If you want to contribute an article
to Goto-Silicon-Valley.com, please feel free to contact
us (please read the author guidelines
first).
Also, if you're interested in small business technology, please
take a look at the Small
Business Technology Magazine. It is a compendium to provide concrete advice,
opinions and reference information about how technology can effectively be used
by small businesses to improve their operations, grow and succeed. Articles are
written in simple, professional terms allowing any small business owner or manager
to get the most out of the world of technology.
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Mary Gospe: "Boosting Email Campaign Effectiveness: Tips for improving Deliverability and Response Rates (Part I)"
Email continues to be a popular and effective marketing medium. The DMA reported in its 2007 Response Rate Trends Report that "email produced the highest absolute response rates for those whose primary objective was to generate leads." Although it is relatively easy to launch an email program, doing it well takes some planning. More...
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Mary Gospe: "Boosting Email Campaign Effectiveness: Tips for improving Deliverability and Response Rates (Part II)"
To improve deliverability and response rates, successful marketers are segmenting their audience and delivering messages and offers that are relevant and personalized. Personalization can occur not just in the greeting, as in "Dear Mary" but by providing content that reflects a recipient's interests, website behavior and buying history. More...
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Mike
Gospe: "Lead Generation Blueprints in 30 Minutes: How one Company quadrupled their Marketing ROI"
Not long ago one of my clients asked me to take on the role of an interim director of field marketing. This mid-sized Internet security company enjoys a solid customer base and a number of rich product offerings. But, with fierce competition and a lengthy sales process, the ability to produce well-qualified leads in a timely fashion has been difficult. More...
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Mike
Gospe: "How Sun Re-invented the Marketing Campaign"
Good marketing can be equated to playing chess. Chess grandmasters are winners because they have been trained to think several moves ahead. And in this planning they are able to react to their opponents' moves with skill and finesse. They study the situation, making note of possible moves and then follow-on moves. They anticipate reactions, and then act accordingly. This very same approach is what Sun embraced in 1997 to reinvent its approach to marketing. More...
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Anne Bakstad: "What is Process Mapping and How Does it Help You Launch Successful Products?"
Successful companies everywhere use process mapping to both develop and improve processes. The tool technique can be used for discrete sub-processes like reengineering an accounts payable or other backend business process. Or, it can be used to develop new, comprehensive processes like building the full quote to cash process to support the launch of a new product or a new line of business. More...
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Anne Bakstad: "Product Launch Readiness: Ten Common Pitfalls to Avoid"
In addition to all the externally focused activities required to ensure a successful product launch - marketing, advertising, PR - there are a number of activities that companies need to focus on internally. It is common to encounter numerous pitfalls when preparing to operationally support new products and services in the market. Being aware of the pitfalls and knowing how to avoid them has a huge impact on the success or failure of a new launch. More...
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Mike
Gospe: "Customer Advisory Board: Frequently Asked Questions"
Many companies, both large and small, are considering or are already running customer or partner advisory boards. These sessions can be very effective tools to gain feedback on strategic priorities and company direction while solidifying relationships with top customers. Here are a few answers to some of the most commonly asked questions about these forums. More...
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Mike
Gospe: "The Truth about
Campaign Management: Recognizing a good integrated Marketing Campaign is easy,
but working the Process takes Practice"
The single, basic truth
about world-class campaign management is that it is easy to say, but hard to do.
It is hard to do because to do it properly requires following a disciplined, systematic
approach that becomes both a guide and a tool for helping a company make better
marketing and sales investment decisions in order to optimize its performance.
More...
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Gary
Katz: "Marketing Operations:
A Three-Phase Self-Assessment to Determine If Your Marketing Organization Is Ready
To Change Its M.O. Now"
Marketing Operations is an emerging discipline
with the potential to significantly increase performance and accountability in
complex marketing organizations. This article identifies those characteristics
that signal your organization's readiness for M.O. and answers these questions:
What does that organization look like? What are its primary pain points? What
is its vision for the future? What pressures are driving it to consider undergoing
substantial change? More...
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Mary Gospe: "Boost
Response Rates by 10 Times: Three Keys to successful one-to-one Marketing"
The
problems of one-to-one marketing are being solved by personalized marketing. It
used to be that these programs were plagued with logistical issues and high costs.
