How do we display Critical Thinking / Analytical Ability when answering questions?

Before answering that question we need to ask ourselves SOME of the following questions, firstly…
{What DO we already know …if anything?}

{What are the COSTs, RISKS, REDUCED UTILITY if the inverse was true …if any?}
{What are the dependencies …if any?}
{What is required in order for each option to be TRUE/FALSE …if any?}
{What is the probability of each option …if any?}
{What DON’T we already know …if any?}
{What assumptions can we make …if any?}
{What are the risks if .. …if any?}
{What are the limiting factors …if any?}

The Whole Product

Whole Product
Reading Guy's blog today, he lays down some simple rules around Geek Marketing 101. It always come down to a few basic rules. They're basically the same rules we were taught in our first marketing class. The rules are simple, sticking to them is what's hard. Technology companies love to solve problems that don't exist - "because they can". Companies are popping up all over the landscape (I talk to them every day) that have interesting products but they will never amount to much.

It's because making the product might be a 5% slice of the success pie.


" Whole Product" diagrams can be useful tools to get customers to understand that you need to have a "complete solution" if you want it to take off. Early adopters will suffer through complicated instructions, difficult downloads and installations, no customer support - but mainstream users need to be spoon fed.

The Rules:

1. Does It Solve A Problem - Have you solved a problem the customer recognizes. Have you identified the customers pain. If not, you have a vitamin and not a pain killer. You want a pain killer.

2. Is It Easy To Understand - Seriously, 5 words should do it. 2 words is better. Do the "mom test" If mom doesn't understand it, change something until she does.

3. Is It Easy To Get - Have you removed the barriers between you and having your customers use your product. In a 2.0 world we are talking free trials, no cost, fast, easy. Get it in their hands or nothing good will happen.

4. Is It Easy To Use - At Apple our rule was, "1 minute after they start to use it , they feel like calling their friends". ......" You will not believe what I just got".

5. Is It Easy To Share - In this ultra-connected world, your customers are your marketing department. If your customers are not marketing your product, you have problems. We used to call it evangelism, now we call it sharing. Your product needs to have "embedded viral components" - active mechanisms built directly into the application that assume your customers will want to tell everyone they know. Make it easy for them to do so.

http://donthorson.typepad.com/don_thorson/2006/10/whole_product.html

Why do marketing campaigns fail and customers leave?

Here are the reasons people gave for wanting off companies’ email blasts.
Email was too frequent: 54%
The emails became repetitive or boring: 49% (an additional 25% said the emails were never relevant in the first place)
I get too much email and need to pare it down: 47%

When people do find a email from a marketer boring, about two-thirds say they’ll click on the ‘unsubscribe’ link. But 8% say they’ll classify the email as spam.

The top three reasons consumers ‘unliked’ a company on Facebook:
The company posted too frequently: 47%
My wall was becoming crowded with marketing messages and I needed to get rid of some of them: 43%
The content became repetitive or boring over time: 38%. (Another 19% said the content wasn’t relevant from the start, and 17% said the company’s posts were too chit-chatty and not focused on value.)

Why consumers unfollow on Twitter
The company’s tweets became boring over time (52%). An additional 15% said the content wasn’t relevant from the start. Some 21% say the tweets were too promotional, and 20% said the tweets didn’t focus on value
41% needed to cut down on the number of tweets they saw
39% said the company tweeted too frequently

6 Things to Ask your prospect before selling to them. Sales

#1: Their History. Where are they coming from? How did they get here? What do they know about your and your firm? What dealings have taken place in the past?
#2: Frames of Reference. What ideologies and situations might affect their decision-making? Do they have a certain way of viewing your offering? How do they feel about their own firm?
#3: Needs and Desires. Where do they want to go? How do they expect to feel when they get there? How do they think they’re going to get there? What do they think will prevent it?
#4: Likely Objections. What is going to cause them to balk? How fervently do the believe in that objection? How real is it? Might it block the deal, no matter what you say or do?
#5: Capacity to Act. Are you communicating with decision-makers or seat-warmers? If decision-makers, what decision do you want them to make? If not, why are you talking to them?
#6: Decision-making Style. If they’re decision-makers, how do they make decisions? Are they all about facts and figures? Or do they decide according to a gut feeling?

