For Whom the Bell Tolls I don’t understand why everyone in the world hasn’t yet signed up for VOIP services from companies like Vonage. We just did it a couple of weeks ago at home. In terms of quality, it’s virually indistinguidhable from a POTS land line. You can have as many numbers as you want on the same account. TiVo works with it. You can keep your old phone number. There are no minimums and no contracts. They don’t have to come to your house to get it to work. They’ve even figured out how to get 911 and 311 to work with it. It’s got tons of other cool features, as well, but even if all you do…
Archives / October, 2004
Why is Seth Godin so Grumpy?
Why is Seth Godin so Grumpy? Permission marketing guru Seth Godin says we should all Beware the CEO blog. His logic? Blogs should have six characteristics: Candor, Urgency, Timeliness, Pithiness, Controversy, and maybe Utility — and apparently in his book, CEOs don’t possess those characteristics. Certainly, CEOs who view blogs as a promotional tool are wasting their time, or are at least missing a fundamental understanding about the power of blogs and interactivity. But many of the ones I read (and the one I write) do their best to be anything but promotional. One of my colleagues here describes my blog as “a peek inside the CEO’s head,” which is a great way of putting it. And I still stand…
Everyone's a Marketer, Part I
Everyone’s a Marketer, Part I While there’s a specific marketing department at most companies, I think in today’s inter-connected, service-oriented business, everyone in the company is a marketer. Ok, it’s probably more true in some industries than others, but consider these pockets of marketing activity from non-sales/marketing personnel: – Our front line customer service manager, Anthony, is on the phone with hundreds of customers each week answering questions about their email subscriptions or helping them unsubscribe. His mission? Make sure they understand our services and try to get as many of them as possible to stay on with us. – Our client data coordinators Jeremy and Tom talk and email with clients regularly as we send data back and forth…
The Bush Dilemma
The Bush Dilemma I think I’ve finally articulated The Bush Dilemma that I am having as a moderate Republican with the upcoming election. Here was my dialog with Fred, an ardent but utterly rational Democrat, the other night at dinner. Matt: Kerry is clearly a much smarter person than Bush, but I tend to agree with Bush’s philosophy and positions on more issues than I do Kerry’s. Fred: If you agree with him on the top 10 issues, then you should vote for him. Matt: I agree with him on most of MY top 10 issues…but not on most of HIS top 10 issues. Fred: That’s a dilemma. I suspect many other moderate Republicans have this same dilemma. Whether they…
Giving Away State Secrets
Giving Away State Secrets Ed Daciuk, one of my subscribers, questions me: “I am wondering how a CEO who blogs balances the disparate goals of giving enough insight to be interesting but not give away trade secrets like positioning or financial drivers.” Good question, and one that I thought about along with my prior posting. It’s a tough balance sometimes, but the goal is to stimulate thinking and communicate in broad strokes more than it is to detail things out, especially with non-public information. So for example, in the prior posting, I didn’t mention the client’s name, industry, or location; the data was close but not exact; and I refrained from discussing some of Return Path’s efforts to solve this…
Why Email Will Win the Day
Why Email Will Win the Day I attended the same presentation as Fred where a great B2C marketer talked about how she got a 40:1 payback for every dollar spent on email marketing versus an 8:1 payback on search. As head of an email marketing company, it was music to my ears. But the “finite issue” Fred highlights is actually a great opportunity more than it is a drawback. Most marketers still have email addresses for less than 25% of their full customer database, meaning that if we do our job as an industry, we should be able to increase the availability of email addresses threefold in the coming couple of years. With the inevitable scale efficiencies in email marketing,…
Angel and Strategic Investors
Angel and Strategic Investors While I and others have recently done a number of postings on Venture Capital investors and their relationship with entrepreneurs, I thought I’d do a posting on handling other kinds of investors — angels and strategics. Angel investors. My definition: high net worth individuals who put personal money into a company. The good: they’re typically your friends and family, so they don’t play hardball when negotiating terms. The bad: they’re typically your friends and family, so every dinner party you attend has the potential to morph into an ad hoc investor relations conference. The ugly: you feel awful if you lose their money or dilute them down. Strategic investors. My definition: operating companies (not investment firms)…
It’s Up There With Air and Water Now
It’s Up There With Air and Water Now A study on “web withdrawl” conducted by Yahoo and OMD confirmed that most people are now so accustomed to using the web that they have problems when internet access is taken away from them. Nothing too earthshattering, but it’s an interesting quick read. My favorite part: one person reported that he even missed getting spam. Now THAT’S a sign that it’s time to get outside and enjoy some fresh air.
If Only International Relations Were This Easy
If Only International Relations Were This Easy Iceland is one of those weird places on earth where two continental plates meet — and you can see it. Here we are, me on the American plate and Mariquita on the Eurasian plate, with the earth seemingly coming apart at the seams in between. If anyone’s interested in a short travelog to Iceland, here it is.
Political versus Corporate Leadership, Part III: The First Debate
Political versus Corporate Leadership, Part III: The First Debate Well, there you have it. Both of my first two postings on this subject — Realism vs. Idealism and Admitting Mistakes — came up in last night’s debate. At one point, in response to Kerry’s attempted criticism of him for expressing two different views on the situation in Iraq, Bush responded that he thought he could — and had to — be simultaneously a realist and an optimist. And a few minutes later, Kerry admitted a mistake and brilliantly turned the tables on Bush by saying something to the effect of “I made a mistake in how I talked about Iraq, and he made a mistake by taking us to war…