Prevent and Protect Against Business Lawsuits
Just because you have a healthy fear of the legal system (namely the fact that cases could go either way, even if you’re sure you have an iron-clad defense) it doesn’t mean you can indulge in the luxury of avoiding legal matters. Not only must your business operate within certain legal parameters, but it also behooves you to be aware of the many ways in which your business could potentially come under attack from lawsuits. In short, you need to do everything in your power to prevent legal action and protect yourself against it, should it arise. So here are just a few steps you may want to take in order to ensure that the law is on your side.
Contacting an Attorney
The first thing you should do is contract the services of an attorney. You might not be able to afford to keep a law firm on retainer, but you will need a few legal services (and some advice) when you start your business, and possibly down the road. Since you probably don’t have a background in law, you should start by asking for information about the types of lawsuits you might encounter. Your best bet to avoid lawsuits is to see where they could come from and then take measures to prevent them. And on this score, an attorney can be very useful.
Look for Specialization
Lawyers that specialize in business contracts can help you to create legal documents that will serve to protect you from all kinds of potential issues. For example, you may deal with sensitive information or proprietary software, which means you’ll need employees to sign contracts with non-disclosure agreements. Or you may want to pen a user agreement and a return policy for your online store. And if you work with corporate clients you’ll almost certainly need contracts for services that specify everything from delivery dates to payments for milestones. The right law firm will help you to create the basic legal documents by which your business operates, and they will represent you in disputes (often for free if they want to avoid malpractice suits themselves).
The Best Defense
But there’s a lot you can do on your own to prevent lawsuits, as well. You can start by putting yourself in the shoes of others. Imagine how you might feel if you received a faulty product that led to accident or injury; you’d probably want reparations (or at least your out-of-pocket medical costs covered). Would you be willing to sue to get these funds? Some people would. Or what if you worked hard only to have your boss demand you work through lunch (frequently, and more importantly, illegally)? What if your business partner was in breach of contract, to your detriment? Or what if a vendor you relied on failed to deliver on time, costing you money?
By thinking through issues like these and doing your best to treat your customers, clients, partners, lenders, employees, and anyone else associated with your business fairly, you may be able to stave off the lawsuits that other companies face due to their callous disregard for others. While a smile and a handshake won’t serve you well in a courtroom setting, sometimes common courtesy, customer service, and simply treating others as you would like to be treated is enough to keep them from filing suit.
About the Author: Evan Fischer is a writer for http://www.Maryland-Injury-Lawyer.com/ , a law firm that protects the livelihood of clients who have suffered from an injury due to another person’s negligence.
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LinkedIn Publicity: How Online Press Release Distribution Can Help You with Your LinkedIn Marketing Efforts
Online press release distribution has not lost its power to create buzz and brand awareness. In fact, in speaking with many business professionals who have used our distribution partner’s press release services, we’ve been told:
- Their press releases were picked up by 40+ online sites and media news stations.
- Their press release placement brought additional credibility to the launch of their new books, products and services.
- They started to dominate the search engines – and “own” their keywords as search engines love optimized press releases
- They doubled and tripled their website traffic
- Multiple reporters and media professionals contacted them for additional interviews and media opportunities that give them more exposure.
- Their website now ranks higher on Google – because online press release distribution is a powerful link building too.
Here’s an additional benefit of online press release distribution that no one else is talking about…Online press release distribution will help you with your overall LinkedIn marketing efforts.
6 Ways Online Press Release Distribution Can Help You With Your LinkedIn Marketing Efforts
1) The press release generated publicity can provide you with instant credibility with your LinkedIn profile visitors.
For example my client Sara LaForest’s headline reads like this: “Top Management Consultant Featured in Business Week, Fast Company & WomenEntrepreneur.com – Connect and Find Out Why”. This shows readers immediately why they should trust her and why they should trust what she has to say.
Here are some of the other ways you can highlight your publicity on your LinkedIn profile:
- Create a quoted media positions
- Showcase your media mentions within your summary
- Add the publications section to your LinkedIn profile
- Create a media kit on your LinkedIn profile using Box.net
2) Showcasing your press release generated publicity will prove to journalists that you are media worthy.
