Sazbean» Opinion

It’s Official: Facebook is more evil than Google

Sarah Worsham — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 18:42:45 +0000

There’s been a lot of hype about the recent set of privacy changes by Facebook. And usually I don’t necessarily have a problem with privacy changes as long as they’re done in a way that allows choice and protects individuals. But these latest changes by Facebook really are just plain evil. Even if you opt out according to the instructions, your information is still being shared out without your permission. This lack of any control and the fact that your network can do things that infringe upon your personal privacy (and you can’t stop them) makes Facebook more evil than Google in my book.

I followed GigaOm’s very straight-forward instructions on how to opt-out of the newest changes. I already have fairly tight controls on my groups and profile, allowing very few people to share information. But when I went to the Washington Post’s website recently to read about the volcanic dust plume over Europe, this is what I saw:

The top result is an article on the Washington Post that one of my friends shared. Now I have not “liked” the Washington Post and I didn’t click on a link in Facebook. I just happened to have logged into Facebook recently and have a cookie on my machine. Apparently this means that any site out there with this Facebook social plugin can see what my friends have done on their site.

I have a real problem with this. There doesn’t appear to be a way to opt-out of this, other than making sure you log out of Facebook. Here’s what the plugin looks like after I went to Facebook and logged out:

I fully accept that what I do online is visible and public in some way. What I can’t accept is that what my network does becomes part of what I do online. I have no control over the people in my network (nor should I).

I used to join groups and “like” pages on Facebook from people in my network. I like to be social and supportive, but these new changes are really making me consider whether I should delete or deactivate my account. The problem is, I’ve connected better with some family members through Facebook and that is important. Maybe I need a separate profile just for that connection? But I’d still be tied to what they’re doing online….

If you’d like to see what Facebook is publishing out about you, Ka-Ping Yee created a tool that will show you. You might be surprised. I have everything pretty buttoned down, but you can still see any pages I’ve “liked” (which made me go through and unlike a whole bunch that I didn’t care as much about. Maybe I won’t like anything at all.).

Google also knows and shares information about people. When you search for something on Google, sometimes you’ll magically start seeing ads across the web related to that search. They’ve recently made it easier to find out what they know and opt-out of some of this collection and sharing. But this information use has been kind of in the background. Maybe they’re doing the same sort of things as Facebook in terms of sharing information based on your network. Maybe it’s just not as obvious. They certainly aren’t as vocal as Facebook in their complete disregard for personal privacy.

What do you think? Are you concerned about the Facebook changes? Is what Facebook is doing different than what Google does?

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(photo by lenore-m) / CC BY 2.0

Technorati tags: Facebook, Google, privacy, social media, marketing, business

My Hopes & Expectations for FutureMidwest 2010 #fmw10

Sarah Worsham — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 14:09:41 +0000

FutureMidwest starts tomorrow (although there are a lot of great events happening all week):

FutureMidwest is the region’s largest two-day technology and knowledge conference taking place in Royal Oak, Mich. April 16 – 17, 2010. Founded by Adrian Pittman, Jordan Wolfe and Zach Lipson, FutureMidwest is the fusion of two successful conferences held in Michigan in 2009 – the Module Midwest Digital Conference and TechNow.

I’ve been to a lot of conferences – some great – some not so much. And the bar is set really high for my expectations of this weekend. I know I will meet a lot of great people and do some valuable networking. I’m sure there will be some great conversations and this event is part of our energized rebuilding of Detroit & Michigan. But my hopes – for better or worse – are for even higher levels of achievement.

I’m hoping for someone (speaker, attendee, whoever) to really challenge my thinking and opinions about some topic. Conferences need to be about more than hearing rock-star speakers or great networking. They need to energize the community with new thoughts and ideas. They need to get us all thinking in new ways so we can grow and create.

Much of the conversation in the social media and digital community seems to have gotten a bit stale. I feel like we’re in a big echo-chamber right now with the same ideas bouncing around. I want to hear something new or a radically new way to think about something. I want something to really get my brain going. Is that too much to ask?

(As an aside – am I the only one that’s reminded of the dogcow by FutureMidwest’s logo?)

