Over the last ten years I have talked to hundreds of CEOs of small and medium-sized businesses about what works and what doesn’t in building a repeatable lead stream for their business and a marketing engine that delivers measurable business results.  I started to keep track of what CEOs were telling me and devised a list of the attributes of marketing programs that succeed.  My last post addressed why a website is so important to the future of your business. Today we address how redoing your website can challenge your business model.

We are currently in the process of launching new online strategies for three companies that sell business solutions to other businesses. Their current websites are typical brochure-ware, meaning there is lots of detail about what the company does, but very little detail with respect to why it matters to the business processes of their customers. 

We have worked through their respective value propositions and mapped the buying process of their customers. We have designed the home page to reflect the buying process and carefully placed the value proposition in the main eye-tracking area of the site as we do using landing page optimization techniques. I have detailed elements of this process in previous blog posts. But a curious thing has happened. While we were taking care of all of the technical aspects of a website, we discovered that:

• Creating a website forces business owners to re-evaluate their business models.

In this post and ones in the coming weeks, we are going use these three companies as examples of how business models can change as result of redoing websites and creating online business strategies.

As these three companies sat down to write copy from the perspective of their customers and how their customers buy their products and services, they have come to realize that what they are selling has little differentiation in the marketplace, is highly commoditized in the industry and the actual product is not something someone is searching for in a search engine. Therefore, people searching will never find them and if they do, they won’t understand what they would be buying.

In other words, their business models no longer work in this new era of search. Bolting online tactics to an old model is no longer enough.
If this sounds familiar, read on:

1. Your company sells complex solutions versus “off the shelf”.
2. You don’t sell your products online using an eCommerce engine.
3. You have been in business for 10+ years and have a well established client base.
4. You recognize the value and impact a good website and web presence has on your business.

Don’t read on if you still believe...

“But my customers don’t go on the web to make purchasing decisions.”

Oh, but they do and this is why paying close attention to your web presence forces you to evaluate your business model. (See my last post on the way people are buying anything today and the 11.2 pieces of data they are using to make their decisions). In a world of infinite customer choice and the ability to learn about anything using a search engine, the way you position your company and communicate about it lets you break away from what everyone else in your sector is doing and changes what you sell and how you sell it.

When you start to build a new website for your business, you will likely be faced with these types of questions and challenges:

1. How to do I present the context of what I do and why it matters without jumping to features and functions and product details?
2. How would I navigate a potential buyer through the story?
3. What are prospective customers seeking that would get them to my site in the first place?
4. What are they going to find when they get there that sets my company apart?

Answers to these questions impact your business model.  Take a look at these examples:

Example A: Sells training courses. If you are a big company, you hire them to help train your managers. But this is a cluttered, highly commoditized space.  Now the way they discuss, package and sell their product has to change. Just taking course listings and dumping it on the website, isn’t going to tell the right story. How they tie together courses to create leadership solutions changes the story and the model.

Example B: Sells point of sale systems for retailers. Again, this is a highly commoditized industry ranging from selling cash registers to highly sophisticated systems that track what, how, when and where a customer buys in a retail outlet. If you do a search on “POS Systems”, an infinite number of search results are returned. For this client, just listing a series of products on the website is no longer an option. They are really in the business of selling retail intelligence and their site and sales process needs to reflect this change in the actual value of their solutions on their website and keyword strategy.

Example C: Sells audio visual equipment, another competitive space full of people who sell and set up equipment. This client needs to use their website to sell the vision of what a company is trying to achieve when they buy audio visual equipment - a collaborative ecosystem for their employees. This means their business model changes. It’s no longer just about recommending equipment and setting it up. It needs to be about selling the value of achieving business goals and outcomes.

Stay tuned as we follow their journey from concept to real website and how it transforms their business.

Marie Wiese is founder of Marketing CoPilot, www.marketingcopilot.com and the author of the eBook, “Why marketing fails... and what you can do about it!” Marketing CoPilot provides outsourced marketing services to business owners that want to create a two-way dialogue with past, current and future customers. Marie is a 20 year veteran of the B2B marketing world, past Chair of the York Technology Alliance in the greater Toronto region and a workshop leader at Regional Innovation Centres (RICs) in Ontario where she teaches early stage companies how to build online lead generation engines that deliver measurable business results.

Transamerica Life Canada COO Scott Sinclair says only one competitor keeps him up at night: Google Inc., whom he fears could remake the Canadian life insurance industry in its electronic image.

“I believe Google will dominate the insurance industry within the next 10 years if we can’t make the transition to a paperless industry,” Sinclair told around 50 financial services industry executives at a TELUS conference on electronic contracts and digital signature technology in Toronto last week.

It’s plain as the nose on Sinclair’s face that the culprit is a 24-page paper life insurance application, and another 100 support forms, that life insurers use to underwrite new policies written up by independent advisors/brokers.

“Google has a better solution, a paperless solution, an integrated solution and they understand their customer,” he told the crowd who gathered to hear a panel of experts from Transamerica Life Canada, HUB International Ontario, Foresters, Recombo and Blake, Cassels & Graydon discuss how financial and insurance organizations can replace paper-based processes with paperless ones to enhance the customer experience while meeting legal, compliance, operational and efficiency requirements.

Sinclair believes chasing sales rather than paperwork is a better use of an advisor’s talents. So Transamerica, a Toronto-based company that markets insurance and investment funds, is saving time and money by accelerating how it underwrites new life insurance policies. It’s doing that by eliminating faxing, scanning and shipping paper documents to/from its advisor/brokers.

Photo: Transamerica Life Canada COO Scott Sinclair

Introducing Electronic Contracts

Transamerica is using an electronic application process that Sinclair is betting will help the life insurance industry win in the emerging digital economy.

