Fresh ID » Process

Malcolm Baldrige Introduces Social Media criteria in 2012

freshid — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 15:16:50 +0000

The Malcolm Baldrige program is the “nation’s public-private partnership dedicated to process excellence.” The Malcolm Baldrige is a customer-focused change agent that defines criteria to influence continuous business improvement and award performance excellence. There is a cost to apply for the award, however organizations receive at least 300 hours of review by a minimum of eight business and quality experts. Site-visited organizations receive over 1,000 hours of in-depth review. Every applicant receives an extensive feedback report highlighting strengths and areas to improve. An article in the Journal for Quality and Participation said, “The Baldrige feedback report is arguably the best bargain in consulting in America.” There are six eligibility categories: manufacturing, service, small business, education, health care, and nonprofit. I can assure you the application process is extensive, hard, long and worth every penny spent on evaluating and assessing your business to make it better. According to the Malcolm Baldrige program, there are seven integrated criteria categories that drive performance excellence:

Leadership
Strategic Planning
Customer Focus
Information & Analysis
Human Resources
Processes/Operations Focus
Business Results

The social media criteria has been included in the Customer Focus category, however as is the nature of the Malcolm Baldrige formula, social media impacts all 7 categories. The new criteria is as follows:

How do you listen to customers to obtain actionable information?
How do your listening methods vary for different customers, customer groups or market segments?
How do you use social media and web-based technologies to listen to customers?
How do your listening methods vary across the customer life cycle?
How do you follow-up with customers on the quality of products, customer support and transactions to receive immediate and actionable feedback?

We are quite pleased to see the emphasis put on “listening.” Even better is the criteria asks not only how companies are listening but more importantly what they are doing with what they are hearing. In Baldrige circles this is called making the “full loop” which is where so many companies tend to fall …they capture data but fail to analyze the data on what it is telling them or fail to make changes accordingly. I shared with the audience that never before have companies had access to the real-time data they have today but having access is only the start. Establishing a strategy that drives the organization to analyze what their customers are saying AND do something about it can be the difference between killing the competition and fading away in to the sunset.

The Perspective on Pricing

freshid — Tue, 01 Nov 2011 23:17:10 +0000

I had the pleasure of writing this article for the special edition 2011-2012 “The Thinking Bigger – Guide for Entrepreneurs” publication that was placed on the news stands in October. We understand many of our blog readers are from outside the KC area so wanted to shared it here to help anyone who may be involved with setting product and service price points.

Focus on costs and goals to develop your pricing strategy.

Pricing a product or service is a tricky thing….too low and you’re not credible, too high and you may price yourself out of the opportunity of a lifetime. Mentors have helped me considerably over the years when it comes to setting the price list. I came from a world where prices were set by finance experts in the corporate world. Firm, fixed, margins, floor and ceilings were all words in my daily vocabulary but estimates, hours and time tracking were words rarely spoken. I knew if my small business was ever going to have a chance of making money then we would need serious help in determining profitable price points. I surround myself with smart people who ask me hard questions and expect me to spew out ROI, profit percentages and revenue targets in the blink of an eye. My mentors have also helped me establish a pricing strategy that supports our operations model, long-term goals and competitive advantage.

Start with Your Cost

First, you need to establish your cost baseline. Too many companies focus on revenue targets without much consideration for the expenses that are associated to achieving the revenue. Just because you bring in revenue doesn’t mean you are profitable. Focusing on expenses actually impacts profitability more than revenue. Look at the must-haves that your company needs to cover: salaries, contractors, rent, utilities, office expenses…basically all those items on the liability side of the balance sheet.

Go After Goals

Second, establish the goals. What are the six, 12 and 24-month needs, wants and desires? Do you want a $400K salary a year? What about your partners, executive team, employees? What is the kind of office you want to have? What products do you want to develop? What kind of branding do you want? What are the costs you will incur to achieve these goals?

Setting your Strategy

Third, understand the difference between the baseline and the goals. What money is required to cover your must-haves and achieve your goals? Now we get in to pricing strategy. Start with the going market rate and assume you would charge the same. Based on the revenues needed to cover your costs, how much of your product/service at the current market rate would you need to sell? For many business owners, this is where worries begin as they realize if they charge as low as their competitors, they’ll never come close to hitting their goals. Therefore, rarely should a small business price to its competitors or market rate. You need to clearly understand your differentiators, and price according to how you are better…create a new market if you will. This focus often times, helps a company target specific industries and/or markets to sell to and in some cases actually create new products/services. Seek out clients that can appreciate your differentiator and are willing to pay accordingly. If your company can’t identify a differentiator then pricing isn’t your problem, your product or service is. There are times that pricing itself is the differentiator, however, that is the exception not the rule. When you start to get in to the “I’ll price lower than you” game, that is the time you typically finds your business in trouble. It can be scary to ask for more money, and many business owners hate the idea of saying “no” to business of any kind. The sales conversation should e about your offer, what you can do to help the client make more money, save money and/or live a better life in someway. If you help the client see that your company is the best choice, then getting agreement on a price point is easy. Be who you are and learn to be better, Lisa

