I'm in Boston for tonight's Rockstars of Social CRM event (more on that later today). But before that I'm doing a Barack 2.0 webinar hosted by the fine folks at Jigsaw.com. It's at 1pm ET/ 10am PT today. And yes, it's free! If you're interested you can use the link below to check it out:
Over the past few months there have been some interesting studies focused on small business and how they are coping in this tough economy. Among them are the Network Solutions Small Business Success Index (http://growsmartbusiness.com/), and Microsoft's SMB Insights report. I've written about the findings in both of these reports over on the American Express OPEN blog - A Tale of Two Studies and Tech Savvy SMBs Will Lead the Way. I've also had executives from both companies on Technology For Business Sake (TFBS) to go "inside the numbers" a bit:
Network Solutions CEO Roy Dunbar on Small Business Success Index
Microsoft VP of Solution Partners and ISVs Ross Brown on Microsoft SMB Insights report
I think this kind of information can be of great importance to small businesses looking to compete, survive and thrive today. Which is why I am working with small business experts Anita Campbell (publisher of SmallBizTrends.com) and Ramon Ray (publisher of SmallBizTechnology.com) to help research firm Hurwitz & Associates on a new study. We need your input about the types of marketing tools you use and plan to use to help your business survive and thrive in these challenging economic times. The results from the survey will be used to develop a series of three whitepapers on this topic.
Please take a few minutes to provide us with your valuable insights and opinions. You can complete the survey online in about 15 minutes.
What's in it for you?
In return for completing this survey, we will send you copies of the three papers that summarize the key findings of the survey, and enter you in a drawing to win one of the following prizes:
Your individual survey responses are completely confidential; neither your name nor your company's name will be associated with your answers. Any responses you provide will be used only in combination with those of other survey respondents.
To participate, click on the link below:
Thank you for your help. Your contribution to the success of this survey is greatly appreciated!
I've been digging into some great small business studies that have come out over the last several weeks. Network Solutions recently unveiled the small business study they did with the University of Maryland, and Intuit released the latest installment in their Future of Small Business study. Both of these studies are must reads if your serious about being in business for a while.
Another must read study comes from Microsoft with respect to the impact technology can have on the success of small and mid-size businesses (SMBs), and the impact technology-savvy SMBs can have on stimulating our economy. In fact SMB IT spend is growing at more than ten times the rate of worldwide IT spend, according to the report.
Most Demanded Productivity Tools (According to Microsoft Study)
I had a chance to speak with Ross Brown - Microsoft VP of Solution Partners & ISVs - about the report findings. Ross talks about the technology spending trends in the SMB community, the growing role of unified communications, and the increasing demand for mobile solutions and remote workers. Ross also touches on the growing interest in business intelligence and the ramifications it has on SMBs. And despite all the hype surrounding other areas of technology, he explains why the key technologies in 2009 are backup, IT consolidation and virtualization.
Key SMB Technologies in 2009
To hear the conversation with Ross click the player below, or download the mp3 file by clicking here.
Remember that old kids game Tag? You know, where you hide from the people who are trying to find you so they can tag you and make you "it". So you'd run and hide and try your best not ever to be tagged and become "it". And as long and hard as people were looking for you, your aim was to never be found so you didn't have to be "it", and then have to go chasing them around.
Well folks, sometimes it feels like we're still trying our best not to be "it". Maybe not being "it" was cool when we were on the playground in grade school. But now, where the playing field is the web and the object of the "game" is to be successful in business, the last thing we want to do is go off and hide from people searching for the products and services we can give them
So how do we make it as easy as possible to become "it" now that we want to? Well, it's learning to play TAG. Not the kids game, but learning how to show up on Twitter and Google (TAG...get it?), and any other tool or site on the web where people are looking for answers to the challenges they are facing.
The graphic below taken from a recent Nielsen Online Global Index study shows that search is the number one business activity taking place. But time spent on social networking community sites is #4 with a bullet, moving past email.
On Wednesday April 29th, I'm moderating a free webinar featuring three small business experts who will share their experience and expertise in building a successful, engaging business web presence.... and winning the adult version of TAG. These experts are:
· Anita Campbell, Editor-in-Chief of Small Business Trends
· Liz Strauss, Social web strategist and founder of SOBCon
· Mike Volpe, VP of Marketing for Hubspot
The goal of this event is to help small businesses learn how they can begin to show up in Google searches, in Twitter conversations, and anywhere else people are looking on the web for the help you can provide them. And we are looking to answer questions you may have in creating a highly effective web presence. Please leave any questions you may have here in the comments section, and we'll try to answer as many of them as we possibly can.