How? The e-application aims to shorten sales cycles for insurance advisors so they can close more deals, while underwriters aim to dramatically reduce error and customer abandonment rates, and cut overall operating costs.

Sinclair says the average life insurance turnaround time currently for new client applications is 36 days.

That’s far too long to deliver on a product people would rather not have in the first place: life insurance that pays out to beneficiaries when they die.

With so-called e-applications, or electronically secure contract technology,

Transamerica has got that turnaround time down to four days.

And that’s still too long, Sinclair says.

“Leveraging technology, we’ll reduce the cycle time to two hours and will not use a single piece of cutting-edge technology,” he says, meaning they’re achieveing dramatic productivity gains with available internet-based digital technology, not rocket science technology.

Financial Services See E-App Benefits

It’s not just insurers that benefit from electronic application software.

Going paperless with secure electronic contracts can dramatically change the shape or direction of banks, real estate leasers or any financial services company that prepares and processes contractual paperwork and fears the transformation of Google into a competitor.

For example, a merchant wants to process transactions with Visa, MasterCard and other credit cards using a portable terminal.

So a salesperson asks the merchant to make their way through a swath of paperwork, which is then faxed to the technology provider. Then there¹s data entry, correcting application errors, adjudication and signing off on the application.

Think about it. Time is money here.

The sooner the merchant receives the credit card terminal and can process transactions, the sooner customers with plastic start paying for goods, and the salesperson gets their commission.

The bottom line is paperwork slows down money transfers, the foundation of sales.

E-Banking Goes Paperless

There’s an e-application benefit for banks as well.

You’re renewing your mortgage, and an advisor keys personal data into a computer. And just when you think you’re done, three application copies are printed out. You then sign two copies to be shipped to a service center for processing.

You’re a long way from completing the paperwork and getting an answer back from the bank.

Why? The mortgage application must be checked for errors. Additional supporting forms may be required. The bank may need to contact the applicant for missing information and expect them to print, sign, fax or mail the document back to the processing centre.

Not only is precious time lost here, so too are customers.

Mike Gardner, CEO of Recombo, a Vancouver-based secure contract software provider, says a paperless business drastically reduces error rates, and that improves customer abandonment rates.

The average not-in-good-order (NIGO) rate for paper documents is 40%, he says.

“That means 40% of the time I¹m going back to doing it again. The customer says ‘You’re a fool. Is this how difficult it is to do business with you?’” Gardner adds.

And considering customer abandonment rates are roughly half of an NIGO rate, if you have a 40% error rate, as many as 20% of your prospects may well go elsewhere to buy product.

Photo: David Ebert of Springhouse Investments, Mike Gardner, CEO, Recombo

Why Do Companies Still Use Paper?

All this is obvious. Businesses in a fast-changing digital age have to adapt or die.

But if going paperless saves time and money, why aren’t more companies tossing their printers, faxes, scanners and waste paper baskets? The reality is going paperless calls for far more than introducing a new digital infrastructure.

It calls for a cultural shift. It calls for a company mission, for goals.

And ultimately, it calls for customer acceptance and use of new technology from customers and field sales, to inside sales and head office operations.

“Adoption is absolutely everything in our space. You can create some spectacular technology, but the adoption of the technology is where all the challenges come in,” Recombo’s Gardner says.

Deborah Swail, vice president of business transformation and governance at Foresters, another Canadian life insurance provider, says a better strategy for technology adoption than mandating its use is demonstrating its benefits.

“If you can take advisors from 36 days to getting an answer to them in a day or two, you¹re really speaking their language,” Swail told the TELUS event panel about shortening sales cycles for insurance advisors.

So don’t be fooled by thinking electronic processing is about pleasing head office. Acceptance about going paperless is about addressing issues that concern customers.

After all, customers use digital technology in their own way. And whether that customer is a mutual fund advisor, a mortgage broker or a property rental agent, they’re more likely to go paperless when it seamlessly improves their ability to close sales and boost earnings.

HUB International automated its insurance application process using TELUS’ Secure Contracts technology in part to help its agents reduce unreturned applications because a potential customer typically chose not to scan or fax paperwork to close business.

“From a broker perspective, it’s more the customer experience, that’s the reason for moving forward with this product,” says Sharlene Locke, president of personal insurance practice at HUB International Ontario, an insurance broker.

“Not only did we get some great results in terms of increased revenue and reduced abandonment, it was a great way to organize our producers,” Locke added.

Sales people constantly grumble about paperwork, which keeps them away from the business of boosting sales with faster closing of business.

“This is a great tool for sales people to organize themselves and create an audit trail to figure out where a document is and that shortens the sales process,” Locke said.

Tomorrow:  A place to start if you’re new to paperless, and a legal perspective on electronic signatures from Blake Cassels & Graydon.

Etan Vlessing is a Toronto-based business reporter.

Watch this space for more news and information about going paperless at enterprise companies in the weeks ahead. If you’re thinking about starting or expanding a paperless or green initiative at your company and want more information, contact oren.friedman@telus.com

If you're a BlackBerry owner then you're well aware of the major blackout that took place a couple of weeks back, causing disruptions around the world for about three days in total.

Perhaps you've heard the news Research in Motion (RIM), as compensation for those inconvenienced by the outage, has offered $100 worth of premium apps for free, which can be downloaded until the end of the year.