Steve Jobs takes medical leave of absence… now what?

freshid — Fri, 21 Jan 2011 20:51:22 +0000

It’s no longer breaking news that Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple, is taking a medical leave of absence. This is not the first time that Jobs has had to hand over day-to-day operations for medical reasons and, unfortunately, probably won’t be the last. As with any company, the strength, and in this case, health, of the companies leader plays a vital role in the publics perception of the companies financial strength and viability. This is clear by Apple’s stock slump following the announcement of Jobs’ leave of absence. However, Apple has been in the situation before and appears to have plans already in place to make sure that the public feels comfortable that Apple is in good hands. With this blog, we usually focus on new design trends, social media and experiencing life online. However, I decided to briefly depart from that general focus to discuss a more general business lesson that is vital to companies of all sizes: Train those beneath you to do YOUR job! At first glance, I understand that a lot of people would be fearful of this idea. Why would I train someone below me to do my job? Wouldn’t that make me expendable? You’re right. This is a legitimate concern. However, can your business afford to take a hit if, for some reason, you can’t perform your duties and neither can anyone else in the office? The answer is no. Jobs’ health concerns are a great example of this. Having been through this issue before, Jobs’ can take his leave of absence knowing that he is leaving Apple in good hands, COO Timothy Cook’s, who has taken this role before. Health is obviously not the only concern here. Do you ever take a day off? Wouldn’t it be nice if someone could continue your work while you are gone? Furthermore, as your business grows, there are going to be opportunities for those on the bottom rung of the ladder to take on additional responsibilities and roles. Wouldn’t it be great if, when those opportunities come along, those individuals already knew how to handle the additional responsibilities without additional training? I’ve been with Fresh ID for about a year now. One of the greatest things I’ve experienced so far is the transparency. From day one, those above me have kept me in the loop 100%. I’ve seen the business from end to end and have gotten to experience a lot of things that I didn’t expect to experience. Because of that transparency, there are a lot of situations where I feel comfortable stepping up and handling responsibilities that don’t necessarily fall under my job description. Below, I’ve listed some pieces of information and experiences that you want to make sure ALL of your employees know and are familiar with. These are things that I, as someone in training, would definitely want to know before I felt comfortable handling extra responsibilities.

Who are we?
What does our business do?
What are our goals?
What are our clients’ goals?
How does work move through our organization?
What type of conduct do we expect during meetings, phone calls, emails, etc.?
What is the process from receiving a lead to signing a client?

This is just a starter list. In my opinion, the best policy is transparency. The more transparent you are with your employees, the more comfortable they will be if they need to step in for you for some reason. Spend time with them and let them see you do your job. There is no better way to learn a skill than to watch someone who already knows what they are doing. You owe this to your employees and your business… but most importantly, to your clients. ~ Matt

How We Create a Social Media Campaign

freshid — Mon, 17 Jan 2011 05:23:01 +0000

We are often asked, “How do you go about creating a social media campaign? Where do you start, what do you do, how do you know if it is working?” We decided to share how we answer these questions with all of you to get your feedback on our approach and hear from you on what you may do differently. Hubspot recently recognized our John Deere/Chip Foose campaign as one of their 11 online marketing success stories so thought that would be a good one to use as our example project.

Campaign Backstory John Deere had selected Chip Foose, of the famous Discovery channel Overhaulin’ t.v. show to turn a legendary Big Buck 4020 tractor in to a one-of-a-kind hotrod. To help bolster their 1Q purchase incentive, John Deere decided to add a contest to the mix with the big winner taking home the tractor. Before we came on board, the advertising/PR team had already decided on an online multi-webisode video effort to show Chip Foose customizing the tractor over time, along with a variety of banner ads, traditional PR releases, and official website landing page to support the campaign. The campaign started in November 2009 with the contest winner scheduled to be announced in late summer 2010. The “new” Big Buck overhauled 4020 tractor would be unveiled at the Commodity Classic in Anaheim, CA in March 2010 and then would go on tour as part of the annual Drive Green tour through July 2010. The John Deere Drive Green tour showcases new equipment at various local dealerships throughout the country.

