The Secrets of a Waiting Room Jedi

It happens all the time. It’s happened to us, and it’s happened to you. More than once, guaranteed. It goes like this:

You’ve finally scheduled a meeting with that prospective client you’ve been after (or maybe a first meeting with a new client—where you’ll set the tone for your relationship).

And you’re ready.

You’ve done your research, both online and off. You’ve consulted with your analysts and your colleagues back at the shop. You’ve thought about what you can offer that your prospect might value. You’ve refined and rehearsed a short script or two. You’ve got your initial questions lined up. You’ve left yourself ample travel time to compensate for unexpected traffic. You’ve even used the facilities by the elevators, just in case.

You arrive at reception, you give your name, and you’re told by the employee behind the desk that unfortunately your meeting will be delayed because Ms. Bizzee is still on a previous call.

So far, not unusual. The question is, what do you do next?

If you’re like 99% of your competitors, you take a seat and do one or more of the following:

• Review your notes for the meeting
• Flip through a waiting room magazine
• Pull out your smart phone and check your emails
• Check your mobile contact manager
• Listen to your voice mails
• Check Facebook
• Make a call
• Complete your half-finished Sudoku puzzle
• Check your email again

Hey, you’ve got some time to kill. Why not kill it?

Really?

One of most important sales skills we address in our book Never Be Closing is art and science of discovering what’s useful to your client. In our experience, your potential usefulness is the most important thing you can communicate—and the thing that will most likely win you the sale.

But the concept of usefulness goes way beyond your conversation with your client. It’s threaded through everything you do in the sales process. In fact, we suggest asking the simple question, ‘Is this useful?’ about every aspect of your own sales or business behavior. If your answer is ‘no’, ‘maybe’, or ‘not sure’, we suggest you seriously consider deleting that behavior from your repertoire.

Behavior Testing

Let’s use this simple test on the list of behaviors above.

Reviewing your notes for the meeting could be useful, but if you’re not familiar enough with them by this point, another few minutes probably won’t do you much good.

Flipping through a two-month-old waiting room magazine is decidedly unuseful. The exception here might be the possibility of finding a relevant article in a recent industry or corporate publication.

Checking your emails, your contact manager, or your voice mails? Psychologists would call these conditioned responses to having time on your hands. But useful? Who are we kidding?

Checking Facebook? Ditto.

Making a phone call? Maybe, but chances are you’ll have to say a quick good-bye, so is it really worth it?

And re-checking all of the above is about as useful as finishing that Sudoku puzzle. In other words—not.

So if none of these behaviors are particularly useful, the next question becomes, what could you do that would be useful?

Seeing with Jedi Eyes

Your clients’ offices—including reception and common areas—are their habitats, filled with clues about the company, its culture, the people you’ll be meeting. Sure, you’ve done research online and with your colleagues, but where better to begin to truly understand the people you’ll meet than where they spend the majority of their working—and waking—lives?

Being in your clients’ territory affords you the best possible opportunity to get to know who you’ll be meeting. You’re exposed to information and resources that simply aren’t available in company reports or on the internet. That’s pretty special, considering all your competitors have access to that same internet information.

Once you appreciate the value of spending time in your clients’ space, you’re ready to practice the art of the Waiting Room Jedi.

The first thing a Jedi needs to understand is the power of the Force. And in business, the Force is Connection. Anything and everything you can do to increase the connection between you and your potential client is a step in the right direction—a step toward the sale.

Finding Hidden Connections

If you had a first appointment with an important potential client and a friendly leprechaun offered you the opportunity to meet someone who knew your prospect, and who might be able to give you some useful information about them, you’d be delighted, wouldn’t you?

Well, today’s your lucky day. Because have the opportunity to do just that—every time you arrive early for a client meeting and every time your client is late.

Introduce yourself to the receptionist. We mean really introduce yourself. There’s a good chance the receptionist knows your prospect. If they’ve been with the company a while, receptionists can be a great source of useful information. They know who comes and goes. They know the culture of the organization. They know if times are good or times are bad. They know if executives and managers are part of the team or if they ride above it. They know when it’s an up day or a down day. Furthermore, receptions are often invisible in the waiting room, treated as just another piece of furniture. If they’re not too busy, they may really appreciate a chance to talk. Imagine standing face to face with a resource like that and deciding to check your email instead of talking to them!

