No stupid questions at business seminars

The audience chuckled last week when I opened a seminar by saying:

We all know intellectually that there's no such thing as a stupid question, but...sometimes we're not sure about our own.  Take advantage of the lunch break, or take a business card and call from the privacy of your own office.

I think it was an effective ice-breaker, so I'm sharing it with you for your speeches.  I wish I'd added

Your questions are important, so please ask them.

The follow-up from the seminar was encouraging.  Nothing is more effective than face-to-face communication, when you can convince people to take time off from their busy schedules.

We need more Brazilians

After hours of research, I conclude that the world would be a better place if more of us were Brazilian.

The research was at the airport, where I looked for people who flew more or less regularly to South America.  The Brazilians were uniformly courteous, even the ones who declined to take my survey.  How pleasant the world would be if more people were so civil.  I didn't even have to use my Googlely-translated script. I can't even fake Portuguese.

Though fewer of them actually took the survey, I'm proud to say that Spanish-speaking travelers complimented my pronunciation.  I credit Pimsleur, which is a great way to learn a language, better, in my opinion, than Rosetta Stone.  (Travel, of course, is the best way, but I don't do enough of that.)

Gracias lo mismo y buen viaje.

Ginny Hillenbrand’s “Instant Focus” Works

There was a problem with the way I presented myself. I’d read books about it, prayed about it, asked others. Still I couldn’t put my finger on exactly where the problem was and what I could do about it.

So I called Ginny Hillenbrand. Ginny trained me when I started out as a realtor. Some of the best advice you see on this blog actually comes from her.

Ginny is now a life coach. She offers three kinds of coaching.

• Presentation Skills
• Instant Focus™
• Leadership Coaching

I want instant results, of course. So I went for the Instant Focus™

As Ginny puts it

“Instant Focus” is a one-time coaching session designed to help you move quickly toward an answer, an idea, a solution… NOW! This unique hybrid between Coaching and Consulting has helped scores of top executives and salespeople pump energy and clarity into confusing or exasperating situations.

I described my problem as best I could. And within minutes Ginny responded in a way that made me understand where I could improve my performance, and how to do it. I’d been fretting over this issue for months. Ginny got right to the heart of it. I can’t say enough how impressed I am.

Here’s how Ginny’s Instant Focus™ sessions work:

1. Initial phone call to discuss the format (no charge). This will help you clarify your goals. If you don’t move ahead, no problem, but what do you have to lose from making the call?
2. “Discovery” survey exploring the goal of the process for the individual. All information shared is totally confidential.
3. 90-minute coaching session over the phone.
4. One week after the session, follow-up call to reinforce and identify areas of progress.

I’m touched and grateful that Ginny pinpointed the problem area for me and gave me concrete ways to address it. If you have a work or life problem, contact Ginny for that initial phone call and see if she can help you the way she helped me. Ginny’s website is www.1-866-IMPROVE.com

Unwelcome edits

This just makes me laugh:

Nothing, not love, not greed, not passion or hatred, is stronger than a writer's need to change another writer's copy. --Arthur Evans

Site Templates Are Your Friends

When you start your first website, you probably don't need a lot of fancy features.  You need to get comfortable putting your message on the interwebs--you can always change it up later.

Templates are your friends.  They give you a variety of looks for your site--maybe not as much variety as you want, but still.  If you decide it's really not you, press a button and it's gone.

If you have a blog, you already know how templates work.  Was I surprised that setting up a "real" website is just as easy.

So find a template you like and concentrate on the more important issues: what you want to say, and your domain name.  I'm happy to help you with both, of course.  But I want you to learn how to update your site yourself, so that you can keep it fresh and keep readers (both human and search engines) coming back for more.

FYI, I created my own website, KatharineHadow.com, using a template. :)

Sales Enablement

 

Insightful messages are great, but Tom Pisello reminds us that if they’re not what the B to B sales force needs, they’re useless.

In Is Marketing Too Busy?  The Forgotten Sales Professional, Pisello, the “ROI Guy,” recommends a Content Marketing Institute article by Jennifer Watson, The Audience Content Marketers Can’t Afford To Ignore – But Almost Always Do.  

I agree with both Pisello and Watson.  It takes humility to acknowledge that you’ll never know product attributes and how they meet the needs of potential customers as well as the sales people do.  Given that, once you do your best job, it takes creativity and ingenuity to figure out a way to make your sales enablement programs easily available to the sales force with the tools they use daily.

Watson includes a link to an eBook, The New Rules of Sales Enablement by Jeff Ernst.  Whether you’re from sales or marketing, you’ll want to have a look at this book and forward it to your friends.