Begin with Corporate Strategy & Support What is your client trying to achieve? Do they have goals/key performance indicators defined? If not, you need to start with helping them identify these goals. In the case of the John Deere Big Buck 4020 campaign they had the following determined:

Maintain 1st quarter market share (in the years prior they had experienced a slip in 1st quarter market share)
200,000 contest entries (all entries had to be submitted through the local dealership)
Increase foot traffic to local dealerships

What resources/content are available? In our case we understood we would be working with an online partner, a 10-14 day release of 7 webisodes, pictures, limited access to in-house writers, support from PR, and would need to drive traffic to the main corporate website. What rules/policies are in place? At the time of hiring, John Deere was in the process of hiring a corporate social media agency of record so we were not able to utilize any social network profiles with the exception of a newly created you-tube account. We created a risk management plan that clearly defined what we could reply to online vs. when/how we would engage John Deere resources. We also defined our monitoring and response guidelines. Who are you working with? We partnered with the department PR agency and worked through them in our interactions with all corporate departments including PR, Marketing, and Advertising. It is important to know your decision makers and key influencer’s and communicate accordingly…and often. Develop Social Media Key Performance Indicators Now that you understand your corporate direction, goals, resources and policies you can begin to develop your social media plan. Our first step was to define our key indicators:

Number of mentions
Frequency of mentions
Audience reach
Multi-media views
Back-links

Social Media Plan Now that we had the goals in place we could develop our plan. Our plan incorporated the following:

Research, identify and engage with Top 50 influencer’s
An exclusive online media site
Online live unveiling
Community calendars

Influencer’s – We chose to target 50 influencer’s (bloggers, forums, communities) in a wave approach. Understanding that this would be a six month campaign, we elected a wave approach to build momentum, learn and adjust to what wasn’t working, and work with the always changing landscape of influencer’s. We engaged with a new set of 10-15 influencer’s approximately every 10-14 days. We chose influencer’s based on the following criteria:

Number of readers
Number of back-links
Number of blogs listed on blog roll
Number of groups linked to blog
Alternative forms of content (i.e. podcasts/video blogs)
Post schedule
Location
Sharing venues (i.e. facebook, twitter, friendfeed, etc)
Sentiment analysis
Number of readers in other venues
Access to writing for other venues (i.e. one of our blog writers was also a writer for a major online magazine)

Online Media Site – Early on we recognized the need to provide our influencer’s exclusive content that was not available to general public. In order to quickly adjust to corporate and blogger requests we also needed a way to update content fast. These two factors led us to developing a wordpress site. This site allowed us to offer content that was easily sharable, could quickly be updated and track back-links/rss feeds. Online Live Unveiling - There were many John Deere employees who were involved with the planning and execution of this campaign and were interested in seeing the unveiling. In addition, the webisodes had built a strong interest in seeing the tractor completed. In turn, we encouraged the corporate team to consider a live unveiling online. We utilized our Intefy platform and John Deere selected the Ustream Watershed video solution to stream the video live. This live video garnered thousands of views during and within days of the unveiling and was Agwired’s most watched video of 2010! Producing a live unveiling was the campaign highlight and resulted in a significant online response with mentions across the globe. Community Calendars – As we transitioned from the Big Buck 4020 creation to the Drive Green tour we also transitioned our engagement plan. We continued to support our Top 50 but also began leveraging local community sites to post Drive Green tour information. This tactic allowed us to promote the tour details in a multitude of sites without having to rely on others posting for us. The Drive Green tour experienced a 30%+ increase in foot traffic year over year…never underestimate the power of community sites! Monitor, Analyze and Report We learned quite a bit with this campaign but our biggest lesson was the need to report and communicate on a recurring basis. Don’t wait for the client to ask for an update…you should create a report schedule and stick to it. Even if the client seems busy with other priorities and/or doesn’t schedule recurring meetings, you should still send them ongoing reports. It is also important to be clear with definitions, explanations, and strategy/tactic reminders. You live this world everyday…your client doesn’t. Be prepared with the “so-what” and recommendations to improve results. Our monitoring tools included Scout Labs (now Lithium), good ol’ Google Alerts, and quite a bit of manual intervention. We tracked everything in a spreadsheet and summarized our reports in Excel charts and Powerpoint. We also shared our Google Analytics reports we used to track the blogger wordpress site. The more charts we could provide the better! We also discussed corporate goal tracking to understand relationship and to make sure we were on track with the ultimate objectives. At the End of the Day Company goals:

Maintain 1st Quarter market share; Result – Company experienced a 5 point market share increase
200,000 Contest Entries; Result – Company experienced 3X the goal: 600,000+ entries
Increase Drive Green/Dealership traffic; Result - Company experienced 30% increase

Social Media goals:

1.25 million audience; Result – 24 million+
125 mentions; Result – more than 1,100 mentions across the globe
5,000 media views; Result – 135,000 (not including JohnDeere.com media views)

It is hard to summarize a full campaign in one blog post so if you have questions or would like more information feel free to leave us a comment or use our contact form. We would love to hear from you! Be who you are and learn to be better, Lisa

How Social Media Has Changed Digital Design

Kristi — Mon, 31 May 2010 16:11:06 +0000

This is an amazing presentation, well-designed itself, about how social media adoption in mass numbers has changed the way we designers approach projects, solve problems and meet needs these days. Great line to remember: “Social media is bringing back humanity to all digital life. We are no longer users, consumers, shoppers. We are all people again.”