6 Questions to answer before closing any sales deal? Based on persuasion

Q1: Have you already helped this customer? If you’ve already helped the customer in some way, that customer will feel obligated to say “yes” when you move to close. Have you, for example, provided a unique industry perspective, or brought your customer a referral for a potential customer?
Q2: Does this customer think your offering is unique or rare? Customers peculiarly value products that are rare or difficult to get. Have you established that your firm is the only viable source for what the customer actually needs, so that customer will perceive your offering as uniquely valuable?
Q3: Does this customer consider you an authority? Have you revealed anything about your specific background or experience that might increase the customer’s perception that you’re an authority and that your firm is reputable?
Q4: Would buying bolster the customer’s self-image? Customers are more likely to buy if buying is consistent with a prior commitment they’ve made in your presence. Have you gotten the customer to define himself or herself as the type of person who truly needs what you’re offering?.
Q5: Does the customer know peers who’ve bought from you? Customers are more likely to say “yes” when presented with evidence that their peers are also saying “yes.” Have you provided the customer with examples and references that match the profile of that customer?
Q6: Does the customer like you personally? Customers are more likely to say “yes” if they know and like you. Have you found similarities between yourself and the customer and raised them to the surface? Have you communicated that you truly respect the customer?
v

How do you sell value?

INCREASE THEIR SALES:
How can my offering uniquely help them improve their revenue? How much more product could they sell? How much are those extra sales worth to them?

REDUCE THEIR COSTS:
How can my offering uniquely help them reduce costs? How much could they save in labor costs? How much could they save in overhead?

IMPROVE THE QUALITY OF THEIR OFFERING:
How much could they save in reworks, scrap, overtime, corrective action costs, and so forth?
How can my offering uniquely help them improve delivery performance? How much would they save in canceled orders, expediting costs, airfreight charges, and so forth?

REDUCE THEIR RISK:
reduce their exposure to risk and liability? How much could they save in penalties, legal fees, and litigation?

By asking those questions, you’re defining the economic value of your offering to the customer.

Then, when you have your initial conversation with your customer, add the following three steps to your sales process:

STEP #1: Get the customer to agree on the specific negative financial impact of the problem.
Work with the customer to define ALL the ways that the problem that your solution addresses impacts their revenue and profit. Include direct costs, lost opportunity costs, personnel costs, etc., etc. Do this early in the sales cycle and make sure that the the decision maker buys into the cost analysis.

STEP #2: Convince the customer that your solution has attributes that no other solution provides.
It’s not enough to be vaguely “higher quality.” You need to be able to express specific quantitative elements of your entire solution that are unique from the competition. Anything that is unique about your solution (even the fact that YOU are the sale rep) is a potential differentiator.

STEP #3: Get the customer to agree on the specific financial impact of your differentiators.
For example, if your products can be at the customer site within one hour, and the low-cost competitors can only get the product there within 24 hours, what how much is it costing the customer to do without the product for 23 hours?

How do I beat my competitors by complimenting them?

Evolution - Describe the industry, market, customer base over a period of time and show what changes have happened. In this model, you can talk about the world of the ’90s, the ’00s and now. By describing the the changes, you can define your competitors’ advantages as addressing a world that no longer exists.

Revolution - Technology, regulation, off-shore competitors and other circumstances revolutionize businesses. Placing your competitors as great pre-revolution solutions is a good way to pigeonhole their value and emphasize yours.

Devolution - The world has gotten smaller — language like “Competition locally required this…, competition nationally requires that…, international competition demands something altogether.” The language of these conversation follows this direction: “Understanding your market as it was until (6 months or a year ago, whatever fits), I completely understand the choices you have made. As a matter of fact, I think under those circumstances, you probably made the best choice at that time. Under the current conditions, I can see why you are exploring new options. Our specialty is helping companies like yours who are in this exact set of circumstances.”

Basically, you’re killing them with kindness and compliments.

5 Scientic Ways to be Happier

How can you be happier? Jennifer L. Aaker, a marketing professor at Stanford University’s School of Business, Melanie Rudd, a Stanford MBA student, and Wharton marketing professor Cassie Mogilner, are here to help. Noting that inquiries into money and happiness have found surprisingly few correlations between the two, the trio instead set out to look at the way people spend their time and how that affects happiness. The researchers examined 60 academic studies, then tried to draw links between those findings to draw more general conclusions.