On LinkedIn you should be looking to connect with journalists, editors, online radio show hosts and other media professionals. Now for those media professionals to accept your invitation, you have to prove you are credible and newsworthy. When your press release is published by a top publication, you have completed half the battle because you have given yourself expert status. Now, you just have to build a relationship with the media professionals you connect with and show them that your information is relevant to their audience.
3) Use press releases to promote your LinkedIn group and community.
We recently created and distributed a press release that promoted Skip Weisman’s Workplace Communication Strategies group – and it was published on CNBC.com. This helped him:
- Increase his LinkedIn group membership by making more people aware of his group.
- Give him a reason to re-announce his group again to his email list as well as any LinkedIn connection that were not already members of his group. Any time you have a success, you should be letting your connections know.
- Give new connections a reason to join his LinkedIn group when we sent out group invites.
4) Your press release placements can position you as a thought leader in your LinkedIn group – and those other groups you belong to.
I like to create discussions around a topic and link the discussion to a press release or article I’ve written that gives more information on the topic and is featured on a top website. This automatically gives me a third party endorsement which offers more credibility than if the information was just placed on my own website or blog.
5) Use your press release placement as a springboard for discussions.
For example, I distributed a press release titled “More Journalist on LinkedIn Than Any Other Social Network, Study Shows”. I then created this discussion within LinkedIn group: “How are you using LinkedIn to get you more publicity?
In the LinkedIn discussion summary I put “In the press release below, I reveal that 82% of journalist are on LinkedIn and that is more than any other social network. So now I am asking you, how are using LinkedIn to build and maintain relationships with media professionals to get you more publicity?”
I then linked the discussion to my press release on Yahoo News.
This helped me:
- Get more exposure for my press release
- Create a discussion among publicity professionals as they provided their insights. I then responded to their feedback with other ideas and explained to them how I can help them with their LinkedIn publicity efforts
- Start a discussion among small business owners and other business professionals who wanted to learn how to get more publicity by using LinkedIn
6) Getting published or featured all over the Web on top websites and blogs will give you access to more people who will want to connect with you on LinkedIn.
You will have people coming to you seeking your advice. They will see your press release and then look you up on LinkedIn wanting to connect with you. For example, as I was writing this article, I received an invitation to connect that said, “Hi Kristina, I just read your tips in Canadian Advisor’s Edge Magazine – I’d like to connect with you and learn more.”
Your Next Steps
Now that I have shown you how online press release distribution can help you with your LinkedIn marketing efforts, it’s time you take action and start writing your press releases. If you need help, check our my Instant Press Release Templates at http://www.40InstantPressReleaseTemplates.com
About the Author: LinkedIn marketing expert Kristina Jaramillo helps small businesses and organizations get more publicity, prospects and profits using effective LinkedIn. Now, at http://www.HowtoGetMorePublicitywithLinkedIn.com, you can gain full access to her FREE 14-Day LinkedIn Publicity E-course that shows you how to create an expert LinkedIn profile the media will love, how to build relationships with the media plus sneaky ways to get more PR using LinkedIn.
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Crowdfunding Your Startup [INFOGRAPHIC]
In a down economy, it’s difficult for entrepreneurs to access the capital needed to build their venture from the ground up. Luckily, projects can now be funded by a powerful combination of the social Internet and generous networks of friends, colleagues, and communities. This model is called “crowdfunding” and is sweeping the startup nation by storm. It seem s to be an entrepreneurs dream,. bit are there problems in the way?
Check out the below infographic on how to navigate the new crowdfunding landscape (click image for larger view).
Click for Larger View
infographic source: drawing a crowd
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Internet Video Formats: Which is best for your Video Marketing?
OK, so you’ve decided that getting some web video on your site and social media profiles is a great idea to make you more eye-catching to customers and put your SEO (search engine optimization) on HGH. You understand that video marketing is a fundamental part of your overall search engine marketing and social media strategy. Bully for you! Now on to the tech stuff. Video formats can be overwhelming and vary depending on the equipment the video was shot with, the kind of computer you use, and the final destination where you want to host and serve up your on-demand video as part of your video marketing plan.
So which is best for you?
Lorraine Grula offers these tips from her years of experience as a top shelf video photographer and producer in ReelSEO.