Information vs. Engagement: Are You Giving People What They Need?

Kristi — Sun, 24 Jan 2010 03:45:46 +0000

I don’t expect this to be an overly popular post – I have brought this conversation up several times – I even moderated the #sm42 chat about it, and it almost always results in a backlash of folks that claim all social media communication is about engagement, and I am wrong to think otherwise. But still… I think otherwise. I just can’t let go of the notion we can make social media work even more efficiently and effectively for all concerned. I’m not against engagement and talking to people. Obviously I talk to lots of people who talk to me on Twitter, and do my best to engage both new people I don’t know and people I consider friends. As well as prospects, clients and various companies and brands. I am a user advocate, after all, so I get it. Using Twitter, Facebook and various other social platforms to develop mutually beneficial or even just interesting relationships with others is not new. Using these platforms to solicit web traffic, sell a book, product or service or promote yourself as a celebrity or expert of some type is really becoming yesterday’s news, as well. People are jumping onto these platforms by droves to take advantage of the marketing opportunities, and to provide a listening ear or customer support also. There is definitely marketing value, in listening to people and acknowledging what they have to say about your company… it takes finesse sometimes, which savvy social media marketers and community managers have (or anyone tweeting for your company) in order to read the needs and then meet them, for the particular individual you’re dealing with. But I know there’s more we can do, with all the people, and the easy, instant access, and the short-burst communication and the open api’s and ability to integrate technology online, where it can be accessed from anywhere there’s a computer and internet connection. So much more. Some enterprising local companies are taking orders over Twitter and having food or drink ready for the person when they arrive. Delivery companies are finding ways to use Twitter. Cabs can be ordered and dispatched. Shipments can be tracked. I even had an interaction with a great company called Gourmet Library and they changed their site for me that night, to add a suggested feature. Now THIS, this is a beautiful way to use these unexpected (a few years ago) resources in ways that can benefit our bottom lines and improve our business processes. Still… people go on and on about engagement and almost can’t stand to have a conversation including social media that doesn’t put the total emphasis on that singular concept. I understand why – lots of companies and business people are on Twitter, but they don’t all do it like we wish they would. Some of them are stiff, not overly chatty or friendly. Some are defensive. Some of them have an account name and don’t even tweet or acknowledge things being said about them at all. Some users/customers/prospects DO choose another company based on the lack of interaction, by the way. Some send out automated, crappy sales solicitations and annoy you. Some just listen – you know they are – using all the real-time streaming as intelligence but they don’t deign to respond. Some intervene too much – maybe you want to vent about your hideous tasting sandwich from a fast food chain, but don’t want to be confronted about it in public. So all the advice and the opinions and feedback about how to develop these relationships online is definitely warranted. But is “engagement” the ONLY need that people have? I’ve been thinking about this a long, long time. I believe people/users/customers/buyers/employees have needs, and engaging with a company representative in order to meet the need is only one facet of a holistic plan to be implemented. For you, in your life, what’s the fastest way to go about getting a particular piece of company information? Say you want to know the hours and location of a company you plan to do business with later today. Do you…

Ask a friend/spouse/coworker if they know?
Look them up in a paper phonebook?
Look them up in Google or online?
Go to their site and hunt until you find the information on the site?
Call phone information and ask for their phone number so you can talk to someone on the phone?
Drive by the location to look at a sign on the door?
Search for them on Twitter or Facebook, to see if the company is there and you can ask or see the info?
Send an email to them to find out?
Ask an intern/spouse/assistant or some other person to find out?

