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Archive for the ‘Business’ Category
Where in the world are you?
Tuesday, April 26th, 2011 by David Morgan
A peek at location data sorted on an Iphone
For the last week, the tech news has been reporting that Apple has secret files on the iPhone that track user location and store it on the device, without the permission of the device owner. It’s unclear what the data is used for and why Apple has been collecting it in iOS products that carry a 3G antenna for nearly a year now.
There’s no evidence of that information being sent to Apple or anybody else. Even so, the data is unencrypted, giving anyone with access to your phone or computer where backups may be stored a way to grab the data and extrapolate a person’s whereabouts and routines.
Soon after this announcement, Microsoft and Android fessed up as well—stating that their devices collected records of the physical locations of customers who use their mobile operating system. Microsoft does say, however, that location histories are not saved directly on the device. That’s different from Apple’s practice of recording the locations of visible cell towers on iPhone and iPad devices, which can result in more than a year’s worth of data being quietly logged. Google’s approach, by contrast, records only the last few dozen locations on Android phones.
All of these practices have come under scrutiny by members of congress and several attorneys General of some states.
Note this isn’t the data that you allow to happen—like our Ipad asking whether or not it can use location services to see if I’m close to a gas station. This is data being recorded without permission. To make applications like maps work, of course, it’s necessary for a smartphone Ipad to transmit its GPS coordinates to a remote server–and, in exchange, receive nearby restaurant reviews, or driving directions, and so on.Privacy concerns begin to arise when a unique device ID is transmitted, which allows a company to track a customer’s whereabouts over an extended period of time. That’s the privacy issue.
As marketers at Force 5, we’re always interested in how our advertising or marketing campaigns are doing—are they reaching the right audiences, are we getting responses? However, the unauthorized location services on smartphones is going too far. Tracking minute by minute locations is certainly an invasion of privacy. This will be in the news for a while as a good balance of location services for convenience and safety versus invasion of privacy issues are debated. Stay tuned. To read more, check out cnet.com
Mobile Health Seekers
Monday, April 25th, 2011 by Deb DeFreeuwI recently read an article in MediaPost which had some incredible stats on the mobile users consumption of health information through apps and browsers.
- 38% of cell phone owners access the Internet using mobile phone — up 52% year over year
- 55% of cell phone Internet users go online daily from their mobile phones
- 30% of mobile subscribers use search, 29% use downloaded apps
- 26% of apps downloaded in 2010 were used just once
I think one of the key points of the article had to do with the idea of not just condensing an entire website into an app. Consider the difference of mobile health info seekers and the content which is most sought after (as a proportional of total traffic); sexual health topics (HIV/AIDS, pregnancy and STDs). These users are understandably concerned about privacy, and likely in an urgent and emotional state – make content straightforward, useful and easy to find.
When creating mobile content we need to follow the same rules as we do with any other media. Define your audience, determine what are they looking for – then deliver it efficiently and effectively!
We’re diving into all kinds of mobile projects here at Force 5 and can help your company make smart decisions about moving forward with mobile content.
DECA’s local impact
Wednesday, April 20th, 2011 by Nevin McElwrath
In the business world, preparation is key to many forms of success. Enter DECA (formerly known as Distributive Education Clubs of America). DECA aims to give high school students the skills needed to enter the workforce prepared and ready for that success. What is DECA? DECA is a global high school business organization whose main goal is to prepare emerging young leaders and entrepreneurs in marketing, finance, hospitality and management. Worldwide, over 185,000 high school students are members. (source: deca.org)While DECA’s large-scope benefits may be easier to see, local impact may need a closer look. In order to see the local benefits, we need to ask the right questions.
The following questions were asked of Stephanie McElwrath, the DECA Advisor for the Penn High School Chapter in Mishawaka, Indiana.
Q. What opportunities are there for local businesses to be involved?
A. Local businesses can be involved in DECA by being on a chapter business advisory board, allowing students to do projects based on their businesses (and in turn being able to use any information or marketing products created free of charge), sponsoring chapters and judging DECA competitions on the local, state and national levels.
