Marketing

John Dodd has a  great post HERE. The following snippets align with Agile/Lean development and user stories.

• Meet a customer need
• Lucid two-way communication
• Think of the "product" in terms of
  • What it does not how it does
  • What most people will be happy doing
  • Speed and multiple settings may be hot
    • Outside such attributes may not provide the greatest satisfaction
• Only you RTFM
  • Regular people don’t read the manual
• Technical Support is marketing
• Blinding with science is as bad as baffling with bullshit
 Read more...

Not in the usual sense of the word, I am now hearing this as a synonym for “training materials”.  As in,

Our field sales reps need to learn about the new SQL Server 2008 product.  Is there any readiness for it they can download?

more Microspeak here

Network World recently interviewed me for their "Prediction Week" podcast series:

As part of our Prediction Week of podcasts, we talk with Daniel Chait from Lab49 (pictured) about the top trends in Web application, development and outsourcing for 2008. Find out whether this year will be the SOA Hangover, and how offshoring will change during the year (18:37).

Listen to the podcast here.

I recently received this unsolicited email in response to a job ad I posted.  In that ad, as in all ads, I specifically state that I do not want to be contacted by recruiters or agents, principals only.  Nonetheless, I get this gem:

Good Afternoon,

Although it says on your posting not to contact you, I will make this brief.  If you do use Staffing companies to fill your job openings, please consider us.  We are a permanent placement company with extremely competitive rates willing to negotiate to get your business.  If you should need some assistance, please don’t hesitate to call.

 Read more...

Yesterday I spent the morning over at Microsoft’s offices recording a podcast chat with Joe’s (Rubino and Cleaver).

We covered a wide range of topics within Finance and Technology and as always with those two it was fun and interesting as well.

When it’s available online I’ll post a link here.

I was recently discussing Lab49’s tagline (”Innovation on Demand”), which I quite like. First, it has a nice, balanced look and it rolls easily off the tongue. Second, it effectively encapsulates two very important aspects of our business; “Innovation” refers to our ability to engage with challenging customer problems and create novel solutions, while “on Demand” speaks to our customers’ ability to “tap in” to our power when they need it, get the job done, and move on to other things.  Read more...

Here at Lab49 the founders take pride in the fact that as a company we are very easy to work with. Being easy to work with is an important dimension for measuring potential technology vendors that is often overlooked. Recently I have been working with quite a few vendor products and one particular experience has reminded me of the importance of of this critical dimension.  Read more...

Modern technology has made it possible for customers to radically change their approach towards marketing. As a result of which, customers are shying away from conventional media to the new cyber space.

How important is blogging?

Blogging is fast becoming a powerful instrument in the creative course. Blogs, be it official blogs (corporate blogs) or unofficial blogs and PR are the essential features of corporate communication. Both these aspects help shape a company’s brand name and reputation. Yet, they seem to be working against each other. Blogs are discussions between the customer and the company. They are casual conversations that are based on developing practices. If done right, blogging can help civilize a company.

Official or corporate blogs act as a direct medium for communication and information sharing within a corporate community. They are considered to be outrageous and provocative. On the other hand, some people visualize blogs as an “open-source marketplace” for ideas. Blogs allow people to reveal issues and concepts to a worldwide audience and talk about them analytically. However, blogs are deceivingly tricky to control. If done wrong, you could not only humiliate yourself, but you could also alienate potential customers as well as end up with a lawsuit.

There are a large number of banks that use blogs internally as a direct means to encourage communication and dispense information, including some that persuade users to share criticisms, ideas and requests of internal information technology systems. Blogs are used to share research and information. They provide a multiple perspective with ideas flowing to and fro. Technology companies were the first to get into business blogging. Microsoft and IBM have many bloggers writing for specific audiences.

Given below is a short list of blogs supported by organizations

The World Bank blogs

Jim Highsmith makes some interesting statements and recommendations in his book – this is a must-read as it also has many real-life anecdotes and other industry/acedemic references. The top-line summary is that any company in the marketplace has demands to continually innovate while facing pressures to reduce costs, and to deliver in a reliable manner. [...]

I found this article while looking at the services Ogilvy (the ad, marketing, PR, etc agency) provides. It discusses how the entire blogsphere (blogs, wikis, podcasts, etc) should (or could) be used for formal corporate marketing, and some of the guiding principles for their use.