Digital Disruption

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Is Competition a Catalyst for Innovation?

Image credit: Antonio Zugaldia via Wikipedia

For hundreds of years of human history, innovation and discovery have occurred simultaneously, by different parties, all over the globe. In fact, it is difficult to find a major technological breakthrough of the last 200 years that didn't have multiple inventors, perhaps working thousands of miles apart, claiming that a particular discovery was theirs.

The lightbulb, most often attributed to Thomas Edison, had 20 individuals claiming responsibility for its technology. The development of the telephone can be attributed to the work of 10 great minds over 50 years, even though it is commonly credited to Alexander Graham Bell. In the 20th century, one of the most fascinating discoveries in physics, the theory of quantum electrodynamics, was developed by Richard Feynman, Sin-Itiro Tomonaga and Julian Schwinger, all independently of one another and across continents. While all three won the Nobel Prize for the discovery, a silent competitiveness ensued between Feynman and Schwinger as they seemed to race to publish their findings.

But to me, these are examples of an innovation Zeitgeist or spirit of the time that in many ways has been fueled by competition. 

The early stages. In most instances a technological innovation, when first discovered, is not ready for the consumer. Often t innovator doesn’t fully understand the implications of what he or she has discovered. That's because at the moment of discovery the technology exists in a form that's may be very different from what a person needs. For the widespread commercial success of any innovation, two crucial discovery moments should be recognized: the discovery of the technology and the consumer’s discovery of products containing this technology.
    
At the core of the product-discovery moment for a consumer is awareness. Usually in order for this awareness to arise, the product has to be mentioned in a conversation between consumers. More often than not this dialogue takes place during a debate or as a comparison is made between two competing products. For the modern consumer, who is often inundated by product-marketing impressions and an abundance of choice, a product that can’t be incorporated in a side-by-side comparison with a competing product may be invisible. That's because competition increases category awareness, which in turn drives demand for a product category.

With low barriers to entry, and more and more affordable development resources, competition is a key component of the technology Zeitgeist we're in today. Competing products help fuel and articulate the value proposition of each device and force companies to innovate through differentiation. 

The adoption factor. Within the tech community, people often talk about “adoption” without pausing to take in what the word really means. We simply speak of early and late adopters as elements on Everett Rogers’ innovation-adoption curve. What gets missed is that adoption is about recognizing that something has a place in one’s life. Competition can then be seen as a positive force that shapes technology into form factors and feature sets that better and better meet the needs of people. 

Today we are seeing innovation folded into products that become a part of our daily lives at a much faster rate than in previous generations. We are witnessing this now with the Internet of Things, as an increasing number of connected devices become available to the ordinary consumer and people adopt these devices as permanent fixtures in their homes. 

One of the most exciting things for me as an entrepreneur is helping bring innovation to people. Watching people develop close interactions with innovative products is extremely satisfying. This is because, when it is done right, interaction with a product can be seen as a form of human expression. When a product is fully adopted, it plays a vital role in fleshing out who the customer is as a person. And competition brings products closer to truly fulfilling the needs of people.

At the end of the day, the often unspoken truth is that companies like Apple need Google, Box needs Dropbox just as Thomas Edison needed Joseph Swan and Alexander Graham Bell needed Elisha Gray. Competition is fundamentally necessary to educate consumers and force companies to be innovative with their product offerings  and business model. Microsoft finds itself in its current position because of having been too many years without strong competition and pressure to stay nimble with its business model. 

So, as an entrepreneur, when asked how I feel about my competitors, my answer is very simple: I need them.

Jason Johnson

4 Things Marketers May Not Know About Social Media Marketing

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Steve Olenski 

 

I know, I know, there is no shortage of social media experts, gurus and bhagwans and many marketers themselves now believe they know all there is to know about social media marketing. Yeah and I’m Donald Duck. Translation: Don’t believe anyone who says they know everything about social media. Ever.

Why? For the simple reason it’s still growing and may never stop so how can you know all there is to know about something that has not stopped evolving yet?

The explosion that is mobile marketing alone and the way consumers are using their mobile devices for any and all social media related activities alone is cause to sit up and take notice when someone tells you they know everything about social media.

Instagram and other Social Media Apps (Photo credit: Jason A. Howie)

To those who claim to know everything and to all others among you, here are 4 things marketers may not know about social media marketing

1. Use brain science to ‘make’ people trust your brand
Don’t just rely on knowing or anticipating what the customer wants. Srini Pillay, M.D. and CEO of NueroBusiness Group did a study that shows the brain has a ‘trust hormone’ oxytocin; which does in fact enhance trust, possibly because it enhances the distinction between self and others and increases the positive evaluation of others. Thus, a trust hormone actually changes how the brain perceives people and situations.

The greater the trust you can build between your customer and your brand, the greater the chance of marketing success (which I define by amount of deals closed or leads generated).

What are some of these trust building activities? Clear communication, being on time, delivering on promises, and fulfilling contractual obligations are good ways to create a climate of trust when things are unfamiliar.

2. Do your homework
Rather than cold calls, use social media to develop the relationship to a warm point before an initial call. Target someone through LinkedIn LNKD -2.22% that fits your buyer profile through an advanced search. With Google GOOGL -0.63% Analytics, there are certain metrics that can measure how long visitors from LinkedIn stay on your web page. More time spent on the web page means that you have engaging and meaningful content. Using this information, you can target your customers easier through social media.

Once you have identified them, do research on them through reading their profiles using a CRM such as Nimble to aggregate all of their public information. Then find their email address or send them a direct message on Twitter TWTR -2.59% to start a conversation.
This works best for people who have retweeted or favorited something you have said on Twitter or LinkedIn.

3. Use your resources
The number of social media followers you have has little to do with how many people will see any social media posts you make. Since most adults don’t live on social media 24/7, only those who are checking the network at that moment (or whom you tag by name) will see the post. Tools like HootSuite and Hiplogiq’s SociaCentiv allow you to set up repeated or rephrased posts later.

According to Social Media Examiner it’s important to have three or more posts in between repeats so your profile stays interesting.