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When You Shouldn’t Listen to Your Customers

Sarah Worsham — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 19:02:39 +0000

Mark Cuban wrote an interesting post earlier this week on why you should never listen to your customers. Never listening is probably taking it a bit far. After all, customers are the ones giving you money in exchange for your product or service, so you should listen to their feedback and concerns. But I do think there are specific situations when you shouldn’t listen to your customers, which may go against everything you’ve ever heard, but hear me out…

Your customers are busy doing whatever it is that’s important to them. They don’t really care what features your product has. Only what problem it can solve or how it makes their life easier. When you ask your customers what features they want, you’re almost never going to get good answers. Customers can only think in terms of features they’ve seen before somewhere else and will only guess whether they’d be willing to pay for those features.

I’m working with a company that at one point had a product that was not only best in class, but also technically far ahead of its competition. It created a better way of offering its service and customers loved it and paid for it. Then it made a fatal mistake. It asked its customers what features they wanted to see in the product and they delivered on those features – Why You Should NEVER Listen to Your Customers (Mark Cuban)

Until customers can see something in front of them and how it works, they’re not really going to be able to visualize whether it’s something of value. We each bring our own personal experiences and opinions along when we’re asked a questions. How we visualize a certain feature depends heavily on our past experiences. Customers aren’t really great at predicting the future.

Surveys can give some valuable information and are ideal for doing some heavy-duty modeling of markets and segmentation. But surveys are only as good as the data received, which depends on who is asked and what they’re asked. Surveys can easily be mis-designed to lead results the way a company wants to see them instead of getting valuable feedback. Customers may answer questions the way you ask them, but not in the way you intend (or want).

Focus groups have fallen out of favor, mostly since a lot of customer sentiment information can be mined via social media. Another problem with focus groups is that they tend to produce group think. Customers will come to a group consensus instead of providing individual insights. Focus groups also tend to provide only information as good as the moderator.

Asking individual customers for feedback can give you some great insights. But you need to take whatever is said in conjunction with what others say and where you want your company to go. Customers aren’t always completely honest when asked questions directly, not because they’re being dishonest, but because they’re being polite. Solicit feedback from a bunch of sources and learn who gives the most honest responses.

As business owners, it’s up to us to decide where we want our company to go and how we’re going to get there.

Your customers can tell you the things that are broken and how they want to be made happen. Listen to them. Make them happy. But they won’t create the future roadmap for your product or service. That’s your job. – Why You Should NEVER Listen to Your Customers (Mark Cuban)

Customers are definitely an integral part of the equation, but I think there are times when you need to take what they say with a grain of salt.

What do you think?

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http://www.flickr.com/photos/mymollypop / CC BY-SA 2.0

Technorati tags: product development, customer service, reputation, marketing, brand, social networking, business

How to Encourage Participation With Your Brand

Sarah Worsham — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 19:01:36 +0000

You’re really excited about your brand, your company and your products and services. You think everyone will also be excited so you get all the various social media and networks and start posting links to your products and your website and sit back waiting for everyone to hop on the bandwagon. Nothing. What’s the deal?

For some reason people think that communication on the Internet is somehow magically different than communication in person. If you were at a networking event and someone just started talking about themselves and their company and products and wouldn’t shut up, what would you do? You’d probably walk away. The Internet is no different – except its 100 times easier to walk away since you don’t have to worry about making up some excuse for why you have to leave right now (sorry, my phone is going off and I have to take this call….)

People will participate with your brand because you have something valuable to offer them. You provide useful information. You help people out. You give and give and give. It’s all about them. It takes a lot of work and a lot of patience. It takes time. It requires learning more about people, having conversations, linking to useful information, helping other people out, etc. All the same things you have to do to network effectively in-person.

The Internet is a communication tool. It’s not some magical device that will make you a millionaire over night. Building a community takes a lot of work and a lot of patience. It requires giving way more than you’re receiving. Encourage participation by being someone that people want to participate with.

How do you encourage participation with your brand?

(photo by cyberuly @ Flickr CC)

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Technorati Tags: blogging, blogs, community, social media, social media strategy, social networks, social networking, internet marketing, marketing

Google vs. Facebook – Really?

Sarah Worsham — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 18:58:59 +0000

There was some interesting news on Mashable yesterday:

People Spend 3x More Time on Facebook Than Google – Mashable: Back in July, we reported that Facebook had become the Internet’s ultimate time waster, with users spending an average of 4 hours, 39 minutes on it per month, more than any other site on the Web….