Here's the current list of apps, with more to be added soon, says RIM:

• The Sims 3 - Electronic Arts
• Bejeweled - Electronic Arts
• N.O.V.A. - Gameloft
• Texas Hold’em Poker 2 - Gameloft
• Bubble Bash 2 - Gameloft
• Photo Editor Ultimate - Ice Cold Apps
• DriveSafe.ly Pro - iSpeech.org
• iSpeech Translator Pro - iSpeech.org
• Drive Safe.ly Enterprise - iSpeech.org
• Nobex Radio™ Premium - Nobex
• Shazam Encore - Shazam
• Vlingo Plus: Virtual Assistant - Vlingo

OK, so it's not like games can't help you blow off some steam after a tough day at the office or to keep yourself entertained during a boring conference call (oh, don’t pretend you haven’t done it), but some of the voice-enhanced, productivity-focused apps offered for free might be more appealing to those in business.

Here's a look at three:

• Suffer through a long commute to and from work each day? Now you can turn that down time into a more productive one, safely, with a new app that can read your emails and text messages to you. iSpeech.Org's DriveSafe.ly Pro transcribes your inbox into words, which you'll hear through the smartphone's speakers, via earphones or a Bluetooth headset. If you like, the sender also gets an automated reply to confirm the message has been received (and that you'll reply when you can). This pro version gives you the first 500 words of a message, and other advantages over the free version.

• While many people are buzzing about Siri for iPhone 4S, many of the same features can be found in Vlingo Plus: Virtual Assistant for BlackBerry. Speak into your smartphone – such as "Text John; We on for 1pm today?" or "Find Japanese restaurants" -- and these actions will be performed via your voice instead of thumbs. Along with texting and web searches, you can email, update Facebook and Twitter, make a call or find info, such as the Euro/Canadian dollar exchange rate at that moment. With its SafeReader feature, Vlingo Plus can also read your incoming text and email messages aloud.

• Also from iSpeech.Org is iSpeech Translator. This app lets you speak or type any words or phrases and it will be translated on the BlackBerry in seconds. Ideal for world travelers, the app uses both human-like text to speech and speech recognition technology to translate 7 languages or listen to your text translations read aloud in 18 languages. After typing or speaking the phrase, the translation will appear in the text box, which you can then copy, if desired, into an email, text chat, Facebook update, and so on. Supported languages include Catalan, Danish, Dutch, English, Finnish, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Simplified Chinese, Spanish, Swedish and Traditional Chinese.

Talking Business readers, do you think RIM was right to offer up premium apps for free or should they do more to compensate customers? Or have people overreacted about being without service for one day (in Canada)?

Gridly is a hosted, web-based solution that makes it easy to produce and manage professional, consistently branded, print-ready documents like advertisements, product sheets and posters, with nothing more than a web browser.

Gridly was voted the “A100 One to Watch” at the Startup Calgary Launch Party last year. I spoke with cofounder Dan Meeking about the state of tech startups in Calgary, his goals for the upcoming year, and the biggest branding challenges faced by businesses.

The key to a profitable SaaS business is the ability to meet the needs of customers as a group. How do you address customer feedback and what does it take to implement changes based on this feedback?

I take every opportunity I can to talk to my customers. I want to hear what they have to say first hand, every single day. There is no other way to really know what your customers think about your product.

When it comes to implementing changes based on feedback, we make few. If we implemented every feature that people asked for, we would spend every dime we have and more on developing these features and the reality is that most features would never get used. Gridly’s strength is its simplicity and ease of use and so while we listen carefully to our customers and keep track of every suggestion, we never implement anything unless we are convinced that it will be useful to most of our customers. So far most change requests don’t actually required a functional change – they may simply need a tweaked user interface or instructions to make it more clear how to achieve the intended result.

What are your goals at Gridly for the upcoming year?

We launched earlier this year so our overarching goal is to continue building our customer base. In terms of the product, we’re usually tight lipped about feature development not because we want to be secretive but because we don’t like hype: we’d much rather tell you about new features when they are actually available for you to use. That said, we have some really interesting work underway to help designers to take existing collateral out of the Adobe Creative Suite and bring it straight into Gridly. This will make it easier for customers to get their existing collateral into Gridly and available for everyone in their organization to work with.

Backpocket COO Cameron Herold compared entrepreneurship to being obsessive-compulsive, bi-polar, and manic depressive. How do you maintain a work / life balance while growing a successful business?

My wife and I had our first child in January and so with a nine-month old in the house, things are busy. I try hard to get away from the business for a few hours a day not only to spend time with my family but also to let my mind wander. I have always found that the solutions to the most daunting problems don’t come to me while I’m focused on finding the solution. Instead, the solution comes to me when I’m thinking about something else entirely.

How has Gridly arranged its financing? Are you actively seeking investors?

Gridly was spun out of an established agency, Karo, where I worked for almost 10 years. During my time there I developed brand management software solutions for several of Karo’s clients. Two years ago, I pitched the idea of Gridly to the partners at Karo and they went for it. Gridly’s funding came from Karo, myself, and four others who I have worked with for many years. We are just starting to make arrangements for a second round of funding. Interested investors are welcome to get in touch with me.

Tech entrepreneurs are subject to information overload about all the exciting startups solving unique business problems. What other companies excite you right now?

I’ll highlight three western Canadian companies that I am watching. In Calgary, I am really excited about Cardinal Media Technologies not so much because of what they are doing right now but because of what they plan on doing in the near future. Keep an eye on them! Another Calgary-based startup that I am watching is Hookflash. They are developing a really interesting voice and video calling platform that looks really, really promising. Out of Vancouver, ThoughtFarmer is selling what I think is the best Intranet solution going.

Often aspiring entrepreneurs think they have a really great idea. What advice can you give to someone looking to get a tech business off the ground?

The cold hard reality is that ideas are worth nothing unless you have the team to execute on the idea. If you are just getting started, surround yourself with the best team you can possibly find and structure your company so that everyone’s interests are aligned with the success of the business. Also, reach out to the startup community because everyone in that community wants nothing more than to see you succeed.