4. Offline presence
Many offline tactics still have better conversion rates than online techniques. But, a recent study by Search Engine Land found that 85% of consumers have used the Internet to find a local business. Integrating TV, radio and print into your digital marketing efforts helps differentiate your brand and target a new and profitable audience. Scott Langdon of Highervisibility.com said, “we’re living in a very digital world, but people still like to have something tangible to hold or feel when making a purchasing decicision.”

Social media marketing takes consistent effort and attention to detail. Businesses that use social media outlets to build relationships of trust, combined with an offline presence,  and diligent consumer data gathering will drive awareness and profitability for the long term.

So How Do We Reward Risk-Taking?

Five years ago, appliance makers Maytag and Whirlpool both faced a recessionary environment, intense global competition, and products that consumers could not tell apart. Maytag elected to hunker down and cut costs while Whirlpool took a different tack. Under then-CEO Dave Whitwam, the company launched an all-out, enterprise-wide initiative to develop a core competency in innovation. Not having a cookbook to follow, they experimented with how best to reward risk-takers and foster a culture where ideas were welcomed, supported, and funded. 

 

Now the results are in. Maytag, a once-great American brand, cost cut its way to near-oblivion, while a reenergized Whirlpool grew by 36 percent into a global appliance powerhouse. Whirlpool is in the final stages of buying up Maytag for a fraction of its former worth. 

 

More and more companies are embracing Whirlpool's strategy as they see the limits of Maytag's. Yet in attempting to drive organic growth to supplement acquisitions, companies routinely find they lack the champions and risk-takers needed to dream up and execute bold new ideas. "We've been operationally-minded for so long," they tell me, "that we are having trouble finding entrepreneurially-minded folks to lead the charge." 

 

What behavior do you reward? When it comes to changing people's behavior, it's important to remember an underlying principle: behavior that gets rewarded gets repeated. If you've rewarded risk-avoidance, punished failure, and ingrained incrementalism for decades and that was what moved managers up the ladder of success, guess what types of projects people run away from?

For years, companies from Tyco to Kraft to GE rewarded managers for making their numbers, gobbling up other companies, and cutting costs. The fact is, it worked. Until it didn't any longer. Maverick thinkers who somehow made it through the Orwellian hiring tests that help HR departments identify "people who think and act just like us" were not seen as valuable talent but as difficult-to-manage nuisances. Often their reward was to be first-fired during layoffs.

So if you're now looking for different behavior, you have to get clear on exactly what actions, decisions, cultural norms and values you've been rewarding - and then look for ways to incent different behaviors going forward. It won't be enough to have your CEO speak about the importance of innovation as one of the company's 17 top priorities and expect people to suddenly alter ingrained habits. You'll need to do lots of things to get the word out that expectations are changing, and that not innovating is the greater risk to one's career.

If you have trouble identifying people in your organization whom everyone recognizes as risk-takers and entrepreneurs, that should tell you something. My advice: steer clear of monetary rewards as a way to get attention. Beyond small monetary rewards given to teams not individuals, cash for ideas can backfire, and besides, the literature shows that recognition is the most reliable reward of all. Properly motivated and recognized, enough people will step forward and seemingly ordinary contributors that you may have assumed "didn't have it in them" will do amazing things.

Publicizing examples of innovativeness from your own people is another way to gain buy-in and reinforce the new behaviors you're hoping to spawn. Not only do you shine a spotlight on people who dearly need recognition, but you provide evidence that innovation isn't something that only the Apples and the Googles can do; it's something your people are doing too - and need to do more of. Give recognition to teams and individuals who stick their necks out to launch new products, even if they aren't successful right off and even if they fail. 

The rarest, and therefore the most valuable people to identify, are those who are more concerned about customers than they are about the latest company politics. Seek out those who care deeply about identifying problems customers have that they aren't solving very effectively using existing products. Look for people who dream up new solutions to customers' problems, who aren't content just to perfect the system but want to originate bold new products, services and solutions and change the system.

Robert B. Tucker is president of The Innovation Resource (www.innovationresource.com), an innovation consulting firm based in Santa Barbara, Calif. A frequent keynote speaker at conferences, he is the author of "Driving Growth Through Innovation: How Leading Firms Are Transforming Their Futures."

Developing Mindful Leaders for the C-Suite

 

 

Time Magazine recently put “The Mindfulness Revolution” on its cover, which could either be seen as hyping the latest business fad, or as signaling a major change in the thinking of executive leaders. I believe it’s the latter.

 

The use of mindful practices like meditation, introspection, and journaling are taking hold at such successful enterprises as Google, General Mills, Goldman Sachs, Apple, Medtronic, and Aetna, and contributing to the success of these remarkable organizations. Let’s look at a few examples:

• With support from CEO Larry Page, Google’s Chade-Meng Tan, known as Google’s Jolly Good Fellow, runs hundreds of classes on meditation and has written a best-selling book, Search Inside Yourself.
• General Mills, under the guidance of CEO Ken Powell, has made meditation a regular practice. Former executive Janice Marturano, who led the company’s internal classes, has left the company to launch the Institute for Mindful Leadership, which conducts executive courses in mindfulness meditation.
• Goldman Sachs, which moved up 48 places in Fortune Magazine’s Best Places to Work list, was recently featured in Fortune for its mindfulness classes and practices.
• At Apple, founder Steve Jobs — who was a regular meditator — used mindfulness to calm his negative energies, to focus on creating unique products, and to challenge his teams to achieve excellence.
• Thanks to the vision of founder Earl Bakken, Medtronic has a meditation room that dates back to 1974 which became a symbol of the company’s commitment to creativity.
• Under the leadership of CEO Mark Bertolini, Aetna has done rigorous studies of both meditation and yoga and their positive impact on employee healthcare costs.

These competitive companies understand the enormous pressure faced by their employees — from their top executives on down. They recognize the need to take more time to reflect on what’s most important in order to create ways to overcome difficult challenges. We all need to find ways to sort through myriad demands and distractions, but it’s especially important that leaders with great responsibilities gain focus and clarity in making their most important decisions, creativity in transforming their enterprises, compassion for their customers and employees, and the courage to go their own way.