Q. Why should local businesses get involved in local DECA chapters?
A. Local business involvement will only make the DECA chapters stronger. Teaming up with these outgoing young people not only helps to give businesses a fresh look at their product or service, but it also can create networking opportunities for the businesses with their target market.
Q. In what ways are DECA alumni encouraged to be involved and help the community?
A. DECA is a strong organization and because of that, their alumni are very committed to helped current DECA students. Alumni are encouraged to help mentor current students, judge competitive events and host DECA students at their businesses. Because a large majority of DECA alumni attend a 4 year college, alumni can also help current DECA students by mentoring them on what to expect in college, majors, etc.
Q. What are local DECA chapters doing to help the community?
A. Local DECA chapters are heavily encouraged to help the community by using their entreprenuerial and marketing skills to run fundraisers that benefit local and national non-profit charitable organizations. These community service projects are done annually by most DECA chapters.
With the local integration with the leading youth within the community, DECA stands to not only build invaluable relationships, but improve and strengthen the local economic health along the way.
If you, or know someone who has DECA experience, tell us your story in the comments below.
Who’s Your Audience and What’s Their Word?
Thursday, April 14th, 2011 by Butch WhitmireThe latest data from Experian Hitwise shows that the number of keywords typed into search engines is declining. Longer searches, those of 5-8 words, were down last month 3%. As the data table shows, 1 word searches comprise a full 24% of all searches. 2 word searches are a close second.
When it comes to people finding your business or organization organically on the web, understanding who your potential customers are, how they think, and what they may type into their favorite search engine is essential.
At Force 5, we help clients determine their customer’s “word” as part of our Soul Searching™ brand development process and in our free SEO consultation services included in their web development packages.
Is Your Mobile Website Ready for a Caveman to Use?
Monday, April 4th, 2011 by Butch Whitmire
Mobile browsing is here and now. With estimates that over 50% of all mobile phones sold this year will be smart, preparing your website to become an amazing internet experience on these devices can be challenging. As mobile technology continues to evolve into tomorrow, keeping it simple today is a must. How simple?
Think Cave Man simple.
Here some things Cave Men are thinking about when it comes to web site mobile optimization:
“Finger Big. Phone Small.”
Call if fat fingers, butt dial, or human factors engineering, there are physiological limitations that must be considered to ensure a great user experience. So, even if your Cave Man shaves his knuckles before visiting your site from his smartphone, making mobile web pages with BIG buttons and easy to discern icons, fonts and colors schemes will keep him from hitting you with a club.
“Want Fast. Phone Slow.”
Visitors to your site expect fast page downloads. From a desktop or laptop with a high-speed internet connection, a considerable percentage of users will abandon your site if a page fails to load in under 6 seconds. Mobile download speeds are most often significantly slower. So, keeping your mobile landing page lean and fast will keep your visitors from becoming extinct.
“Want Easy. Life Com … pli…cate …dud.”
Keeping it simple; this is a challenging exercise that will benefit marketers and their customers. I believe, as a general rule, most websites are too complicated: lots of links, lots of Flash, lots of buttons and popups. With limited real estate for the interface and a slower pipeline, marketers are going to have to focus. They’ll have to anticipate who will visit their mobile site and what are the 3 to 6 (that’s about as many buttons that will fit) most important things they’ll want to do when they get there. And that translates into understanding customers and their needs at a deep level. And when that happens, customer relationships start to evolve.
The Boss Rules #4: The Perfect Day
Tuesday, March 29th, 2011 by Butch WhitmireI remember walking into Joe’s office pretty frustrated. I’d had one of those days – the bad kind. Actually, I’d had about 10 of those days in a row, placing me exactly halfway to a pretty lousy month. I had recently accepted a new role leading a new team and things were just not happening the way I had envisioned. Already we were missing deadlines, delivering below-standard work, and experiencing infighting and poor moral. As a newer manager I was tired and frustrated. I wondered if I was ever going to be able to pull out of the tailspin I found myself in.