Martin Studzinski is TELUS team member with a focus on consumer solutions, with interests in design, technology, and education reform. You can follow Martin on Twitter @martstudz.

It's midway through Small Business Month. Are you taking advantage of it? A shout-out to startups in Hamilton, Ontario! October 21-23 (this weekend!) is Canada's first Startup Weekend in Steeltown. For all the details about this non-profit early stage startup event, check out hamilton.startupweekend.org.

It all started about 18 years ago when I was shopping in a store and was quite unhappy with the customer service. I complained to the manager and after telling me he was very sorry he asked for my name and address, which I presumed was because he wanted to follow up with an apology. Much to my surprise a bouquet of flowers was delivered to my home from the manager apologizing for the lack of customer service at his store. I phoned him up and said that the flowers were nice but all I wanted was for the experience in his store to be better for myself and other customers, not a gift to help ease my pain.

At the years passed it soon became apparent I could make quite a living out of complaining: I have been offered gift cards, free meals, a free holiday, and much more but it’s not what I want! How on earth can freebies make me feel better when I buy a product or use a service that is so sub-standard that I have to take the time to complain—and wasting time means wasting money.  Every time a customer walks away without letting the business know why, it means the next customer will suffer the same fate as the last one and nothing gets better.

Recently the BlackBerry has been in the news because of a problem, which meant many users were unable to use certain features of their phones for about four days. The makers of this very clever smart phone, RIM, decided to make a video where the CEO apologised to all the customers. As well as promising to fix the problem they also offered a freebie: $100 worth of free apps. It was interesting reading the mixed tweets on Twitter, as some of the customers were really pleased with this peace offering and others were saying, just fix the problem once and for all.

Another example is Microsoft when they launched a Valentine’s Day edition of the Zune, which was red. Due to popular demand they were unable to deliver to all their customers on time so gave away free Zunes to the customers who had to wait.

The late, great Steve Jobs offered a free iPhone case to Apple’s customers who were unhappy about the iPhone 4’s signal issues. What is important here is that the iPhone 4S that followed had a new antenna system, which fixed the original problem. Apple obviously listened to its customers and made sure the problem was not ongoing. While everyone was talking about this supposed issue, only 1.7% of iPhone 4’s had been returned, and just 0.55% of buyers had called Apple to complain, Jobs said.

One size does not fit all!

Toyota had a serious problem with their gas pedals which meant recalling millions of vehicles in the US and Europe. An apology was forthcoming but no apparent repair procedure was put in place at that time. This gave a message to the customers that Toyota did not care and ignored the customer complaints for the problem to be fixed.

The message, I think, is that whether you are a large or small business you are gambling with your reputation and customer loyalty when you make decisions that they do not understand or feel are best for them. You might get away with it if they are really passionate, as in the case of Apple and RIM, but generally customers will not come back.

Some tips below on how businesses can better their chances of keeping their customers happy and loyal:

• Be honest with your customers. If there is a problem with a product admit it. If you receive a complaint about customer service ensure procedures are put in place and that your employees are trained efficiently.
• Making empty promises does not make loyal customers.
• Ignoring customer complaints does not mean there are no complaints—it makes the problem worse.
• Be transparent, if you do not have solutions to fix a problem let your customers know and assure them this is a work in progress.
• If you offer freebies without dealing with the issue at hand you will lose customer loyalty eventually.

Customers want great customer service not a pay off. Get it right the first time and ensure your customers see value for money. Today more than ever when a customer is not happy a gift card is offered, a discount on their next purchase or a free item of sorts.

I would love your comments on my thoughts, whether you think giving freebies is a good way to apologise to customers for not coming up to their expectations or if you think like me and just want things to work from day one!

As Donald Porter, V.P. British Airways says, “Customers don’t expect you to be perfect. They do expect you to fix things when they go wrong.”

"Let them eat cake."

- Marie Antionnette

(You cant solve anyones problems if you don’t know what they are)

Linda Ockwell-Jenner is the Social Sweetheart. She is President of Motivational Steps and Co-Founder of the Small Business Community Network (SBCN) based in Waterloo Region. Find out more about Linda at www.motivationalsteps.com and www.sbcncanada.org

Over the last ten years I have talked to hundreds of CEOs of small and medium-sized businesses about what works and what doesn’t in building a repeatable lead stream for their business and a marketing engine that delivers measurable business results.  I started to keep track of what CEOs were telling me and devised a list of the attributes of marketing programs that succeed.  My last post was about how to view the real value of your website – it’s the equivalent of a full time employee working the front desk. Today we address why a website is so darn important to the future of your business.

Something strange has happened to your customers. There was a time when they would be happy watching an ad on TV, reading an article in a trade publication or asking a colleague for a recommendation for a business solution.  The internet has changed this. They can now do research and find data points to instantaneously help them decide.

Today, the average customer uses 11.2 data points via search, video, customer reviews and other online sources in order to make a buying decision.

In a new study by Saatchi and Saatchi X, commissioned by Google, they have coined a new term, the “Zero Moment of Truth” (ZMOT) that explains what a customer is doing before they buy.  Whether they are buying an airline engine, piece of software, or a can of soup, the ZMOT applies equally to what people are hoping to find when they research for a solution to a problem, either personally or for their business.

• 79% of consumers now say they use a smartphone to help with shopping
• 83% of moms say they do online research after seeing a TV commercial that interests them

What this means is that your presence on the web, needs to be more than a website and much more than product information or contact details. You need comments, articles, value-based information and at least 11.2 data points that will help a person decide. If you are out selling your products and services, via typical channels like sales people and advertising, what do people find when they search for you after they have heard about you? If your sales team is creating stimulus in the marketplace, make sure your web presence can deliver.