Web Video Guidelines
Depending on whether you are doing research to get started with web video or if you are making use of existing equipment and software, you may be limited to formats as follows:
- Raw Video Format — As determined by your camera or, currently, your recording software. For instance, the software I record SmartVu Video Interviews with processes raw video optimally when stored as Windows Movie (. wmv). I have a PC based application. Your camera or software may have a different standard, particularly if you are using a MAC.
- Editing Basics — Your editing software may also have a limitation on formats of video it will accept and types that it works the best with. My videos are substance related, not glitz and glamour, so I use programs like Corel Video Studio and Windows Live Movie Maker. Most video editors will accept almost all the standard raw video formats, but you’ll want to confirm.
- Video Platform– What type video format works best with your online video platform that will work as your host? Will you host it on your site? Take into account Adobe Flash for speed reasons of loading without buffering. YouTube? They convert your incoming video to Flash (.flv) for display. If you’re using a 3rd party, ask about their preferred video format.
Obviously if you have a mismatch in your video camera output and your editor, for example, you’re up a creek without a paddle and will need to convert your raw video to be accepted by the editor. Avoid this, as every conversion results in quality loss for the video. Limit too many conversions.
High Quality or File Size?
Look, with internet video marketing, you are looking at a tradeoff between two things when recording, editing and finishing videos: resolution and file size. Lorraine talks about compatibility too in the ReelSEO piece, and we talked about that already. The greater the quality, the larger the file size (usually), and that means the longer the buffer when loading the video on your player upon demand (particularly if uploaded straight from your site server). If you want super-clear quality, the first thing you need is a work-horse computer loaded up with RAM and an uber-fast processor. I am a PC guy and I had to get an I-7 Dell to accommodate recording Hi-Def video. My old PC (5 years old) could not manage the large files without Japanese Monster Movie style mis-tracking between voice and image and I was forced to record at lower resolutions until upgrading.
The Main Video Formats for Web Video
If you ‘re trying to find the best of both worlds and your hardware can handle the recording and editing, see this brief (did I say brief?) summary of web video formats you’ll be utilizing:
Windows Media Video (. wmv)
This is the basic PC video file format that comes with Windows set up for Windows Media Player. It is well-known, delivers acceptable quality and a fairly small file size. Want higher quality? Record or finish-edit at a higher resolution and the file size increases accordingly. The advantage of .wmv is that it’s standard with all Windows PCs and, if shot in low enough resolution, can actually be small enough to share via email. I use this format for SmartVu Video Interviews and then stream them on Youtube, and they convert without much issue with good finish quality.
Audio-Video Interlaced (. avi)
This is the original video format from Microsoft and has a tendency to create very large files unsuitable for sharing, but of good quality for master files. For sharing, most videographers finish-edit the file in another format to lower file size. According to Grula there is some inconsistency with the codecs (tech video term here) depending on the recording device, making. avi not a great choice for small business video and novice producers.
Motion Picture Experts Group MPEG-4 (. mp4)
Increasing numbers of video producers online are loving .mp4 as the format of choice. It has the H-264 compression codec which is considered top drawer, and is quickly becoming the basic output of camcorders and video cameras. For online sharing the .mp4 format is moving toward the universal preference and in fact is recommended by Youtube, the big fish in the platform market.
Apple Quick Time (. mov)
This format has been around a while and is standard from Apple Quick Time, but is not restricted to Macs. File sizes are big and quality is high. If super-tight quality is your concern, this may be your format.
Flash Video (. flv)
This is the most popular file format on the web today, usable in the Adobe Flash Player which is standard on 99 % of all computers. Video sharing websites like Youtube, Vimeo, etc. take your existing videos and convert to flash for streaming to watchers of the site. File sizes are small, it streams fast, and the flash player can start playing the videos while they are still loading which is fantastic for longer videos (5 min or more). If you host video on your own server, converting to. flv is almost a requirement for user experience. I have used the Riva converter to convert some. wmv files to flash and noticed quality degradation in exchange for the file size and speed issue; nevertheless, Youtube conversions seem to be very clear.
Tips
Here is my recommendation to small business owners and entrepreneurs looking to get into video marketing on their websites and social media profiles.
Record raw footage in the best possible format for your device. If that is .mp4, you’re one step ahead of the game.
When editing, finish the video in. mp4. Test to see if your quality is acceptable with no degradation. MPEG-4 is much simpler to upload and move around. If you see a quality reduction, save finish edits to the same file format as your raw footage.