This certainly is an interesting statistic, but makes sense when you think about what people do on each of the sites (which the Mashable article does go into a bit). Google’s job (at least as far as search) is to present you with search results as fast as possible. They actually want you to leave their site as quickly as possible (meaning you’ve found what you’re looking for, or at least something intriguing). Facebook, on the other hand, is a social network. People go there to converse with friends and family (and waste a lot of time), so it’s not really surprising that people spend so much more time there than Google.

Google has purchased many different sites, such as YouTube, to help them increase their share of eye time. They also provide a service, Google AdSense, which extends their ads to content sites. When you take a look at Mashable’s statistics and add YouTube into Google’s numbers, the gap closes. People are still spending more time on Facebook, but now it’s only twice as much. But YouTube videos can be embeded in Facebook (and elsewhere) – how do you count that interaction time?

Obviously this brings up bigger questions in terms of how you measure where (and how) people are spending their time. And Facebook and Google are competing on some level, since they both sell ads. But, I think that when you see numbers like this, you need to stop and think about what they mean and just what’s being measured.

What do you think?

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Technorati Tags: blogging, google, facebook, social media, social media strategy, social networks, social networking, internet marketing, marketing

Why Your Crappy Free Wireless is Costing You Business

Sarah Worsham — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 18:14:09 +0000

Many businesses, especially restaurants and coffee shops, have free wireless these days. However, many have really crappy free wireless (it’s slow or it cuts out, etc.) and that is costing them business.

Do it Well or Don’t Do it

If you’re going to have free wireless, you probably advertise it. It’s an enticement to come to your shop. It’s a reason why people have meetings or work there. If your free wireless isn’t that good, they’re not going to return when they want somewhere to meet or work and that’s lost business.

Cost to Customers

Let’s say you have free wireless and someone decides to meet a client at your shop, but your slow wireless makes their online product seem slow. You’ve cost your customer a sale. Do you think they’re ever going to return? I don’t think so.

Affects Your Reputation

Every service you provide, even free wireless, affects your reputation. When you have free wireless and it’s not so good, people wonder what else isn’t so good about what you do. You won’t get as many recommendations either.

Your Free Wireless Isn’t Free

Even though you advertise free wireless, customers don’t consider it to be free. They feel like they’re paying for a little bit of it when they come into your store and buy your coffee or whatever. Now that they consider it paid instead of free, they expect it to be decent. They probably don’t expect it to be as fast as at home, but they still expect it to be reasonable.

Consider it a Cost of Doing Business

Want to compete with the place down the street? Having good free wireless may be a differentiator. Even if it’s not, consider it a cost of doing business. Do it right and don’t think of it as a free service (even if you market it that way).

People Remember

Yes, I’m a tech person, but I do work out of my home office, so having good wireless when I go to meet clients is important. I remember the places that have good wireless (it helps if they also have good coffee or food). I take clients to those places. I go out of my way to work there when I need a break from the home office. I tell others about them. I spread the word. People remember your wireless service just like any other service you provide.

(photo by Jan Tik @ Flickr CC )

Technorati tags: wireless, reputation, customer service, brand, business

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Are You the Grain or the Chaff?

Sarah Worsham — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 14:19:55 +0000

Are you the grain or the chaff?

When people thresh through their inbox or social media network, are you the grain that they find useful or the chaff that they throw away? People are selfish. They’re only going to listen to you if they find what you you’re saying to be valuable or interesting. With so many people tweeting and posting and producing content, there’s a limit to how many people anyone can read regularly. – Are You the Grain or the Chaff? – Sarah Worsham – Insights Group

In my post over at Insights Group today, I write about how to distinguish yourself from the chaff and stand out as a grain.

(photo by KevinLallier @ Flickr CC)

Don't We Have More Important Things to Regulate Other Than SEO & Google?

Sarah Worsham — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 15:45:11 +0000

Recently there was a call for the government to regulate Google in terms of how the search engine displays results. The anonymous author of the post called for transparency in terms of how Google’s algorithm works. Reading the post, I became convinced that the author’s company had recently had some type of run-in with Google – which probably means they did something that was against Google’s TOS. Just like any 5-year old that gets caught with his hand in the cookie jar, our anonymous author has started to throw a temper tantrum and scream “It’s not fair!”

In my years of experience with Google and SEO, if you follow generally good SEO practices and focus on the content of your site and how well it works for your visitors, you’ll have success. Yes, many people find you via a search engine, but in these days of social media, people are just as likely to find you elsewhere or be recommended by a friend (which is way more valuable than a search engine listing). But, having good content and creating a good website takes time and patience. Creating a place where people want to visit isn’t an overnight task.