Different people will take different approaches, based on how they learn and gather information, and where they are at the time. If I’m driving, I might ask someone else to look it up for me, or I might Google a search at a red light. If I’m on Twitter, I might pop the name into search and see if the company is there, and take the lazy route of asking someone and waiting for the answer. If I want to see the company’s site, I might visit and poke around and eventually get to the info. But I want to be able to do any of these things, and come up with the answer fast… because I have a lot to do and this is kind of like “white noise” in my day – until I get the info I need, I can’t ignore it and so it’s on the mental task list until I can check it off. Emarketer’s latest research offers reasons that people befriend or follow a company using social media. They say social media users are “interested in deeper engagement.” That seems to be somewhat true, but have we helped respondents identify what it is they TRULY need? Two of these categories are too vague (at least as represented in this simple chart.) Do they need a person from Whole Foods, Macy’s or Apple to address them? Or do they need a question answered, a complaint addressed, a suggestion for a feature or product acknowledged, some praise for an employee noted, a request considered, or some other, specific need answered, that may or may not involve “engaging?” What requires unique answers vs. what could be answered in a FAQ or inventory call? Inquiring about known product availability is different than asking if the company even has a product that meets a particular need, or a service offering. Asking for hours of operation is different than engaging in a conversation about the best person to contact within the company to discuss a potential business deal, or an inquiry about a unique problem with a newly purchased product. Asking a Human Resources representative on Twitter about the most appropriate clothing choices for a new hire, is different than asking if there are job openings. One requires human engagement, the other can be answered by a machine. We don’t refuse to automate business processes inside the enterprise, or factory, or kitchen… wherever they make sense and are affordable. So why do we act as if some automation of information via a social platform is a crime against humanity? As a user experience designer, I have seen that interactions inside a site or software system (or over a phone system) are also forms of engaging with your company and brand. The increasing popularity of making purchases online is a testament to this. You need to think of interactions and transactions as mechanical engaging, and you’ll see how important they are. People have good, bad and downright horrifying experiences, just like they do with your employees in person. An online experience with a site or ecommerce shopping cart can leave the same good or bad taste in your mouth, resulting in the same good or bad word of mouth sharing. If you have a crappy site, and are hoping your salespeople or customer support will make up for it (or vice versa), you won’t be fooling anyone, really. Customer care is a pervasive, underlying foundation or it’s not, and all aspects of your approach need to deliver on it. Social media is not a silo, your site is not a silo, your blog and community managers are not a silo, your managers, customer support handlers, marketing people, receptionists, retail floorwalkers, the lobby, restrooms and the parking lot are not independently going to carry the brand – it takes all of these pieces – human, tangible and intangible – working in tandem from the same value belief system, to satisfy prospects, buyers, partners and even former customers. So instead of looking at the world of social media and thinking “Oh my gosh, how can I even go there? Our staff doesn’t have enough time as it is!” I am suggesting that you step back and ask yourself, what do people in your business ecosystem really NEED?

What do prospects need?
What do people appropriate for our products/services need, that don’t know about us yet?
What do existing customers need?
What do people with a return or complaint need?
What do potential partners need?
What do employees need?
What do our salespeople need to close deals/do their job?
What do company managers need?
What do investors/stakeholders need?
What do people we owe money to/do business with need?

Then look at your people, business processes and existing technological systems, and pinpoint where you can start to meet these needs. If you can honestly always answer “deeper engagement” for the myriad needs you will come up with, I’d be highly surprised. We have got to separate true need of specific information (inventory question, process explanation, how to return something, what time a store closes, if something desired is in or out of stock, if a discount is available for bulk purchase, if sales or discounts exist) from ego gratification from need for positive acknowledgment (desire to contribute to brand growth or offer a suggestion) from need for issue acknowledgment (desire to be heard when customer has had a problem or complaint.) All of us that do marketing consultation and act as social media advisors need to be careful tossing around terms like “deeper engagement.” What does that mean, anyway? I have deep engagement with my closest friends and family – not so much with Freshbooks, though I sure think very highly of them and recommend them often (for example.) It makes people feel good when a company rep or major brand responds to them, but why? Is it because they are perceived as being busy/important/popular and the name-dropping in our direction impresses others (and maybe delights us. It can be fun when someone you admire responds.) But is our ego drive to be acknowledged an unacknowledged driver behind the call for engagement with brands and companies on Twitter? Or do people need access to information, that may sometimes includes a person and sometimes an automated FAQ or inventory tool? What makes interacting with Sally Smith (a random person – like any of us) any different than interacting with Mark Parker (the CEO of Nike)? Do we value a brief interaction with Mark Parker, who we don’t know, more than with a beloved friend who lends us a word of encouragement, or a mate who declares undying love in public for all the world to see, or a boss that gives us an ‘atta boy’ in front of our peers? If people aren’t accessing Twitter accounts for fast info now, is it because that type of interaction doesn’t much exist today, so there’s no precedent to believe they can do that? Or because they don’t want to? (The classic chicken and egg question.) I would much rather hit Twitter (where let’s face it, I am 75% of the time off and on) and ask a quick question and get the answer now (automatic response) or later (via a nice human) than dig through a company site full of information and FAQ’s or support questions. It might be the height of laziness for me, but it’s the art of providing convenience and engagement (even if automated!) for savvy businesses who have the foresight to see it now, because it WILL come eventually. Our processes for automating certain interactions are more clear inside the company than on these social platforms, I think. We haven’t built them yet, but we can and we should go further than the “social” in social media and include opportunities we have to meet and answer needs in a number of cool ways. Maybe it’s just me, but…

