The Guiding Assumption

Your guiding assumption—what you really think about your customers—can be the biggest obstacle (or catalyst) to your success. In an era when customers are scrutinizing every move you make, you can not afford to assume that they are all not trustworthy.

Trust your customers. And if you don’t, find new customers you can. Running a business and establishing a relationship on the conviction that everyone around you is out to get you is not a recipe for business (or personal) success.

Did I Believe Criss Angel? Lessons in Experience Design

The Criss Angel Show “Believe” at the Luxur hotel in Las Vegas was true to what Las Vegas is all about: a constant attempt to outdo your competitors….

…[Although] the cynic in me did not buy into the magic and illusions, I did appreciate the experience and admire the showmanship and the work that went into the show. Criss Angel did not take his audience for granted and did his best to deliver the exceptional experience they paid for.

Game On! A TV Game Show for IT and Analysts?

Imagine a game show featuring three competing teams of contestants who are given a business problem involving choices. They get one week to design and test their hypotheses through experiments and return to the show with their answers. A panel of CEOs would judge the winning team.

Why not provide analysts, and the important role they perform, more visibility to the public? Make it fun. The popular TV show “The Big Bang Theory” highlights physicists. So why not have a TV game show for analysts and IT specialists to show off their investigative and discovery skills? We might call it “The Big Data Theory!”

A Rant On Engagement

*A portion of this blog post is republished with permission from SiriusDecisions, Inc. To read the full post, please visit:http://www.siriusdecisions.com/blog/a-rant-on-engagement/*   I’ve got a gripe with the term engagement. I think it’s misleading. What most marketers are calling engagement is really content consumption. The content may be presented contextually; it may be presented dynamically by industry…

Deep Flows the River Between Social and Business

It’s been quite a while since the world has been gripped by the Social Media fever . However, as is the case with any new concept that catches the masses by their eyeballs and wallets, social media too has turned into a big Gold Rush with many following suit. Suddenly, plenty of creative designers, copywriters, and account managers have now turned into peer-recognized and self-proclaimed social media specialists.

Yet, like every time the dust rises, it also has to settle down. When it does settle down, are we going to see despair as we did with the Dot Com bust in the 1990s? For everyone’s sake, I hope not, but, somewhere deep inside I sense a repeat of history.

The Voice of the Customer Lies Hidden In Your Unstructured Data

Why is the customer’s voice so important?

First of all, you want to keep them as your customer. Secondly the customer has become your unpaid sales staff. It is called word of mouth. Happy customers will recommend you to others, and consumers tend to listen to their friends (especially millennials). Lastly the customer is a testing ground for your products and services by providing feedback on new offerings. You don’t want to believe that you are conducting tests on your customers but that is exactly what happens. Customer feedback is necessary for continual improvement, and continual improvement is necessary to keep pace with your competitors.

All the information we gather about our customer’s experiences is important when it comes to improvements, reputation and ultimately, the bottom line.

The Voice of the Customer Lies Hidden In Your Unstructured Data

Why is the customer’s voice so important?

First of all, you want to keep them as your customer. Secondly the customer has become your unpaid sales staff. It is called word of mouth. Happy customers will recommend you to others, and consumers tend to listen to their friends (especially millennials).

Lastly the customer is a testing ground for your products and services by providing feedback on new offerings. You don’t want to believe that you are conducting tests on your customers but that is exactly what happens. Customer feedback is necessary for continual improvement, and continual improvement is necessary to keep pace with your competitors.

All the information we gather about our customer’s experiences is important when it comes to improvements, reputation and ultimately, the bottom line.

Moving Social Media Analysis from the Platform to the Individual Level

Creating engaging content and encouraging your audience to engage with your brand are important pieces of a successful social media program. This is evident when you speak with many social marketers who tend to focus a great deal of effort on increasing engagement levels and expanding their audience.

Less attention seems to be paid to who is engaging, how often they engage, and what they are saying.