I also think that Google is genuinely interested in creating results that match what people are looking for. They are constantly tweaking their algorithm to provide the best results for people. And they have to – if they don’t provide good results, people will just start using something else. By gaming the system, companies are trying to circumvent the rules that everyone else is playing with – and that just doesn’t sit well with me. Maybe it’s these violators and hack-SEO firms that need regulating…. (although I think Google regulates them by changing their algorithms so that the hacks no longer work)

If you can’t get a good position in the organic search results, you have the opportunity to purchase an ad. As the author stated, unlike a normal auction, the highest bid doesn’t necessarily win – you also have to be relevant to the keywords in question. This allows a level playing field where big companies can’t just buy their way into owning the entire Internet. Instead, small companies, which are providing more relevant content for the keywords in question, have a chance at reaching the same eyeballs as the big guys. This provides the best results for people who are using the search engine. Yes, this is in Google’s best interest because people will go somewhere else if the results are poor, but it’s also in all of our best interest.

In these days of economic crisis where the banking and real estate industries have failed us, when healthcare is a mess, when big companies seem to have the upper hand (as long as you’re not an auto company), when the environment is in danger, I think the government has much larger problems to deal with than trying to regulate a company that’s providing consumers with good products. Econsultancy Blog had a similar reaction, if you’d like some further reading.

What do you think?

(photo by i eated a cookie @ FlickrCC)

Technorati tags: SEO, marketing, google, internet marketing, business

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Can People Be Taught How to Use Social Media?

Sarah Worsham — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 14:56:13 +0000

Last night, Chris Brogan asked whether Social Media can be taught based on a post by Adam Cohen, which got me thinking. My initial reaction is yes, of course, people are fairly intelligent (for the most part) and they know how to have conversations in person, so having conversations with social media shouldn’t be too much of a jump. Using social media to have conversations just requires understanding the technologies and the techniques needed to keep track of what’s being said.

Some social media is more intuitive than others. I think a lot of people understand blogging and judging by the increase in usage of Facebook, that’s probably fairly easy for people to understand as well. Twitter is a bit more difficult – mostly because it can be used in so many different ways. I think Adam is correct in that there isn’t a set formula for teaching people how to use social media – mostly because what social media to use varies so much based on end goals, industries and familiarity.

I do think that there are some social media basics that are fairly easy to teach in courses and workshops. Introducing blogging, Facebook, and Twitter can be standardized in a way that shows people exactly what they need to do to use each and have conversations. Social media that’s more specific to an industry may be more difficult to understand or teach, but with the understanding of how to use the basics, some people could probably figure it out with a bit of help.

The problem with teaching many people how to use something new is that they’re set in their ways. If you’ve been in the business world for a long time and are used to doing things a certain way (that’s always worked before), it’s difficult to motivate yourself to learn something new. A lot of people just don’t like to work any harder than they have to, and learning something new can involve thinking and hard work.

So, is it possible to teach people how to use social media? Yes, definitely. Can you standardize a course that works for every type of social media in every type of situation and industry? Of course not. But the basics definitely can be taught, and with the basics people would have a better chance of being able to grasp more specific uses of social media for their organization.

What do you think? Can social media be taught?

(photo by atomicjeep @ Flickr CC)

Technorati tags: social media, social media usability, social networking, marketing, strategy, business

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Your Website is Your Business Card

Sarah Worsham — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 15:00:36 +0000

What does your paper business card look like? It probably has your name, your company logo, some contact information and maybe a quick tagline summarizing what your company does. People can find all the information they need to contact you just by glancing at your card.

Business cards are still pretty important for face-to-face networking. People are usually horrible about remembering names or company names and a small paper card lets them connect the conversation they had with the person they spoke to. (And gives them a point of contact if they want to continue the conversation).

Business websites are your online business card, yet so many businesses neglect to have the same important information in a quick & easy to understand as a paper business card provides. Most business websites are just a boring brochure of some marketing-blabber about what the company does (that usually isn’t clear to anyone other than the author of the marketing-blabber), but don’t provide any real information to the visitor.

The nice thing about a website, as opposed to a small business card, is that you have the opportunity to offer so much more information. But this can also be a crunch – businesses get caught up in the technology and create flashy websites, but forget about the basics. It’s ok to offer lots of information to visitors – matter of fact, it’s a great way to get people to come back to your website over and over, but remember to keep the basics in mind: contact information, benefits to the customer, what it is you do – all visible and understandable in 5-10 seconds.