Photo Credit: ZMOT PDF

Take a moment and conduct a keyword search on your company and on the keywords your customers search for. See the web through the eyes of your customers and look at all of things they could be looking at to make a decision before they buy from you.

If you are spending money on marketing to drive prospects to your business, perhaps you need to stop and start spending time and money your web presence first. Just stimulating name recognition for your business could be a huge waste of time and money if its not support by your web presence in helping people make a buying decision.

Here is the check your web presence needs to deliver:

• The buying decision journey has changed. Customers are educated and have easier access to information than ever before.
• What once was a message is now a conversation. It’s ongoing and continuous and needs to available any time anywhere.
• Word of mouth is stronger than ever. It just happens now on the web.

To help you on your journey, Hubspot has just issued a new eBook called “25 Must-Have’s for Your Website”. It’s a great guide and checklist.

While the concept of maintaining and investing in a web presence for your business may seem involved and expensive, the reality today is that you can’t afford not to have one. So jump in, take the first step and start building a web presence roadmap for your business.

Marie Wiese is founder of Marketing CoPilot, www.marketingcopilot.com and the author of the eBook, “Why marketing fails... and what you can do about it!” Marketing CoPilot designs and delivers online strategies that help companies find customers and keep customers. Marie is a 20 year veteran of the B2B marketing world, past Chair of the York Technology Alliance in the greater Toronto region and a workshop leader at Regional Innovation Centres (RICs) in Ontario where she teaches early stage companies how to build online lead generation engines that deliver measurable business results.

Daniel Patricio is the founder of Pinpoint Social, a Toronto startup that offers businesses an easy and effective way to run promotions on Facebook. Pinpoint Social focuses on simplifying the campaign creation process, and allows customers to create a Facebook promotion in less than ten minutes!

I spoke with Daniel about the upcoming launch of Pinpoint Social to get his thoughts on Facebook as a marketing platform, startups targeting the SMB segment, and the state of tech entrepreneurship in Toronto.

Pinpoint Social is a platform for that makes it easy for businesses to create promotion apps for Facebook. How do you market yourself to the key decision makers in the SMB sector?

People that work in SMBs typically have a short attention span for new technologies or products due to the multifaceted nature of any job description in a growing company.

We find that the key decision markers in SMBs need to hear a value proposition that is going to help them add value to the bottom line, reduce their workload, and keep ahead of the curve and their competitors.

Today our most important marketing activity is working with the key decision makers to build a case for social media in their organization and real understanding of their challenges. We do that the good old-fashioned way: by going out to events, visiting our clients offices, and offering hands-on support to each customer.

We believe that the most sustainable marketing strategy is building case studies with people that will rant and rave about you.

What is the biggest differentiator between Pinpoint Social and its competition?

We aren’t trying to have a bigger feature set than the next application. We know the reality is that our customers are still getting a hang of how to market on Facebook and we believe that simplicity is more important than more features.

We want our customers to run a great campaign with us, so we do less, far better, with great design, and measureable results. we always strive to empower them to do it better – that comes through in the user experience, ease of use and support.

That is the value we provide today and how we will always compete and address competition and we attract customers that believe in that as well.

Facebook has become a powerful platform for businesses to reach potential clients. How has consumer behavior changed with the popularization of social media, and what are brands missing when attempting to market via social media?

The two biggest challenges for brands diving into social are:

1) You really have to be interesting, different, and conversation worthy

2) If you aren’t, the silence can be deafening

Many brands have stuck to their guns for decades and marketing has been very brand centric rather than people centric. With more passive mediums people are forced to endure your message but with social it is so easy for consumers to simplify ignore you.

This can be really demoralizing for a brand that spends thousands of dollars working on a campaign that the consumers don’t care about.

We believe that SMBs should take a consumer first and measureable approach to all of their marketing – it is absolutely required to succeed in the social media sphere.

The key to a profitable SaaS business is the ability to meet the needs of customers as a group. How do you address customer feedback and what does it take to implement changes based on this feedback?

Customers really are king in every product business. We have been through three iterations to get to where we are at with Pinpoint Social today and our users from Day 1 have helped us get there and build a better product.

When building a product a market – not a handful of customers you have to listen but you can’t build a custom product for every customers needs. You can very quickly end up with a Frankenstein-like product that scares off anyone that tries to use it for the first time.

It takes leadership, conviction and vision to tell customers where the product is going and most importantly to tell customers – no. If a feature isn’t aligned with the vision of the platform, you have to stand up for your product.

Tech startups exist in a constant state of flux or pivoting. What factors have driven Pinpoint Social to this third iteration?

Startups pivot because it is impossible to know how people are going to use your product until they actually get their hands on it and more importantly, if they see enough value to pay for it.

For us it was about learning about our customers and really having the understanding and knowledge to build a simpler product that creates the most value.

Our first iteration worked great but gave users too many ways to launch a campaign (email, Twitter, Facebook, QR, flyers) and that confused them.

The second iteration focused on Facebook Pages and got amazing results but wasn’t self service and intuitive enough.

We would like to think the third iteration is simpler and easier to use than ever and we have made it more accessible.  Most importantly we feel the product is aligned with our vision and that of our customers.

All the lessons we have learnt couldn’t have come to us without shipping the product and learning from the people that matter – our customers.

What are your goals at Pinpoint Social for the coming year? What is the most exciting feature that you can’t wait to deploy to customers?

We have simple goals. We want to be the answer to Facebook marketing for SMB and we want to be serving 250,000 consumers per month on our platform by next year.

I would definitely say we are most excited about our free trial that will be available to any business with a Facebook Page. SMBs will try anything for free but only pay when they see value.

We are proud of what we have been working on and are confident that anyone that tries it will see value so we think it will be very important for us.

