by Richard Fouts | May 17, 2012 | Submit a Comment
While in New York recently, I had the opportunity to wander by Lester Wunderman’s office (accompanied by CMO Trish Wheaton who generously made the introduction). At age 91, he’s sharp as a tack and ventures into the office everyday (saying, “what else would I do?”). Well, I can think of plenty of things I’d do, [...]
Category: Brand awareness Marketing communications Personal selling Tags:
by Richard Fouts | August 18, 2010 | 3 Comments
Eloqua is teasing us to attend their next webinar with the email subject line, Why the CMO Should Carry a Quota. Great idea right? After all, marketing executives are rapidly adopting the mantra, “We drive growth.” While it might sound new, there are plenty of CMOs that carry quotas, and when I talk to them [...]
Category: Personal selling Tags: digital marketing
by Richard Fouts | April 19, 2010 | 8 Comments
Automating the management of customer references is an emerging software category whose time has come. Companies like Boulder Logic, Point of Reference, References-Online and Metia all see how complex it can be to not only recruit customers to act as references, but to manage them as well. When customers act as references, they put their reputations [...]
Category: Brand awareness Marketing communications Personal selling Public relations Tags:
by Richard Fouts | April 2, 2010 | 2 Comments
The Boss would take issue with marketing and communications people that include “exceed customer expectations” in their mission statements (or those lists of core values you see hanging in company cafeterias). Why? “Because I want them to come to my next concert,” he replied when a pesky reporter called him “ungenerous and almost stingy when [...]
Category: Personal selling Public relations Uncategorized Tags:
by Richard Fouts | January 7, 2010 | 7 Comments
One of our Account Executives, Amanda Duffy, asked me if SMS was the next voicemail. There’s no question voicemail has declined rapidly in recent years as we’ve shifted our messaging preferences to email, text messaging, and now Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. Why the decline in voicemail? Simple … it is not an immediate response tool, [...]
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by Richard Fouts | July 30, 2009 | 1 Comment
It’s tempting in any economy, but especially one where demand is soft, to cast a wider net in hopes of generating more leads. But with sales costs soaring, it’s more important than ever to keep lead quality high. Nothing can burn dollars faster than chasing down unqualified opportunities. In this interview, lead management consultant Carlos Hidalgo [...]
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by Richard Fouts | June 24, 2009 | Submit a Comment
If you sell to buyers in IT departments you’ll want to look at Baseline’s story “What Business Managers Really Think of IT.” The report begins, “A survey of non-IT executives … shows that many business leaders believe IT investments create value, but many still view the department as an operational and tactical asset rather than as [...]
Category: Marketing communications Marketing Strategy Personal selling Tags:
by Richard Fouts | May 20, 2009 | Submit a Comment
I thought about Carly Fiorina versus Mark Hurd when reading David Brooks’ insight into CEOs today (New York Times, Op Ed from May 19, 2009). According to Brooks, CEOs, at least the good ones, aren’t exactly the life of the party – in fact, “they are usually quite one-dimensional.” Brooks observations actually stem from a study [...]
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by Richard Fouts | May 6, 2009 | Submit a Comment
Bill Nussey, CEO of Silverpop blogged recently about a story in the New York Times … here’s the text of his post which says a lot about how communication is changing…and why brevity is the new black. According to the story, the once-indispensable tool for busy offices and households, voicemail, appears to be going [...]
Category: Personal selling Tags: communication
by Richard Fouts | April 30, 2009 | 1 Comment
In this blog we discuss issues facing technology marketers and sales people. For example: I just reviewed a pitch from an IT service providers that opens with the famous statistic – that 70% of the typical IT budget is consumed with keeping the lights on. Haven’t we been looking at this statistic for at least 15 [...]
Category: Marketing communications Personal selling Tags:
