How to Communicate Your Strategy More Effectively: Investing in Communication

November 16, 2011 by


 

Why Investing in Employee Communications is Critical

The steps to achieving a certain goal all have one thing in common; they all need a investment by you in order to work.  In communicating your strategy to your people, that investment is your time.  If your leadership is to have an impact, you must spend the right amount of time mastering effective employee communications. To finish out my series, I reveal how and why it is critical to invest your time for the message.

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This is Part Five of a Five Part Series on how to communicate your strategy more effectively with Tyler Pyburn, Host at The Pulse Network, and Stephen Saber, Chief Executive Officer at The Pulse Network. Check out the entire series right here: Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four.

Think I missed something on the post?  What some more advice on how to innovate? Let me know by commenting on this post, or by reaching out to me on e-mail: ssaber@thepulsenetwork.com

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How to Communicate Your Strategy More Effectively Through Body Language

October 17, 2011 by

Best Practices for Body Language

Your body language says everything.  Subtle or blatant, body language is an instinctual thing that most people pick up regardless of the language they speak or the message that you are trying to get across.  How you sit, make eye contact and hold your hands all effect the message you are sending across but trying to be aware of all of those elements is extremely difficult.  Ergo, I tell people do not focus on how you are feeling but rather what is the message your body language is sending.

Below I explain more helpful hints to take into account when it comes to body language. If I’m missing anything, please feel free to e-mail me with your additions at SSaber@thepulsenetwork.com

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For the full segment on tips and tricks for written communication and body language click here also check out my blog post on spoken communication and written communication.

Tune in every Thursday at 9:30 a.m. ET for TPN Finance where Stephen Saber, CEO of the Pulse Network, roams every topic a business leader could encounter from business ethics to social media’s ROI.


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How to Communication Your Strategy More Effectively: Building a Framework

October 11, 2011 by

 

This is Part Two of a Five Part Series with Tyler Pyburn, Host at The Pulse Network, and Stephen Saber, Chief Executive Officer at The Pulse Network, on how to communicate your strategy more effectively.
 

How to Build a Framework for Your Message

The goal of communicating your strategy is to make your message easier understood and echoed.  Since the only way to achieve that is by keeping the message consistent every time you state it, you must build a framework to your message.  This article gave the suggestion to set up a framework that inspires, educates, and reinforces your message.  For this part of the series I explained why each layer of the framework is critical to your communication strategy and how to perform said task.

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In part three of this series I will go about helping to make the message apart of what you are.

Didn’t get a chance to check out the rest of the series, check them out here: Part One.

Think I missed something on the post?  What some more advice on how to innovate? Let me know by commenting on this post, or by reaching out to me on e-mail: ssaber@thepulsenetwork.com

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A Guide to Understanding Long-Term Business Growth

October 10, 2011 by

 

Tune in every Thursday at 9:30 a.m. ET for TPN Finance where Stephen Saber, CEO of the Pulse Network, roams every topic a business leader could encounter from business ethics to social media’s ROI.
 

Source: 50marathonchallenge.blogspot.com

A business cycle is a lot like a roller coaster, it has its rises and falls but after every fall comes a rise.  Ergo, the best time to plan for your businesses’ growth is during the recession because expansion is the next phase of the business cycle.  Vijay Govindarajan wrote an accomplished blog post in the Harvard Business Review with a processes for how to achieve long-term growth that I expounded upon on TPN Finance.

The steps laid out for creating long-term growth in your business are: decide what you are playing for, get everyone speaking the same language, imagine your future, align your actions with your intentions, and finally do it.  While the steps do not come off as an intimidating blueprint, every step is as critical as the one before it and if a business leader does not follow them it could mean failure.

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Please feel free to comment on the post or reach out to me on e-mail: ssaber@thepulsenetwork.com

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The State of Social CRM – Mapping the Vendor Landscape

October 6, 2011 by

This is part one of a five part series between Tyler Pyburn, host at The Pulse Network, and Allen Bonde, Chief Marketing Officer at The Pulse Network, as they break down the who, the what and the how of Social CRM.

 

If you ask 10 people ‘what is Social CRM?’ you are likely to get 10 different answers.  Industry watchers like Esteban Kolsky and Mitch Lieberman have certainly helped to frame the discussion.  And in dealing with customer interactions and all the related front-office processes, many people already know the basic concepts of CRM.  But how does the addition of social channels, analytics, campaign tools and even customer-to-customer interactions change what we know about CRM?

In this series I’ll aim to break it down, and provide some perspectives on the various aspects of Social CRM based on what I’ve been seeing over the past few years, as well as my background covering the CRM space dating way back to the mid-90′s at Yankee Group and Extraprise (early Siebel partner) and perspectives as a marketer. Yes, my CMO role may color how I see things, but hopefully the way I look at things is relevant to other marketers and at least a useful starting point for others.

In general, Social CRM combines the traditional roles of the call center, the marketing programs, and the support systems (and of course sales, but not as much as the other areas) with the social channels and social data to put a more personal, social spin on the role of CRM. In a way we are also combining the business side (traditional process-centric CRM) with the consumer side (social interactions and connections). With this in mind, when mapping the Social CRM landscape, it’s helpful to think of four main functions or categories:

  • Listening,
  • Support Communities,
  • Fan Marketing, and
  • Sales Automation.

Check out the video below to see how these parts fit together and what vendors have emerged as early leaders in each category.  And next time we’ll start to drill-down into each category, starting with social monitoring and listening tools.

 

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TPN Finance, Evaluating Business Models

September 9, 2011 by

 

Tune in every Thursday at 9:30 a.m. ET for TPN Finance where Stephen Saber, CEO of the Pulse Network, roams every topic a business leader could encounter from business ethics to social media’s ROI.
 
 

 

Evaluating Business Models

Groupon’s reevaluation of going public has many professionals wondering if that could spell doom for other internet-based businesses.  Rita McGrath, whom was of the opinion that Groupon would fail, wrote a stimulating article on how Groupon’s troubles should not be grouped in with all internet-based models.  Rita broke down how another internet-based business model, Angie’ List, compared to Groupon’s thru the use of a seven point scale to base models.  On this episode of TPN Finance, I illustrate how businesses can utilize the scale by showing how Angie’s list business model fits into the scale.

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For the full episode of TPN Finance on Evaluating Business Models, click here.

Please feel free to comment on the post or reach out to me on e-mail: ssaber@thepulsenetwork.com

 
 
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Debt in Business

August 12, 2011 by

 

 
 
 
Tune in every Thursday at 9:40 a.m. ET for TPN Finance where Stephen Saber, CEO of the Pulse Network, roams every topic a business leader could encounter from business ethics to social media’s ROI.

 

How Americans are feeling on the AA+ rating

 

The S&P downgrade has thrown American consumers in a tizzy of worry.  However, for business managers, debt is essentially an cheap way to gain access to capital.  Howbeit, the concept of using debt to ones advantage does seem negative but when it is broken down it does not come off as profiting off of tragedy.  In the end, debt is just a risk reward game and it comes down on the business owner to balance the scale.

 

 

Ways to gain access to Debt

 

 

In this episode of TPN Finance I illustrate what debt really means for business leaders, how to capitalise off it, and even what the current S&P downgrade could mean for small businesses.


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Storytelling Drives Social Media Marketing: The Art of Curation

August 3, 2011 by

This is part three of a five part series between Tyler Pyburn, host at The Pulse Network, and Allen Bonde, Chief Marketing Officer at The Pulse Network, as they determine how storytelling drives social media marketing.

 

After breaking down the TPN Content Model in Part 2 of this series, I want to now fous in on a vital piece of that model: content curation.

There are many definitions and active discussions about the topic of content curation, but at its core, curation is simply the process of gathering and organizing (and maintaining) artifacts. In social media marketing, this is how we capture, deliver and package pieces of content to fuel the development of a community. Although people have been collecting things – and content – for long before the advent of social networking, whether it’s gathering news articles or just compiling a group of links together, curation for social marketing is a lot about creating lists (like in Twitter), building groups of content, and packaging each link or ‘translating’ each article into the appropriate language for the targeted channel.