Recent advances in digital printing technology, combined with more efficient database
marketing systems and the Internet now make the delivery of personalized, relevant
and targeted communication easier and more cost-effective than ever. More...
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Gary Katz: "Marketing
Operations: Solving Marketing's Seven Deadly Sins"
Busy corporate
marketing groups can be so focused on tactics and fire fighting that they jeopardize
their marketing investment. Some leading companies have embraced Marketing Operations
to improve performance, measure ROI and run marketing with an operational focus.
This article discusses how Marketing Operations tackles the seven deadliest marketing
sins that plague companies of all sizes. More...
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Mike Gospe: "Expect
more out of meetings: Professional facilitators can keep your meetings focused
and productive"
Running a successful meeting yourself isn't always
as easy as it sounds, especially when you need to balance managing the meeting
while actively participating in it. Partnering with a professional facilitator
can help do both. More...
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Mike Gospe: "Do
you have a clear Picture of your Marketing Team's Performance? Conduct a Marketing
Assessment now to prepare for 2007"
Many businesses will soon begin
the process of planning their marketing programs and budgets for 2007. To help
chief marketing officers and their directors prepare for this exercise, it makes
sense to conduct an annual assessment of the marketing organization's strengths
and weaknesses before allocating dollars. More...
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Allan Linden: "Speed
up Marketing Initiatives with Digital Asset Management"
Your company's
digital assets (those electronic files holding print ads, brochures, photos, etc.)
represent a crucial component of its marketing success. But, are they scattered
about? Hard to find, and share? New technology, Digital Asset Management, enables
you to centralize and organize these electronic files for rapid retrieval and
usage, reducing costs, increasing efficiency, and making your business more competitive
than ever before. More...
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Al Morgan: "Is "Bell
Curve" Thinking Flattening Your Channel Performance?"
We've
all grown up with the "bell curve" as the standard for measuring performance.
During my 14 years at HP, performance evaluations were always "curved",
even though the vast majority of my peers were high performance, talented, and
trained individuals. More...
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Peter E. Cohan: "The Content-Free
Buzzword-Compliant Vocabulary List"
“Our powerful software
is flexible, intuitive, easy-to-use and integrates seamlessly with your other
tools. Robust and scalable, your organization can enjoy the benefits of our best-of-breed
world-class offering.” How many times have you read this in marketing materials
for software? Does it provide you with any real information – or is it simply
a string of meaningless buzzwords? More...
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Peter E. Cohan: "Death
by Corporate Overview"
We often hear the question, “How much
of our company’s corporate overview presentation should we include in meetings?” Good question. The answer: as little as possible! More...
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Mary Sullivan: "A
Blog is a Two-Way Street: Benefits of Business Blogs"
Suddenly,
business blogs are hot. Major publications are telling businesses, “Catch
up, or catch you later” (BusinessWeek, May 2, 2005). Why should businesses
use blogs when they’re already expending time, energy and budget on traditional
media and Web content? Must you have a blog just to show you’re forward-thinking
and cool? More...
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Mary Gospe: "The Scoop about SEO:
Seven Steps to Organic Search Engine Optimization"
Search Engine
Optimization (SEO) is a strategy to understand and leverage how search engines
like Google and Yahoo! rank results. The goal is for your website to be listed
at the top of relevant search results so prospects investigate your offerings
before those of your competitors. More...
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Mike Gospe: "Do you
know the "Voice" of your Customer?"
You can greatly improve
your chances of succeeding in today's marketplace if you focus your efforts on
addressing the business issues that face your key customers. Consequently, it
is more important than ever that you know "the voice of your customer"
and that you use this knowledge to create competitive solutions that deliver real
business value. More...
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Guy Smith: "Touching
Brands: Your Brand is only as strong as your Toilet Paper"
From
within the bowls of Starbucks, their branding guru had summarized the Starbucks
brand into an extremely concise brand statement: A great coffee experience. This
brand statement encompassed the Starbucks store design, bean selection, barista
personalities . . . even their toilet paper. More...
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Sridhar Ramanathan: "Sales
and Marketing -- A Sibling Rivalry or Business Partnership?"
Sometimes
sibling rivalry is a good thing. It can actually push kids to carve out their
identities more distinctly and to perform better. The same is true in the business
world. CEOs often encourage some healthy tension to push the organization to higher
levels of performance. More...
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Guy Smith: "Defeating
Commoditization of Technology Products"
My client's face was stuck
somewhere between horror, disbelief, and anger after I said "Over time, all
products become commodities, including yours." Then again, most people take
bad news poorly. More...
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Sridhar Ramanathan: "The
Bottom Line in Growing Top Line"
There's one immutable reality
in sales. Sales is a veritable "funnel." The more you put in, the more
you get out. Even a small improvement in some key ratios will make a direct, immediate
impact on sales. Let's look at three parameters in particular. More...
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Bette Daoust: "The Seven
Deadly Sins in Selling"
Sales organizations make the same classic
mistakes on a repetitive basis. The objective of this article is to provide you
with an opportunity to compare the behaviors of your sales force to the findings
of our experience. More...
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Sridhar Ramanathan: "The
Outsourcing Business - Is it Right for You?"
If you run a channel
business, you're probably asking yourself, "should we get into the outsourcing
business?" Gartner Group estimates that midsize business spending on IT management
services will exceed $15 billion by 2006. If you're responsible for top line growth,
you can't afford not to take a hard look. More...
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Sridhar Ramanathan: "POCs
- A Golden Opportunity for the Channel"
For every adversity there's
a seed of opportunity. At least that's how I see the current challenges in the
high technology sector. Keith Newman's article "Get your MoFo Rising"
struck a chord with me having just finished advising my client, a collaborative
services company, on how to exploit the trend towards Proof-of-Concept (POC) in
pre-sales. More...
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Mary
Gospe: "Building a Successful
B2B Sales Development Organization (Part 3)"
Once you have defined
your sales development operations and processes, it's time to begin hiring, training
and motivating your team. More...
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Mike Gospe: "Building
a Successful B2B Sales Development Organization (Part 2)"
How do
you equip your sales development group to perform like a team of Michael Jordans
and guarantee these results? In this article, we'll walk you through the "best
practice" process used by many large and small businesses today. More...
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Mary Gospe: "Building
a Successful B2B Sales Development Organization (Part 1)"
What
are companies doing to cost-effectively boost their sales pipeline? Learn how
to accelerate revenue generation, shorten the sales cycle and lower the cost of
sales through telephone-based prospecting. More...
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Dennis Fernandez: "Top-10
Most Common Intellectual Property Rights Mistakes During Venture Capital Due Diligence"
Learn
from the mistakes of others: why it's not too late to start filing patent applications
even after certain public or private disclosure of the invention; why you should
not underestimate the importance of trade secrets and confidentiality. More...
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Mike
Gospe: "Making the Pitch:
The Five Most Important Lessons of Presenting to VCs"
A good technology,
even coupled with a good CEO bio, is not sufficient for winning the financial
support that your company deserves. The fact of the matter is that the CEO's presentation
and skills as an orator are equally as important as the product or service he
is selling. More...
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Rob Elmore: "How to
conduct a customer-focused marketing audit"
For an enterprise systems
marketing executive leading a team, especially in a time of challenge or change,
it's often wise to conduct a comprehensive "marketing audit." This is
an analysis of what's working well in the current marketing and sales programs,
what's not, why, and what needs to change so you can better drive new customer
sales and revenue growth in the future. More...
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Rick Kaplowitz: "Seven
Ways To Work Effectively With Your Business Process Outsourcer"
Business
Process Outsourcing (BPO) means hiring an outside vendor to handle non-core but
essential business needs. This article details seven ways small to midsized companies
can get the benefits and avoid the pitfalls of outsourcing. Learn how to reduce
overhead costs while securing expertise that is often not available internally.
More …
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George Mattathil: "FCC
Ruling: An Opportunity for the Phone Companies"
The recent Federal
Communication Commission (FCC) ruling provides a rational basis for evolving the
telephone network infrastructure for future communication needs. The ruling has
retracted the earlier position that deregulation could be the engine for promoting
next generation network (NGN) capabilities. More...
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Diana Yoshikawa: "A New
Breed of Incubators"
Along with much of the U.S. economy, incubators
in Silicon Valley have recently experienced a dramatic downturn. The focus of
this article is to look at a different breed of incubators -- those who either
incubate international startups or are foreign owned. More...
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Derek Cheng: "Winning
Strategies for Email Marketing"
Email can be the smartest, most
effective junk mail on the planet. That's the good news. The bad news is that
like a piece of junk mail that might offer 0% financing or a 20% discount on air-duct
cleaning, email (especially if viewers perceive it as spam or scam) is often and
easily ignored. More...
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Keith Rayner: "Ensuring
Success for Your First International Expansion"
For smaller companies,
a first move abroad can seem enticing but daunting. This article encourages you
to explore and move ahead with your international options, points out three pitfalls
you might encounter, and gives you some comforting advice on how to avoid them.
More...
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Rob Elmore: "Avoid a "Trap"
in the Priorities of Product Management vs. Product Marketing"
Successful
high-tech firms at all stages -- startup, mid-stage, and established -- focus
continually on driving customer revenue growth through plans and actions for New
Business Development. As you take such actions, however, it pays to avoid a revenue-killing
"trap" that you can easily fall into: How you manage your Product Management priorities
internally vs. how you set your Product Marketing messages externally. More...
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Kim Ruby: "Connect with
Your Customers: Email Newsletters"
Permission-based email newsletters
are a powerful way to interact with your customers and increase quality traffic
to your site. A well-researched and well-designed opt-in email newsletter will
increase brand awareness and customer loyalty, and is highly cost-effective when
compared to traditional direct marketing. More...
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Mike
Gospe: "The Seven Critical Success
Factors for Launching & Driving a Successful Business"
Despite
the current economic winter, the entrepreneur spirit is alive and well. But for
every company that has deciphered the magic code to grow marketshare in a down
economy, dozens still struggle with the challenge. This paper highlights seven
critical factors that successful businesses have embraced. More...
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Pat McHenry Sullivan: "Ten
Secrets of Winning Business Plans"
As a business owner, you're
called to go where no business has gone before. Sometimes, like great adventure
heroes, you'll have to move ahead before you know where you're going. Still, there's
no substitute for a business plan. The best plans enhance your creativity, your
vision and values. Here are tips for creating a winning plan. More...
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Frank Cohen: "Finding
A Job in Silicon Valley Is Still a Possibility"
Every week at least
3 people come to me and ask if I know who is hiring. The recession is in full
swing and a lot of people are changing jobs. Finding a good Silicon Valley job
might have become a little more difficult but it is possible. Here are a few ideas.
More...
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Tony Wessling: "Invoking
Cliches Gets You Nowhere - But the Alternative Takes Guts"
Why
are companies allowing their brand image to be reduced to a monkeyshine? More
criminal yet, who in the marketing communications industry is promoting this sort
of meaningless bandwagonism to their clients? More...
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George Mattathil: "Internet
Vulnerability"
The recent (Oct 21, 02) Distributed Denial of Service
(DDoS) attack on all the 13 root domain Nameservers highlighted one of the vulnerabilities
of the Internet. What is the solution? This type network problem has been solved,
but not for the Internet. More...
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Barbara Angius Saxby: "Web
Services: A Floor Wax or Dessert Topping?"
This paper provides
an overview of Web Services and discusses the opportunities for software companies
by application sector. What is all of this hype about Web Services? What IS a
Web Service? Why is it important and who should care? More...
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Guy Smith: "Technology
Marketing in Tough Times"
We have gone from boom to bust, from
dot com to dot bomb. Many technology marketers know nothing except the roaring
90's, and now face mature markets, constrained customer budgets and technology
gluts. But recessions create opportunities if you understand how organizations
react to tough times and how to overcome their new resistance. More...
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Markus Hoevener: "You Get What You
Pay For"
Markus, an online marketing specialist, talks about search
engine services and that you can't get a personalized site promotion or search
engine optimization service for a few dollars. There are many services out there,
that promise "guaranteed top ten position" or "submission to 100,000
search engines and directories", but you get
what you pay for...
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Markus Hoevener: "Money
for Nothing"
This article reflects some experiences that we had
while launching the Goto-Silicon-Valley.com web site. Bye bye philanthropy? I
don't think so :) More...
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