Creative Agency Secrets

Thanks to the eagle eyed Mark McGuinness , I've been invited to chair a panel for Sport England and Channel 4 at their "All Together Now - sports, community and the web" event on 1 May.

Now this really gets me excited.  Many of you know that I write a rowing blog , I still compete and am involved on the committee of a big rowing race.  This is a perfect place for my passion and my business work in social media, digital and business development to intersect.

Here's what the event is about. 

Over the course of the past three years the emergence of blogging, social networking services and platforms which showcase and share user generated content have transformed the possibilities of how we connect, converse and collaborate with one another.
’In the 20th Century, we were defined by what we owned, in the 21st Century we will be defined by what we share and give away’ Charles Leadbeater, author of "We Think"

The potential for organisations and brands to harness these technologies and tools to engage with users, customers and their communities in radically new ways is becoming clear.

How can all those organisations working to promote active participation in sports and the brands that wish to sponsor their activates and campaigns work together to make the most of the unrivalled viral power and network effects of the web in the run up to 2012?

All Together Now will bring together leading social media developers and thinkers, sports governing bodies, communities’ sports organisations and some of our leading brands into a unique event to explore these opportunities.
 

Now, can you guys put your thinking caps on and tell me what questions you think I should be asking the panel members?

Here are some of my ideas….. 

What would be a 'perfect' social media outcome for London 2012?

How would you ideally like to engage online with the folk who run your sport?

Where do you go to talk about your sporting interests?  (online and offline).

I was invited by the lovely folk at Designer Breakfasts to do a workshop on how to do business development for your agency or for yourself.

The group was fantastic and worked really hard on the problems and tools I set them tow ork on.  Here are the photos.

The handout is here. Designer Breakfasts handout

I have been invited by Designer Breakfasts to lead a "brunch workshop" on 17th April

They are running a series of events to help design businesses improve their skills in getting new clients.

the first event was Sir George Cox talking about the future for design businesses; then Frances Hinton on  how to ask the right questions of potential clients.

I will be moving towards practical strategies for finding and winning new customers and clients. As the blurb says…

 This month’s event takes that approach to a practical level – developing a new business methodology that will make winning SME clients part of everyday studio life for you and your team.
Creative business development expert, Rebecca Caroe will get you thinking analytically about yourself, the type of clients you work well with and how to differentiate your business in a crowded market.
You’ll design your ideal customer profile, learn how to create and convert new opportunities using deep listening techniques and ‘golden questions’ and get insights on:

• Auditing your new business strategy
• Developing disciplined steps to make new business work for you
• Preparing a marketing plan
• Committing to forward actions that involve your whole team
• Asking meaningful post pitch analysis questions

Book by email events@designerbreakfasts.net

Cost £95 including VAT.

What will it be like when consumers control their own data and become the driver of relationships with vendors?

Went to another VRM Lonodn meeting last week organised by Adriana Lukas.

Richard Marr has written a good synopsis of his undestanding with some very handy 'use cases" illustrating what VRM might be used for in the future 

Insurance

Bob is looking for some home insurance. He inputs data about all the belongings in his house that he wants covered, his postcode (zip code if you’re merkin), and then sends a message through the VRM host to insurance companies giving them one-off access and asking them for a quote. The insurance companies respond. He then selects the quote he wants, and provides them with his identity and whatever other personal data is required to establish a relationship. The chosen insurance company can then be given persistent access to Bob’s private house contents data so that he can quickly re-insure when he buys something to avoid being underinsured.

The insurance company wins because they can cut out the brokers. Bob wins because he gets cheaper insurance and can reduce the hassle of re-insuring. He doesn’t want to be underinsured if something goes wrong.

Neat, does it for me, particularly as the average fee paid to brokers for their service is £50 which would be a nice cost reduction on MY home insurance. 