Curation in today’s multi-channel world is also a matter of being a ‘transmedia’ storyteller and being equally comfortable in each channel or outlet.

A great example of this type of storyteller is Garrison Keiller. Garrison and his Prairie Home shows do an excellent job in making his stories authentic and related to the listener’s personal experiences. Of course the radio format also enables ongoing stories or serials, and is very much a variety show that draws content from many sources, packages it up in familiar segments, and delivers it a format that builds community.  The key: make your stories about the audience, and your audience will want to share them as well!

 

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In case you missed our past episode, you can see it here. In Part 4 we’ll look at driving conversation from conversations.

 

Allen Bonde is the CMO of The Pulse Network and can be found on Twitter or email,abonde@thepulsenetwork.com.

Tyler Pyburn is a host at The Pulse Network and can be reached on his twitter or e-mail, tpyburn@thepulsenetwork.com

 

 

 

 

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Storytelling Drives Social Media Marketing: The Formula

July 29, 2011 by

This is part one of a five part series between Tyler Pyburn, host at The Pulse Network, and Allen Bonde, Chief Marketing Officer at The Pulse Network, as they determine how storytelling drives social media marketing.

Telling a good story is essential to reaching your target audience.

This is especially the case in social media marketing.  In fact, I’ve always thought that good marketing is good storytelling.  But in social media marketing, the trick is getting your customers to tell these stories for you!  We can break down the formula that makes this work on social channels into three parts: content, connections, and lastly participation (and influence of participants).

The goal for those of us in social media marketing is to package up the appropriate content and then translate it into the language of the specific channel.  For instance, on Twitter you need to keep your story very short, but can also use links and hashtags to make it easy to learn more and share your content.  The way you format your story to fit the language of each social media channel determines your audiences engagement and also how effectively you generate word of mouth and take your audience down a path where they’re expecting to hear the next story – and maybe even an offer or pitch!

I lay out some of these ideas in my conversation with Tyler, so check it out:


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So, what do you think?  Which brands do the best job with storytelling?  Add your thoughts in the comments, and look for part two of this series, when we’ll explore how content can be used to build communities.

 

Allen Bonde is the CMO of The Pulse Network and can be found on Twitter or email, abonde@thepulsenetwork.com.

Tyler Pyburn is a host at The Pulse Network and can be reached on his twitter or e-mail, tpyburn@thepulsenetwork.com

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What are the key characteristics in a valuable business???

March 2, 2009 by

What are the key characteristics in a valuable business???

By far, this is probably the most talked about topic that we discuss on a daily, weekly, yearly basis. As we are trying to build value, it is so important to clearly understand what is value…

In reading an article recently published by the Jordan Edmiston Group (www.jegi.com) I came across what is probably the most clearly delineated listing of what buyers would be looking for.The quote is from Philip Siegel, General Partner from Austin Ventures in discussion interactive and marketing acquisitions. He stated, “we’re looking for a company that combines two or three key aspects: a focus on proprietary information; a software application that the user embeds into their business process; and recurring revenue”.(Source – JEGI Client Briefing – January 2009) For a while I have been preaching the theme of “Locked-in / Recurring Revenues” as the model most appealing as value to customers. This is a combination of business model, technologies, business processes associated with these technologies, and a clear vision for growth.

Philip’s delineation, I believe, is a further and clearer and better definition then mine on the same theme.  It clearly rules out many business models and avenues that people would go down to chase business and build out a company.  However, as a roadmap and key guiding principles – it is very clear and should hang on the wall of every tech CEO and anyone looking to grow a value business.

Again – here they are -

1) A focus on proprietary information

2)A software application that the user embeds into their business process

3) Recurring revenue

Obvious – probably.  Simple to understand – definitely.  Easy to make happen – not so much.  Worthwhile as a guiding light – DEFINITELY.

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