Upload your videos to a video sharing platform. I recommend Youtube. It is the most popular, gets the most traffic by far, and let’s face it. Google now owns Youtube. If you’re streaming video on your site from Youtube or another site, which one do you think will get the greatest SEO results and page 1 positioning? Youtube will convert to either .mp4 or .flv and do a fine job with it, taking that off your plate.
Now you just need to learn how to use Youtube without providing 100 options for people to leave your video and go view something else. I’ll tell you more on that in a later article.
About the Author: Want better results from Video Marketing? Smart Company Growth helps business SEO by Video Interview Marketing to generate site traffic and build trust with prospects to spike inbound leads. President Karl Walinskas works with companies on Growth Strategy and LinkedIn Marketing for brand building, and has authored Getting Connected Through Exceptional Leadership and been published in AOL, SiteProNews, Selling Power and a million more.
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Open Office Spaces: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
Depending upon the location of your lookout perch on the nation’s workforce tree, you may or may not be aware of a rapidly growing trend in workspace design—the trend toward open office spaces. Popularized by an explosion in the European market, open offices are now catching on in the States, even though the precise definition of “open” is itself still very much open to interpretation. In some settings, the traditional “four walls and a door” office is being replaced by various forms of less compartmentalized partitioning where employees are still somewhat separate while working more closely together.
In the more extreme cases, every kind of wall is undergoing the same fate as the Berlin Wall—tumbling down completely—and the result is an environment where employees sit together with no barriers between them in a large central workspace. The common denominator here is the evolution from an isolated and insulated atmosphere to a more unlocked, uncovered, and unplugged one. But is this trend a good thing? This is the subject of a very spirited and ongoing debate.
Interestingly, both the proponents and detractors of open space offices tend to relate their arguments to a very similar, and nearly identical, set of metrics. Supporters often cite the positive effect of open space on employee morale, workforce productivity, environmental concerns, and individual worker performance. But detractors will point out how openness impacts these same criteria—only in a negative way. Let’s take a closer look at the pros and cons and maybe we can learn something:
Employee Morale
- Why open space is good: Even animals in the zoo don’t like being cooped up in cages, right? This is why you see many of them roaming around modern zoos in open-looking areas that somewhat resemble their natural habitats. Well, common sense tells us that if it works for animals it should work just as well for people. Open offices afford the ideal conditions for humans to roam around and in the process make friends, collaborate with co-workers, communicate more, and achieve a true sense of community within the office space. All these things are bound to add up to higher employee morale.
- Why open space is bad: Morale is great when you are sitting face to face on a daily basis with someone you like. But what if that person happens to be someone you dislike? And communication can be great—but some kinds are much better than others. Unfortunately open spacing gives us the bad along with the good. Being forced to listen to every co-worker’s phone calls and conversations, not to mention bad-mouthing and gossip, can kill morale instead of enhancing it. And another side effect of openness can be a higher risk of personal property theft. What could be more demoralizing than that?
Productivity/Bottom-line Profits
- Why open space is good: Studies have shown that open space offices are very cost-effective, saving businesses upwards of 20% in overhead costs. More people can be fit into workspaces and if the right kind of furniture is chosen, planners can maximize their usable space. Also, open spaces tend to more naturally accommodate modern work practices such as teleworking and office-sharing.
- Why open space is bad: A study by Australian scientists published in the Asia-Pacific Journal of Health Management concludes that open space offices are bad for employee health. The research found that in 90% of cases studied, “the outcome of working in an open-plan office was seen as negative, with open-plan offices causing high levels of stress, conflict, high blood pressure, and a high staff turnover.” Germs are also more easily transmitted, leading to more employee sickness and a loss of production. Another negative risk to the company’s bottom line is the potential for theft of company secrets. In an open office space, the odds of someone seeing or hearing confidential or business-sensitive information increases considerably. And a leakage of proprietary information can not only destroy profits but can destroy entire companies too.
Workplace Environment
- Why open space is good: For many of the same reasons that consolidation into an open space plan yields corporate cost savings, it can also result in a greener workplace. Facilities with open offices are generally more eco-friendly due to greater efficiencies in heating and cooling.