While writing, Adriana has uploaded a slideshow of her vision of the user experience for VRM here 

I particularly like her summary of recent online applications that have created a movement behind the initial software.  Blogging is the killer app for conversations; Social networks are the killer app for relationships.  Could VRM be the platform for killer apps for transactions [slide 7].

She gives a travel example in slides 10 - 15 showing all the different places online she puts her travel information - from flights to photos and suggests these should come together into a single central place, personal to her. 

The working title for the online place where you put all your data is "Mine!" - double entendre intended. 

At the end is the link to the London VRM Hub wiki - come and join a meeting if you are curious.  They happen monthly. 

I met Tim at SXSW earlier this month.  He has written a seminal book called the Four Hour Work Week and it's being launched in London next week.

Tim has set up a pub sessio for any Uk blogger / social media types who fancy hooking up with him.  Wednesday 2nd April in the Chandos pub on St Martin's Lane, London WC2

Sign up here .

If you are a girl geek - keep checking the site as we may have organised an exclusive breakfast with Tim…… my brilliant idea [thanks Sarah for the support!]

Fast Company article about Tim Ferriss and his tactics for getting "known" online.

1. Go where the bloggers are.
2. Read the blogs of the people you want to cover you.
3. Send bloggers interesting stories — especially about other people.
4. Start blogging.
5. Don't send press releases.

Simple.  Tim will be in London next week - details here

Glad to see my mate Mark McGuinness will be there…. he put me onto the talk Tim gave at SXSW which I blogged earlier . 

Customer data has been an important part of the advice I give most of my clients for a long time - since I worked for Peppers and Rogers I have tended to suggest that it be called Customer Relationship Management or CRM.  

But that time is now moving into the past.  The future is about 'flipping' the control of customer data out of the hands of the corporation and into the hands of the individual.  

You and I both know that many organisations have our personal data - whether it is just logins to websites or fully comprehensive bank account and credit card details from vendors we use online and offline.   Do you have a complete list of these companies and websites?  Betcha don't.  I certainly don't.

 And so when something changes - you move house, for example or you decide that you no longer want your data to be held by a particular organisation or group of companies. you have to write individually to each to 'unsubscribe' or change or amend your customer data profile.  Which is frankly a right royal pain in the bum.

Early days yet - but a possible change is for you to hold all the data about yourself and for companies and organisations that want to have a relationsihp with you to come to a private place online that you control and manage and to"collect" your data there for their purposes - with your permission.  And so if you change something, you update in ONE place.  And if you change your mind about a company and you no longer want their newsletter, you go to one place and change their permissions - maybe letting them know automatically in the process why you did or what they did to make you alter your view of them and their brand.

Sounds good?

It is called Vendor Relationship Management.  VRM.  

And the principles are still being worked out by some of the leading minds of the online age - Doc Searls and Adriana Lukas.  I am working with Adriana on the London end of the project.  

If you want to learn more, read this slide deck from Doc updating his "Cluetrain Manifesto" view of the world 10 years on… and explaining some of the VRM principles as he sees them

And Adriana's One pager about VRM post which states her future-gazing view of the future.

If you are a business here's a possible future for you

Imagine having your customers share with you what they like, want and
think of you. At the moment, you are dependent on market research,
which is like looking through a keyhole at the rich ‘user-generated’
world. Imagine being able to relate to your customers, consistently and
persistently, where they contribute directly to your supply chain where
it makes sense - whether it is R&D, product design, distribution
and marketing. Interaction with them is modular, intuitive and
user-driven freeing much of your resources spent on marketing and
transaction cost.

And if you are a customer here's a possible future for you

The ability to manage and analyze your data will give you better
knowledge about yourself, the kind of knowledge that is the holy grail
of most companies’ customer data management. The awareness of your
preferences, understanding of your needs will help you to articulate
them easier and strengthen your position with vendors.

If you want to learn more about what you can do for VRM and what VRM can do for you - come to this workshop that I'm helping to run 

Tuesday April 15th, the theme is VRM and how it addresses (and
hopefully redresses) the imbalance between individuals and their
relationships with vendors, companies or institutions.

