Buzz Marketing: Beanie Babies, Flying Wrenches, and Ice Castles
26 December 2009 — Ken Krogue
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Brent Christenson is one of my favorite people. He is scrappy, and that is a trait that is getting harder and harder to find. I have found that the single most important success ingredient in running an inside sales department is a scrappy manager; so I look for stories of “scrappiness” and share them when I find them. Here’s one:
By summer he runs a small engine repair business he calls http://www.flyingwrench.com/ throughout all of northern Utah County. When he told me he was starting that business years ago I thought he was crazy. But with three or four mobile mini-van repair vehicles and several employees later, he definitely proved me wrong.
What does an owner of a small engine repair business do to drum up more business? Normal owners would take out an ad in the Yellow Pages or hand out business cards; not Brent. He shoots Beanie Babies from a home-made compressed air cannon dozens of feet into the sky to the thousands in the Alpine Days Parade. And he does it while riding on the roof of his Flying Wrench van every single year.
When one of his many vans isn’t out on a service call it is parked in a field very […]
If 100 people go to your website, how many of them fill out a form or buy something? If 2 out of 100 fill out a form, then you have a 2% conversion rate. This is slightly better than the average for most corporate websites. We were lucky (or blessed) to get the name InsideSales.com and tap into a large flow of web traffic from our very first day. In fact, we got 8 leads their first day we turned up our website.
The process of converting visitors to leads or sales is the process of website conversion. And designing your website to do this well is called conversion design. Most companies make a fancy website that looks like a nice electronic brochure but hardly generates any leads at all.
I just spent an hour on the phone with Tim Ash, the founder of http://www.sitetuners.com as he walked me through an express review of the home page of InsideSales.com.
The good news is that we have lot’s of room for improvement. We convert leads at 3-4 times better than the average. The sad news is that our previous website, though not nearly as good looking, converted somewhat better than this one does. Hmmm, look or […]
Behind the Cloud – Part 6 – The Corporate Philanthropy Playbook
18 December 2009 — Ken Krogue
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Whenever I read a great book, I summarize it so I can learn better and recall it later. I have been asked to make some of my “Ken’s Notes” available. Here is part 6 of ”Behind the Cloud” by Marc Benioff, the founder of salesforce.com. Scroll to the bottom for links to the other Parts – Ken Krogue
Make Your Company About More Than the Bottom Line
Play #64: The Business of Business Is More Than Business
Businesses can use all of their assets—their equity, their capital, their people, their relationships—to serve as a force for good in the world. Oracle launched Oracles’ Promise with a younger Marc Beniof in charge of putting computers in schools. This is how he met Colin Powell. They failed in installing computers at a school and Collin Powell sent in the Marines to help.
It doesn’t work unless philanthropy is woven into the fabric of the company, with commitment.
Play #65: Integrate Philanthropy from the Beginning
Filed the Salesforce Foundation as a 501 (c)(3) the same time as incorporate salesforce.com
Found Suzanne DiBianca to lead it.
Play #66: Make your Foundation Part of Your Business Model
The 1-1-1- model: 1% of time, product, and equity. Hasbro inspired 1% of time or 4 hours […]
The Most Powerful (and simple) Lead Scoring Model We Have Tried
16 December 2009 — Ken Krogue
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There are two schools of thought around lead scoring, use lots of data and find correlations or find the datapoint with the most correlation and stick with that. Lots of data is the luxury of companies with lots of smart people and/or expensive software and is better.
For the majority of small or medium companies we like one datapoint.
And that one datapoint is offer types.
Offer types are the kinds of things you offer on your website.
Do you offer free trials or whitepapers? A free trial may be MUCH more powerful than a whitepaper. You see, they are closer to buying something with a free trial than if they are downloading a whitepaper.
We call free trials, pricing, proposal requests a “buying signal” offer.
We call whitepapers, newsletters, ebooks, and even research papers (our favorite) “tire kicker” offers.
Tire kickers promote interest, buying signals indicate need.
Interest is the counterfeit of need. But interest can become need with education and time.
Call your buying signal leads back really fast (like within 5 minutes like our MIT study says), but perhaps don’t bother calling your tire kicker leads back at all, instead you should nurture them until they return and become a […]
Whenever I read a great book, I summarize it so I can learn better and recall it later. I have been asked to make some of my “Ken’s Notes” available. Here is part 5 of ”Behind the Cloud” by Marc Benioff, the founder of salesforce.com. Scroll to the bottom for links to the other Parts – Ken Krogue
How to Develop Products Users Love
Play #52: Have the Courage to Pursue Your Innovation—Before It Is Obvious to the Market
Produce a product customers love. Build a product for companies in the world to use at the same time. Build ground up for the Internet. A securely partitioned, highly personalized experience with their own data, logic, and end-user experience. Call it “multitenancy.”
Don’t give up the End of Software mission. This is our religion.
Play #53: Invest in the Long Term with a Prototype That Sets a Strong Foundation
“Do it fast, simple, and right the first time (and did we mention fast?)”
Play #54: Follow the Lead of Companies That Are Loved by Their Customers
Follow Google, eBay, and Yahoo! By offering one product, then adding more later. Focus.
Play #55: Don’t Do It All Yourself; Reuse, Don’t Rebuild
Don’t build it all yourself from scratch.