- Why open space is bad: One type of pollution that usually rises in an open setting instead of falling is noise. There is more of it around and more employees are exposed to it. A 2002 study cited (in addition to lack of privacy and confidentiality) increased noise as a primary complaint of open offices listed by surveyed employees.
Individual Worker Performance
- Why open space is good: It’s not hard to see how an open office design can facilitate more teamwork and better communication. In support of this premise, a 1996 research study published in the Harvard Business Review revealed that companies that had modified their business processes by, among other things, migrating from private spaces to open environments realized performance increases averaging 440 percent.
- Why open space is bad: Lack of privacy is often cited as a downside of open space offices, but its impact can be more profound than simply a feeling of inconvenience. In her book Communication Theories in Action, Julia Wood explores the dynamics of communication from a performance standpoint, and offers the theory that there are two types of communication, both of which are needed to be effective: “front stage” (in front of an audience) and “back stage” (where one can relax and not have to worry about what others think). The danger of open offices is that employees may no longer have an individual office area to recuperate from the demands of continual front stage interactions.
So what do we conclude from all this? Well, the fact that there are undeniably positive aspects to open offices is surely a good start. The common-sense thinking is that if we can figure out how to design the open spaces in a way that keeps the good and eliminates (or at least cuts down) the bad lends hope to the thought that the trend is overall a good one and that the negatives can be looked upon as road bumps that need to be overcome. Variations of open office design are already being tried with positive results, some of them based on a very early study by Greg R. Oldham, whose research as far back as 1988 provided information on solutions to some of the problems presented by open office design. The trend towards open offices is not likely to go away anytime soon but there is definitely hope that it can be tweaked and managed in a way that will make open offices look increasingly good, less bad, and never ugly.
About the Author: Dean Stier is Vice President of National Business Furniture, one of America’s leading providers of office desks, office chairs and other office furniture to businesses, government agencies and other institutions.
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Who Says the Internet is Boring?
A surprisingly large number of people, actually; they’re right, the internet is boring. It’s old hat, it’s everyday, it’s yesterday’s news; which is why no traditional business can afford to be without it. That may seem counter-intuitive, but there is a good reason why we’re all bored with the internet; it has simply become a utility.
Once upon a time – and it really is a very long time ago now – the Yellow Pages was exciting. It was the way in which anybody could find anything they wanted and it was the one way in which businesses could get their message out there. Everybody wanted to let their fingers do the walking and everybody did. Then the Yellow Pages got boring. Just like the internet has done today. We all use it so much it’s just an everyday ‘thing’ that we hardly notice we use at all. When we aren’t paying our bills, buying our stamps, getting directions or watching TV over the internet, we are keeping in touch with friends, reading reviews, advice, joining forums. If you want to, you can even order a coffin online and probably get a good deal on it as well.
A Free Trial Too Far
I’ll admit when I started this blog post that I thought there may be some traditional businesses that probably can’t operate online – and the funeral business was one of those. How wrong am I? A quick Google later and I’m thoroughly enlightened. The internet’s saturation into every area of our lives must surely be complete when it’s possible to not only order your own coffin – with a rather startling choice of designs and colours, not to mention materials I’d never thought of – but also plan your funeral online. One site even encouraged me to ‘try it today’, a free offer that I’m declining for now, despite my passion for free trials.
The simple fact that you can do/order just about anything online today is the one reason that any traditional business cannot afford to be without a strong online presence. If, during the recession, you’re wondering where all the customers have gone, it’s simple; online.
The Convenience Store
Traditional businesses can fare particularly well online despite their fears of this strange new world. Undertakers are probably one of the oldest businesses going and they have the ultimate market share – we all use them eventually.
But certainly in the modern, western world people are less familiar with death and prefer a more sanitised, hands off approach; cleverly, these online undertakers and coffin builders take advantage of that fact, helping to put the ‘Fun’ back into ‘Funeral’. Yes, one of them does make that claim. The internet is about convenience, about creating simple solutions for customers who just want to click to access a product or a service, and move on quickly to do something more interesting. This principle operates in other areas of life – not just at the end of it.
Not So Boring After All?
