There's been so much crap written about "everything 2.0", yet I've seen scant discussion, that is to say that there's really been NO discussion, on what "Sales 2.0" really means for the discipline of sales and marketing.

I've been thinking about this a lot lately. I'm delivering a course at a local tech college on Wednesday that's titled "Better Selling Through Technology", but that's really a user-friendly name for the bigger agenda of starting to spread the word on "Sales 2.0".

What changes in Sales 2.0? Well, I think there are a few key things. Keep in mind, this is a working document, so bear with me, not everything's gonig to hold water at this point.

Sales 2.0

General themes:
- Sales reps have more control over the tools that they use; the CIO no longer makes one-size-fits-all technology decisions for the sales force
- Sales reps are taking customer communications into their own hands and to an entirely new level. Starting their own blogs, engaging in social networking and generally putting a friendlier face, theirs, on the corporate message.
- Web-app based mission critical tools such as instant messaging, salesforce.com, virtual assistants and online project management tools.
- Free or nearly free services as reliable, relied upon, enterprise tools. Free conference calls, blogging software and other free enablers, which once carried some stigma or were thought unreliable are enabling a new class of sales executive 2.0.
- Always on sales people. Broadband penetration among the ranks of sales professionals is much higher than even five years ago when we all 'dialed in' at the end of the day to check email. This opens up new possibilities for connectivity and real-time interaction
- Voice and email on par with one another. Blackberries and Treos now accompany many salespeople out into their rounds in the field. Customers have come to expect the same response time from whatever communique they send your way.
- End-user power. It's no longer just he buyer that's got influence. When innovation and ideas come from all over the enterprise, you never know when you next sale-influencer will come from.

Areas affected by Sales 2.0:
- Voice communications (VOIP, cell, Skype)
- Sales rep availability (always on)
- Conference calling (free)
- Sales force automation (web based)
- Customer communication (blogging, email)
- Customer community (wiki, jotspot)
- Project management
- Messaging
- email (mobile)
- IM (in office, sidekick, etc)
- Pre-call planning / customer research
- Collaboration (internal blogs, wikis, IM)
- Collateral (real time, PDF, POD (print on demand)
- Document authoring (web document authoring)

Sales 2.0 Vendor List:
- Storyquest
- Zimbra
- Skype
- Vonage
- Salesforce.com
- Sugar CRM
- Basecamp
- TypePad

Pre-call planning:
- I can remember back 7 years ago when it was a real novelty to research companies on the internet before a sales call. Between Yahoo and Hoovers there wasn't much you couldn't find, and it was really all you needed going in. Now, pre-call planning has moved from an episodic research endeavor to an ongoing conversation monitoring art. Sure, Hoovers is still relevant, but now we have Technorati, to keep up on the blog conversation about our customers (and us) and Google news alerts along with your prospects' RSS feeds. Now, pre call planning is not part of the evening ritual, it's an ongoing part of a sales executive's job description.

> Enablers:
- Google news alerts
- RSS feeds & aggregators
- NewsGator, Bloglines
- Technorati.com search feeds.

Availability:
- The day has arrived that customers have come to expect persistent availability. Asking customers to try your office, your cell phone, your pager or whatever other phone number you have is often too much to ask. Once only within reach of large corporations with enterprise phone systems, everyone from the medium size sales force to the solo sales rep can now take advantage of services that aggregate phone service, voicemail, call forwarding , fax and virtual PBX service for one low price.

> Enablers:
- Vonage for basic voice over IP, call forwarding and retrieving messages through emailed MP3 attachments or from anywhere via a dial in number. You can even get different vonage numbers for each local that you serve, making it a local call for your customers.
- GotVMail Communications offers an virtual PBX, fax, call forwarding and a wide array of additional virtual services such as virtual assistant starting at less than $10 per month.
- Onebox.com (J2 company...owners of Jfax)
- http://www.virtualpbx.com/

VOIP:
- Sure, Vonage is great, but it's not portable. Skype is. I recently talked to a friend who's a college recruiter working from his home office who is using Skype almost exclusively. Whether he's in a hotel, a coffee house, his own house, or visiting friends near the beach, his office phone is never more than a boot-up a way. Moreover, Skype now offers call forwarding, so if you happen to be using a cell phone or land line and don't have Skype turned on, it will forward to any number you choose.

> Enablers:
- Skype - www.skype.com
- Also, Gizmo Project

RESOURCES:
http://www.alwayson-network.com/comments.php?id=P14914_0_4_0_C
http://www.nickdenton.org/002173.html
http://www.evhead.com/2005/04/running-your-company-on-web-apps.asp
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_2.0
http://www.americanbusinessmedia.com/assnfe/ev.asp?MODE=&SNID=945900684&ID=77

I was doing my annual reading of Ted Levitt's Marketing Myopia this week and got to thinking about the whole process of product development and what business certain companies are really in.