The results? Here are five guidelines they say anyone can use to increase their happiness.

1. Spend time with the “right people.” Sounds simple. But who exactly are the right people? Unfortunately, they’re generally not your office mates, who are the ones people tend to spend the most time with. The people that make you happiest will generally be friends, family, and romantic partners. That’s why one the most powerful influencers of general happiness is whether or not someone has a “best friend” at work and whether or not they like their boss.
Avoid small talk. A related predictor of happiness is how much substantive discussion a person engages in, compared to small talk. Generally, small talk makes people unhappy, and often, work relationships involve a disproportionate amount of small talk. If you want to increase your happiness, it’s far better to find one or two colleagues with whom you can have a real discussion than to engage in small talk around the water cooler.

2. Spend time on “socially connecting” activities, such as volunteering and spending time with friends.
Work doesn’t count. Unless your job is particularly fulfilling and your colleagues are your best buds, work is not ’socially connecting’ and is generally one of the more unhappy parts of the day. Commuting is also gets high marks for making people unhappy.
Volunteering has been proven to be a good way to increase happiness.
Memory is important, because it helps us take an event that happened in the past and extend its ‘worth’ into the future. One way to help choose experiences that will increase happiness is to consider how you might remember them in the future. What are your happiest memories? How might you create more similar memories?

3. Day dream, or, as the researchers say, enjoy the experience without spending the time. As counterintuitive as it may seem, research has shown that the part of the brain responsible for feeling pleasure can be activated just by thinking about something pleasurable. And we often enjoy the anticipation of something pleasurable more than the actual experience that we think is going to be so great. The most common example is vacation planning, which some find more pleasurable than the vacation itself.

4. Expand your time. No, this does not mean you have to find a warp in the space-time continuum (although it might help). Focusing on the “here and now” slows down the perceived passage of time, allowing people to feel less rushed and hurried. How can we do that?
Breathe slowly. Just for a few minutes. As the authors write: “In one study, subjects who were instructed to take long and slow breaths (vs. short and quick ones) for 5 minutes not only felt there was more time available to get things done, but also perceived their day to be longer.”
Volunteering makes it seem like you have more time. In general, spending time on someone else makes people feel like they have more spare time and that their future is more expansive.
Pay people to do the chores you hate. Activities that we choose to do generally make us happier than those that are obligatory. So if you can afford it, hire someone else to do some of the ‘obligatory’ tasks, such as cleaning the house. Then use the time you’ve ‘bought’ not to catch up on work, but to do something you genuinely enjoy.

5. Be aware that aging changes the way people experience happiness. Youths tend to equate happiness with excitement, but as people get older, happiness is associated with feeling peaceful. Young people get more happiness from spending time with interesting new acquaintances, while older people get more enjoyment from spending time with close friends and family.

Do these sound like guidelines you can follow in your own life? What activities make you happy? What else do you think should be on the list? I’m compiling readers’ suggestions and posting the best ones here.