Thanks to Jeremiah's post on OpenSocial

Important Concept: Distributed
Web Marketing no longer is limited to your corporate site. Let go of
the concept of ‘driving traffic to your website’ as a sole measurement
of success. The web, it’s message, and your battles are now fought on
the open and distributed web. Trusted decisions between prospects and
customers are made on these social communities and networks, savvy
executives need to go there.

Until I'd visited a few places where the webby types hang out and talk, I didn't really believe that it was possible that we might be moving into a new era where this becomes the dominant force behind marketing communications.  But, I really think that this is a possible probable  future.  For us all.

Here are a wide list of places where you should check out your brand - where it is probably being represented, either by you, your competitors, your customers and your prospects.  They will talk without your intermediation, without your 'campaigns', and without your having any influence over it at all.

1. Facebook
2. MySpace
3. Blogs - go to Technorati.com and search for your brand name(s)
4. YouTube
5. Competitors - go to any search engine and search for your brand
6. F***ed company.com or equivalent places where the disgruntled go to complain [I searched for David Clulow Cambridge recently…. try it!]

Some PR firms are now offering online 'evaluation' services.  This may be a very nice sideline for you to monitor online opinions about your brand, and you may consider it worthwhile buying.  My friend Erwin Cardol at LogicaCMG is getting it set up now.

But my view is that the bottom line on your online PR profile, is the underlying honesty of your organisation and the quality of your product set.  Get those two things right and you shouldn't have many problems with bad publicity.

PS Check  out GetSatisfaction - customer service provided by the customers for the customers.  Neat!

What a disappointment.  I was driven to the O2 website by an advert for their new Bluebook service.

Curious, I watched the demo  and so I signed up.  Seemed a nice idea to keep all you sms updates, photos and phone numbers backed up.  

and then having gone through all the registration process, received a text with a unique code I got the immortal message 

You must be an O2 customer to use this service.

Thanks for your interest in Bluebook. The service is exclusive to O2
customers. The easiest way to become an O2 customer is to visit an O2
shop or click here to shop with O2 on line. (link to http://shop.o2.co.uk/shop/)

You may also try the following options:

• Go back to the previous page
• Go to the O2 Homepage http://www.o2.co.uk/
• Go to the O2 Sitemap http://www.o2.co.uk/sitemap

How blooming irritating is that?  you do the whole registration - they could have told me before that it was only for O2 customers.

I reckon that opening the service up for non-O2 customers would draw a much wider 'net' around potential customers who then might be persuaded to swap carriers because of the fantastic add-on services like Bluebook offered. 

Why is this good?

1. Offer a new service that other providers don't yet offer
2. Show prospective customers the 'inside' line on how wonderful it is to be an O2 customer
3. Create a uniquely receptive audience to switching offers
4. Undermine offers from other carriers by direct communication with their customers

Oh goodness, when will big brands realise that offering something online / digital for free to a wider audience than your own customers gives you an unique opportunity.  But they threw it away. 

And so if you are in a competitive marketplace, can you set up a service to attract new customers who might be persuaded to defect from the competition because of the excellent service you offer (particularly if the net cost to you is low) this could be a winning strategy.

Go for it.

I did a coaching session for Geraldine Grey - who is changing career direction and retraining as a real estate agent.

She has kindly allowed me to write up the key biz dev tools that I recommended to her

1. Create a strong "Brand You".  For her, this is to be 'the English Realtor' [yes she'd in USA!]
2.  Have a short list of golden questions that can help you to firstly find out whether a prospect is serious and secondly to close down sales
3. Have a strong process for keeping track of prospects, leads and follow-ups
4. Get all your customers to write a reference after each job and build a Net Promoter Score scorecard

Good luck, Gerry - hope it all goes well for you.

Read this presentation on the Art of Self-Branding.

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