How do you probe for information from the receptionist? Just ask. Clearly, your chances of getting under the sheets are limited (nor do we suggest you try; you risk coming off as inappropriately nosey, and even sleazy), but you can open the tent.

Here’s a list of simple starter questions that most receptionists should be able (and often happy) to answer:

• How long has the company been at this location (or on this floor)? What was the reason for the move?
• How many people work here? What kinds of jobs do they do? This can often lead to great follow-up conversations. If the location has both engineering and marketing in it for example, you can observe that that’s an unusual combination. Any reason for that?
• What’s the biggest department or division in this location?
• Is everyone always this (relaxed, friendly, energized, busy) around here, or is something special going on today?
• What do you like best about working here?
• Are the principals usually around, or mostly on the road? Do you get to see or talk to them much?

These are the kinds of questions you can work into almost any conversation and which can provide you with useful ways to make connections later in your meeting.

Imagine in your meeting with your prospective client being able to say something like, “I understand you’ve only been in this location for 18 months and you’re already bursting at the seams. Sounds like things are going well. Must be challenging to manage that kind of growth.”

Searching for Other Threads

Aside from these general starter questions, there are clues to the personalities of the company and its employees literally littering the walls. The artwork, the trophy case, the plaque, the photo of the ribbon cutting, the mission statement, the free (or maybe not free) soda machine, even the building itself if it’s company owned. All of these are data about the founders, the principals, the charities, the activities, the culture of the office and the organization. Each is a conversation starter with the receptionist or others you may meet. And each is a thread of a possible connection to your client. The more threads you discover, the better your chances of weaving them together into the beginning of a relationship.

Curiosity Killed the Can’t

The skill of being a Waiting Room Jedi is to transform a series of waiting room habits—checking email, posting on Facebook, and flipping through magazines—into a deliberate process of exploration and discovery.

More than anything else, being a Waiting Room Jedi is about being curious. The more genuinely curious you are, the more you learn, and the more you learn, the more likely you’ll be able to make connections with your client.

The attitude and skill the Waiting Room Jedi is one of a series of interlocking steps that form what we call the Productive Selling process. It starts with knowing who you are and why you’re selling. Then moves into finding, making, and developing connections. The next step is earning the credibility required for your clients to feel comfortable answering the tough, probing questions you’ll need to ask so that you can understand their situation. Once you truly understand your clients’ issues, itches, and challenges, the next step is to demonstrate your usefulness. Once you’ve done that, you can start developing a productive business relationship.

And after all, isn’t that what the best selling is all about?

Microsoft Rushes to Fix Browser After Attacks; No Fix for XP Users

BOSTON — Microsoft Corp is rushing to fix a bug in its widely used Internet Explorer web browser after a computer security firm disclosed the flaw over the weekend, saying hackers have already exploited it in attacks on some U.S. companies.

PCs running Windows XP will not receive any updates fixing that bug when they are released, however, because Microsoft stopped supporting the 13-year-old operating system earlier this month. Security firms estimate that between 15 and 25 percent of the world's PCs still run Windows XP.

Microsoft disclosed on Saturday its plans to fix the bug in an advisory to its customers posted on its security website, which it said is present in Internet Explorer versions 6 to 11. Those versions dominate desktop browsing, accounting for 55 percent of the PC browser market, according to tech research firm NetMarketShare.

Cybersecurity software maker FireEye Inc said that a sophisticated group of hackers have been exploiting the bug in a campaign dubbed "Operation Clandestine Fox."

FireEye, whose Mandiant division helps companies respond to cyber attacks, declined to name specific victims or identify the group of hackers, saying that an investigation into the matter is still active.

"It's a campaign of targeted attacks seemingly against U.S.-based firms, currently tied to defense and financial sectors," FireEye spokesman Vitor De Souza said via email. "It's unclear what the motives of this attack group are, at this point. It appears to be broad-spectrum intel gathering."

He declined to elaborate, though he said one way to protect against them would be to switch to another browser.