Focus, clarity, creativity, compassion, and courage. These are the qualities of the mindful leaders I have worked with, taught, mentored, and interviewed. They are also the qualities that give today’s best leaders the resilience to cope with the many challenges coming their way and the resolve to sustain long-term success. The real point of leverage — which though it sounds simple, many executives never discover — is the ability to think clearly and to focus on the most important opportunities.

In his new book Focus, psychologist Dr. Daniel Goleman, the father of emotional intelligence (or EQ), provides data that supports the importance of mindfulness in focusing the mind’s cognitive abilities, linking them to qualities of the heart like compassion and courage. Dr. Goleman prescribes a framework for success that enables leaders to build clarity about where to direct their attention and that of their organizations by focusing on themselves, others, and the external world — in that order.  Cultivating this type of focus requires establishing regular practices that allow your brain to fully relax and let go of the anxiousness, confusion, and pressures that can fill the day. (Editor’s note: here is Daniel Goleman’s related HBR article, The Focused Leader.)

I began meditating in 1975 after attending a Transcendental Meditation workshop with my wife Penny, and have continued the practice for the past 38 years. (In spite of this, I still do mindless things like leaving my laptop on an airplane, but I continue to work on staying in the present moment.) All of our family members meditate regularly. Our son Jeff, a successful executive in his own right, believes he would not be successful in his high-stress job were it not for daily meditation and jogging.

Meditation is not the only way to be a mindful leader. In the classes I teach at Harvard Business School, participating executives share a wide range of practices they use to calm their minds and gain clarity in their thinking. They report that the biggest derailer of their leadership is not lack of IQ or intensity, but the challenges they face in staying focused and healthy. To be equipped for the rapid-fire intensity of executive life, they cultivate daily practices that allow them to regularly renew their minds, bodies, and spirits. Among these are prayer, journaling, jogging and/or physical workouts, long walks, and in-depth discussions with their spouses and mentors.

The important thing is to have a regular introspective practice that takes you away from your daily routines and enables you to reflect on your work and your life — to really focus on what is truly important to you. By doing so, you will not only be more successful, you will be happier and more fulfilled in the long run.

Bill George

Bill George is professor of management practice at Harvard Business School and former chair and CEO of Medtronic.

How To Unlock Great Ideas

Many companies blow off the best ideas of their most creative employees–leaving innovators no choice but to leave if they want to act on their brainstorms. This is clearly a source of huge frustration, as some of you expressed in your comments the last time I posted on this topic in “What To Do When Your Boss Won’t Support Your Great Ideas.”

But if you’re an inventive type, maybe there’s hope that you don’t have to live with your frustrations indefinitely. Serial entrepreneur Ken Tencer, co-author of the new book Cause a Disturbance, believes that it’s very possible for companies to change and embrace innovation. He’s the CEO of Spyder Works, a branding and innovation firm with offices in New York and in a suburb of Ontario, Canada. He previously founded Nettlewoods, a private label of bath and body products sold through major chains, such as Walmart. He is also chair of the Unleashing Innovation Summit, to be held in New York City on March 26 and 27. Here’s an edited transcript of a conversation we had yesterday about how to bring more innovation to today’s workplaces and to innovate more on your own.

Many people say it is hard to get their company to pay attention to their great ideas. How can companies become more receptive?
Tencer: Certain companies really embrace the notion that `We have a lot of incredible people working for us, they’re very close to our customers, and we should actually be engaging these people.’ If  you look at a company like LinkedIn LNKD -4.55%, they enable employees to come up with new idea, put a pitch together and if it comes through, to bring the idea to market. At Google GOOG -0.37%, 20% of your time can be spent on projects other than your main job. I don’t know why more companies aren’t gravitating toward that whole notion of empowering employees, of putting in place mechanisms where they allow people to present ideas and push them forward. It engages and motivates them and helps attract the best talent to your company, rather than frustrating them, turning them off or pushing them out.

Is it possible that big companies don’t see an upside to internal innovation? Many seem to want their employees to focus the products or services they already sell. When they want to add new products and services, they go out and acquire small, innovative companies, instead of doing a lot of R&D internally.
Tencer: If they don’t see an upside to internal innovation, I think it’s incredible short-sightedness. Your brand is about building relationships with your customers. Innovation is about keeping those relationships fresh. It’s about introducing “new, improved and better.” The people closest to your relationships are your employees. They’re on the front lines of  speaking to or working with customers. To me, these are where the most relevant ideas are coming from or should be coming from. I’m not saying acquisitions or open source innovation aren’t important. They are, but why–if you have  5 or 50,000 or 100,000 people–would you ignore their ideas?

Some companies want their employees to stay focused, but I am not saying innovation should be 100% of their day.  I’m talking about adding a glorified suggestion box. Let’s get those great suggestions back to corporate management and the R&D team. I think the tide is turning. I hope it’s turning. I think the great companies are seeing that listening to your employees is powerfully motivating and engaging.

What’s holding the other, not-so-innovative companies back? 
Tencer: It’s an incredible mind shift for most companies to move from viewing employees as the doers and executors to the idea generators. I think companies are afraid it will take them out of the stride of their daily work. The change is hard. Instead of being managers, we’re being motivator and coaches.

I think managers can be. [Creativity expert] Ken Robinson talks about  the notion that creativity is taken away from us and replaced by very linear thinking through our education processes in his TED talks. In large companies, just like you have an open source innovation platform, you need an internal platform through which employees propose or present their ideas, so it doesn’t become every manager’s responsibility to be brilliant at this. If you have the processes in place, you’ll see that tide changing. I do believe that, given permission, managers will start to shift.

What if you’re an employee in a company that isn’t as receptive to innovation as LinkedIn–and you’re innovative? What can you do to put your ideas into action? 
I think if top management  really doesn’t appreciate it–I hate to say it–but in many cases an innovative employee will leave. If you’re one voice in 50,000 I don’t know that you’re going to have incredible success at it. But I think that with this new generation of employees, recognition and engagement are so high up on the scale of what motivates people that you won’t be the one voice in the company anymore. Hopefully a lot of companies will recognize that they don’t want to lose their employees.

