Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category

I love reading Stowe’s blog – if nothing the brutal honesty makes me smile. Today he’s on to Scoble’s video on search. I don’t watch too much meaningful video online (but I do watch lots of trash…). Meaningful video is too binary for me. For, Stowe, watching Scoble is “like the Marx Brothers channeling Gartner”. Brilliant!

I watch the ongoing diatribe about the stupidity of PR people pitching bloggers with some frustration. Most PR people I know are very smart and get that this is all about relationships and participation – it’s not about pitching. None of them are in the blog spam game. All are overly sensitive to the bloggers wants and needs. Thus, I swing to the defense of PR pros.

Then idiots send me emails like this and I loose all faith:

…reading your blog had always being a great experience in getting the information on the technology and security specifically.

I am working with XXXX a company providing the XXXX based security solutions.We would like to know if you could use the information from our site to write the blog entry for your readers. You can visit us at XXXX to read about our company.

Your time and early response in this regards is appreciated.

name, PR Manager…

First, mirroring the email strategies of scammers and con-artists is never a good approach. Second, before entering the blogosphere, at least spend a minute figuring out how it operates. Third, treat bloggers with the same commonsense approach you would a journalist – unless you have something specific, that they are going to be specifically interested in, don’t bother them. Finally, we are not communications outlets for your messages.

What is interesting here is the same goes for ‘business blogs’. It’s equally offensive to receive pitches suggesting that I pop onto XXXX site and post on the genius of your ways.

I’m not going to paint all PR folks – or even the profession – with the same brush – it’s time we we separated the Pros from those who can’t seem to grasp the fundamentals of modern communications.

“To what?” most Americans ask. Ahhhhh. The Rugby World Cup mate!

So imagine my surprise when no less than three locals asked me today who I thought would win. I don’t think they quite expected the answer to take soooooo long.

Here’s how I see it.

1. The All Blacks: The favorites and #1 team in the Universe. Some say they are chokers at this tournament. Reality is, the format of this tournament favors the best team on the day and they have made it to the semis and finals multiple times only to be beaten by a better team on the day. This time round they are incredibly well prepared and born of new professional era that should favor them. And I’ll be in the stands cheering – so that will help.
2. Sth Africa (the Springboks): In incredible form this year and capable of stunning any big team. In my books they are equal to the All Blacks who have definitely been off form to date this year. I’m betting on an All Black vs. Sth Africa final. I hope they don’t meet before the final.
3. Australia (the Wallabies): Sorry, the Qantas Wallabies. Actually, just like the Qantas plane fleet, great but aging. Some real stars in Larkham, Mortlock and Greegan. They could beat NZ or Sth Africa on the day. I just don’t see it happening in this tournament though. But hey, they are the great upsetters of Kiwi aspirations.
4. France: Coached by “The Mouth” Laporte, the French have home field advantage but I just haven’t seen them rise to the level of the Sthrn Hemisphere teams. Don’t write them off. Laporte seems determined to piss everyone in NZ off and stir the pot.
5. England: Pathetic. Washed up. Only slightly less annoying than English commentators are the coaches who now seem interested in attacking other sides integrity rather than focusing on their woeful preparation and strategy. It’s sad – they won last time round after Australia upset NZ to make it to the final.
6. Ireland: Could surprise but aren’t looking like doing so.
7. Wales & Scotland: Will be entertaining to watch them duke it out with the big guys and fight minnows – like the USA and Fiji.

As a spectator and rugby fanatic you couldn’t ask for a better scenario. Three wickedly talented sides fighting for a slot in the final and the dark horse France looking to raise their game at home. Will be a great tournament. If you want to watch in the US try Setanta sports.

Sounds simple right. Yet so many businesses seem intent on doing just that.

Take Salesforce.com. I’ve been an avid user and fanatic for years. I love the notion of the AppExchange – the idea of integrating more applications with Salesforce as a central window into the soul and activity of customers is very, very powerful. Eloqua is a terrific example of this – you can take every web and marketing interaction and associate it with a contact in Salesforce. Cool.

Now Salesforce has always had a young and aggressive sales team so I shouldn’t have been surprised by this but we start getting messages that we’re about to run out of storage. Run out of storage? Isn’t the concept of software as a service predicated on lots of cheap storage… Really?

No, Salesforce has decided to #$%!#! it’s customers with some of the most punitive pricing I’ve ever seen. guess how much Salesforce wants for 1gig of data? Go on… bet it wasn’t $3,000. The only other solution is to upgrade to the “Unlimited Option” – which for 70 users prices Salesforce at over $200k per year. Suddenly SAS isn’t cheap, AppExchange doesn’t matter, and Oracle looks really, really interesting. Salesforce quickly becomes the last place you want to store ANY data.

One of the universal laws that makes “Don’t #$%!#! The Customer” such a terrific operating principle is – customers will #$%!#! you back with an equal if not greater force.

As I look across my spectrum of vendor and supplier relationships this rings true. I fly less with American Airlines because I can’t use my miles to fly to NZ or Australia – there is about one seat available on every Qantas flight and pretty much no upgrades.

All companies make mistakes but this is very different from #$%!#! the customer. I wandered into the anarchic Apple store at Valley Fair the other day with my dead iPod. The Genius pointed out it probably needed a “shock charge” – which pretty much seemed to me to involve plugging it in. I pointed out I’d done this and would appreciate it if he would take a closer look. The Genius forgot all about me in this process and it wasn’t till 30 minutes later when I asked what the heck was going on that he realized the error of his ways, apologized profusely, agreed that the iPod was dead, and upgraded me to a new iPod on the spot. Love the customer and you’ll get loyalty + love in return. For the same reason I fly Virgin now whenever I can – they are quick to correct mistakes and never forget you have a choice.

Don’t #$%!#! The Customer as an idea gets at a deeper “evil” or blindness that companies commit with intent. Experiencing what is happening at Salesforce got me thinking that two of the most powerful forces driving a company’s inclination to #$%!#! the customer are growth and success. They seem to spawn creed and arrogance in equal portions. Mike at Atlassian is on the right path in incorporating “Don’t #$%!#! The Customer”  into their core values. Every day companies need to remind themselves of this truth – or, run the risk of being reminded by your customers.

Ashlee says it all on the VMWare IPO. What a stunner… Citrix, not to be outdone, then turns-up its acquisition machine buying XenSource for what must be the highest multiple paid in the Valley in years… Nuts. It just makes me want to go on a crazy spending spree and buy something…. hmmm… maybe one of those new Apple keyboards?