“I just don’t know where to begin,” I said to Joe, “I feel like I’m just getting started but I’m losing control of the team already.”
Joe looked at me and said, “Maybe a good place to start is by describing the perfect day.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean,” he replied, “describe the perfect day.”
I thought for a moment, “Well, I guess the perfect day would mean that we’d hit all our deadlines with great work and we’d all be happy about it.”
“No,” he said, “I’d like you to think smaller than that. What would be the perfect day for you – one sentence at a time? Say something like ‘I wake up in the morning and I feel refreshed.’
I repeated after him, “I wake up in the morning and I feel refreshed,”
“Good. What’s next?” he replied.
“I come to work and say, ‘good morning’ to everyone and they’re glad to see me.”
“Excellent!”
I continued, “Then, I run a great morning meeting.”
“Now, you’re getting it!” he exclaimed, “Butch, I’d like you to make a sentence of each and every event that would describe a perfect day for you. Then, when you’re done, I’d like you to answer a single question for each of these events. Here’s the question: In order for this to happen, what must be true?”
He could tell I was confused.
“So,” he replied, “If you say, ‘I wake up feeling refreshed,’ what must be true is that you may have go to bed at an earlier time. If you say, ‘I run a great meeting’ , one of the things that might need to be true is that you carve more time to prepare for the meeting. There aren’t any perfect days, Butch, but maybe by going through this exercise, you can identify a few things you can do to get the day and your team a little bit closer to good.”
Black Hat SEO will git you run out of town Pardner
Monday, March 28th, 2011 by David MorganJust like in the ole West, or at least as our Western movies tell us, Black hats are villains – and usually up to “no good”.
The New York Times recently noticed something odd when performing Google searches on terms as diverse as bedding, skinny jeans, area rugs and grommet-top curtains. “You could imagine a dozen contenders for each of these searches,” writes David Segal. “But in the last several months, one name turned up, with uncanny regularity, in the No. 1 spot for each and every term: JCPenney.” The retailer’s ranking even bested manufacturer Samsonite.com in Google searches for Samsonite carry-on luggage.
They discovered the strikingly unsubtle use of “black hat” optimization—including an array of phony sites that appeared to exist for the sole purpose of linking to the store’s website.
“There are links to JCPenney.com’s dresses page on sites about diseases, cameras, cars, dogs, aluminum sheets, travel, snoring, diamond drills, bathroom tiles, hotel furniture, online games, commodities, fishing, Adobe Flash, glass shower doors, jokes and dentists—and the list goes on,” noted Doug Pierce of Blue Fountain Media, a firm hired by the New York Times to investigate. He found an array of phony sites that appeared to exist for the sole purpose of linking to the store’s website.Though not illegal, black-hat tactics are strictly verboten in the Google rulebook. “The company draws a pretty thick line between techniques it considers deceptive and ‘white hat’ approaches, which are offered by hundreds of consulting firms and are legitimate ways to increase a site’s visibility.
Google retaliated with a “manual action” against JCPenney. In the space of two hours, for instance, the retailer’s No. 1 ranking for Samsonite carry-on luggage plummeted to No. 71. Rankings for other search terms underwent similarly dramatic demotions.
The Po!nt: In the end, cheaters never win. Sure, everyone’s trying to boost their search-engine rankings. Just make sure you follow Google’s ground rules when you do it.
Source:The full (and very interesting article) The New York Times.The Boss Rules: Rule #3
Friday, March 4th, 2011 by Butch WhitmireI’ve worked for a lot of years, enjoyed a lot of roles in my career, and had a lot of supervisors who imparted their wisdom to me. I thought I would share some of their best stuff with you in this series of posts called, “The Boss Rules.”
Rule #3: Become an “Owner”
Sometimes the best things a boss can say to you hurt a little. I remember going into a review feeling pretty good – sales were above goal, profits were good, and there had been no mutinies. I was a newer sales manager so I was comfortable (and probably a little cocky) that all the metrics were where they needed to be as I walked into Joe’s office.
At the end of my review Joe said, “Butch, you’re becoming a fine manager and things are looking pretty good. But you know, what I really want you to do is focus on becoming an owner.”