What can someone who is, say, 47 years old, learn from Millennials about innovation? 
They’ve grown up and see sharing as just a normal part of their life. They’re sharing their ideas, thoughts on what they’re doing and social activism through social media. They are habitual sharers. What we need to learn is it’s okay to share our ideas and to build on one another’s idea. For the 47-year-old, the whole notion of the wiki or open source programming or innovation is a little more challenging. We were taught to keep our head down, keep things to ourselves and go in a linear fashion. To be fair to our generation, we didn’t have social media growing up. We can adapt to a new reality. We do it very well through LinkedIn. We share a lot of ideas through LinkedIn groups and other platforms. We can do that internally, as well.

Do you see any relationship between Millennials’ attitudes about consumerism and their opportunities to create? Many started their careers during the Great Recession.
We were brought up with home ownership and the cars in the garage as status symbols. To them, status symbols relate to whether something goes to sharing: Does it go to lowering emissions, saving the planet, to working together for a better cause? It’s an extension of that whole interconnectedness. To me, they’re almost better equipped to bootstrap a company. They don’t have that singular focus on the acquisition of material goods.

So how do midlife professionals who have mortgage to pay take a cue from a younger, very entrepreneurial generation and get back in touch with the innovative side of themselves? 
In my workshops, I don’t start out talking about innovation and being creative. I ask people to talk about what cool things around them they like. Someone might say: “Standing on a corner and getting a text message that your cab is one mile away, and your cab is number 118.” Here’s another example I like: At Disney theme parks, if a child drops an ice cream cone, an attendant will run up and take them to the ice cream vendor, who will put a new ice cream upside down in a cup, with a smiley face on it. These are examples of brilliant process innovation. It’s about making your customer happy in a simple but very different way. It doesn’t have to cost a lot of money. Once people start realizing that innovation is that simple, it frees them up to be creative.

7 Deadly Sins Businesses Make With Their Reputation

BY Andy Beal 

Think just hatching a Twitter account will catapult your company to the top of everyone's mind? Or your sporadic Facebook posts will bring your brand's reputation to the next level?

Try again.

The web is littered with good companies that failed to take charge of their brand and wound up as reputation road kill.

To not end up as the next travesty, avoid these seven deadly sins.

Not understanding your audience. Who is the prime audience for your company? While you may instantly be able to verbalize the traits of a perfect customer, they only make up a small portion of your online audience. Bloggers, journalists, business partners, employees -- even jilted lovers -- all have a say in your reputation.

As a business owner, you should know where your customers hang out on the web, what social networks and blogs they frequent, and make it part of your business plan to get to know them.

Not building a presence. Once you understand where your audience likes to hang out, you should make sure you put your “open for business” sign in the same locations. If your customers tend to migrate to Facebook, then you should make sure you have an active Facebook page. If they favor LinkedIn, then that’s where you should invest your time.

You don’t need a huge budget either. Mya-Moe Ukuleles is a small, custom ukulele builder, yet has built a vibrant Facebook community with stunning photos, informational videos and product demos. Take note.

Failing to be congruent. It’s likely you’ll find yourself engaging with your audience in more than one location. When that happens, be sure to provide a congruent experience so that you don’t send mixed messages about your reputation.

Coca Cola and McDonalds both do a great job of this. Whether you visit their Facebook page, Twitter profile or YouTube channel, you’ll see the same look, tone and discussions going on. 

Not being there 24/7. For small businesses it’s impossible to watch the internet all day, every day for conversations about your reputation. That doesn’t mean you can’t have some automated eyes and ears to help you out. Automated social media monitoring tools such as Google Alerts, my company Trackur or Radian6 will listen for any mentions of your brand, allowing you to join conversations you might otherwise have missed.

Taking too long to apologize. When you make a mistake, you should apologize quickly. Think of it as a band-aid on your reputation boo-boo. Rip it off quickly and get the pain over with.

When an Austin, Texas Minibar employee chalked up a beer promotion with the text ”I like my beer like I like my violence: domestic” it could have spelled doom for the drinking establishment. Fortunately, the owner quickly removed the sign, fired the employee and said, “I give my utmost apology and assure it won’t happen again.” He then promised $1 of every domestic beer sold in October would go to the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, and the reputation crisis quickly diffused.

Not being transparent. Along with being quick to apologize, you should also offer some transparency. How did this happen and what are you doing to make sure it doesn’t happen again. Target has done an admirable job explaining what happened with its data breach.

Outsourcing your reputation. The companies that have the best reputations are the ones that don’t hand the reins of their brand to an outsider. When your business is the one connecting with your audience, you learn more about them, which leads to better communication and improved service. When you outsource that to a PR firm, you not only lose that connection with your customers, but you also risk them pulling a horrible stunt. 

Andy Beal

Andy Beal is the CEO of Trackur.com, a social media monitoring tool. The co-author of Radically Transparent: Monitoring and Managing Reputations Online, Beal has spent more than a decade advising individuals and businesses on how to manage their online reputation. His new book, Repped: 30 Days to a Better Online Reputation, provides a practical plan for improving personal and corporate reputations.

9 Ways Social Media Marketing Will Change in 2014

Image: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images News

From the decline of Facebook use among teens to Twitter's IPO, if there is one thing we know for sure about social media, it's that few trends hold on for long — so marketers need to stay on their toes.

With that in mind, we asked nine successful entrepreneurs how they are planning on altering their social media marketing strategies in the next six months, based on their predictions for the new year. Here's what they had to say. 

