  This cuts out lots of steps for your employees and you HR team.  And Adobe Acrobat or similar PDF creation tool is cheaper than the time you spend on postage/stuffing envelopes.
3.  Get you employees mugs and water bottles.  You probably have company swag.  And these 2 are popular ones.  Give on to each employee and lead by example: use it for you water cooler, tea and coffee.  Sure you have to wash a few more dishes, but you’ll have less trash.
4.  Ditch the bottled water for a cooler of better yet filtered tap.  Either way you’ll use less plastic and decrease transport costs.

I thinks these are a few easy and low cost ways.  Chime in if you have ideas.

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Raise your hand if you know a blackberry user.  Keep them raised if the use it for personal stuff.  

Keep them raised if the personal > work.

I’m sure if we were in a room of 100 people the number of hands left in the air would be less than 20.

Blackberries are the consumate work phone.  To get your mail your company needs a special server.  Cell phone carriers tack on the $30/month Blackberry surcharge, which frankly, even for the biggest Facebook addicts, isn’t worth it unless someone else foots the bill,

In contrast the iphone is the consumate “play” phone.  Games, music, and movies are a breeze.  Work? Steadily improving.

If you recall, when Palm launched the Centro, it was called the “life” phone for work and home.  But it lacked the work streed cred of the Blackberry and the cool factor of the iphone.  It sold a lot, but didn’t convert many existing smartphone users.

The Pre aims to change this by getting some work friendly features, and some play friendly ones.  Let’s call it the crackberry for people looking for balance.

With that goal, Palm could be on to something.  And the idea behind Synergy and WebOS support this notion.

Here’s to balance for work and play.

(BTW I wrote this on my Pre)

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