Play #56: Embrace Transparency and Build […]
Whenever I read a great book, I summarize it so I can learn better and recall it later. I have been asked to make some of my “Ken’s Notes” available. Here is part 4 of ”Behind the Cloud” by Marc Benioff, the founder of salesforce.com. Scroll to the bottom for links to the other Parts – Ken Krogue
How to Energize Your Customers into a Million-Member Sales Team
Play #37: Give it Away
They offered a free functional five user for a year. Got valuable feedback.
Play #38: Win First Customer by Treating Them Like Partners
Start with your warm market, let them use it for free in the beginning in exchange for being the beta testing bug force. Then hired a sales rep and started getting paying customers. Initially sold month-to-month.
Use a feedback loop:
Stay in touch with customers
Develop a way to track their requests
Respond quickly
Ask if their needs are satisfactorily met
Pay attention to how they use the product
Play #39: Let Your Web Site Be a Sales Rep
Got an article in the Wall Street Journal in 1999 by Don Clark, a journalist invited to the Laboratory. They got 100 leads in one day. They registered for free trials before they even talked to a sales […]
Whenever I read a good book, I summarize it so I can learn better and recall it later. This book is very applicable to SaaS and high-tech companies. Here is part 3 of my Ken’s Notes on ”Behind the Cloud” by Marc Benioff, the founder of salesforce.com. – Ken Krogue
How to Use Events to Build Buzz and Drive Business
Play #27: Feed the Word-of-Mouth Phenomenon
Two methods that most directly converted into sales:
Editorial: unbiased business and technology stories in the press.
Testimonial: the word-of-mouth phenomenon created by customers sharing success stories with their peers.
Did a six-stop “City Tour” like a financial road show with potential customers, customers, analysts, press, partners, philanthropists, and nonprofit leaders.
Play #28: Build Street Teams and Leverage Testimony
Keynote talking about the pains of CRM users, questions and answers, and a live demo of the product. Customers answered the questions.
Give customers a service or product they love.
Elicit customers insight—and use it—so that they’ll love what you’re offering even more.
Provide a platform for customers to share enthusiasm
Operate locally to build teams that influence others on a community level and collectively form a global network.
Without prompting, customers stood up and delivered spontaneous testimony professing their belief in our product.
They have a person whose sole position […]
Here is an outline of my Ken’s Notes for the new book “Behind the Cloud” by Marc Benioff. Whenever I read a good book I like to take the time and summarize the book so I understand better and retain the good ideas. Hope it helps. This is a book you should own. Ken Krogue
Behind the Cloud: the untold story of how Salesforce.com went from idea to billion-dollar company—and revolutionized an industry – Marc Benioff – Chairman & CEO of Salesforce.com and Carlye Adler
Outline by Ken Krogue, President of InsideSales.com (more in-depth summary by parts on my corporate blog – adding one per day or so)
Here are links to my notes on “Behind the Cloud” by Marc Benioff on my corporate blog The Insider, I’ll notify of new summaries of other books I do on my Twitter/LinkedIn accounts – Ken Krogue
Part 1 – The Start-Up Playbook – How to Turn a Simple Idea into a High-Growth Company
Part 2 – The Marketing Playbook – How to Cut Through the Noise and Pitch the Bigger Picture
Part 3 – The Events Playbook – How to Use Events to Build Buzz and Drive Business
Part 4 – The Sales Playbook […]
Whenever I read a great book, I summarize it so I can learn better and recall it later. I have dozens of these and I have been asked to make some of my “Ken’s Notes” available. Here is part 2 of ”Behind the Cloud” by Marc Benioff, the founder of salesforce.com. Scroll to the bottom for links to the rest – Ken Krogue
How to Cut Through the Noise and Pitch the Bigger Picture
Play #15: Position Yourself
Held a press party with 30 journalists to demo the software and declare something bigger than CRM: “The End of Software.” Take every opportunity to show your difference to the media and potential customers. Wage war against the traditional.
Play #16: Party with a Purpose.
Marc spent $600k to have the B-52’s play at a massive party to launch the concept and break through the noise.
Play #17: Create a Persona.
Marc played the role of revolutionary and wore fatigues in the fight against established software. The CEO is the perfect person to become this “character.” A brand is not just a logo, it is a collective set of memories, a personality.
Play #18: Differentiate, Differentiate, Differentiate.
“No Software” logo and “the End of Software” mission. Marc had an ad with […]
Whenever I read a good book, I like to summarize it so I can learn it better and recall it later. I have been asked to make these available. So here are my summary notes of part 1 of an incredible book I recently finished called “Behind the Cloud” by Marc Benioff, the founder of salesforce.com. Scroll to the bottom for links to the rest of the summary of the book – Ken Krogue
Behind the Cloud: the untold story of how Salesforce.com went from idea to billion-dollar company—and revolutionized an industry
Marc Benioff – Chairman & CEO of Salesforce.com and Carlye Adler
Part 1 – The Start-Up Playbook – How to Turn a Simple Idea into a High-Growth Company
Play #1: Allow Yourself Time to Recharge. Don’t be afraid to take time off when you need it.
Marc took three months in Hawaii and two months in India to meet the Dalai Lama, Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, and Mata Amritanandamayi, the “hugging saint” who introduced the idea of giving back to the world while pursuing career ambitions.
Play #2: Have a Big Dream. Pursue it passionately and constantly defend it.
Marc believed in a new way to deliver business of software applications, what is now called […]