It may seem mad that you can arrange your funeral online, but it seems madder still that you can order a pint of milk. I mean, how difficult can buying milk be? At least one UK dairy has realised that for some people it’s just too much trouble to be constantly nipping to the shop when they should be updating their Facebook profile. Taking the old concept of the milkman and evolving it to create a competitive food shopping service for small, single item orders – minus the delivery charge – was actually a simple, but inspired step. The big news is that people like it; the formerly endangered species of ‘milkman’ is seeing a comeback and business is booming.
Other traditional small businesses that have chosen to step off the high street and into the ether of the virtual world include fruit stalls in London – supplying five-a-day deficient office workers. For small, or large, traditional businesses the internet is, perhaps, the only way to retain and grow your market share. For many permanently plugged-in consumers, the internet may be ‘boring’, but for traditional businesses, it’s anything but.
About the Author: Neil works in online marketing for a dairy products and grocery delivery website, when he’s not online he likes running, reading and soaking up his favourite past time at his local cinema.
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Mobile App Monetization: 3 Great Ways
Unlike the iPhone app market, the market for Android apps is wide open for developers wanting to monetize mobile apps. That means endless opportunities for any developer looking to monetize mobile apps.
How do you monetize mobile apps? Developers usually use at least one of three key strategies.
In-app Advertising
In-app advertising is a good way to monetize mobile apps for consumer apps with big audiences and highly targeted mobile apps and some publishers are able to use ads to earn decent money solely from ads. In-app advertising works especially well for making money with mobile apps if your app is targeted apps, but ads work for apps with broad audiences as well. While it’s possible to make money with mobile apps by negotiating with individual advertisers on ad placement, it’s easier and more profitable to go through an advertising company like Moolah Media. Think of it like choosing between AdSense and putting up a banner that says “Advertise Here” and crossing your fingers that somebody finds it.
In-app Transactions
Developers have now started to utilize the in-app transactions and generate both extra revenue and as their main source of revenue. The iPhone poker game Card Ace, for example, sells users play-money chips with an in-app chip store, and this is the app’s main provider of revenue. When users run out of chips, they must buy more to reload and keep playing. In-app transactions, especially microtransactions, create more consistent revenue streams where the consumer ends up spending little bits of money every so often instead of paying for an app all at once.
Subscription Models
Subscriptions are best used for new content apps, professional and consumer services apps and telecom apps. The most successful examples of monetized subscription are from telecom apps (like Skype) but the trend is picking up. The subscription model helps developers keep their customers’ life value up. It’s a good idea to lower customer acquisition costs and reduce churn over time. Monthly trials and free offers are also great approaches.
About the Author: I do blogger relations for Moolah Media.
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7 Essential Qualities for Customer Relationship Personnel
There is no doubt that the CRM executives need to be responsive, reliable and respectful to help provide customer satisfaction. This according to the Harvard Business Review leads to retention, related sales and referrals for the company. To get to these benefits the company needs to train the CRM staff in specific areas.
Interpersonal Skills
Ability to deal with people politely and empathy towards them are traits desirable in all human beings, but in the case of Customer Relationship Management executives this could well be the gospel truth. If your staff is unable to establish good interpersonal relationships with your customers you are not going to get their business.
Communication
While most of the duties of a customer care executive can be conducted through automated software there are other undertakings which cannot be. For these activities the customer may use the phone or walk in physically to the company premises. If the customer has taken so much trouble to come in to the company he will have a sizable problem to solve. That is where communication skills of the CRM staff will be put to the test.
Handling Stress
No one likes to deal with rude people who want to bite your head off but customer relationship can often involve just that. It can be highly stressful trying to calm down irate customers on a daily basis. There is no excuse for rude behavior on the part of the company staff even if the customer is being discourteous.
Active Listening
One of the reasons why customers don’t feel comfortable dealing with the company on the phone is the number of recorded messages that they need to filter through. When you have a problem to report you do not want to spend five minutes shuttling through different voice recorded menus. That is why it is important for the CRM staff to listen to the customer and respond intelligently to the problem that they hear.
Team Work
This one should be obvious but sometimes a single link in the chain kept out of the loop can cause more damage than imagined. If you are dealing with a customer, have all his relevant details at hand and fed into a centralized system. This will ensure that the customer is never left in the lurch just because you forgot to brief a team mate about what needs to be done.
Problem Solving and Complaints Handling
This is quite literally the crux of the matter. All the chatter that the customer generates is related to his problem. The way the CRM staff functions to solve the problem right from the time the first complaint is registered with them can make a huge difference to the reputation of the company.