1. Graphic software will rise.

 

Posts on Facebook with photos get 53% more likes, 104% more comments and 84% more click-throughs than text-based posts, according to Kissmetrics. With the rise of Pinterest and Tumblr, it's going to become increasingly important to produce content in visual form, whether it is infographics, images with text overlay or pretty quote graphics. We'll be using more graphic software to turn our written content into visual content to make it more shareable on social media.
- Laura Pepper Wu, 30 Day Books 

2. Social won't be used for sales.
 

People love to buy, but they hate to be sold. Companies currently celebrating the most success in social media focus on engagement, nurturing relationships and sharing value through their social outreach. Customers and prospects will seek out companies offering value, entertainment, discounts, help and engagement.
- Charles Gaudet, Predictable Profits 

3. Automation will explode.
 

 A lot currently rides on the shoulders of social media marketers. They have to be on top of brand voice, any current company promotions or marketing campaigns, the tools they measure social media with, the various communities on the platforms, etc. It's a lot, and it's more varied than most people are capable of doing well. In 2014, we'll see a lot of automation of the tactics (think timing, platform, structure, etc.), so social media marketers can focus on the content and the genuine social interaction. Autonomics is being adopted now and will only explode as more technologies come online in 2014.
- Brennan White, Watchtower 

4. LinkedIn will become the most important publisher.
 

Imagine a publication with more than 100 million captive readers and writers, such as Bill Gates and Richard Branson, all natively hooked into and targeted to a social network. LinkedIn will become a premium destination for industry news, and you need to take part in that ecosystem early and often. Publish original content, network among peers in groups and raise your profile now.
- Trevor Sumner, LocalVox 

5. Content will be bigger and better.
 

Simple messages and simple questions aren't enough anymore. To achieve a deeper connection with your customers, a company needs to engage on a deeper and more intelligent level. Short videos, infographics, quality imagery and polls are all ways to engage deeper. Companies need to look at the content they put out and ask themselves, "Is this shareable?" An example of a huge company that's doing this really well right now is Wal-Mart. Its content is smart and engaging, and the fan engagement is very high by comparison to its competitors. Also, companies need to focus on the fans they have and not the fans they want. If your message is always trying to reach out, you'll bore the fans that have chosen to connect with you.
- Andrew Howlett, Rain 

6. Social will need to stand out.
 

Social media has really started to mature. Therefore, it will be a lot harder to stand out. To win big in social media, you'll have to think outside the box and find ways to get your content to stand out in all the noise.
- Wade Foster, Zapier 

7. Social media campaigns will have to be paid.
 

 I assume that the most effective social media campaigns in 2014 will be paid. The key is learning how to use Facebook and Twitter's paid tools now so that you'll have an edge on the competition. For instance, are you using Facebook's advanced audience tool? It allows you to upload your email database and send specific response messages directly to your focused audience. Imagine being able to segment both email marketing and Facebook ads to your target audience. Facebook already offers these types of advanced tools, and they will become more mainstream in 2014. Similarly, Twitter is now public and has been making an aggressive push into paid advertising. If you are a brand and want to succeed on Twitter in 2014, get ready to pay for it.
- Kristopher Jones, ReferLocal.com 

8. Interactive content will trump static content.
 

Creating static content is too easy. In 2014, the bar will be raised on the type of content people choose to engage with. Expect to see content become more interactive (think software-like). The year 2013 was the year of "Top 10" lists. To get users to engage to the same degree in 2014 and subsequent years, publishers will need to make it increasingly engaging, and one effective way to do that is to make your content interactive.
- Chuck Cohn, Varsity Tutors 

9. Google+ will merge into the social scene.
 

As Google continues to merge its products, it’s becoming more and more important in the social media landscape. There are so many benefits to using Google+. It creates a strong community that allows you to use your brand and identify consumers who share an interest in your products. It also allows your brand to become more social with like-minded consumers. They provide like-minded consumers a platform to connect with one another.

This builds a strong community, which is a great way to get feedback on new and old products from real-time consumers.
- Nicolas Gremion, Free-eBooks.net

Scott GerberScott Gerber is a serial entrepreneur, author (Never Get a 'Real' Job), TV commentator and founder of Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC), an invite-only organization comprised of the world's most promising young entrepreneur...More

Bad Business Decisions and Famous Quotes

Here are a few bad decisions from the world of business that have become famous -- and are downright humorous in hindsight. Some people learned from their mistakes and moved on (Bill Gates.) Some, sadly, faded into history (Decca).

"640K ought to be enough for anybody." -- Bill Gates, 1981

"Drill for oil? You mean drill into the ground to try to find oil? You're crazy." -- Drillers who Edwin L. Drake tried to enlist to his project to drill for oil in 1859

"But what ... is it good for?" -- Engineer at the Advanced Computing Systems Division of IBM, 1968, commenting on the microchip.

"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home." --Ken Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corp., 1977

"The wireless music box has no imaginable commercial value. Who would pay for a message sent to nobody in particular?" --David Sarnoff's associates in response to his urgings for investment in the radio in the 1920s. I hope he fired all of them.

"The concept is interesting and well-formed, but in order to earn better than a 'C,' the idea must be feasible." -- A Yale University management professor in response to Fred Smith's paper proposing reliable overnight delivery service. (Smith went on to found Federal Express Corp.[FedEx])

"Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible." -- Lord Kelvin, president, Royal Society, 1895.

"Airplanes are interesting toys but of no military value." -- Marechal Ferdinand Foch, Professor of Strategy, Ecole Superieure de Guerre. Wasn't France bombed in World War Two?

"I'm just glad it will be Clark Gable falling on his face and not Gary Cooper" -- Gary Cooper on his decision not to take the leading role in "Gone With the Wind"

And my three favorites:

"We don't like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out." --Decca Recording Co. rejecting the Beatles, 1962

"This 'telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us." -- Western-Union internal memo, 1876.  Alexander Bell offered the patent for the Telephone to Western-Union in 1876 for $100,000. They declined. The telephone patent has been estimated as the most valuable patent of all time. Bell's Company, AT&T, later aquired Western-Union. Special Note -- In 1971 AT&T turned down an offer to own the Internet. Oh well.


"So we went to Atari and said, "Hey we've got this amazing thing, even built with some of your parts, what do you think about funding us? Or we'll give it to you. We just want to do it. Pay our salary, we'll come work for you." And they said, "No". So then we went to Hewlett Packard and they said, "Hey, we don't need you; you haven't even got through college yet." -- Apple Computer Co-Founder Steve Jobs on attempts to get Atari and HP interested in he and Steve Wozniak's personal computer. HP recovered nicely (though not quite as nicely, I suspect as they would have if they'd chanced it) but where is Atari today.