I would greatly prefer to order some of my food and beverages directly via Twitter and then go pick them up (like Coffeegroundz in Houston wisely initiated early on – I was longing for this just the other day from Moe’s in Shawnee, KS)
I’d love to be able to sit on my rump in Twitter and ask an Amazon account about a book someone mentioned, and have the link to it sent back to me, instead of going to the site and searching
If I have an Apple Mac issue (I have multiple Macs and an iPod), I want to be able to hit a knowledge base with my question from Twitter. It may work or may not, but it seems easier than going and digging up the info at their site. It’s just one more hook, but for me, mentally massively more convenient.
Someday I want to ask for hairdresser (lawn care, dry cleaner, nail salon, doctor, air conditioner repair, etc. recommendations and receive a nice link back to a list of known folks reviewed near me (or the city I will be going to.) I don’t want a special, local Kansas City site – I want to ask the world at large, from where I hang out (my site, Twitter, Facebook, etc.)
I’d like to be able to tweet a preferred appointment time to my nail lady, doctor’s office, chiropractor, etc. and get an answer back – an automated return of “Yes, that time’s available, would you like to schedule” or “No, I’m sorry, it’s not” is no less valuable coming from a software system than it is a human being. Either way, I get the appointment – engagement and customer care happens with the practitioner I am going to see and the people who take my money at the door, in addition to the software system they set up to meet my needs.
If my internet goes out, or the electricity, I want to tweet an account and get a status update back.
I want to ping my gym and find out what classes are being taught at 5:30 pm (because I realize that’s when I can go.) Or I want to know when Thom or Martha are teaching, or some other schedule related question.

Ask the question OUT, get the answer back IN is the future of cloud computing. Right now, I have to do a lot of work, despite how much more convenient things are now than they were 5 years ago. I have to know the places to go, or ask people and find out, and then go to the sites, and then do a search, and maybe they have or don’t the info I am looking for in THEIR particular database. If they don’t I have to start over. But these social platforms have opened a new door – they offer new horizons of people-powered comments, reviews, praise and complaints to work with. With links mentioned, people recommended or disputed, reports posted, analytics tracked – this is incredibly valuable to the humble person overworked, underpaid, and with the ambition to pack as much productivity into a day as they can. Forrester, who many companies rely on to separate the good from the bad data and information, has recently added a bucket of “conversationalists” to their social media persona ladder. But… I think this needs more work. I’ve added a couple of notes in green: This chart just doesn’t address people who are seeking information vs. the need to engage, in any of these areas. The RSS feed comment is mildly confusing – I assume they mean these collectors aggregate feeds into a feed reader or something, or maybe mix them, but not sure. “Inactives” may not appear to be doing anything, but we can’t know that – after all, they signed up for some reason… maybe they are self-educating or scouring for deals or seeking specific information. Why aren’t we building databases based on social queries? Is it because we are so focused on people, and people who need people (LOL!) that we are totally overlooking an entire segment of socialization? Once I asked @WholeFoods if they carried Nutella – someone answered and said no, it does not meet their ingredient quality list. That answer could be popped into a database for a future automated query, so the next time a Nutella addict wants to know it could be answered automatically. The supplements questions alone (if anything like the quantity we got in the store) could result in a big time-savings for the human staffers. Similar questions as an example: take Cost Plus World Market – do they have a location near me, do they carry Fat Tire Beer (at my location, or nearest?) Does LifeTime Fitness have a tennis center at a gym in Kansas City? (No, automated answer.) Will they ever have one? (Requires human answer with explanation.) Can I tell someone who will listen/respond at LifeTime, how much I wish they would bring Tennis to a KC gym? (Human answer with link to ideas site or direct forward to tennis program director, preferably on Twitter, or Facebook, or wherever I have initiated this conversation.) Do they have any recommendations for tennis in the Kansas City area then, given they are not meeting my need as an existing customer? (This is where the company could go the extra mile in their answer/recommendation, resulting in customer loyalty, user retention or positive WOM benefits.) I am not saying the people running branded accounts on Twitter aren’t doing a world of good for their companies, customers and brands. I have no idea why, but one day someone mentioned to me she had a big problem with a seatbelt in her Ford. Not knowing how I could help, but having a passing acquaintance with Scott Monty, Ford’s very socially present PR person, I forwarded her issue on to him. He got the right people involved apparently, and a few days later she told me Ford had contacted her and was resolving the problem. Now, while I was glad this was the case, I don’t know why her efforts to reach them on her own had failed. These are the kinds of customer care issues all companies have to examine and correct where they see failures. If there were only automated systems, this would not have been possible, and I am not recommending we replace the people spearheading social media efforts at the groundbreaking companies that are here now, with automated systems. In fact, to know how to deal with people who request things and ask questions of you on Twitter, you need to BE an active Twitter user, so don’t even think about planning automated services without being immersed in the social culture, or you will likely pay for it in negativity. I’m suggesting we (my company and others who think about technology and integration and business processes non-stop) help these Twittering employees and companies by coming up with new solutions. New ways of approaching the needs. New ways to scale and manage the requests. I hope that’s clear, if you read this far! I leave you with two things. Tonight I asked the question “If you have recently interacted with a brand/company on Twitter, what was the nature of your interaction? Question/comment/issue?” and I got a lot of neat answers and opinions, which I have starred as favorites. I recommend browsing these comments for insights. New friend @CariEllison gave me a link to a related article that’s interesting, so you might want to check it out also. Want to discuss this? Tell me I’m full of smack? Need help with an integration plan or process? Let’s talk about it. I’m curious to know what other folks think of the idea of mixing automation (for utility, aid and response, not marketing – huge, huge difference) with people on social platforms.