Microsoft said in the advisory that the vulnerability could allow a hacker to take complete control of an affected system, then do things such as viewing changing, or deleting data, installing malicious programs, or creating accounts that would give hackers full user rights.

FireEye and Microsoft have not provided much information about the security flaw or the approach that hackers could use to figure out how to exploit it, said Aviv Raff, chief technology officer of cybersecurity firm Seculert.

Yet other groups of hackers are now racing to learn more about it so they can launch similar attacks before Microsoft prepares a security update, Raff said.

"Microsoft should move fast," he said. "This will snowball."

Still, he cautioned that Windows XP users will not benefit from that update since Microsoft has just halted support for that product.

The software maker said in a statement to Reuters that it advises Windows XP users to upgrade to one of two most recently versions of its operating system, Windows 7 or 8.

50 years of BASIC

BASIC creators John Kemeny and Thomas Kurtz.

The mainframe isn't the only technology hitting the ripe old age of 50 this year. On May 1st, the BASIC programming language, first developed by Dartmouth College Professors Thomas Kurtz and John Kemeny, celebrates 50 years.

At the time, computers were highly serial. You loaded punch cards and waited your turn to run the application. That was known as batch processing. As computers matured from vacuum tubes to silicon semiconductors, they became more powerful and gained the ability to run multiple programs at once.

Kemeny wanted a language that would allow people to write their own programs and execute at the same time. Kemeny and a programming student both ran a program at the same time written in Beginner's All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code, and both got their responses back. BASIC was born.

BASIC lived up to its name and was fairly straightforward, making it much easier to program than writing in assembler language or punch cards. It would start on minicomputers like the DEC PDP line. It would be released on the growing number of personal computers in the 1970s.

When the Altair 8800 came out, there were actually two BASIC compilers for it, both inspired by the minicomputer version of the language: Tiny BASIC, a simple version of the language, and Altair BASIC, written by a company called Micro-Soft. You may have heard of them.

Radio Shack's TRS-80, Apple Computer's Apple II, and Commodore's PET 2001 all came with BASIC built into the firmware, and IBM would release a BASIC interpreter for its Personal Computer as well. BASIC would eventually be overshadowed in significance with developers by C and later C++, but it remained a popular first language for many programmers to grasp the concepts of programming.

Microsoft would return to its roots, breathing new life into BASIC in 1991 with the release of Visual Basic, which helped developers write Windows-based BASIC apps that were actually compiled, not just interpreted. Thanks to the power of the VB compiler, it found favor as more than just a teaching tool, and commercial apps were soon being developed with VB. Granted, many if not most were freeware/shareware, but it was more than anyone expected out of BASIC.

BASIC is still alive and kicking. Wikipedia lists 33 different compilers, plus there is True BASIC, the direct successor to Dartmouth BASIC from a company co-owned by Kurtz. There are even a few in the iOS App Store. It doesn't look a thing like the AppleSoft BASIC I was learning 30 years ago, but that's why it survives; BASIC adapted and grew.

Dartmouth will be holding a series of events to mark the anniversary on the campus, but they will also be broadcast on the Internet.

How to Steal Ideas From Everybody You Meet

All creativity begins with the moment of conception.

That little piece of kindling that gets the fire going. That initial source of inspiration that takes on a life of its own. That single note from which the entire symphony grows. That single spark of life that signals an idea’s movement value, almost screaming to us, something wants to be built here.

And so, in this new blog series, I’m going to be deconstructing my favorite moments of conception from popular movies. Each post will contain a video clip from a different film, along with a series of lessons we can learn from the characters.

Today's clip comes from the Xerox scene of The Pirates of Silicon Valley:

So, what did they do right?

Good artists copy, great artists steal. According to the bestselling biography Steve Jobs, the Xerox agreement was sometimes described as one of the biggest heists in the chronicles of history. But the subtext is, it’s not because Jobs stumbled across some random fragment of an idea and casually incorporated it into his own strategy. He was ruthless, shameless and intentional. Apple knew whom they wanted to steal from, what they wanted to steal, and most importantly, how to persuade them to let them steal it. And, like any successful car thief, once they brought the stolen hotrod back to the garage, within twenty four hours, it had a new paint job, new rims, new tires, a convertible top and a better designed dice in the mirror. That’s not theft, that’s theater. Proving, that it doesn’t matter if you steal something, it only matters what you do with it once you’ve stolen it.

