{!date dayname+0}, {!date long+0} Dear {!firstname_fix} Another week over and another momentous change. No, not the revolution in Egypt, but a dramatic shift in the Jones household. We are no longer a Firefox family, but have shifted to an alternative web browser, Google Chrome. After several weeks of testing, it's obvious that Chrome is superior. Having dismissed the early versions of Chrome for lack of functions, that has been addressed thanks to hundreds of extensions. Now, Chrome has all my favourite Firefox functions - but, here's the benefit - with extra speed and no memory hogging. Firefox eats up your memory like nothing else and helps slow your computer down. Firefox crashes at least once a week on my PC thanks to guzzling up the memory. Google Chrome is perceptibly faster - and speed tests confirm it is much faster anyway. And, I have had no memory crashes since using it; well at least not on the PC - my own memory, well that's a different story...!
YOUR QUESTIONS ANSWERED: How can I cope with several different social sites? Have you visited Facebook today? And what about Twitter - have you been Tweeting all morning? Of course, you are bound to have been discussing things on LinkedIn. And then when you finished that I suppose you went on to your favourite clubs on Ecademy before trawling through all your messages on Plaxo, Fastpitch and Friends Reunited. Hang on a minute...aren't you doing any work...? The fact of the matter is, you could spend all day on dozens of different social networking websites if you wanted - and never get any real work done. The problem is, because humans are social creatures work has always been social - both in terms of productivity and in terms of attracting new business. So, if you are not engaged in social networking sites, you probably aren't doing much business either - or at least won't be in the future. In other words, you are damned if you do and damned if you don't do social networking. Much of the evidence of the benefits of social networking comes from big business. Starbucks and Dell are frequently cited as organisations which have made millions as a result of Facebook and Twitter. True. But each of those organisations has legions of people working around the clock - and that is there only job. The people at Starbucks who do their social networking on Facebook only do that - they don't source the coffee beans, or arrange the marketing or train their franchisees. Similarly at Dell, the guys running their corporate Twitter accounts don't make your computer. However, for small businesses the reality is different. The person Tweeting or adding material to Facebook is often also the same person who does much of the actual work - and makes the tea...! Social networking - as valuable and important as it is - actually puts pressure on small business owners. There is a massive desire to take part in social networking - because of the obvious word-of-mouth benefits. But that desire has to face up to the fact that there are only 24 hours in a day. So, here is something you want - permission NOT to do social networking. Phew. At last. Someone has said it. True enough, you do need to engage in online social activity - but you do not have to do EVERYTHING...! What you need to do is work out where your customers and potential customers hang out. For instance, are they in LinkedIn or are they over at Ecademy? Do they Tweet or do they Plurk? In other words, rather than having a scatter gun approach to social networking (which can work if you are a major international brand) most businesses are better off taking aim at a specific target. That means if you don't want to use Facebook for business, because none of your customers really want to engage with you there, then that is fine; don't use it for business. Equally, if only a handful of potential customers or suppliers use Twitter, then it's safe to ignore it. It is OK to select what you want to do with social networking so that you can achieve your precise goals. Otherwise you will spend hours on end actually achieving nothing - other than building up more friends, followers and contacts. Just notches on the bedpost really.
WHAT I LEARNED THIS WEEK: I must review how I make customers think Yesterday I was shopping in my local supermarket. Nothing unusual in that - just pottering around with my trolley getting the usual stuff. I stopped by the medicines to get some painkillers where I stood next to a young couple in their late 20s or early 30s with a small child sitting in the trolley. As they reached for the children's cough medicines nearby they became angry. I mean angry. They started shouting and were clearly disgusted at the price that Tesco was daring to charge for children's cough medicine. As they selected the product for their coughing child in the trolley they marched off swearing and shouting: "This is disgusting. We shouldn't have to pay for this. Medicines for children should be free. Why are they making us pay? It should be free." Of course, some medicines for children are free - but only for relatively seriously ill children. And besides, they are only free to the parent - other people have paid for them via their taxes (including most parents themselves anyway). But a mild cough and a £2 bottle of linctus? Really? I smiled as the couple stormed off - but then realised that actually Tesco are partly to blame here. Walk around the store and you will see - as in almost every other retailer - "Buy one get one FREE", "TWO for one", "THREE for two" - you name it there are signs everywhere for getting stuff - FREE OF CHARGE. In other words, the retailers have helped make us think we DESERVE things free. Can you imagine walking into a High Street store and there NOT being any offers? You would think you had been transported to another planet...! It made me think. What do I do in my business that leads to expectations in my customers? And what do you do in your business that your customers have come to expect? It can lead to all sorts of problems in the future if you are not careful.
THIS WEEK'S "MUST BUY": FREE - well not quite...! Having said you need to consider how you create customer expectations, this book is a great read because it suggests that we may well be expecting much more free of charge these days. Indeed, the book points out that the notion of "free" is so prevalent in society these days that businesses need to consider new ways of generating income. The book suggests that every industry is going to be affected - including yours! So if you want some ideas and solutions as to how your business might cope in a world where people aren't prepared to buy anything, this book is for you. Of course, you have to buy the book; it isn't free...! To find out more about this book visit: http://uklik.me/thebookfree
SPECIAL NOTE: Social Media Conference - 1 WEEK to go... Join me and my colleagues, The Social Media Guys, at the Thames Valley Social Media Conference on 18th February. This all-day event is being held near Bracknell and proves to be an exciting day full of practical hints and tips. BOOK NOW at: http://socialmediafeb2011.eventbrite.com/ Kind Regards
Graham Jones Web: grahamjones.co.uk Tel: +44 118 336 9710 If you no longer wish to receive this newsletter than you can delete your name from the mailing list by clicking this link: {!remove_web} Affiliate Links: Some of the links in this newsletter are affiliate links providing me with a small commission when you purchase the item. However, I only use affiliate links for products which I personally value. |