Special Mention -- Couldn't find a quote for these two, but...

In 1933 Coca-Cola declined an opportunity to buy it's then-bankrupt and insignificant rival Pepsi - Cola

In 1999, Excite declined the opportunity to buy Google for $1 million. It's possible that ANY quote on this from Excite would be -- a-hum -- unprintable. ;)

About the author:  http://www.articlesbase.com/authors/mark-hester/30502

Clay Adams

It is the most popular website in the world, drawing a billion visitors each month. More than 12 billion queries are sent through its search engine each month and there are more than 15 million websites connected to its Analytics tool. We’re talking, of course, about Google.

Whether your business has a well-established web presence or you’re just emerging on your own slice of cyberspace real estate, Google is most likely a key aspect of your online efforts and pursuits.

We understand that busy CEOs and entrepreneurs can’t possibly learn all there is to know about this internet gargantuan as quickly as they’d like, and your marketing team or SEO agency will likely help with understanding the common conventions regarding Google.

So today, I want to instead help you focus on five important concepts about Google that you may not come across often, yet are equally crucial to your online business strategy.

#1) Google is Constantly Changing

Before you take one more single step toward leveraging Google for your online marketing efforts, it’s imperative to understand this fact. The level of fluidity, growth, and diversity of this company is mind-blowing. You will never see Google stagnate. If it ever does go the way of the Dodo, it won’t be from complacency.

If we’re looking at all of Google enterprises as a whole, the amount of corporate acquisitions, inventions (and patents), new software products and tools, website properties and similar business activities is practically innumerable. And that’s without even considering its core component – the Search Engine.

Google is always changing and cooking up something new. Just recently, they lauded the new ‘Google Compute’ product, stepping into the ring with rivals Apple and Amazon for a veritable clash of the Cloud Computing titans.

Okay, so what about Google Search? This is the cornerstone of Google’s empire, and the service that started it all is equally dynamic. Google makes about 500 changes and updates just to its search engine algorithm each year. Many more likely occur quietly behind the scenes. They also change-up their Index and how it operates.

It would take some time and a fair amount of research to fully understand the ins and outs of Google’s algorithm changes, and may prove beneficial in the long run. But right now, the takeaway is simple: Your business must be adaptable to Google’s whims if you wish to leverage the power of search marketing.

#2) Your Competitors Are Leveraging Google

This is interesting, albeit somewhat obvious, because it applies to your business even if you don’t currently operate any type of online presence. You can bet without a sliver of doubt that some (if not all) of your rivals are competing for exposure on Google, whether through Organic Search or Pay-Per-Click ads.

If your business has an active, well optimized and maintained website with high quality unique content, then you may find yourself a step ahead already. However, the majority of business owners fall into one of two camps, which we’ll examine now. If you fall into one of these groups, your competitors are taking the money you’ve left on the table.

The first group consists of businesses with no online presence. If all you have is a single Facebook page for your business, you can count yourself among these ranks as well.

The facts are simple: You need a website…at the very least. A complete online marketing strategy is a prudent follow-up step. Think of it this way: You are saying “No” to the opportunity of exposure in front of the nearly 275 million internet users in North America alone. If you have the capabilities for global reach, the number is closer to 2.4 billion.

The other group is businesses who have a website and perhaps some additional online assets such as Social Media profiles or blogs, but aren’t competing for exposure on Google (or perhaps not competing effectively). Applying comprehensive search engine optimization for your website, as well as robust content creation and promotion strategies are the crucial first steps for businesses in this group.

It’s understandable that you may not have the time to learn or apply proper SEO techniques while running your company. If that’s the case, your next best bet is to hire an internet marketing agency. Your biggest competitors are spending those marketing dollars for good reason.

#3) Google isn’t just a search engine anymore

Google’s benefits for business in terms of marketing exposure are clear, but Google has grown into much more than just a search engine. All it takes is a quick glance over Google’s Products Page for a true understanding of the company’s breadth. And this doesn’t even include the slew of tools and resources they offer for webmasters and online marketers, such as Google Analytics. Let’s also not forget Google is the proprietor for the firmware running on all ‘Android’ mobile devices.

This means that leveraging Google for your business goes beyond simple organic optimization for their search engine. The integration Google has established (and continues to establish) across all of their platforms means you’re embarking on a more elaborate campaign with more intricate strategies.

Even by looking at just a small sampling of some ‘flagship’ products, such as Google Plus, YouTube, Google Search and Google Places, we can recognize crucial interconnections and avenues for our marketing strategies. Let’s review some examples.

Recently, Google implemented its social platform (Google Plus) as a commenting system in YouTube. While this move drew a widespread outcry from netizens worldwide, the integration opens up new avenues by which multimedia, social media, and even SEO come together in a harmony that is still yet to be realized.

Google Plus and Google Places are also intertwined. Furthermore, they are wired into Google Search, though not always in the way most people expect. Perhaps the easiest way to bolster exposure for a business using these properties is to simply create and nurture company profiles in Plus and Places.

#4) Google strives for a high-quality user experience

This could very well be the most important concept for business owners to understand about marketing in the ‘Google-scape’. Recognizing the standards of quality Google expects from websites (and why) helps us shape our campaigns and the best strategy to achieve that pinnacle positioning on search results.

Honestly, this should already align with our own commitments to provide a great user experience on the web. But it’s easy for many business owners to get caught up in optimizing for robots, relegating actual human visitors to an afterthought.

While I don’t like to bypass an opportunity to preach my “Humans First” credo for web marketers, there is still more to be gleaned from looking at Google’s stance on the matter. Let’s examine it from Google’s profit perspective.

Google’s Search Engine is the company’s core product, driving about a quarter of its revenue from paid search advertising (AdWords), to the tune of over $42 Billion in 2012.

Because of the immense traffic volume garnered through Google Search, the advertising value of such a space is enormous. Furthermore, AdWords is uniquely versatile in its ability to generate customized, dynamic, targeted ads.