Ideas are free, only execution is priceless. Xerox’s technologies of the mouse, the graphic interface and the programming language were genius. But they were also ahead of their time. And because their team lacked the taste and design and finesse when it came to prototyping, presenting and the persuading their board of directions, they failed to realize their concepts. Steve, on the other hand, was five moves ahead. And as anyone in the startup world will tell you, he who ships first, wins. Ultimately”, with the help of his trademark reality distortion field, he convinced Xerox to open the kimono and share their new concepts in exchange for an equity investment. Who do you think got the short end of that digital stick? Jobs out executed the competition. He didn’t have an idea, he had an I did. To quote the Steve Jobsbiography once again, “The mark of an innovative company is not only that it comes up with new ideas first, but also that it knows how to leapfrog when it finds itself behind.”

Everything is prey. This scene perfectly points out the astonishing short sightedness and lack of imagination of top corporate executives. Steve knew the Xerox was sitting on a goldmine, and yet, he couldn’t believe they hadn’t yet commercialized their technology. And so, his philosophy was, if these dolts are so dense that they can’t realize the economic and cultural value of this software­­, that they, themselves, have developed, then they don’t deserve to have it. Xerox wasn’t worthy of their own innovation. And in the words of my favorite country song, “I could love you better than that, I know how to make you forget her, all I’m asking is for one little chance, baby I can love you better.” Jobs was right. It comes down to trying to expose yourself to the best things that humans have done, and then try to bring those things into what you’re doing.

Change your company culture and get onto the cloud

Now that cloud computing is the new normal, it's the company culture -- not technology -- holding back the cloud

Technology issues don't typically stop cloud implementations. More often than not, it's the people. Office politics, unrealistic expectations, and general stupidity are the common culprits that hinder cloud computing use at many enterprises.

The vocal opponents to cloud computing we heard in 2008 are mostly quiet in 2014. However, they are still lurking. Today, they use closed-door conversations to call the cloud into question, often for the wrong reasons. By doing so, they create a toxic culture around the use of cloud computing -- or any new technologies that may prove to be innovative and helpful but threaten the status quo.

[ From Amazon Web Services to Windows Azure, see how the elite 8 public clouds compare in the InfoWorld Test Center's review. | Stay up on the cloud with InfoWorld's Cloud Computing Report newsletter. ]

Today, cloud computing has real momentum. Projects are beginning to ramp up, despite opposition around the use of public cloud resources. However, if a business pushes cloud computing onto an IT culture that simply won't have it, the project becomes so difficult that it is likely to fail.

To change such toxic cultures, many CIOs have simply fired those who are impeding progress. But while you can certainly scare people into agreeing with you (at least publicly), doing so is counterproductive. You end up trading a culture problem for a morale problem. I would rather have the culture problem.

Changing hearts and minds around the use of any technology is a process that begins with engaging everyone in the evaluation and implementation of the technology. Create a small, ad-hoc team of cloud computing skeptics and task them with "getting to the truth" around the value of this technology, including working a small proof-of-concept cloud project -- for example, the implementation of a small storage system or another option that can be accomplished quickly with only a small amount of risk.

You'll likely see certain results. First, those given the power to evaluate cloud computing for the company are likely to take the task to heart and provide a sound evaluation of the technology, including both the pros and the cons. Second, they are likely to feel empowered, and therefore open their minds a bit around the use of new technology, namely cloud computing. Finally, you'll get some good data around the work that's done and can use that information to adjust your cloud plans.

If you're faced with a "no cloud, no way" culture, try this approach. Change takes time, and most people will eventually come around if given the chance. And never forget that their arguments might include some valid points. You need to acknowledge that.

5 of the Top Emerging Technology Trends of 2014

In a recent study, technology research firm Gartner identified a number of top technology trends emerging in 2014, with the potential to have a significant impact on enterprises over the next three years.

David Cearley, a vice president at the firm, said there is a “Nexus of Forces” made up of social, mobile, cloud and information technologies, which are converging and creating demand for “advanced programmable infrastructure that can execute at Web-scale.”