Take a look at your website. Can you get the same type of information that’s on your business card? Does your business website offer valuable information to your customers? Is what you do clear in terms of benefits and value to the customers?

Make your business website a valuable business tool.

Technorati tags: design, usability, content, marketing, strategy, business

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Do You Have the Requirements for Innovation?

Sarah Worsham — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 15:29:31 +0000

I tried to ping Twitter for some ideas, but it seems like no one ever works on Fridays. I did, however, get a bit of brilliant input which really summarized my thoughts as well:

@johnyeng: willing to ask crazy or even stupid questions, as well as open to crazy ideas….

@chad_oliver: requirements for innovation – at least three failures

You’ve heard all the cliches before – thinking outside of the box – willing to take risks – blah, blah, blah. But looking around The National Summit at all the CEO suits on one side, small business people on another, and students at the back, you start to think that there really is something to all those cliches. What if everyone started to mingle? And CEOs were talking to students and small business people? I think that’s what The National Summit was striving for, but the forum for true conversation within the audience just didn’t materialize.

Companies like to talk the talk, but just how many of them actually foster an environment that allows innovation to happen? If someone has an idea, does anyone listen to them? Or do the only good ideas come from the C-suite?

A creative environment doesn’t mean chaos or a lack of hierarchy – it still needs to be clear who is making the final decision. But I think a lot of companies say they’re innovative (As Dr. John Mao said, “innovation is in danger of becoming the new buzzword of the century”), but don’t actually allow their employees to innovate.

What do you think?

(photo by lepiaf.geo @ Flickr CC)

Technorati tags: national summit, conference, detroit, strategy, business, innovation

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Thoughts on The National Summit #tns09

Sarah Worsham — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 15:08:16 +0000

As mentioned, I attended the National Summit yesterday here in Detroit. I was lucky enough to attend for free as a student, but I only went to the last day. Still, if you were able to follow my Twitter feed, you know there was some interesting and valuable conversations. I’ll provide them again here and then move into some of my thoughts from the day:

At national summit #tns09 horrible signage made for an adventure. No plugs in room should make coverage spotty.

I wish people would get off the web 2.0 kick. That’s old news #tns09

Looked over and there’s a little bird hopping around in the Renaissance ballroom – bit unexpected #tns09

I’d be interested in a discussion about how to manage and engage different generations of workers #tns09

we’re in detroit and auto industry is important but we need to get beyond relating every issue back to it. Broaden your thinking #tns09

Jim balsillie (RIM) – few think strategically about technology – don’t get caught up in the device but what transformation it enables #tns09

Micheal Klein – in recession there are more needs than ever = opportunities to innovate and grow #tns09

Micheal Klein – marvel comics announced they are bringing back Capt America – the US needs a hero with super powers as a role model #tns09

I never thought I’d admit it but MS has some cool tech (surfaces, tagging, touch screen) I blame @joshholmes #tns09

Deborah wince-smith – son is getting engineering degree – forced to integrate multidisciplines of education to innovate #tns09

John mao – concept of classroom in us needs to change – we’re stuck in a system based on farming schedules – innovation in education #tns09

John mao – innovation is in danger of becoming the new buzzword of the century #tns09

Alan mulally – innovation is a process enabling technology to provide what people actually want (add value to their lives) #tns09

Steve ballmer – learned everything that’s important about life when he lived in Detroit #tns09 woot!

Aneesh chopra – need to use technology to create mashups of data, devices, & entreprenurial vision #tns09

Steve ballmer – bing – need to be tenacious and patient and keep up a high rate of innovation for the long run #tns09

Steve ballmer is really passionate that patience, investments for long term and education are key to sustaining innovation #tns09

Steve ballmer – lots of people here still using paper – tech hasn’t solved their problems yet #tns09

I think the idea behind this conference was brilliant – bringing together CEOs, thought leaders, business people and students to have some conversations about the issues facing us as a country. But, I think that they could have a done a better job of encouraging conversation between audience members. Most of the conversations were between panel members and the audience. I think it would have been awesome if they had scheduled some specific networking events – maybe even about certain issues or industries to encourage these conversations. (I’m not sure what was done on the first two days, however). And a lunch where you were “forced” to sit down at a table with people from different industries and experience would have broken down some of the traditional barriers. One thing I noticed is that many people did know each other, but you had cliques forming – CEOs over here – students over there – companies all together – that I think stiffled some of the truly collaborative conversations which could have been had.