Competition for the coveted spaces and high volume keywords is managed through bid-based pay-per-click campaigns, which serve to boost Google’s revenues beyond what static advertisements might otherwise yield.

Google has built a consistent, residual revenue stream unmatched in the advertising realm. But they recognize how quickly those profits can seep out if they were to lose even the slightest slice of market share among search engines. As long as they’re returning great results for users on the engine, they can retain this billion-dollar behemoth.

The Take-away: Create websites and content meriting placement in search results based on Google’s quality standards. Putting your site in that number one spot might be worth a lot to your business, but putting the right one there is worth billions to Google.

#5) Google wants to know everything it can about you and your business

The upcoming year represents a brave new world in search marketing. Google has always been a rather data-thirsty enterprise, but the gathering will grow and all that information will soon come to bear.

Google has already begun rolling out features of its new Knowledge Graph technology. If you’re a business owner on the web and you’re unfamiliar with Knowledge Graph, make sure to check out Google’s ‘Inside Search’ feature page for a crash course on the subject.

Right now, backlinks are by-and-large the most effective method Google currently has in determining where to rank a site in the results, thereby making them an important pursuit and ranking factor for SEOs. But Google may well be moving away from links as Knowledge Graph becomes more powerful, versatile and stable.

Knowledge Graph is powered by real data about real people, places and things (known as ‘entities’). Not only is Google striving to return results based on this paradigm (as opposed to algorithmically scoring the ‘votes’ from backlinks), but they are also connecting these entities together in the ether.

The advent of Knowledge Graph is already upon us, with no signs of slowing. Just this month, Google announced the addition of automobiles to the Graph. But we’ve only seen the tip of the iceberg. Google is tying together its flagship products (Search, YouTube, Google Plus) as both an information gathering and data integration platform serving as the foundation for new search engine technology like Knowledge Graph.

The SEO world recently went topsy-turvy at the announcement of the new Hummingbird algorithm as well, which caters to mobile and spoken searches (among other changes). It’s more adept at discerning conversational queries and answering questions. Hummingbird falls right in line with the rest of the components previously mentioned, improving the intelligence of the search engine in serving up results.

Taking all of this into context with our original point about Google’s desire to learn all it can about you and your business, we begin to see that there are some new ranking factors in town; and they are all tied to your authority and influence on the web.

Brand-building will be more important than ever. Advanced SEO techniques leveraging Microformatting and Authorship Markup are becoming staples in our arsenals. Your company’s trust factors, authority, influence, and reputation are being ever more intelligently indexed – and scrutinized.

For Google, backlinks are a necessary evil because they are relatively easy for spammers to manipulate, while also being the best method for ranking websites. Knowledge Graph is much more difficult to manipulate and could potentially improve search results even beyond the current standards.

Business owners on the web should therefore evaluate their search marketing strategies now. Optimizing for Google organic search is traditionally a reactive task. Algorithms change, new penalties pop up, new ranking factors are introduced and the SEO industry shifts gears to align with the latest changes. But this time, we know what’s coming.

It’s time to be proactive with search marketing – now more than ever. Research, prepare, and apply the appropriate strategies to bolster the positioning your business needs in a new era of search engine technology.

SEO Beginner’s Guide: 5 Things Every Business Owner Should Know About Google

Posted on January 17, 2014 by Clay Adams | 8 comments

The views of contributors are their own, and not necessarily those of SEJ.

• inShare51

It is the most popular website in the world, drawing a billion visitors each month. More than 12 billion queries are sent through its search engine each month and there are more than 15 million websites connected to its Analytics tool. We’re talking, of course, about Google.
Whether your business has a well-established web presence or you’re just emerging on your own slice of cyberspace real estate, Google is most likely a key aspect of your online efforts and pursuits.
We understand that busy CEOs and entrepreneurs can’t possibly learn all there is to know about this internet gargantuan as quickly as they’d like, and your marketing team or SEO agency will likely help with understanding the common conventions regarding Google.
So today, I want to instead help you focus on five important concepts about Google that you may not come across often, yet are equally crucial to your online business strategy.

#1) Google is Constantly Changing

Before you take one more single step toward leveraging Google for your online marketing efforts, it’s imperative to understand this fact. The level of fluidity, growth, and diversity of this company is mind-blowing. You will never see Google stagnate. If it ever does go the way of the Dodo, it won’t be from complacency.
If we’re looking at all of Google enterprises as a whole, the amount of corporate acquisitions, inventions (and patents), new software products and tools, website properties and similar business activities is practically innumerable. And that’s without even considering its core component – the Search Engine.
Google is always changing and cooking up something new. Just recently, they lauded the new ‘Google Compute’ product, stepping into the ring with rivals Apple and Amazon for a veritable clash of the Cloud Computing titans.
Okay, so what about Google Search? This is the cornerstone of Google’s empire, and the service that started it all is equally dynamic. Google makes about 500 changes and updates just to its search engine algorithm each year. Many more likely occur quietly behind the scenes. They also change-up their Index and how it operates.
It would take some time and a fair amount of research to fully understand the ins and outs of Google’s algorithm changes, and may prove beneficial in the long run. But right now, the takeaway is simple: Your business must be adaptable to Google’s whims if you wish to leverage the power of search marketing.

#2) Your Competitors Are Leveraging Google

This is interesting, albeit somewhat obvious, because it applies to your business even if you don’t currently operate any type of online presence. You can bet without a sliver of doubt that some (if not all) of your rivals are competing for exposure on Google, whether through Organic Search or Pay-Per-Click ads.
If your business has an active, well optimized and maintained website with high quality unique content, then you may find yourself a step ahead already. However, the majority of business owners fall into one of two camps, which we’ll examine now. If you fall into one of these groups, your competitors are taking the money you’ve left on the table.
The first group consists of businesses with no online presence. If all you have is a single Facebook page for your business, you can count yourself among these ranks as well.
The facts are simple: You need a website…at the very least. A complete online marketing strategy is a prudent follow-up step. Think of it this way: You are saying “No” to the opportunity of exposure in front of the nearly 275 million internet users in North America alone. If you have the capabilities for global reach, the number is closer to 2.4 billion.
The other group is businesses who have a website and perhaps some additional online assets such as Social Media profiles or blogs, but aren’t competing for exposure on Google (or perhaps not competing effectively). Applying comprehensive search engine optimization for your website, as well as robust content creation and promotion strategies are the crucial first steps for businesses in this group.
It’s understandable that you may not have the time to learn or apply proper SEO techniques while running your company. If that’s the case, your next best bet is to hire an internet marketing agency. Your biggest competitors are spending those marketing dollars for good reason.