Write down your happy moments. Tim Noyce says he finds “great value” in journaling happy moments or achievements. It’s easy to forget powerfully positive moments, he says. Reading them in a journal is emotionally uplifting.
Take a look at the big picture. Jenyj89 says having breast cancer in 2009 made her reassess her priorities. “Your family should be your WORLD,” she wrote.
Believe in a higher power. Several readers, among them Calil West and 2TallTexan, mentioned the power of God to instill happiness2TallTexan says a belief in the supernatural increases happiness, and that children who believe in Santa Claus and the tooth fairy are happier than those who don’t.
Work out. DataDude1 says he would add “staying physical… Take a break from the computer!”AirGate Solutions agrees: “Get out and exercise!” From Manabozho: “Exercise is huge.”
Do good deeds. Deancubed said, even if you don’t volunteer, “trying at least once per day to do something nice for someone else outside of the norm is a great way to uplift your spirits.”
Find a hobby. Nigel.colter says having a hobby has been “a great source of happiness.” And he notes that it’s widened his social circle as well.
Become an entrepreneur, if you hate your job, Mike Van Horn says.
Jay Taffet writes, “Avoid spam email from the mind.” He says we internalize thoughts like “I’m upset” “I’m anxious” even though we would never say “I’m a hurt elbow” or “I’m a sore knee.” We consider what’s going on with our physical self differently than we do our mental self, even though both kinds of mental messages–”I’m upset” and “I’m a hurt elbow”– can be ignored if we work at it.
Bentonsmom makes a related point: “Your brain responds to what you tell it and this includes the attitude and emotion you say it with… If you tell yourself you are going to have a great day, you will.” She also suggests living with compassion for those around you (hard to argue with that one).
Jim.marks references the work of academic Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, a professor of psychology and author renowned for his work in the area of positive psychology. His suggestion: Set appropriate goals that provide immediate feedback and measurable progress.
Lyndsay Katauskas recommends women keep a “Have-done” list, or reiterate their accomplishments to a partner each day, to combat the stress of a never-ending “To-Do” list.
Finally, from Mvanderford: “Don’t forget the benefits of a good night’s sleep.” Hear ye, hear ye.

How Do You Identify The Metrics that Measure You To Show Value

http://blogs.hbr.org/johnson/2010/11/your-own-kind-of-moneyball-the.html?cm_mmc=email-_-newsletter-_-management_tip-_-tip121610&referral=00203&utm_source=newsletter_management_tip&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=tip121610

“Once we’ve identified our best skills, and figured out how to measure them, we are well on our way to maximizing our value.”

If you can measure what you do best, you'll get paid what you're worth.

If you can't measure it, you'll have a harder time putting a price on it. No price tag, no getting paid what you're worth

"When the A's acquired MLB relief pitcher Chad Bradford from the White Sox, Bradford's standard pitching metrics were respectable, but his fastball came in at 81-85 mph, and he looked funny when he threw — the scouts made fun of him. But because the A's thought about measurement more comprehensively than the other teams, Beane knew Bradford was a steal.
According to Lewis, "Chad Bradford gave up his share of hits per balls in play, but, more than any pitcher in baseball, they were ground ball hits. His minor league ground ball to fly ball ratio was 5:1. The big league average was more like 1.1: 1. Ground balls were not only hard to hit over the wall; they were hard to hit for doubles and triples." Bradford eventually signed a three-year, $10.5 million deal with the Baltimore Orioles."

1) Talent Developer — tally the number of team members for whom a manager has brokered a move into other areas of the organization; 2) Innovator — did they create an environment that fosters innovation as evidenced by the number of ideas generated by their team; 3) Value Integrator (a manager who analyzes and synthesizes information and turns it into a competitive asset) — count, for example, how many cash management strategies came from their division? The number of M&A points of integration? Or, how many Lean or Six Sigma initiatives were successfully implemented?"

Because headline metrics rarely tell the whole story, you need to find the metrics that do, whether running a business or managing your career. That's what conflict negotiation and mediation teaches — whenever you walk into any negotiation you need to know how to value what you are bringing to the table, to put a price tag on it. Getting paid what you are worth is ultimately a negotiation. When you can identify your disruptive or best skills, and then present metrics that establish your value (creating them if need be), you can communicate your value. Are you ready to play some moneyball?

How do I have a better relationship with my manager?

10 Simple Questions That Will Win Over Your Boss
1.Ask what he thinks you can do to be more effective.
2.Ask what her top three priorities or goals are.
3.Ask what you can do to make him more effective.
4.Ask what you can do to make the team more effective.
5.Ask if he’s interested in knowing what will make your job easier.
6.Ask what her take is on the company’s top priorities and goals.
7.Ask what he thinks you should do differently or improve upon to be more effective.
8.Ask if she’d like to meet periodically, one-on-one, and if so, how frequently and what format would she like the meeting to take. Then set it up.
9.Ask what his philosophy is on your shared functional responsibility, whatever that is, i.e. marketing, HR, IT, engineering, finance.
10.And, if the meeting’s open-form and you feel it’s appropriate, ask about her background. Most people like to talk about themselves and how they got there, as long as they don’t feel like they’re being grilled, pumped for information, or played in some way.