Not sure where this came from, but gas stations are one of the places that I just loathe. They think they're in the business of dispensing fuel and, save for the convenience store movement, which was a marginal improvement over just pumps, they've not changed much. I'm not sure that I'll be able to redefine their business, but here's a few things I was thinking of that would just make things better. Hell, it might change their

...Get better coffee. Shell or BP or someone should partner with Starbucks or Peets or someone. Gas station coffee is notoriously horrible. Why not do something about it, promote it, and raise your margins a bit. Put a major recognized brand in place, not some shitty house brand that's no different than folgers.

...Put air hoses with built in tire pressure gauges at every pump, and charge for it. Mario Andretti and Michelin are all over the TV with their 'inflate your tires' safety message, yet there's one air hose hidden behind the building that only works 1/2 of the time. Why not become the "Volvo" of convenience stores and promote safety, quality and efficient transportation. Won't you join us, my ass. Put some muscle into it. And, charge me for the privilege of pumping up my tires, or ask me when I'm done filling up, like you do when you want me to buy a car wash. What do I need more, fuel economy & safety or a car wash?

...Put Purell dispensers next to the toweling and window washer. I hate the way that my hands smell when I get done pumping gas and I'm sure I'm not alone. How am I supposed to eat that pastry I just bought if my hands smell like fuel?

I'm sure that there's more, but there's a few ideas...if someone did those, I'd certainly get loyal real quick!

It only comes around every four years, and after all of the NBC hype dies off, usually within the first couple of days, there's a void that could easily be filled with a well timed event, press release or some other marketing opportunity that draws on the energy of the Olympics.

I got a message today through an online networking group referring to a 'local' wine reseller that was doing a "free tour of wines from the Piedmont Province of Italy, which is home to Turin." What a beautiful concept. Simply beautiful!

Yeah, I know, the big brands like Visa are all over this, so, why aren't you? In fact, many big brands bypassed the ultra-expensive Superbowl ads this year and focused on doing an entire campaign, and a more cost-effective one, around the 2006 Winter Olympics.

Here's a few thoughts:

- A coffee shop that offers special drinks named after a different event for the remainder of the 17 days and nights of the games.
- Hometowns of olympic athletes getting together with the chamber of commerce to celebrate the occasion in their establishments
- A grocery store that highlights a section of products that are of Italian heritage or that are olympic sponsors
- Sporting goods stores that capitalize on the brand names used at the olympics (skis, snowboards, etc)
- Sports bars that have "Olympic parties" similar to football parties during football season
- Local gyms that run promotions for classes or workouts that highlight the muscles used in each of the different events
- Local bookstores and libraries that set aside special sections of books on the Olympics and on the Olympic sports in general - special discounts on any books written by Olympic athletes.
- How about a cross of a health club teaching people how to participate in these winter events and giving away recipes for "healthy" Italian dishes.
- An import shop could highlight items from medal-winning countries.
- Local breweries could do a 'medal winner beers from around the world' special

I'm sure there are more. The bottom line here is that you still have almost 10 days to put something together. If that's not enough time, the next olympics are coming up in Beijing in 2008. That should give you plenty of time to plan!

Technorati Tags: Advertising, olympics

BMW drives into audio book podcasts
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Mediocrity by "areas of improvement"
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TechCrunch » A Taste of DEMO 2006
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Job hunting online complicated by the feds [via Virtual Handshake blog]
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Don't litter [via AdRants]
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Technorati Tags: audio blogging, podcasts

The SRI conference last week wasn't just about blogging. As such, there were several people there from the social networking space which I had the pleasure to meet. Ohad Jehassi, an HBS graduate and founder of friendsand.com, and online social networking and dating site, has combined the best of AOL style chat, locked pictures (amazing what you can learn from the adult industry) and a host of other features to make his dating/social networking service so unique. It's only been out a few months and there are already over 300,000 members.

I asked Ohad about where he thought RSS fit into the scheme of online dating. His site does not offer anything in the way of RSS. From what I gather from most folks, RSS has not yet permeated the online dating space in a big way at all.

The big idea here is that if I were looking for a certain type of person, I'd want an IRSS feed (individualized RSS) that feeds me custom results anytime someone that matchs my profile submits a new profile or updates a profile, or posts a video cast or podcast about themselves on the dating site.

We also talked at length about how the adult industry leads the way in many areas online. Perhaps that's what Hugh meant by Business Porn.

Just a quick blurb on a synthesis of ideas today. Decker mentioned the tactic of 'selling down' when he got a recent traffic violation, which makes me wonder how we could get everyone to own elephants (or, whatever your "elephant" is) by lowering the barriers for the average consumer. Because you all know why YOU don't own an elephant.