Pinpoint Social is currently headquartered in Toronto. Do you find that you face challenges being thousands of kilometers and several hours away from the West Coast tech ecosystem?

I think Toronto has everything that you need to build a great company. I also find that being in the big spotlight you can focus too much on your competitors rather than solving your customer’s problems.

Toronto is a great market for technology, social media and engineering talent. We are proud to be building a business in Toronto.

Backpocket COO Cameron Herold compared entrepreneurship to being obsessive-compulsive, bi-polar, and manic depressive. How do you maintain a work / life balance while growing a successful business?

Startup life can definitely throw out any previous ideas or concepts of work / life balance. We all work really hard, I never really stop thinking about the business and my lifestyle has definitely changed in many ways, not necessarily for the better.

However I do think you reach a level of maturity as an entrepreneur where you realize focus and effort is more important than the numbers of we work. I still work 12 hour days but if I ever feel I am no longer being productive I am learning when to step back.

Our offices are in the St. Lawrence Market neighbourhood and everyday I start my day picking up some fresh baked bread at the market, taking a time out at St. James Park, or letting off some steam on the arcade game machines we have in the office.

How has Pinpoint Social arranged its financing? Are you actively seeking investors?

We have bootstrapped the company for the last few years, but we are at the stage where we are confident in the product and we think the market opportunity is huge, so we are looking at several options to really go after the market with the help of some investors.

Working in tech you are often subject to information overload about cool startups. What other companies excite you right now?

My favourite startups and products are those that are easy to use and have a great user experience. My two favourites that I use daily as a product manager are Balsamiq and Invision app. They help turn my ideas into working prototypes that we can show to clients and the development team. I couldn’t live without them.

What advice can you give aspiring entrepreneurs who think they have a really great idea and aren’t sure how to get started?

Don’t start anything and don’t quit your day job until you can find five people that would pay for your product.

Once you have those five, build a prototype with PowerPoint or Balsamiq. If ten people will give you cheques, build a real prototype.

Far too many of us spend too much time on ideas that no one will pay for. It takes less to start than you think but you have to be focused on the customer from Day 1.

Love the idea of high performance promotions via Facebook? Check out Pinpoint Social or follow them on Twitter @pinpointsocial.

Martin Studzinski is TELUS team member with a focus on consumer solutions, with interests in design, technology, and education reform. You can follow Martin on Twitter @martstudz.

What challenges has your company faced in the adoption of social media as a marketing tool? Share in the comments below!

Last week we released the results of a recent TELUS-commissioned Ipsos Reid study. The study results helped us gain an understanding of how well Canadian small business owners are prepared to deal with change, what barriers they encounter and the steps they plan to take to manage this change.

This new research found that 82% of B.C. and Alberta small businesses are looking for new ways to deal with change. Small businesses’ ability to manage change is impacted by:

• lack of financial resources (44%)
• lack of time (40%) and
• complexity of processes such as technology, administrative, and billing (19%).

The study also found:

• The number one way SMBs in Canada manage change is by reviewing their current tools and technology (40 %).
• Streamlining vendor relationships was identified as the third most commonly used method to help manage change by 30%of the respondents.

We released the survey results along with our launch of Business Freedom, our new flexible wireline and wireless bundle designed to simplify and streamline telecommunications business processes as well as give SMBs the ability to adapt their tools and technology as required for their business.

At a networking event of small business influencers held last Thursday evening at The Network Hub in Vancouver, attendees discussed the results of the survey and how Business Freedom supports small business and the constant need to adapt to change.

Stephen Jagger, an entrepreneur spoke about his multiple businesses and how important it is to embrace change. Stephen co-funded four businesses, Ubertor.com, a real estate software company; Reachd.com, an in person training company focusing on online marketing; OutsourcingThingsDone.com, a leased labour business based in Manila PH and PayrollHero.com, a payroll, time tracking software company. He spoke about how change is an everyday occurrence in his business and that it’s essential to accept and even encourage change with employees.

“Change happens constantly in business which is why it is so  important to have products, services and suppliers that provide the  flexibility to adapt to those changes on the fly.  At the end of the day  it saves me time and money” Stephen Jagger

Attendees agreed that change is the new normal, a sentiment that is widely felt in Western Canada. In addition to providing valuable insight on SMB change management, the survey found that while BC and Alberta may be the most bullish in the country when it comes to change—84% said they are not afraid of change compared to 72% for the rest of Canada, still one in four SMBs said they are not prepared to deal with it (26%).  Small businesses and companies who supply these businesses must adapt and work towards providing solutions and processes to help make dealing with change more simple.

Leigh Tynan, Director of Marketing, TELUS Business Solutions discusses the new Business Freedom bundle for small business.

Attendees at the Business Freedom networking event.

On Business Freedom: “Two phones and a landline as a starting point make a lot of sense. Most small businesses have at least that as a requirement.  “Super Sam”, Taxsupport.ca

Raul Pacheco of Hummingbird604 and Lynsey Brothers of High Road Communications.

To find out more about Business Freedom and how it can support your changing business visit telus.com/businessfreedom.

While the unfortunately passing of Steve Jobs on Wednesday has overshadowed the unveiling of iPhone 4S a day earlier, Apple's latest smartphone becomes available in Canada on Oct. 14, with prices starting at $159 on a 3-year plan.

Yours truly attended the launch event at Apple's headquarters in Cupertino, Calif. and while many were disappointed it wasn't a radically redesigned iPhone 5, don't write off the iPhone 4S until you test-drive the amazing Siri voice-activated "personal assistant" feature and slew of hardware updates.

Here's the scoop on what you can expect from iPhone 4S, whether you're considering it for business or pleasure, or in all likelihood, a bit of both.