What if the media call and you’re not ready?

High-profile employees at large firms receive training in public speaking, including speaking on camera.  If they suddenly have to speak up on behalf of the company, they and their bosses are confident that they’ll come across well.  In the best cases they’ll express exactly what they’re supposed to.  They’ll be articulate and poised.

The rest of us may want to be that suave, but it’s not really that important, is it?

It is if you have a dream.  If you have a product or service you want to persuade others about, you need to speak compellingly.  And if you suddenly have a big breakthrough and the media want to talk to you, would you want to say, “No…thanks, really.  I’m just not a good public speaker.”?

They have other stories to cover.  While you’re gathering your wits, they’re turning to their next assignment.  Too bad, so sad.

That’s why, if you want to promote something, you need to be ready to speak.  That’s why I joined Toastmasters eight years ago. 

At Toastmasters you practice giving speeches in a friendly environment.  Fellow club members give you feedback about your speeches.  If you like speaking, you can also participate in contests.

Toastmasters needs you to fill in other roles, such as leading the meeting, being the “humorist” (telling one joke), and counting the number of times speakers say “ah” and “um.”

Toastmasters membership costs under $100 per year.  If you put in the time, you get something invaluable back—the ability to say the right thing at the right time.

Here’s the link to my club, the Murray Hill Speakers Club.

Here’s the link to Toastmasters International, where you can find a club near you.

If you’re serious about marketing, drop by a meeting for free and learn more about the program.

gurlz ONLY

Attention, gentlemen: this post is about menopause.  You might want to click away now.

LOL!  Can’t you hear those trackballs spinning frantically?

This really is about menopause.  It’s about how I can only think of one reason why the International Sleep Products Association (ISPA) hasn’t already implemented this marketing campaign:

“Congratulations!  You’ve reached menopause.  No more worry about staining your bedding, so buy the best.  Celebrate by treating yourself to a luxury mattress.  

As a special treat, if you tell us you’re over 50, we’ll include a set of 500-thread count Egyptian cotton sheets as our gift.”

(They’ll actually card everybody—nothing like the thrill of being told you don’t look your age.)

I see spots (hee hee) on the Lifetime Channel and OWN, The Oprah Winfrey Network.  I see ads in the women’s service magazines.  I see this as huge.

The only possible reason that they haven’t already initiated this campaign is that they haven’t thought of it.  Yet.

Gives me something to look forward to.

New Year’s Resolution, part 2

To follow up on yesterday’s post: yes, you do want to update your site frequently in order to woo (or wow) the search engines.

Not everyone has the desire or facility to come up with something fresh and witty every day.  As Gene Fowler once wrote:

Writing is easy; all you do is sit staring at a blank sheet of paper until the drops of blood form on your forehead.

 I don’t digress when I say that yesterday I grew tired of looking at all my excess labels.  If you scroll all the way down to the bottom of any post, you’ll see a few labels, words that I thought applied to whatever I was writing about that day.  They help bloggers organize their posts, and, yes, they help the search engines find the posts.

In the beginning of this blog, I was label-happy.  I made up new labels every time I mentioned new subjects, which is why I only had one blog entry labeled “food pyramid.”  It was like setting up a filing system with paper files that only contained one sheet of paper.  After a while all those files get in your way.

I did something about those extra labels, deleting a lot of them.

Here’s the funny thing: that was good for my search engine optimization as well.  The search engines can’t really tell if I’ve just added important and timely news to my blog (only you can do that.)

To a search engine “spider” a deleted label is as much an update as is a trenchant blog post.  So’s a deleted comma.  I could edit my site every day, deleting a comma tomorrow and adding it back in the next day.  The search engines would think I was making serious changes and would think my blog had hotter news in it than the completing blog at the next IP address, which didn’t make daily minor tweaks.

I’d rather add new and interesting blog posts, but even when I do something dull like administer my labels, it’s nice to know that even that may help one more reader find this blog.

Off-the-wall idea for churches and houses of worship

 

Houses of worship of any religion should always be looking for ways to attract new members.  Here’s one you may want to try.

Distribute a letter to recent arrivals and neighbors.

• ·        For neighbors, use church volunteers and door hangers.  Target the houses and apartments nearby.  The more volunteers you have, the farther afield you can go.
• ·        For new arrivals, check municipal records for property transfers and mail out the letters.

The letter:

Welcome to (community name)!   (Or “Hello, neighbor.”)  If you’re interested in joining a house of worship, the congregation at (house of worship name) invites you to visit us at (address). 