They did try to encourage a conversation online on their blogs and bulletin boards. As a student we were “required” to post at least one response to a blog and two to the discussion groups. But this forced posting did nothing to really foster conversations. The levels of students went from high school up through graduate level college, which doesn’t necessarily provide balanced levels of interesting ideas. Since there were no plugs in the conference rooms and we were supposedly not allowed to use cell phones, there was very little conversation online during the actual conference (I obviously broke with the cell phone rule in order to Twitter).

Overall I think the conference was a bit of a dichotomy – foster conversations but no way to have them – old guard (executive management) and new guard (students) – Twitter and Facebook during the conference but no cell phone use – use of new media and technology but no way to use them during the actual conference. I think the conference had a lot of value in terms of things that were brought up, but I think the conversations and engagement would have been more productive if they had taken more steps to foster more interaction during the conference.

Technorati tags: national summit, conference, detroit, strategy, business, innovation

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Are You Doing What Matters?

Sarah Worsham — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 18:40:39 +0000

While in the self-checkout lane at Meijers today I started thinking about rfid again. Wouldn’t it be cool if we could just walk right out the door and everything in our basket would be instantly scanned and charged? IBM made a commercial about the very possibility. Think about the time savings!

There’s no denying that what Tetherball is doing is interesting to marketers. But if people aren’t willing to use the device, it won’t be of any use to marketers. (there are lots of things that are interesting to marketers that no one else wants). So, what if instead of spending time on a device that seems cool, they could somehow actually make it useful to the people using it? Wouldn’t that matter more? Wouldn’t that help make the device more accepted and actually make it more useful to marketers?

What about what you’re doing? Does it matter? How can you make it matter more? Is there something you could be doing to accelerate your progress?

(photo by iChaz @ Flickr CC)

Technorati tags: tetherball, loyalty programs, mobile, marketing, mobile advertising, business, reward programs

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Tetherball – A Thousand Times Worse Than Loyalty Cards

Sarah Worsham — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 18:56:20 +0000

As you may be aware – I hate loyalty cards. I think they’re a pain in the butt and offer way more reward to the company than to me. I don’t mind loyalty programs, but I want the burden to be on the company to keep track of what I’ve purchased and my rewards. This may be what led to the development of Tetherball, which is a service that connects mobile advertising & marketing directly with individual consumers via a small rfid chip on their mobile devices. Marketers and advertisers seem to be estatic about the possibilities, but to me, it sounds a thousand times worse than loyalty cards.

Security Issues

While it sounds convenient to have a sticker on your mobile device that can interact with devices at a store, there’s usually very little security in current rfid technology. This means that anyone with the proper device can read the information that’s stored on the rfid chip. There’s no way for the owner of the mobile phone to turn off the rfid or control what information is on it or who can access it. There’s also nothing to stop the store that gave you the chip from tracking you in places you may not know about.

Awareness Issues

I wonder just how much people who are using these rfid devices understand how the company is using their information. Are they aware of the possible security and privacy risks? Are the companies devulging any of these possible issues?

Scaling Issues

Even if you like the idea of a rfid chip for a loyalty program, how is it going to work when all the loyalty programs start doing it? Is your mobile device going to be covered in stickers? Just think about how many loyalty cards many people carry – watch the next lady with a big purse shuffle through a card deck looking for the proper card. Will the companies be able to access the information on the other chips?

Transferability Issues

What happens when you get a new mobile device? Will you be able to transfer the sticker to the new device? Probably not. So you’ll have to go through some sort of new sticker transfer process. What if you have multiple devices? Depending on how the technology is implemented, there may be issues with controlling who is actually using the loyalty chip.

Less Invasive Technology

It seems like there would be less invasive ways to use mobile technology for loyalty programs. Many new phones are smartphones – or Internet enabled, which means they’re able to connect to an Internet website. Many also have the ability to connect to wireless hotspots. As the price for these devices comes down, more people will have them. A company could use their wireless network in-store to easily create the same sort of loyalty programs without having the issues presented above in an rfid chip.

What Would You Do?

Is there a company you trust enough to put a rfid chip on your phone? Are you concerned about your privacy and security of your information? What do you think?