The iPhone 4S is powered by Apple’s dual-core A5 chip, comparable to what's in the iPad 2 touchscreen tablet, so users can expect roughly twice the speed and better graphics performance over the iPhone 4. I launched a few apps, played some video and games and flicked through the web browser and noticed a major difference right off the bat.

Wireless speeds are reportedly faster, too, thanks to a dual-antenna design – a first for smartphones, says Apple. We're pretty spoiled in Canada with our fast and reliable networks, but our friends south of the border should also experience better reception and fewer dropped calls.

As a camera, the iPhone 4S took some impressive stills and videos from my initial testing at the Apple campus, thanks to its 8-megapixel sensor (compared to five with the iPhone 4), 1080p HD video recording (compared to 720p) and overall better optics technology. If you're interested, more details on the souped-up camera is available here.

But as I teased near the beginning of this article, the most impressive feature built into iPhone 4S is Siri, a female-sounding assistant that’s activate when you press and hold the Home button (or put the iPhone 4S up to your ear). Simply ask a question or give a command you'll immediately get a relevant response. You can ask "what's the weather in Vancouver?" and Siri will launch a weather app with details. Tell Siri you want to book a meeting at 12pm tomorrow and she might tell you there's already an appointment at that time. I said "take me to the Golden Gate Bridge" and it immediately opened the Maps application and showed me the route. I also asked "who won the 1985 Stanley Cup?" and it opened Safari to show me it was the Edmonton Oilers. "What good Chinese food restaurants are in San Jose?," I queried, and it quickly showed me a list, ranked by rating.

There's more to this voice-activated artificial intelligence. You can have your text messages spoken to you, as well. Reply, and you’ll see your words transcribed back into text before you send it. You can ask the definition of a word and it'll show it to you via its built-in dictionary. Or tap a microphone icon when composing an email and it'll type it out for you (but emails aren't read to you, though).

The "S" in iPhone 3S might stand for "speed," but I'd like to think it's for "Siri," as this is the killer app that'll likely have everyone buzzing.

Also keep in mind iPhone 4S will come preloaded with the latest operating system update, iOS 5. I had a chance to test a few of 200-odd new features on the iPhone 4S at the unveiling, including the BBM-like iMessage app, plus Reminders, Newsstand and Notification Centre. The smartphone will also work with the new iCloud service for easy uploading, synchronization and access to your content – contacts, calendar entries, documents, apps, photo, music, ebooks and more – on a number of devices, anywhere you've got a cellular or Wi-Fi connection.

Sure, the iPhone 4S might've disappointed those expecting a major leap forward rather than an iterative update over last year's model. But as with all Apple products, the devil is in the details, which you only "get" once you start playing around with the device for a while.

Change is the one constant in a business.

Your business grows, shrinks, adds staff, reduces staff, changes procedures, moves offices, welcome clients and loses clients. It is all part of the joy of running a business.

One way to effectively manage the constant change within our businesses is to utilize an online tool to document all of our systems and procedures. The idea is to have your "employee manual" or "systems and procedures manual" online, in an easy to view and change format so that it can be adjusted as your business moves forward.

We started with Google Sites as the foundation of our systems and procedures.  Most companies have operations manuals, a printed binder with documents for all aspects of the business.  But when you are running with team members in different locations, we found that printed material just does not work. 

Google Sites allows you to create a “wiki” for your business.  A wiki in this case, is a protected website that allows you and your team to communicate efficiently and effectively.  Our wikis include all the systems and procedures within our businesses.  We document how to open the office, how to close it, how new customers are dealt with, scripts for welcome calls, support emails, etc.  We work to constantly document all aspects of the business - it is always a work in progress. The benefit of documenting everything within the business is that it allows you to run the business instead of work within the business.

If you work to pull yourself out of the business so that you can work on it and not in it, you will find a wiki extremely valuable. Take the time to document all systems and procedures within your business so that your team can solve their own problems, answer their own questions, help clients and get things done.

This will free you up to work on the business rather than in it.

Stephen Jagger is an entrepreneur, speaker and author. He has co-foundered four businesses including Ubertor.com, a real estate software company; Reachd.com, an in person training company focusing on online marketing; OutsourcingThingsDone.com, a leased labour business based in Manila, PH and PayrollHero.com, a payroll, time tracking software company. Stephen also co-authored the book Sociable! You can see more on Stephen at http://www.StephenJagger.com.

E-mail– stephen.jagger@gmail.com

LindaOJ here again, happy to be back after a tiny break from writing my blog on TELUS Talks Business, so that I could give all of my attention to the @MarketPlace Conference. The conference was organized by the Small Business Community Network (of which I’m co-founder) and our exclusive co-host: TELUS. This brings me nicely into a question for you:

How do you feel about making alliances?

Whilst you think about my question let me take you back in time to the 1st Century BC and I am sure you all know a guy called Julius Caesar. Here’s what Wikipedia has to say about him:

“… was a Roman general and statesman and a distinguished writer of Latin prose. He played a critical role in the gradual transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire.”

Julius Caesar

Would you believe Julius Caesar was building alliances all those centuries ago? He was a very clever man. Not only did he marry (more than once) women who came from influential families, he knew that doing so would improve his circumstances. He then worked on building a network made up of people, including politicians, who would support his desire to expand the Empire.

Let’s take a look at what Wikipedia has to say about another famous leader known for her talent in forming alliances:

“Moving into the 19th Century Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was the monarch of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until her death. From 1 May 1876, she used the additional title of Empress of India.”

Queen Victoria

Victoria made sure her children married foreign royals to create a strong alliance to England. She knew the benefit of building strong alliances with politicians and this was one of the reasons she was a very powerful ruler. Her network of powerful people was loyal to her, and she knew how to influence them.

Strategic Alliances

My earlier question, how do you feel about making alliances might be better understood I asked you how you felt about making Strategic Alliances?