(House of worship) is special because (unique selling proposition).

Our services are at (day and time).  If you have questions, please visit us on the internet at (URL) or call us at (telephone number).

Whether you decide to join our congregation or not, if you visit us we’d appreciate your honest and anonymous feedback about how you felt when you visited.  Here’s an anonymous survey.  If you care to fill it out, please send it to (PO Box number/city/state/ZIP)

We hope to see you soon.

Sincerely,

(Religious leader name)

(Religious leader title)

PS If you’d like more information, please do call us at (telephone number).  We promise no sales pitches!

The survey

Thank you for visiting us at (house of worship).  Your anonymous answers to this survey will help us understand how new visitors feel when they visit us.

Why did you visit (house of worship)?

• ·        I received a letter.
• ·        A friend or neighbor invited me.
• ·        Special occasion:
• ·        Holiday service
• ·        Special service such as a funeral
• ·        Other ___________________________________________________________________

• ·        When you visited us, did at least one person greet you with a friendly smile and an introduction?     Yes/No
• ·        Did anyone invite you to return?  Yes/No

•  ·        Was the building itself welcoming?  (Were there any physical barriers that made it difficult for you to participate in the service?) __________________________________________________________________

• ·        Have you visited a (denomination) church before? Yes/No
• ·        Was it difficult to follow the service? Yes/No
• ·        If it was difficult, why was it difficult to follow the service? ________________________________________________________________
•  
• ·        What did you think was the best thing about our service or our welcome?  ________________________________________________________________
• ·        What did you think was the least positive thing about our service or our welcome? _________________________________________________________________ 

Please answer the questions below on a scale from 1 to 5, with 1 meaning “completely untrue,” 3 meaning “neutral,” and 5 meaning “completely true.”

                                                

                                                  Untrue           Neutral           True

                                                          

I felt welcome at the service        1         2        3          4          5

I might return to (house of

                                 Worship)         1         2        3          4          5

• ·        Is there anything else you'd like to tell us about your time with us?   __________________________________________________________________

                         

Thank you so much for filling out this survey!  We’re always trying to ensure that (house of worship) is as welcoming as possible.  Your opinions will help us.

Please mail this survey to PO Box number/city/state/ZIP

A special note from (religious leader): Thanks again for visiting us!  We hope we’ll see you again at (house of worship).

(Signature)

I can’t think of any congregation that wouldn’t benefit from feedback from visitors.  You’re welcome to use this idea, and if you do, I’d appreciate your opinions!

Happy new year.

My Cringeworthy Website

Please don’t visit KatharineHadow.com. 

Whenever I visit it I tell myself that it looks disorganized and unprofessional.  Then I do what anyone else would do.  I close the tab.

I started my site for two reasons:

1. as a portfolio for my print work, so I could send URLs instead of attachments
2. to show that I could produce and maintain a website

 It serves those purposes, but it’s unwieldy now.

It needs to portray a bold, confident marketer who can size up customers and bang out compelling copy on tight deadlines.  It, well, doesn’t.

But, ugh, the thought of rewriting all that copy from scratch, finding the perfect USP and call to action feels so overwhelming.

And yet, I do it daily in my pitch letters.  Pitch letters are easier, probably because I can tell myself that no one reads them anyway.

My project for today is to cull the best lines from my pitch letters and refashion them into exciting web copy for KatharineHadow.com.

About perfection—It’s actually good if the web copy isn’t perfect.  If the site were perfect, I’d never change it.  Then the search engines would assume that I’d abandoned the site, and eventually my rankings would slip.

So, in web copy, as in life, the goal is

Progress, not perfection.

Writing tightly

I had problem meeting word requirements for college essays.  I didn’t like writing bloated prose, though I did it when I had to.

Fortunately, tight writing is a virtue when preparing ads and direct mail.  If a few more words bump you up from a postcard stamp (.28) to a large postcard stamp (.44), you ruthlessly slash a few words from somewhere.

Newspaper experience teaches you a) to make your words fit in the allotted space and b) to get it in on time.

But before you write for the newsletterpaper, you’ve probably written poetry.  And, boy, is that good practice!  Not only do you have to keep down the word count, the words also have to scan and rhyme. 

I only write poetry occasionally now, but it’s a good exercise in forcing yourself to write economically.  Even writing a few couplets for a Burma-Shave style ad disciplines you to justify the use of every word.

I recommend poetry to every budding writer, especially those with no intention of publishing.  Just as musicians play scales but don’t perform them, writing poetry strengthens all your other writing.