Web-based Project Management Tools

freshid — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 16:52:29 +0000

As a project manager, I am often asked to speak on business management tools. A wealth of web-based, simple, and valuable tools exist that can be used in any type of company size and industry. We use many of these applications in our day-to-day business to manage our projects, teams and ourselves. It is important to remember that a tool should help you facilitate your work… NOT add more work to your day. You need to understand your work flow and identify where you need help prior to application selection. Tools should:

help you create, build, and develop projects
lead, direct and advise your teams/sponsors/clients
assess, measure, and analyze your progress
and most important, be simple to use

Project Management Tools

Basecamp – We use this tool to manage our virtual workforce teams and to easily communicate with our clients. We are able to set milestones, assign to-do tasks according to milestones, upload files, and communicate through the forums.You can build templates and customize the tool to match your brand. This tool eliminates our dependency on email and allows 24X7 access to project status.

Smartsheet – This tool was recommended by a colleague. For you spreadsheet lovers out there this tool may be the one for you. In addition to basic project management capabilities, you can produce summary reports and access the tool from your phone through their mobile application. A very interesting aspect to Smartsheet is their on-demand workforce. If you need resources to help with simple tasks (primarily research oriented tasks) they have a virtual workforce to help you (for an hourly rate of course). @Task – This is an enterprise level tool and can be integrated with a variety of applications such as Oracle, Peoplesoft and Salesforce.com. This tool has very impressive reporting capabilities that can support the most detailed of managers and the highest level of executives. If you have large and complex programs this tool may be the one for you. Ning – A lot of people use Ning for communities, but we’ve been experimenting with it for free project management. It’s not quite as robust as Basecamp, but has some similarities, including the ability to create permission-based groups and invite different people to join them. It’s working pretty well, and it’s customized with our brand, which we consider a big benefit.

Administrative Tools

Echosign – I have to say this is my favorite tool lately. Echosign allows you to improve your sales contract cycle time from weeks to hours by allowing online signatures that are in compliance with the ESIGN act making the online signature as powerful as a hand-written one. Red-lining is supported as well as multiple signatures/initials throughout the document. The client/contractor you are requesting to sign does not need to have signed-up for the application and can provide their signature in a matter of seconds. We have had 15 contracts signed in the last month and have yet had anyone experience any issues or confusion… in fact a few of our clients are now using this tool for their business and every time Kristi tweets it out, a lot of people seem thrilled to learn about it. We’ve set up their tweet bot that announces when we signed something or someone has signed a contract with us to help spread the word. Freshbooks – Contractors love this tool so we love it too! Freshbooks make invoicing super easy and helps you keep track of what is paid vs. outstanding. Reporting is included and the open API supports integration with Quickbooks and Basecamp. If you are looking to improve your billing cycle time then we suggest you take a look at Freshbooks. You might recognize one of the testimonials on the home page. Outright- is a companion management tool that we use with Freshbooks to track and manage business expenses. Very helpful for tax-time and reports.

Team Management Tools

Dropbox – A backup server that finally doesn’t require you to load the document twice. This application synchronizes with your hard drive automatically! You get 2G of storage free and automatic notification when any file is loaded or changed. A tool that helps you with your current workload, doesn’t require extra work and is so easy grandma can use it. Backpack – Also by 37Signals, Backpack is great for capturing thoughts from brainstorming sessions, creating task lists and keeping track of things to do, and share notes, calendars, files and lists among your team. It’s intuitive and easy to use, and for people who don’t need the full-blown project management of Basecamp, might be a better choice.