I thought, “An owner! Am I being offered a stock option?” But then I remembered we were a privately held company.
“Butch, we serve a lot of restaurants,” he said. “Have you ever noticed the difference the owner of a restaurant behaves compared to the rest of his staff? “
“Yes,” I replied, “They stay late and come in early, they shovel the drive when it snows, and they fill in for the cook who calls in sick. They work really hard. And I think I’ve been doing those things.”
“You are doing those things, Butch, and that’s really good,” he said. “But there’s something else about ownership you should consider: owners put their family names on the signs outside. At the end of the day, not matter what calamity befalls them; owners know that they must take care of their customers because their business is a reflection not only of them, but of their entire family.”
“I’m proud of my work, Joe.”
“I know you are and you should be, but ownership is more than doing good work. Ownership is an attitude. When a customer at a restaurant has a complaint about a bad experience, a manager says, ‘Sorry, my cook called in sick’ or ‘we’re short of staff’ or ‘my delivery guy was late’ or ‘our internet connection went down.’ But the truth is: Customers don’t care about why they didn’t get a good meal; they just want a good meal. Owners are ultimately responsible and they have to behave accordingly.
Butch, during our last review you said you were going to get an appointment at the Burger Boy account. When I asked you about how that was going, you said ‘I sent three letters, four emails, a made three phone calls but they haven’t called me back yet.’ That’s an effort, Butch, and that’s exactly what a manager would do. But an owner would just get the appointment – some way, somehow – he’d figure it out. Does that make sense?”
“Joe, I was just trying to tell you I was making an effort.”
“I know Butch, but I want you to know that I trust you and I want to empower you. So, moving forward, when we decide to do something, I’m going to ask you just one question:
‘Do you own this?’
If you say ‘yes’ then I’ll assume it’s going to happen. I’ll assume you’ll give it every possible effort, and I won’t have to worry that it’s going to happen. And I’ll assume you will ask me for help if you can’t get it done on your own. And when I ask you about it, you can say to me, ‘I have this done’ or ‘I don’t.’ Cool?”
“Cool. I can own this.”
The Boss Rules
Monday, February 14th, 2011 by Butch WhitmireI’ve been here at Force 5 for just 6 months now, but I’ve been in the workforce since I was legally of age. Throughout the years I’ve been fortunate to have had some great bosses who took the time to pour their wisdom into me. Because their “rules” have been so helpful to me, I thought I would share some of the best ones with you over my next few posts. Here goes:
Rule #1: “Always assume the best in people.”
Now, in a world full of Bernie Madoffs and Balloon Boys, you might say, “Butch, are you crazy? In business? People will cut your throat in a minute!” I know. This one was hard for me to swallow, too. But hear me out: I’m not saying we should go about business naively or that we should turn a blind eye to misconduct. We should do our best to never be surprised by the actions of anyone, friend or foe. What I’m talking about here is making a choice, about choosing a mindset when we hear the rumors or see activity that is suspect.
The business world tells us to assume the worst and why shouldn’t we? After all, assuming the worst is usually the safest route and it proves to the world that we are not oblivious.
But the problem with assuming the worst in other people is that it can apply a dark filter to everything we see around that person. It tints to our emotions and thus our interactions with them. Ultimately, this limits our ability to respect them.
In their book, Crucial Conversations, the authors Patterson, Grenny, McMillan, and Switzler state:
“As people perceive that others don’t respect them, the conversation becomes unsafe and dialog comes to a screeching halt … The instant people perceive disrespect in a conversation, the interaction is no longer about the original purpose – it is now about defending dignity.”
When we lose respect for someone, that person knows it. Hence, our ability to influence, engage, and dialog with them drops to almost nil. Our ability to get to the truth, correct and redirect becomes virtually impossible, and we exhaust our relational collateral.
By nature, I can be quite cynical. I have to work hard at assuming the best in people. But when I manage to fight off my natural tendencies, when I make that choice, I am finding faster paths to the truth and stronger relational growth.