Here are all the details:
Title: Passing the TAG (Twitter & Google) Test: Connecting with Socially-Empowered Customers in 2009
Date: Wednesday, April 29th
Time: 1pm Eastern, Noon Central, 11am Mountain, 10am Pacific
Duration: 60 minutes
Registration link: http://ilinc.com/passthetagtest
While this is a free webinar, please sign up as soon as you can, as seating is limited. And don't forget to add your question for the panelists in the comment section below.
A BIG thanks to the great folks at iLinc for allowing us to use their web conferencing service to host this special webinar!
To learn more about this event, click on the player below (or download mp3 by clicking here) to check out the conversation I had with my friend and small business expert Anita Campbell:
I wrote my latest Amex OPEN Forum post last week. It focused on a few recent studies put out by Network Solutions and The Nielsen Company - I called it A Tale of Two Studies. I talk about how the Network Solutions study created the Small Business Success Index (see graphic below) which measures the health of the nation's small business sector, based on the sentiment of 1000 small business owners they surveyed. And these are real small businesses - 100 employees or less.
I recently had an opportunity to record a conversation for TFBS (Technology For Business Sake) with Network Solutions CEO Roy Dunbar to talk about the findings of the study, and their ramifications for small businesses in 2009 and beyond. The report is 30+ pages and is packed with so much information that I'm going to do more detailed review, which will include the findings of another SMB-focused study put out today by Microsoft. I received a briefing on that report by Eduardo Rosini, corporate vice president, Microsoft Worldwide Small and Midmarket Solutions and Partners Group. I will also have Eduardo on TFBS to talk about the results of their study.
At a very high level, these reports show just how important the wise use of technology can positively impact small business. They also show that small business people are still a pretty positive group of folks, considering all that is going on right now. So check out my conversation with Roy by clicking the player below, or feel free to download the mp3 file,. And find out more about the study at http://www.growsmartbusiness.com.
I just got back from participating in this year's Small Business Summit. I'll do a proper write up of it over the weekend, but in short - it was great! The keynote was Dell's VP of Communities and Conversations Bob Pearson. Bob gave a really interesting talk around Dell's approach to using social media to participate in conversations with customers and prospects, and encouraging them to help Dell be a better vendor to them.
I will post the link to the video of Bob's presentation when that becomes available. And although Dell is a big company, there were some great lessons that small businesses can pick up from listening to Bob share Dell's approach to listening, and the impact it's had on the company.
In the meantime I had the pleasure of recording a conversation with Dell's Director of Communities and Conversations Sean McDonald to hear more about their efforts in using social media to listen to ongoing conversations and engaging the online community - including how Twitter has impacted their business. Dell uses Radian6's social media monitoring platform to listen to those ongoing conversations and take the right steps to engage folks in ways that help them connect with the community. (Note: I'm currently trying out Radian6's platform and will do a post in the near future on my thoughts of it). Radian6's VP of Marketing David Alston was also apart of the conversation, adding some great points about the importance and impact listening can have to companies of all sizes.
If you're looking for insight on how social media can impact business relationships, and to understand the importance of listening to meaningfully engage people with social tools, Sean and David break things down in practical terms. Click below to check out the conversation:
The Entellium saga continues... and every time I think I'm out they pull me back in! OK I actually like being pulled back in by the folks at CRM magazine, which just put out an interesting article discussing the possibility of Intuit (among others) buying up Entellium's assets. And if this happens we all know the Entellium "brand" will go the way of the do-do bird - Rest In Pieces...
Anyways I was one of two folks interviewed by CRM Mag's Lauren McKay. The other person being my friend and SMB super analyst Laurie McCabe of AMI Partners (yup I got that right - Lauren McKay and Laurie McCabe). As I said in the piece, I think this could be a good thing if Intuit takes Entellium's interface and functionality and seamlessly tie it together with Quickbooks. Whatever else that went horribly wrong over there, Entellium's product, and its focus on small business, were pretty good. And this will fill the obvious chink in Inuit's armor that is CRM/contact management. So if this deal does come through, maybe this will bring a positive end to a very negative story, especially for Entellium's loyal customers and employees.
Check the article out to get the full scoop.
The fine folks at CRM magazine put out there annual CRM market awards issue this month. It's always a must read if you have even the slightest interest in what's going on in the industry. I was asked to share my opinions with respect to the vendors providing products to small businesses. I also threw my two cents into the sales force automation tools/vendors discussion.