PS Don’t forget that postage rates go up on January 1.

Attn Direct Mailers: US Postage Rates Increasing

If you like to mail things as much as I do, you'll be dismayed to learn that US postage rates will go up on January 2. Better get those promotional mailings out now.

My favorite direct mail piece is the postcard. Besides the fact that the postage is cheaper, postcards cut through the clutter. The recipient doesn't even have to open the envelope. Just flip it over and read the message.

Like E.B. White, postcards challenge us to write tight. If space permits only 50 words but you have 60, something has to go.

Most of all, postcards are physical. They have an eye appeal and heft that email can never rival.

And they're so darned cheap. I just ordered 500 4-color cards for $33 from printsmadeeasy.com. That's only 15 cents each--half the cost of a postcard stamp on January 2. Better get those mailings out now.

Postcards--when you care enough to send something better than email.

Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt

Just finished reading Junk Science Judo: Self-defense against Health Scares and Scams by Stephen J. Milloy. Milloy seems to assume that poor science makes headlines because scientists, peer reviewers and editors do not understand the scientific method, and that if he just explained it, the scientific community and the media would see the error of their ways. They would refuse to report on inconclusive but alarming results.

How touching. Milloy does not know that there is an entire marketing technique abbreviated as FUD. FUD stands for Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt--deliberate dissemination of disinformation about a product or service in order to confuse consumers and dissuade them from supporting the competition.

Blogs make FUD easier than ever. If I wanted to, I could say disturbing things about my competition here on this blog, and encourage my friends to leave similar comments to boost the PageRank. I could moderate any ripostes from the maligned competition. And if I were truly devious, I could have other websites pick up my posting--websites that do not allow comments. No peer review, just my slanderous word out there in the blogosphere forever.

It's hard to get other people's blog posts taken down, even if they are blatantly inaccurate. Another blogspot blogger took some of my press releases last winter and ran them through a blender, but left my name and telephone number intact. They looked like real press releases, albeit written on hallucinogens. The purpose of those postings was to create links back to an Internet pharmacy site. See the "report abuse" choice at the top of this page? I complained to Google, which owns blogspot. I filled out their online form (the only way they allow complaints) but I when they requested it I did not send a scan of my driver's license because they did not offer me an encrypted transmission. Because I did not send it, Google has not acted. Stalemate.

Fortunately, the bogus press releases do not spread FUD, except on the question of whether I might be blogging while intoxicated. But I give this example to show how easy it is to post misinformation, and how hard it is to remove bad information. Who needs the New England Journal of Medicine or the Journal of the American Medical Association if they can start a free and anonymous blog and say whatever they want?

Do I believe everything Milloy writes about the inappropriate reporting of scientific studies? I don't know. And I find his web site, JunkScience.com, more strident and abrasive than the book. But I do think that as long as people are out there perpetrating FUD, we all need to be aware of it lest we wind up, as Milloy quotes Carl Sagan's foreboding

of an America in my children's generation or my grandchildren's generation...when clutching our horoscopes, our critical faculties in steep decline, unable to distinguish between what's true and what feels good, we slide almost without noticing, into superstition and darkness.

On a similar subject but from an entirely different section of the library, I also just finished reading How to Rig an Election by Allen Raymond and Ian Spiegelman. Raymond is the former top GOP operative who served time in federal prison for jamming the Democratic call center phone lines during the 2002 New Hampshire Elections.

Raymond did not go to the pokey for his political FUD. Having actors portraying urban men calling conservative, potentially racist, households to urge them to vote for the Democratic candidate, in order to scare them into voting Republican is just business as usual, I guess. Ugh. Between shenanigans like that and Operation Bid Rig is it any wonder The Star-Ledger, the largest paper in New Jersey, endorsed independent candidate for governor Chris Daggett?

Adrenaline gets our attention. But we have to keep questioning the source of the information that makes our hearts race, lest we be frightened into acting against our own best interests by cynical purveyors of fear, uncertainty and doubt.

Semantic Stretch II: Low Redefinition

Julian Baggini has another name for semantic stretch: low redefinition. In The Duck that Won the Lottery: 100 New Experiments for the Armchair Philosopher, Baggini writes.

The advertising industry often uses low redefinition to make the ordinary sound extraordinary. My personal favorite is the wide use of "passionate."....This devalues the truly passionate, whose ardor is now put on a par with a corporate desire to make good curtain fittings.

You could say that semantic stretch or low redefinition is the act of appropriating a word or symbol that people have learned to respect (such as "passionate") for one's own personal gain.