Here are 5 of the top trends Gartner identified:

Mobile Device Diversity and Management
The Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) phenomenon is a new reality in the workplace.
Business are in the middle of deciding how they want to address the expectations of their employees, and some business are pushing BYOD themselves, in a bid to save costs on hardware and software.
According to Gartner, one result of BYOD is “a doubling or even tripling of the size of the mobile workforce.”
Provisioning for all of these devices is a major undertaking, with the need to secure network access for employees, guests, and partners, even when they are using personal devices at 

work.

Mobile Apps and Applications
Gartner predicts improvements in JavaScript performance will push HTML5 and browser-based enterprise application development environments into the mainstream.
The firm recommends the development of richer voice and video as a key focus for developers, which can already be seen as WebRTC grows in prominence.
Gartner believes the number of mobile apps will grow—while the number of larger applications shrink–with apps becoming smaller and more targeted than more comprehensive applications.

The Internet of Everything
Along with smart TVs and field equipment, the “Internet of Things” is beginning to take off, with a staggering array of devices, appliances and vehicles just waiting to have their own IP addresses.
Garter lists four basic usage models created by the combination of data streams and services digitizing everything: “Manage, Monetize, Operate and Extend,” which are applicable to any of the four fields of the Internet: people, things, information and places.
The reports cautions that “most enterprises and technology vendors have yet to explore the possibilities of an expanded Internet and are not operationally or organizationally ready.”

Software-Defined Anything
This is another area that’s been very buzzy lately, usually focused on Software-Defined Networking, or SDN.
Gartner predicts Software-Defined Anything (SDx) will result in emerging standards bridging capabilities to benefit portfolios, while challenging individual technology suppliers to achieve true interoperability standards, as opposed to seeing increased siloing.
“Vendors who dominate a sector of the infrastructure may only reluctantly want to abide by standards that have the potential to lower margins and open broader competitive opportunities,” Gartner says, “even when the consumer will benefit by simplicity, cost reduction and consolidation efficiency.”

Smart Machines
You may want to call this “The Rise of the (Smart) Machines.”
Gartner forecasts that over the next two decades, there will be a “proliferation of contextually-aware, intelligent personal assistants, smart advisers (such as IBM Watson), advanced global industrial systems and public availability of early examples of autonomous vehicles.”
According to the firm, this will be the most disruptive in the history of IT.
Whatever the consequences of these titanic shifts in technology and how it’s used, you have to admit: These are interesting times.

Three Musts to Retaining Superstar Talent

In a previous post, I wrote about five toolsto look for when recruiting superstar talent. In this post, I'd like to share some key lessons learned over the years when it comes to retaining your top people.

As a general rule, it's important to note that by the time your best talent comes to you and says they're leaving, more often than not, it's too late. They've long since reached the conclusion it's time to go, having repeatedly seen or experienced examples of why they no longer want to be at the company. At that point, it's going to be extremely difficult to keep them.

One of the reasons it's so hard to change a person's mind once they've communicated their intention to leave is that they may not be willing to share the truth behind their rationale. At least in the case of the tech industry, it's a "small town," so people understandably want to leave doors open vs. burning bridges by speaking hard truths. Without knowing what's really motivating a person's decision to transition, it can be challenging to convince them otherwise.

Additionally, if losing the person to another company, you'll most likely be up against a grass-is-greener dynamic. Departing employees know what it's like at your company -- both the good and the bad -- but they are being wined and dined by hiring managers and recruiters who are telling them only the good, if not the great, about what it's going to be like to join a new team.

Lastly, sometimes the person can't quite put their finger on the reason they want to make a change. They just "know it's time" or have a gut feeling it's the right thing to do. Generally speaking, it's hard to counter an argument when one isn't being made.

All of this underlies one critical dynamic when retaining talent: Start the retention process when the person is still open to staying and not after they've already told you they're leaving. From time to time, you may be fortunate enough to walk someone back from the ledge (in certain cases, I've seen people retained even after they've accepted roles elsewhere), but this is the exception rather than the rule. If you are counting on your ability to persuade people to stay after they've already made the decision to leave, you should expect to lose far more talent than you save.