(photo by grey pumpkin @ Flickr CC)

Technorati tags: tetherball, loyalty programs, mobile, marketing, mobile advertising, business, reward programs

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Simple is Good

Sarah Worsham — Wed, 20 May 2009 19:51:38 +0000

I had a chance to listen to Josh Holme’s talk The Lost Art of Simplicity at the KalamazooX Conference, which I covered here. It’s a great talk, and if you get a chance to listen to it, I encourage you to do so. Josh recently posted his slides from the talk, which are worth a peek.

I think all of us – designers, programmers, marketers, businesspeople, consumers… get caught up in complexity. In making our products, our businesses, our websites, our lives complex. Often I think we believe that people won’t pay for simple. We need to add lots of features, lots of value-adds, lots of freebees.

If we take a few minutes to look at some of the most successful products, we see that they are inherently simple. The Apple iPod. The Sony Walkman. In their design. In their features. In how easy they are to use.

Simple is not easy. It can be very difficult to make these as simple as possible. But simple is a delight to use, too look at, to be apart of.

How can you be simple?

(photo by Sarah Jane)

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9 Ways to Lose Business Using Twitter

Sarah Worsham — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 18:37:02 +0000

Companies and inviduals alike have been flocking to Twitter. Many companies are using Twitter to enage their customers in meaningful conversations, helping with support issues and questions, and gathering feedback to improve their products and services. But some companies are just using Twitter as another broadcast medium, which can actually be harmful. When using Twitter for business here’s what you shouldn’t do:

Talk only about your company and products – Twitter is a social media for having conversations (that means two-way communication).

Ignore what people are saying about you – Twitter gives your customers a voice. Pay attention to what they’re saying.

Fail to Respond – For very large companies with many followers, it can be difficult to respond to every request, but you should try as hard as possible.

Talk about inappropriate subjects – This happens most often when personal and business subjects mix, but it could also be talking about controversial subjects. Just keep in mind that whatever you say is out there for everyone to see.

Sell to followers – Obviously some self-promotion is fine, but it should not be the main use of your Twitter account. And you shouldn’t direct message every follower with links to your product or promotions.

Ask for contacts – If people are interested in your products or services, they’ll contact you. If you provide useful and helpful information, people will start to follow you. People are very protective of their coworkers, friends and family, so don’t violate their trust.

Ask people to promote your stuff - If they find what you say valuable enough, they’ll tell others. Asking for a rt occasionally may be ok, but constantly bugging people to promote you will just annoy them.

Don’t do anything constructive with feedback – Your customers are offering feedback because they care (if they didn’t, they wouldn’t bother). If you don’t do anything useful with the feedback, they’ll stop giving it and it’ll be much more difficult to satisfy them.

Take more than you give – If you fail to offer useful and helpful information, offer support and wisdom, and give information, your customers will stop listening and go elsewhere.

I think a lot of it comes down to acting the same on Twitter as you would in person.

(photo by hansvandenberg30)

Technorati tags: social media, brand, social networking, business, marketing strategy, marketing

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Why I Hate Keyword Clouds

Sarah Worsham — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 19:46:39 +0000

Ever see a set of words in different sizes which are all links on a site? It’s probably a keyword cloud. These clouds try to give a visual representation of what the site is about. Sometimes they’re based on tags, which the writer of the content uses to categorize their content (these are . Often they are based only on the words the site – the keywords – the words that are mentioned the most often are represented by the largest size. The problem is these keyword clouds often falsely represent the true content of a site. Keywords are not intelligent. They don’t know that a story about – they don’t know about context or associations. Keywords are dumb.

For example, we try to cover social media, marketing, strategy and technology links through our Twitter feed. Many of these tweets do not use any of those keywords, but they do cover that subject area. If you were to just look at the words we tweet, you’d come up with a keyword cloud that looks similar to this:

From this keyword cloud, it looks like all our feed is about is thanking people, being happy and retweeting. Secondarily, about marketing, social media and the web. While our tweets certainly to include those words, it’s not the entirety of what we’re about. It doesn’t show context or association.

These types of keyword clouds also encourage people to game the system by always including certain words in their tweets and websites (what people often think of as keywords). This makes conversations dull, repetitive and largely useless. When you start writing and tweeting for search engines or computers, you’re missing the conversations you need to be having with customers and people.