#3) Google isn’t just a search engine anymore

Google’s benefits for business in terms of marketing exposure are clear, but Google has grown into much more than just a search engine. All it takes is a quick glance over Google’s Products Page for a true understanding of the company’s breadth. And this doesn’t even include the slew of tools and resources they offer for webmasters and online marketers, such as Google Analytics. Let’s also not forget Google is the proprietor for the firmware running on all ‘Android’ mobile devices.
This means that leveraging Google for your business goes beyond simple organic optimization for their search engine. The integration Google has established (and continues to establish) across all of their platforms means you’re embarking on a more elaborate campaign with more intricate strategies.
Even by looking at just a small sampling of some ‘flagship’ products, such as Google Plus, YouTube, Google Search and Google Places, we can recognize crucial interconnections and avenues for our marketing strategies. Let’s review some examples.
Recently, Google implemented its social platform (Google Plus) as a commenting system in YouTube. While this move drew a widespread outcry from netizens worldwide, the integration opens up new avenues by which multimedia, social media, and even SEO come together in a harmony that is still yet to be realized.
Google Plus and Google Places are also intertwined. Furthermore, they are wired into Google Search, though not always in the way most people expect. Perhaps the easiest way to bolster exposure for a business using these properties is to simply create and nurture company profiles in Plus and Places.

#4) Google strives for a high-quality user experience

This could very well be the most important concept for business owners to understand about marketing in the ‘Google-scape’. Recognizing the standards of quality Google expects from websites (and why) helps us shape our campaigns and the best strategy to achieve that pinnacle positioning on search results.
Honestly, this should already align with our own commitments to provide a great user experience on the web. But it’s easy for many business owners to get caught up in optimizing for robots, relegating actual human visitors to an afterthought.
While I don’t like to bypass an opportunity to preach my “Humans First” credo for web marketers, there is still more to be gleaned from looking at Google’s stance on the matter. Let’s examine it from Google’s profit perspective.
Google’s Search Engine is the company’s core product, driving about a quarter of its revenue from paid search advertising (AdWords), to the tune of over $42 Billion in 2012.
Because of the immense traffic volume garnered through Google Search, the advertising value of such a space is enormous. Furthermore, AdWords is uniquely versatile in its ability to generate customized, dynamic, targeted ads.
Competition for the coveted spaces and high volume keywords is managed through bid-based pay-per-click campaigns, which serve to boost Google’s revenues beyond what static advertisements might otherwise yield.
Google has built a consistent, residual revenue stream unmatched in the advertising realm. But they recognize how quickly those profits can seep out if they were to lose even the slightest slice of market share among search engines. As long as they’re returning great results for users on the engine, they can retain this billion-dollar behemoth.
The Take-away: Create websites and content meriting placement in search results based on Google’s quality standards. Putting your site in that number one spot might be worth a lot to your business, but putting the right one there is worth billions to Google.

#5) Google wants to know everything it can about you and your business

The upcoming year represents a brave new world in search marketing. Google has always been a rather data-thirsty enterprise, but the gathering will grow and all that information will soon come to bear.
Google has already begun rolling out features of its new Knowledge Graph technology. If you’re a business owner on the web and you’re unfamiliar with Knowledge Graph, make sure to check out Google’s ‘Inside Search’ feature page for a crash course on the subject.
Right now, backlinks are by-and-large the most effective method Google currently has in determining where to rank a site in the results, thereby making them an important pursuit and ranking factor for SEOs. But Google may well be moving away from links as Knowledge Graph becomes more powerful, versatile and stable.
Knowledge Graph is powered by real data about real people, places and things (known as ‘entities’). Not only is Google striving to return results based on this paradigm (as opposed to algorithmically scoring the ‘votes’ from backlinks), but they are also connecting these entities together in the ether.
The advent of Knowledge Graph is already upon us, with no signs of slowing. Just this month, Google announced the addition of automobiles to the Graph. But we’ve only seen the tip of the iceberg. Google is tying together its flagship products (Search, YouTube, Google Plus) as both an information gathering and data integration platform serving as the foundation for new search engine technology like Knowledge Graph.
The SEO world recently went topsy-turvy at the announcement of the new Hummingbird algorithm as well, which caters to mobile and spoken searches (among other changes). It’s more adept at discerning conversational queries and answering questions. Hummingbird falls right in line with the rest of the components previously mentioned, improving the intelligence of the search engine in serving up results.
Taking all of this into context with our original point about Google’s desire to learn all it can about you and your business, we begin to see that there are some new ranking factors in town; and they are all tied to your authority and influence on the web.
Brand-building will be more important than ever. Advanced SEO techniques leveraging Microformatting and Authorship Markup are becoming staples in our arsenals. Your company’s trust factors, authority, influence, and reputation are being ever more intelligently indexed – and scrutinized.
For Google, backlinks are a necessary evil because they are relatively easy for spammers to manipulate, while also being the best method for ranking websites. Knowledge Graph is much more difficult to manipulate and could potentially improve search results even beyond the current standards.

Business owners on the web should therefore evaluate their search marketing strategies now. Optimizing for Google organic search is traditionally a reactive task. Algorithms change, new penalties pop up, new ranking factors are introduced and the SEO industry shifts gears to align with the latest changes. But this time, we know what’s coming.
It’s time to be proactive with search marketing – now more than ever. Research, prepare, and apply the appropriate strategies to bolster the positioning your business needs in a new era of search engine technology.

Read more at http://www.searchenginejournal.com/seo-beginners-guide-5-things-every-business-owner-know-google/84429/#kKcIIMETpFzLrIpV.99