So how can you prevent this scenario to begin with? In my experience, there are three critical must-haves, all of which need to be in place well before the individual comes to you saying they are on their way out: Mentorship, career path, and recognition.

Mentorship

The primary role of a mentor in this case is to help the mentee determine what it is they ultimately want to do, and ensure they are well equipped to pursue that path. Why is this so important when it comes to retention? Because the clearer your talent is about their desired end goal, the earlier in the process you can work with them to make it a reality.

Bear in mind, simply because you are someone's boss, doesn't make you their mentor. To the contrary, by virtue of your role as manager, your employee may be hesitant to share their future plans (especially if it doesn't include you), or concerns about why working for you or your team is leaving them dissatisfied. Without knowing what's on their mind, it's going to prove prohibitively difficult to make the appropriate course corrections.

Rather than assume you are the right mentor for your directs, help them find the right mentor. That means leveraging your understanding of the individual -- their strengths, weaknesses, values, sensibilities -- and suggesting the best person to complement them. A mentor can come from within your organization or outside the company. Either way, they are there for your employee first, providing an impartial sounding board that can draw upon the mentor's own relevant experiences to assist the talent in making and pursuing the right career choices.

Career path

One of the most common questions I'm asked, especially among interns and new college grads, is, "What can I do to successfully achieve my career goals?" My reply is simple: Understand what it is you ultimately want to accomplish. As straightforward as this sounds, I can't tell you the number of times I've asked this question of people who have been working for five, 10, even 15 years, and still don't have any idea what the answer is. Oftentimes, this is due to the fact their careers have largely been opportunistic vs. goal driven. Swept up in a current of promotions, raises, and job offers from the latest hot new company, these individuals steadily work their way up the ranks in title and money, only to find themselves thoroughly unhappy in their current role years later.

Three ways to avoid this scenario are for any individual to:

1. Know what they want to do (optimizing for both skills and passion)
2. Surround themselves with the right people (e.g. see "Mentorship" above)
3. Always be learning

As a manager, one of the most valuable things you can do for your top talent is ensure you are asking the right questions, encouraging the right conversations, and doing everything within your power to help them realize these three dimensions on the way towards achieving their dream job.

Recognition

Every individual you work with, regardless of their position within the organization, not only wants to be recognized -- they need to be recognized. It's a fundamental part of human nature.

While compensation is an important part of the mix, recognition goes well beyond what a person earns. It can take the shape of a promotion, a shout-out at a staff meeting, a congratulatory email, or a pat on the back. The key is taking the time to understand what motivates the individual and expressing your appreciation whenever appropriate. The more personal and authentic, the better.

Don't make the mistake of taking your most talented people for granted and assuming they know how you feel. If that's the case, more often than not you'll end up telling them, but only after it's too late. Recognize a job well done consistently and you'll not only be more likely to retain your most valuable people, you'll motivate them to do their best work along the way.

What Makes Businesses Pinteresting?

In just over 12 months, Pinterest has gone from a social network of choice to an essential marketing tool for many brands. Its online bulletin boards can help humanize a brand and display personality.

With more than 1.36 million visitors every day, Pinterest also gives businesses a platform to tell a compelling story, driving traffic back to their website in the process. In fact, Pinterest has more referral traffic than LinkedIn, Google+ and YouTube combined.

For many brands, it’s the next step once they have established a digital presence
elsewhere, combining two of the most compelling elements of social media: visual content and sharing who you are.

Before you take the Pinterest plunge, here are some tips for building your brand’s presence:

Related Resources from B2C
» Free Webcast: The Success of Visual Brands: How to Measure the Value of Instagram

#1 Make a Business Page

Like Facebook, Pinterest has an optionto establish a business page, providing access to analytical tools that allow you to track the number of unique users, repins, , impressions and visits to your boards.

#2 Write a Good Description

You have only 200 characters to describe your business to the Pinterest world, but with such a visually driven site, that’s plenty. Google Analytics is a great place to start when writing your description; it will tell you what keywords drive people to your site.

#3 Use your Current Website Images (To Start)

Certain industries are more visually driven than others, and while it may seem like building a Pinterest presence will require significant effort that’s not always the case. To start, take an inventory of the photos on your website and post those that best personify your brand. Be sure to consider all of your audiences and look for images and content that speak to their needs.