This just in-- Tiffany Sharples tells us in the August 10 Time Magazine that words really do have power. Using profanity allowed study participants to withstand greater discomfort, and it decreased their perception of the intensity of pain. "(P)eople should not overuse profanity," Time quotes Richard Stephens, lead author of the study in question. "...it blunts [swearwords] of their power when you do need them."

So, you semantic stretchers and low redefiners, stop sapping words of their power. Appropriating words to promote your product is just as dishonest as counterfeiting LiveStrong bracelets or concrete certification tests or antivirus software.

Ps. No one is more surprised than me that this is my 100th blog posting. Thank you very much for continuing to read and post comments. kh

Marketing Communications Metrics

At two round table discussions today "Computing the PR-Sales Link: How Leading Brands Organize the Integration of Communications with Sales" and "Linking Your Communications Efforts to the Bottoms Line--Measuring How You're Being Perceived by Different Audiences and Where to Adjust Your Messaging to Make the Greatest Impact" I learned that other marketing communications professionals are as stymied as I am about how to prove the value of our work.

Every other PR professional I spoke to, including people who worked for agencies, international airlines and Ivy League universities, all felt frustrated by the lack of convincing benchmarks. And all this time I thought that it was just me. I thought that if I read the right book, took the right class, diligently studied the metrics in VOCUS, I could figure out how to demonstrate how my pickups resulted in sales.

Thanks to the Business Development Institute for the Communications, Reputation and Sales Driving the Top Line Conference today, for letting me know that I am not alone.

Leadership and Communication Workshop in March

Books give me great ideas, but they don't give me feedback.

That's why I'm glad to see that my friend Gloria Pierce is organizing a new course of the Individual Development Program. Under the auspices of the Business and Professional Women (BPW) of New Jersey, Gloria taught me personal communication and leadership skills in the ID program 15 years ago. (Frankly, I did not enjoy seeing my skills on videotape. Fortunately, the tape was VHS, so no one will be able to watch it anymore!)

When I read about her new class in the Independent Press I called her to wish her well with this course. She told me that this was a new, revamped ID program. She sent me the details, included below. That convinced me to sign up myself, instead of simply recommending the course to others. Men are welcome, too, Gloria said.

The IDP Leadership program will be March 14 and March 21 from 8:30 to 4. It will be somewhere in the Cranford or Kenilworth area, but the exact location will depend on the size of the class. For BPW members the cost is $50; everyone else pays $75. If you want to sign up, please call Gloria at (973) 375-5445.

IDP LEADERSHIP PROGRAM of the BPW/USA

The IDP Leadership Program is BPW/USA’s leadership development series. The program will assist people to succeed in meeting their goals for community action and Change.

The modules are:

Module 1: Historical perspective and current opportunities of BPW defining membership opportunities, objective, mission, vision, and legislative platform.

Module 2: Understanding peers and employees behavioral and communication styles – managing for improved performance.

Module 3: Reviewing behavioral styles and learning to recruit the right person for the right program/task.

Module 4: Learn how to create presentations

Module 5: Learn to give oral presentations

Module 6: Networking – A Skill for Life.

Module 7: Interviewing tips and techniques.

Module 8: Negotiating skills for the workplace and beyond.

Module 9: Developing leadership qualities that will help you rise to the top!

Module 10: Using parliamentary process can streamline any meeting and committee.

Module 11: Business etiquette: standing out from the rest by understanding how to be the best!

Module 12: Understand your advocacy role in your business and community.

Module 13: Learn about governing values – what is important to you, how do you see the world, and what do you believe in? Develop your goals.

Module 14: Develop media relationships for your business or organization.


©2005 BPW/USA 1

Enhance Persuasion

Never need to convince your child to do the laundry? Never need to beg your boss for a raise? Then you do not need to read Yes! 50 Scientifically Proven Ways to Be Persuasive.

The rest of us mortals will read raptly, from Why should restaurants ditch their baskets of mints? through Who is the better persuader? Devil's advocate or true dissenter? to How can you package your message to ensure it keeps going, and going, and going?

Each of the 50 principles is based on psychological studies, and each fascinates.

Even the epilogue is satisfying, with a dramatic description of the results of unprincipled behavior.

(A)lthough the dishonest use of persuasion strategies may occasionally work in the short run...the long-term consequences to one's reputation are dire

See more information about authors Noah J. Goldstein, Steve J. Martin and Robert B. Cialdini at their website. You can also order the book there, and subscribe to their monthly newsletter.

I look forward to your comments on this book.