Product and Organization Knowledge
A CRM executive cannot solve the problems of the customers who come to him unless he has an innate understanding of the product that the company is selling and a general know-how of the organization. For this reason proper training of the executive in terms of what the company sells and how is essential to his productivity.
About the Author: Sarika Periwal writes for karmacrm.com, a CRM for small businesses and individuals. It is a web based CRM software that can help you streamline all your sales leads and contact data and thus increase customer retention and repeat sales.
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Hatch’d: A Idea-based Social Network for Improving Business
Allow me to introduce you to Hatch’d: a recently born social network with a drastically different purpose than the social media we’ve become accustomed to. Instead of supporting interpersonal, social conversation like Twitter and Facebook, Hatch’d was conceived as a way to simply and efficiently share ideas. Hatch’d is a new take on outsourcing that aggregates product development ideas into one location for the creation and improvement of better products and services.
Easily Communicate Your Ideas
Have you ever had an idea that would allow a company to improve their product or service, but you could not find an effective communication channel that allowed you to be heard? For example, emailing customer service always seemed so distant and ineffective; and posting on Facebook, writing on a company’s Wall, or Tweeting at the business seemed just as hopeless. Now, Hatch’d is working to be the location for you to share and businesses to hear ideas.
Hatch’d works much in the same way as Twitter. A user can share an idea in 140 characters and can utilize the familiar @Username to directly target a business. For example, Brad H. shared his idea “@McDonalds serve breakfast all day.” Users can then vote ideas up or down and can comment on ideas to generate discussion. Through these social aspects, business owners can gain better insight into the minds of their customers and the rationale behind their ideas.
Standard social networking features have also been built into the site. For example, visible on a user’s profile page is a portfolio that displays your posted ideas, picture, and short biography. Users also have the ability to follow other users and businesses to track what is being discussed.
Crowdsourcing What Hatchd Will Become
Admittedly, due to how new the service is, the creators of Hatch’d still do not know what exactly the social network could be. On the About section of the site they ask users to “help figure that out” by sharing an idea @Hatchd.
The largest opportunity for Hatch’d and where I predict the service will find the most success, is for businesses to read ideas that will allow them to better serve their customers. Because voices are often lost in the crowd on sites such as Facebook and Twitter, Hatch’d is a promising tool for its narrow, yet distinct purpose as an ‘idea-network.’ Furthermore, due to this purpose, if a business creates an account on Hatch’d users can trust that their opinions are read and considered.
But Not Perfect, Yet
One aspect of Hatch’d that seems to stray from this well-defined intent is Groups. The About section describes this as a place to “brainstorm ideas with your friends. Plan a vacation with college friends or your family! [Hatch’d wants] to make it as easy for you to toss around ideas here as it is for you to do with your friends over lunch or hanging out at your apartment.”
While the ability and support to discuss ideas with your friends is nice to have, it seems more appropriate for Facebook, where interpersonal conversation is the norm, and even more effective “over lunch or hanging out at your apartment.” To me, Hatch’d needs to be about communicating ideas solely with businesses. Discussion with friends, like I previously said, is sort of played out at this point. Trying to be too many things could lead to its downfall.
Hatch’d is still in beta mode, but it seems solid and bug-free. Expect new features and improvements to roll out regularly. Hatch’d is also competing in Advertising Age’s contest for a reward of a $25,000 partnership to work with respected brand marketers to help launch its product.
Check out Hatch’d and start sharing your ideas!
What do you think Hatch’d’s strengths are? Where could it improve?
About the author: August Drilling works in the marketing department at CliqStudios.com, the online supplier of quality oak kitchen cabinetsand is a blogger, social media enthusiast, and Apple aficionado. You can follow him on Twitter @ardrilling and read insight and odd musings.
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The Ghostbusters Guide to Management [INFOGRAPHIC]
Ghostbusters, the iconic 80′s movie where three unemployed parapsychology professors set up shop as a unique ghost removal service. Great movie, funny, entertaining, some may even say a thrill a minute…but what can it teach us about management? The answer is quite a lot actually, as this infographic from Mindflash illustrates:
The Ghostbusters Guide to Management
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Photo Credit: The Ghostbusters Guide To Management
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