A Strategic Alliance is a formal relationship between two or more parties to pursue a set of agreed upon goals or to meet a critical business need while remaining independent organizations.

Many small business owners fail to understand the need and benefits of building strategic alliances in the early days of their business.  This could be related to the fear factor, as the word alliance does relate in a sense to a partnership, working together, and this may scare some people because they fear it would take away their choice in making decisions for an example.

There are some excellent reasons for forming strategic alliances whether you are a small business or a large corporation:

• You are an author who wants a book published and form a strategic alliance with a printing firm. You work together to publish the book and both businesses gain credibility, exposure and the possibility of future referrals/clients.
• Your organization wants to offer an event but can’t afford speakers fees. You form an alliance with up and coming speakers who are looking for more exposure, or testimonials—just to name a few of the benefits.
• You benefit from being in an alliance with an organization whose budget offers better advertising opportunities. Alternatively you could share the expenses for marketing and advertising.
• You may be in the position where you have a larger target market by combining your database with your strategic alliance
• By entering into a strategic alliance you may increase your sales capacity, which would offer you the chance to strengthen your ability to reach new customers and retain existing ones.

When you enter into a strategic alliance some tips I would offer would be to:

• Have a strong relationship built on trust before you agree to move forward with your alliance.
• Be honest about your reasons for entering into an alliance and be prepared to give and take.
• Ensure that both parties have a similar goal.

As the owner of two small businesses I have definitely benefited and grown these businesses over the years by building strategic alliances. In my early years I was an unknown entity to many in the world of business so by partnering with a more established business that offered me credibility and the opportunity to network with people I would not normally have come into contact with.

Let’s look at a modern day strategic alliance between two very well known businesses:

For those of you who have not yet entered into any strategic alliances I have a feeling you will be looking to build relationships with a goal in that direction. The way I see it, if Julius Caesar and Queen Victoria found it worked for them, along with Microsoft and Nokia, we are following in the footsteps of very successful and farsighted people.

"If you do not seek out allies and helpers, then you will be isolated and weak."
- Sun Tzu, “The Art of War”

Linda Ockwell-Jenner is the Social Sweetheart. She is President of Motivational Steps and Co-Founder of the Small Business Community Network (SBCN) based in Waterloo Region. Find out more about Linda at www.motivationalsteps.com and www.sbcncanada.org

October is Small Business Month, so you can expect Telus Talks Business to bring you even more insightful articles, blog posts and community discussions that matter to you and your growing business. In this piece, we chat about how to take advantage of Facebook as the no. 1 social platform on the planet, but also minimize risks of tainting your brand -- be it from negative comments or inappropriate posts from within your organization.

As with millions of other small-to-midsized businesses, GelaSkins -- a Toronto-based company that sells decorative "skins" to personalize the look of portable gadgets -- relies heavily on Facebook to promote its brand and connect with existing or potential customers.

"We're fortunate to have a fairly social media-savvy team -- 14 members of our staff have 'admin' status on our Facebook page and are encouraged to share and engage with our fan base," explains Dayna Winter, community manager at GelaSkins Inc. "We mix up the content between GelaSkins-related posts, such as new art announcements, and conversation-provoking questions, links and pop culture topics."

Because of the manageable number of employees with Facebook authorization, and two people who actively monitor comments, Winter says the opportunities outweigh the risks in "putting yourself out there."

While not often, Winter says GelaSkins will receive negative comments on its Facebook wall "but resolving the issues directly in this public forum shows transparency, which goes a long way, and forces us to address these concerns quickly."

In fact, Winter says they've found customers can also help answer questions, too, including a recent example of a Spanish-speaking customer helping out another. "This is a very useful tip for companies that do business worldwide but who may not have the resources to translate or respond in other languages," explains Winter. "Reward your most engaged fans, who will in turn do a little leg work for you -- it's been quite successful."

Technology experts agree social media vehicles can help a business – if you're not on Facebook, your competition is – but managing the flow of information must be taken seriously.

"As a business, you need to be aware of what social media content out there is associated with your company’s brand – and this holds true for small and large businesses," says Chenxi Wang, Ph.D., vice president and principal analyst at Forrester Research. "There are of course two kinds of content out there, one category is those that came from the official channel of your company – such as through a social media "spokesperson," someone authorized to post content -- and the other category is content that came from third-party sources including customers, competitors, general reviews and community boards."

To control the first category of content, says Wang, you can go about it via processes or technological means, or the combination of both. "Some companies have a fairly restrictive creation-approval-post process whereby no official content ever leaves the company without proper approval – the approval process can be manual and similar to how you would control outbound content for press and media today," Wang explains. "Large companies sometimes have actual technological means to control social media content, products like Actiance’s Socialite can help with enforcing an actual review-and-post system, with logging and auditing."

To control the second category of content, you would definitely need more "help," continues Wang. "Services like reputation.com and Cyveillance to some extent will help you initiate a process to correct bad reputation or incorrect content, while MarkMonitor could help you understand what content is out there on the greater Internet that's relevant to your brand and reputation."

Winter says GelaSkins has been able to manage the two-way information flow on Facebook without the help of these professional services, but there are times when the conversation must be temporarily taken off the social platform to find a resolution. "Generally, we discuss as a team some of the more sticky situations, and how we handle," says Winter. "Many times, a customer who has posted negatively has contacted us via email already and is looking for a more immediate outlet. It's important that our messaging is consistent before we publically or privately post a reply."

"We use iChat internally, which allows us to really quickly check in with each other before we post -- I think that this would be a good tip for similar companies," adds Winter.

"While a company's rep could be at stake with negative commenting being so available -- and unmoderated, to an extent -- we've found that it gives us a chance to showcase our customer service.