Before I touch on that, I wanted to say a BIG CONGRATULATIONS to my friend Paul Greenberg, for being named one of CRM magazine's 2008 Influential Leaders. Anyone who knows anything about CRM knows how richly deserved this honor is. Not only did the folks at CRM mag get it right, they gave Paul a new nickname to go along with all the others (The Dean of CRM, The Godfather of CRM, The Walt Whitman of CRM, etc.). Now Paul will forever be known as The Herald of CRM - I like it - and I know Paul does as well. Congrats Paul!
I'd also like to say congratulations to Adventnet (parent company of Zoho) CEO Sridhar Vembu and Microsoft's Brad Wilson for joining Paul as 2008 Influential Leaders. I've had the pleasure of having both of these gentlemen on my show and they were both great:
Small Business Suite CRM (Click here to see the CRM magazine article)
Vendors cited as leaders in the small business segment included Netsuite, Salesforce.com, SugarCRM and Zoho - but the winner in this category was Maximizer Software. Two things stand out right away for me. The fact that Zoho is listed here among the established names in the industry says a great deal about them. There are so many good crm providers, more well known than Zoho, that aren't on this list. But I believe Zoho and its laser-like focus on providing solid CRM products to the smallest of small business warrants them being on this list. And the way they are going they may end up leading the pack at some point.
Second thing that jumped out to me is Maximizer taking the top spot. I predict this will be the last year that a winner in the small business category will not be a SaaS offering. As I said in the article, Maximizer offers a ton of stuff for small businesses. But the lack of SaaS offering would have made it hard for me to make them the winner. I really believe SaaS has made it possible for even the smallest of companies to use CRM, and not to offer it in this form limits the number of companies who can benefit from Maximizer's great product. I look forward to Maximizer's on-demand offering when it becomes available.
The small business suite review also named a few "ones to watch", which included Sage Software's ACT! and Netbooks. These two do deserve watching. Additionally I throw in a few others to watch:
There are a few others, like 37 Signals' Highrise and BatchBlue' Batch Book among others I'm keeping an eye one as well. And everyday I get introduced to others to keep an eye on. So the market for small business CRM is in GREAT shape. Plenty of options for every size company. It makes me think my prediction at that 2008 was The Year small businesses embraced CRM was right on the money!
One prediction for next year - I believe next year Google will be represented on this list, meaning I think they will jump into CRM probably by acquiring somebody. But don't be excited, I predicted this two years ago and it still hasn't come through.
I'll share my take on the sales force automation tools a little later.
I recently found out that over half the businesses in this country are home-based businesses. In general these kinds of businesses get no pub, no air time and no spotlight. This is precisely the reason the folks at StartupNation.com teamed up with Microsoft Office Live Small Business on their second annual effort to identify the top 100 home-based businesses in the US of A.
I had a great conversation with StartupNation co-founder (and small biz expert) Rich Sloan that you may want to check out if you're interested in making this year's list, especially if you think you have the greenest, grungiest, yummiest, wackiest, or most unique small businesses across America:
To get the full scoop on this, including how you can enter your own business, go to http://www.startupnation.com/homebased100. Good luck!
This week the folks at Sage came out with the latest version of ACT!. I had a briefing with David van Toor and Larry Ritter, two of their execs on the CRM side of things. I haven't been hands on with it, but I did pick up a couple of things during the demo:
If you're a power user of both Outlook and ACT! then you'll probably want to look into upgrading. This version makes it easy to keep the two apps in sync with each other and track Outlook interactions on contact records in ACT!. They've also made it move around and get to the data you're looking for with more streamlined lookups. It may not sound like much but it makes it much easier and more efficient to get to the data when you need to.
What really grabbed my attention was the ability to see Twitter pages and LinkedIn profiles for contacts, right from within ACT!. Now this functionality isn't apart of the out-of-the-box product, but is part of a growing third party mashup market cropping up around ACT!. But this is important, as it allows you to track even more information with the people you're looking to engage in conversations leading to business opportunities. So being able to view all kinds of social information from one location makes it that much easier to look for conversation points that may help you connect.
Overall I was impressed with the glimpse into ACT! 2009. I hope to dig in more to see how the ease of installing and maintaining the application is coming along. And I'm looking forward to seeing how ACT! "on the go" is progressing. But if you're a die hard fan, you should at the least take a good hard look at this. According to the Sage team, this version had more customer input than others, thanks to members of the ACT! community. In fact you can thank the community for working with Sage to make sure the voice of the customer was not only heard, but was integral to the upgrade process.
Working with the community in an open forum was a new experience for Sage, but it looks like they plan on enlisting the community again for future upgrades. This can't be anything but good news for ACT! and its users. And while I get excited to see social media mashups with crm apps, the most exciting thing to see is CRM vendors working with their communities in a transparent fashion to deliver products and services these communities need. That's a real Social ACT!
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