The Innovative Marketer

Podcast #16 - How to talk to customers

In this edition of The Innovative Marketer Podcast, I speak with Tom Larkin, author of the newly published book How to Talk to Customers.   Tom, and his co-author Diane Berenbaum have a lot of experience consulting on customer service issues through their company Communico.

The book is a good read and I'd recommend it for the solid tips they include on how to better communicate in your daily work life.   There's not a lot new here that you don't already know, but somehow reading it in an easy-to-understand way stands as an important reminder.

Here are three short techniques from the book for improving the interactions with your customers:

**  When you answer your phone, use your first and last name to build credibility, for example, "This is Steve Gershik" vs. "This is Steve."

**  When you are interacting with a customer, you must do so in a way that is accountable, that is, you tell the customer what you're going to do and then follow through.

** In every interaction with a customer, be non-judgmental.

Does this sound simple?  Does this sound obvious?  Then why are our lives filled with interactions like this every day?  And I'm betting if you check your web site, or listen in on the customer service calls coming into your company today, you'll find some of these tenets violated.

What I found truly notable about this book is how it came to me.   A PR rep reached out to me as a blogger, asking if my readers might be interested in the book's subject matter.  A sucker for free stuff, I said I'd take a look at it, thought it would be useful to share, and scheduled a Podcast interview (Tom Larkin's first) about the book.   For fun, I decided to see who else bit on this PR technique and found in general that the book was well received and noticed in the blogging community.  Was this because the publisher reached out proactively to bloggers?   

Interesting concept to consider when you're planning your own PR initiatives.

Listen to the Podcast now.

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Podcast #15 - Tom Meyer on Lead Generation on the Web

Last week, Tom Meyer, author of the O'Reilly book Lead Generation on the Web and I spoke at an Eloqua webinar entitled Reducing the Heat on the Marketing Pressure Cooker.  We had a ton of questions and didn't want the event to run over the hour allotted to it, so we offered to continue the conversation and answer the remaining questions on this Podcast.

Listen to the Podcast now.

Tom is founder of Triple Dog Dare Media and speaks often about creating offers that encourage prospects and customers to engage with your organization more deeply.

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Podcast #14 - Automating the Lead to Sales Process with Aberdeen Group

For the past couple of months the Aberdeen Group has been studying companies that automate the lead to sales process.    They just published their report, and it has some interesting results:

• 53% of companies are currently using marketing automation solutions for lead management; this number is expected to jump to 83% in the next 24 months.
• To deploy a lead management solution, 54% of survey respondents indicated the need to demonstrate a return on marketing investment (ROMI) to justify implementation.
• 62% of best-in-class companies are focused on lead scoring and lead prioritization as strategic actions to focus sales efforts and reduce the sales cycle.

I spoke to Alan Hubbard of Aberdeen to dig in to the results a bit.   Listen to the Podcast now.

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Podcast #13 - Messages that stick: An interview with Chip Heath, author of "Made to Stick"

A lot of authors have written books on copywriting, but Chip and Dan Heath have written the definitive book on crafting lasting stories.  Dan is a teacher and Chip is a Stanford professor, who has studied and analyzed hundreds of urban legends (remember the man who woke up in his ice-filled hotel bathroom to learn his kidney had just been harvested?) to determine what makes them so memorable.

The result are six concrete attributes of stories that I guarantee you'll remember. 

Listen to this Podcast I recorded with Chip for a lot more on how you can create messages that stick.

Here's a link to the urban legend catalog site I mentioned during my intro.

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Podcast #12 - Andy Sernovitz of the Word of Mouth Marketing Association

It's the holiday season, so I thought I'd offer you this bonus Podcast for your end-of-year enjoyment.  Actually, this conversation extends what Jackie Huba was saying in Podcast #11 about the Word of Mouth Marketing Association.

In this episode of The Innovative Marketer Podcast, I speak with Andy Sernovitz, head of the WOMMA, and author of the book "Word of Mouth Marketing: How Smart Companies Get People Talking."

We talk about the need for an association for word of mouth marketers, the ethics surrounding that marketing tactic, and what you can do to jumpstart your own WOM programs in 2007.

Download the Podcast to hear more.

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Podcast #11: Ben McConnell and Jackie Huba

In this episode of The Innovative Marketer Podcast, I speak with Ben McConnell and Jackie Huba of the must-read Church of the Customer blog.  They've released a new book called "Citizen Marketers: When People are the Message," and the timing of their book couldn't be better. 

Time Magazine just named their "Person of the Year" for 2006" --  and it's "You."  You're the person of the year.  Congratulations.  We talk about the implications of you being the person of the year and what social media has to do with all of it.

Download the Podcast to check out the interview.

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Podcast #10 - To Blog or Not to Blog

In this episode of The Innovative Marketer Podcast, Debbie Weil, author of The Corporate Blogging Book, talks about the important things you should consider before starting your company's blog.   

Should you blog?  Who in your company should blog?  And what should you do when your company is called out on a blogger's site?   Download the Podcast to find out.

To learn more about Debbie, you can check out her web site, subscribe to her informative newsletter, and of course, you should buy her book, a great resource for anyone in management or marketing.  If you have a corporate blog, or are interested in blogging for your company, you must read this book. Listen now. (right-click to save to your desktop).

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Podcast #9 - Ruth P. Stevens, event marketing expert

In this episode of The Innovative Marketer Podcast, I speak with Ruth P. Stevens, Columbia University business professor, consultant and author of Trade Show and Event Marketing.

Ruth Stevens, one of the most influential people in B2B marketing, according to BtoB magazine, knows a lot about lead generation.  And event marketing.  And just about every business-to-business marketing strategy you can think of.   We spoke for over an hour (but I cut it down to the best 18 minutes) about topics like how to make your trade show spend more effective and things to avoid in your outbound marketing.

Listen now. (right-click to save to your desktop).

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Podcast #8 - Jill Konrath, author of Selling to Big Companies

In this episode of The Innovative Marketer Podcast, I speak with Jill Konrath, consultant, blogger and author of the informative book Selling to Big Companies. 

Jill has the real-world business experience that makes you take notice.  She's carried a bag.  She's made the cold calls.  She's crept up to the precipice of the sales and marketing divide and looked straight down.  In this interview, she provides plain talk that will help you make some changes in your organization to better sell to large (and small) companies.

Listen now. (right-click to save to your desktop).

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Podcast #7 - Bryan and Jeffrey Eisenberg, authors of Waiting for your Cat to Bark

In this episode of The Innovative Marketer Podcast, I speak with Bryan and Jeffrey Eisenberg, two of my professional heroes in the field of marketing.

The conversation ranged and loped and went off on some odd tangents, all of which returned to the Eisenberg's central chorus of "talk to your customers like they want to be spoken to, not like you want to." Unlike many business books, you can flip to any page in this one and pick out two or three tips you can adapt and adopt in your organization today. After you listen to this Podcast, go immediately to Amazon and pick up a copy of their new book, Waiting for your Cat to Bark: Persuading Customers When they Ignore Marketing, and then add Call to Action and Persuasive Online Copywriting to your shopping cart to boot. If you want more evidence these guys know what they're talking about, check out their blog and their company.

Listen now. (right-click to save to your desktop).

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