#4 Follow Other Businesses

Follow other businesses to see what they are doing to generate content and traffic. Pinterest is a platform where many businesses share content not found elsewhere. In most cases, when you follow someone they will follow you back, building your Pinterest presence.

#5 Explore Rich Pins

This may be the most important tip for the Pinterest skeptics out there. Rich pins add more information to a pin, beyond just using a picture.

Pinterest has 5 types of topic-specific rich pins, which you can include various details related to the pin.

Article Pins – Headline, Author Story description and link

Product Pins – Real-time pricing, availability and where to buy

Recipe Pins – Ingredients, cooking times and serving information

Movie Pins – Ratings, cast members and reviews

Place Pins – Address, phone number and map

You must apply for, add information to and validate your Rich Pins before you can use them, but in the end it’s worth it! These Rich Pins give users and followers more information about the topics they are interested in (YOU!)

YouTube vs. Facebook: Only One Of These Still Has An Audience

We are closing in on the midway point of 2014 and it’s shaping up to be the year online 

video reaches its tipping point in capturing brand dollars.  A recent report showed for the first 

time, Internet ad revenues have passed broadcast TV revenues.  Brands now have to take into consideration that we’re living in a multiscreen world with people watching more and more content online.  But they also have to be fully aware engagement is key or viewers will bypass ads, similar to fast forwarding through every commercial on the DVR.

When it comes to large platforms for brands, Facebook is where brands used to look in the past, but this is 2014 not 2008. Facebook’s declining organic reach and insistence upon brands needing to pay to reach the audiences they’ve spent millions to acquire has left many brands frustrated. Meanwhile, YouTube, with its higher engagement metrics and earned media potential is in a prime position to capitalize and capture brand dollars.

A recent study this February found companies’ posts only reach around 6% of their fans organically on Facebook. This means if your Facebook page has 100,000 fans, only 6,000 of them are likely to see the post. The other 94,000 won’t know your post existed unless they go to your Facebook page and the chances of that happening are even slimmer. Facebook is hinting in the near future brands and companies should expect organic reach to be zero.

Some brands have stopped using Facebook altogether and are going to other platforms. Food site Eat24, which had over 70,000 likes, wrote a “breakup letter” saying they were deleting their page because Facebook is no longer a true social network.  This could be the first of many of brands jumping ship on Facebook and taking up real estate elsewhere.

Facebook says the reason for gradual decline in organic reach is because of increased competition for limited space in the newsfeed for brands. Content being produced is being created at a faster rate than people can consume it. An average of 4.75 billion pieces of content are being shared daily on Facebookand 58% of consumers have liked at least one brand page.

While one brand leaving the platform is hardly a diaspora, it’s likely brands will be looking elsewhere to engage with their fans and YouTube is the likely candidate. According to data I recently pulled across the top five brands on each platform, the engagement rate of YouTube compared to Facebook is 20 times greater (infographic below).

Highly engaged viewers drive sales and according to YouTube, four in ten shoppers visit a store in person or online as a direct result of watching a video.  In addition, 34% of apparel shoppers said they were more likely to make a purchase after viewing an online video.  So, while Facebook fans are becoming less engaged and seeing a steady decline of the youth demo, losing 25.3% over the last three years, YouTube is going in the opposite direction. As I mentioned in a previous post, YouTube has a massive young user base, with more US adults ages 18-34 than any cable network.

At a time when Facebook is alienating advertisers, YouTube is aggressively courting them. Three weeks ago YouTube launched an aggressive print, TV, and outdoor ad campaign, as well as its Google Preferred program, which provides upfront media packages to make itself more palatable to more traditional advertisers.

Brands such as Taco Bell, named marketer of the year for 2013, are generating significant sales and touting YouTube influencers as core to its digital strategy. Now others are likely to follow suit.

It’s not unlikely we’ll see more brands follow Eat24’s lead, opting out of investing in a platform in which engagement is continuing to decline. Meanwhile, YouTube’s aggressive moves to acquire advertisers and overwhelming engagement rates leaves the platform primed to welcome brands looking for alternatives.