(photo by kevindooley)

Technorati tags: content, business, usability, design

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Social Media is Already Affecting Business As We Know It

Sarah Worsham — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 14:36:06 +0000

In his post yesterday, The Future of the Social Web: in Five Eras, Jeremiah Owyang summarizes a larger Forrester report on how the social web will impact businesses for the next fear years. Of particular interest to me are the 5 eras and how they are defined:

The Five Eras of the Social Web:

1) Era of Social Relationships: People connect to others and share
2) Era of Social Functionality: Social networks become like operating system
3) Era of Social Colonization: Every experience can now be social
4) Era of Social Context: Personalized and accurate content
5) Era of Social Commerce: Communities define future products and services

Forrester has era 5 starting around 2011, but I don’t think the eras are so clear-cut. Many companies are already tapping into the social web to define future products and service (era 5) through the concept of co-creation. Through it’s Nike+ iniative, the company engages runners and uses information and feedback to produce products they want. Brother has tapped the social web for hobby sewers to provide products and services for both its customers and for its dealers – leading to more sales of its high-end hobbiest sewing/embrodiery machines. Comcast has famously used the social web to improve customer service. I believe there is quite a bit of cross-over in the eras, with business leaders already jumping into the 5th era. The nice thing about the social web is that any sized company can jump right in, without the need for expensive research tools. I do believe, however, that the social web will also force these eras to happen and businesses who have not entered the fray will be left behind.

(photo by cloudzilla)

Technorati tags: social media, strategy, social media strategy, business, marketing strategy, marketing

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Making Strategy Work – Be Transparent & Speak in Plain English

Sarah Worsham — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 18:44:46 +0000

Do you have a strategy for your business? Do your employees and other stakeholders know what it is? In order for a strategy to work effectively, everyone in the company needs to be working towards the same goal. How can people help implement a strategy if they don’t know what it is? I’ve come from companies without clear strategies and goals. It makes it very difficult for the employees to know what they should be working towards. So everyone just works on what they think they should be working on. Individual thinking is great (and needed), but it won’t help you get where you need to be unless everyone is aligned.

Enter the current economic recession. Many companies have cut costs and laid off employees. Current employees are scared that they are going to lose their jobs. Everyone keeps their heads down and works. No one acts out. No acts of brilliance. No innovation. Nothing new. While many companies may think that cutting costs and just trying to make it through a recession is the way to survival, it will probably only work if they have deep enough pockets to survive for long enough. Who wants to go through life in fear and just surviving?

Figure out what makes your company different. What are you good at? What benefits can you offer your customers? How can you not only survive in this economy, but actually strive. When you figure it out, make sure everyone in your company knows. Keep goals and language simple so everyone understands where you want to go. Employees will be much happier if they can work towards a goal and if they know what the future holds – even if there is some risk, at least they understand what it will be. Not knowing breeds fear – and that’s not a good strategy.

(photo by Vincepal)

Technorati tags: economy, recession, strategy, business, marketing

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Personal vs. Business Branding

Sarah Worsham — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 20:01:22 +0000

There’s been much to do lately about the effect of personal branding on businesses and the importance of personal branding for small and medium businesses. I think both personal and business branding are important – and they certainly have an effect on each other. How much will depend on the influence and reputation of the brands.

Now, I’m not against personal branding, as I said it may offer some people that ability to create the best job going, but a business is an asset, something that gets more valuable over time and, here’s the biggie, can be sold. It is very difficult to sell a personal brand. Some of biggest personal brands you could name on twitter right now would be worth very little without the person behind the avatar. – John Jantsch – Business Isn’t Personal – Duct Tape Marketing

Businesses certainly can benefit from having a bit of personality. Customers want to have experiences, not just purchase products, and they want to interact with brands and businesses. As Scotty Monty, who works for Ford, said:

It’s a lot more difficult to screw a brand when there’s a real person that you know that’s associated with the brand.

Some of the most popular business brands today have strong personal brands behind them. Apple, for instance, is undeniably tied to the personal brand of Steve Jobs. But a personal brand is not the same as a business brand. While Steve Jobs may work for Apple, there is more to his personal brand than just a CEO. Apple is more than just Steve Jobs (at least, so the investers hope).

In an era when transparency is much easier, it is important to be aware of the effects of personal brands on business brands, and vice versa. What you say and do as a person is linked to your business, even if you’re building separate brands. What a company does while you own it can also be tied to your personal brand. Instead of a black and white division – there are many shades of grey.

(photo by Mister Wilson @ Flickr CC)

Technorati tags: brand, branding, branding strategy, business, marketing strategy, marketing

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