Self Management Tools

Skype – Yes, many of us online types have been using Skype for awhile but for those new to the “geek” scene this tool is a nice surprise. This VoIP application allows unlimited free domestic calling, video calling and instant messaging with other Skype users. You can also quickly upload files and send resource links during conference calls. The tool integrates with a multitude of address books and allows calls internationally and to non-Skype users for a premium charge. Remember the Milk – Built with the “Getting Things Done” philosophy this is a great tool to manage all aspects of your life …personal, school and work. They have a variety of mobile app’s to support an on-the-go lifestyle and include map integration that can track where you are to notify you when you are in the vicinity of getting a to-do done. I personally like the tag cloud capability to help me see where my time is being spent and to highlight where I can get two birds with one stone. Google – The mother of all tools. In addition to gmail, calendar, and google docs we also use google groups, google voice and google reader to help simplify our daily responsibilities. Yes, you do sometimes have a glitch here and there but the flexibility, accessibility and simplicity outweigh any of the bumps you may experience from time to time. What makes us the most excited?? Google Wave came out September 30th and a lot of folks seem to be loving it. These really only skim the surface of the cloud-based apps we use everyday… Delicious for bookmarks, Evernote for capturing disparate types of info around the web, Twitterface for monitoring twitter keywords, analyics apps, plus our smartphones which let us access many of these apps while mobile are like an engine powering Fresh ID to run. We are always looking for new and improved ways to operate our business so if you have a killer tool that we didn’t mention here please leave us a comment and let us know about it! Cheers! Lisa

Is Your Agile Software Process Handcuffing the User Experience Design?

Kristi — Sun, 15 Feb 2009 19:15:01 +0000

I’m running across a new problem with a number of clients and wondering if my user experience colleagues are having similar issues. The advent of web applications has resulted in a change for many software providers in the way they release software today. Agile software development is a method in which software is designed, examined and delivered to the market swiftly, so that end-users can provide feedback and more feature changes can be made and adjusted within a few months time, rather than once or twice a year. For off-the-shelf software, such as Adobe, Apple or Microsoft products, this is not as practical a method as it is for web-based services. I’m not sure if large corporations have employed any Agile methodologies or not. The Wikipedia entry describes my issue perfectly:

Agile chooses to do things in small increments with minimal planning, rather than long-term planning. Iterations are short time frames (known as ‘timeboxes’) which typically last from one to four weeks.

So here’s the problem: I am often called in to redesign an existing product, that was designed primarily by developers and managers, and not by an interface or interaction designer, or with consultation by a user experience design specialist who could point out workflow and related product issues, as well as design a product brand identity. And that’s great – this is one of my favorite things to do. Redesigning a product is sometimes easier for me than designing one from scratch, because I can see the technology working – it’s like a live prototype to play with. To take an unpolished, but great idea, and make it even better for the users it was built for, is a lot of fun for me. Historically, I come in, look at a product, talk about the business and marketing goals, and craft a “big picture” plan for the product line identity, interface design, workflow, help systems, etc. and then the big picture gets broken down into phases and tasks. But look at the Agile description again: minimal planning, small changes, releases every 1-2 months. That allows for feature by feature adjustments, not a total redesign of the workflow, layout, navigation systems, etc. What’s a user experience designer with a great idea of how to make this product in front of her better, to do now? I don’t have an answer to this yet. I think when it comes to restructuring the workflow of a product to make it significantly better, executives need to understand there is a time for Agile, and a time to redesign, and redesign efforts take more in the range of 2-6 months to complete, in my experience. It all depends on how much is “surface” redesign, such as moving things around on the pages and creating a nicer look and feel vs. how much the deeper code has to be modified because features need to work completely differently than the developers designed them. As is our habit in the software industry, we tend to look inward and not outward when creating processes that are supposed to make our business run better. Do we need the internal motivation of a release every 4-6 weeks to make things happen? Customers don’t necessarily demand a release once a month, they just need bugs fixed and problematic features redesigned so they can perform their tasks better. Can we design an Agile process that is flexible enough to allow for large-scale design changes when they’re needed? Why do we have to release something once a month? How are you handling this issue, user experience designers? I’d love to hear your advice and stories on how to combine Agile with big picture design or redesign approaches. A List Apart offers a wonderful article on Agile Design (below) but doesn’t really answer the “how” to make it work that I am struggling with. Is persuading executives to give me the time I need with developers to make the software better, the only answer? More Agile & User-Centered Design Thoughts…

The Agile Manifesto
Getting Real About Agile Design by Cennydd Bowles
Human-Centered Design Meets Agile (presentation)
Agile User-Centered Design (discussion thread)
Are Agile Projects Doomed to Half-Baked Design? (presentation)
Agile Development Process & User Experience Design (interview with Charlie Kreitzberg) ”Certainly the developer’s view of a software product is very different from the experience of end users. As a result developers may not see some user experience issues as important. And Ux is concerned with engagement and relationships.”
User Experience Design vs. Agile Development (presentation)
12 Emerging Best Practices for Adding UX Work to Agile by Jeff Patton

Design & Code Right, Man

Kristi — Sun, 25 May 2008 20:26:38 +0000

I cannot possibly explain how to design a site right any better than this catchy rap by Mo Serious, aka The SEO Rapper. He’s serious!!! Phat!

if you trying to grow your company will get bigger
design and code right, man can you get with it