I liken this to where we're at with RSS adoption. We need to LOWER all of the barriers to adopting this technology. I know, I know, we're on the way there. But seriously, we need low barriers to encourage adoption.

Action: What item/category/product/service could you lower the barrier on to encourage trial and adoption?

Holy shit. This is sweet. "amabuddy" (Amazon Buddy?) allows you to call a phone # and enter the ISBN or UPC on a book or CD and get the Amazon lowest price and lowest used price, right over the phone. Cool.

I'm out at Pheedo's offices this week for a round of meetings and it seems that Bill has a line on all of the best cafes in town. I love it! We were at a home-town place this morning called 'Ann's Sunshine Cafe' where, get this - there are four shelves of mugs on the wall - all with this Ann's logo and all with the patrons' names printed on them. Wow - holy personalization and loyalty. Which got me to thinking that all of this stuff about 'the third place' and our 20/30 X-something coffee shop generation is really nothing special. People have been doing this for years...only in the mornings :)

Interesting as it was, I found this piece on Wired this morning even more interesting. Connecting people who are ultra-connected (via the internet) yet disconnected to the general atmosphere and conversation in the place by virtue of their staring at a computer screen. I'm 100% guilty of this. I go to coffee shops "to work", not to converse with people. However, it seems that the folks behind PlaceSite are trying to connect us 'computer zombies' dwelling behind our laptop screens in coffee shops.

I don't buy it. Perhaps this granola, coffee shop tech-savvy generation should get low tech. Really, how hard is it to look up from your screen and see who's around you and walk over and chat...or if you're in a proper cafe, just shout across the room to them like we were this morning, and like the morning coffee-clutch club has been doing for ages.

The NY Times has published a report on the specific actions that it will likely take to improve the credibility of the publication.

There are a number of universal lessons in this report.

[via Buzzmachine]

Fast Company magazine recently launched a "sales and marketing" page on its website, edited by Mr. Heath Row, who invited Cool News editor Tim Manners to become a monthly columnist! The idea is to put a narrative around some of the insights that drift out of the chaos that is Cool News. Please also be sure to take the poll on "pop-up shops" that goes along with the essay, and post your comments in the Fast Company blog, too.

Jennifer over at Brand Mantra has been drawing parallels this week between business and marketing, and the currently ongoing TDF. As a cyclist, I appreciate her insights.

However, some of the analogies are weak, such as this article from Motley Fool on staying mid pack. Seriously folks, how often is Lance out in front pulling, and how often do your sprinters take pulls at the front for the hell of it. Answer: Mid-pack, or in the peleton, is the best place to rest, conserve energy, and plot your course, without the nagging pressure of being out in front, and having someone nab you from behind.

I answered these two questions in the most recent issue of Cincom's Expert Access newsletter.

Question 1: I'm in Marketing. IT doesn't get it. They can't or won't respond quick enough for our internet marketing strategy. In short … they’re non-creative geek-weenies.

Question 2: I'm in IT. They're KBs! (knuckle-boneheads). They are never realistic when it comes to their expectations. My budget has been shrunk 40% (which they don’t seem to care about or consider) and they don't even include me in their online marketing strategy until they need it executed.

[via Cincom Expert Access]

Eliyon has apparently built up a 15.7 million profile database of business people profiles simply by scraping publicly available information on websites and in press releases.

It's being called "The Recruiters Encyclopedia."

Mike @ TechDirt first alerted me to this one.
http://techdirt.com/articles/20030922/022235.shtml

Business 2.0's "Future Boy" article Beyond the Browser says that only reason we all still use web browsers is because "most of us don't know of any other way to access the Net-based information we so desperately crave."

The point of that statement is that what we really seek is knowledge and information, and precious few of view the web browser as the 'end game' in terms of where the information we seek is destined for, and what it is to do for us. Simply put, the web browser is a 'means to an end', the lesser of all evils that we have to endure when scouring the Internet for information. Moreover, this can be said of many corporate ERP, Data Warehouse, CRM, and Business Intelligence systems. We would rather not deal with a host of cumbersome UI's, but rather, we would prefer that the data 'meet us in our medium.'

That last statement, meet them in their medium, is a staple in my mission for Sales Technology at KI for next 2 years. Customers should not be forced to use the browser, and our sales force should not be tethered to the laptop when it comes to accessing sales pipeline, order status, and customer intelligence data. It is our job, as sales and marketing support professionals, to meet our 'customers' (internal and external) in their medium of choice. Whether that be computing devices in your home -- your PDA, your cell phone, a web kiosk in the library, your internet enabled nav system in you car, or your digital entertainment center.

The foundation of this strategy lies in a multipurpose content strategy. Content MUST be created irrespective of the medium for which it is intended, but for the information value it can provide across media. Not surprisingly, this is NOT an issue of technology, but rather an issue of culture. Getting print folks away from Quark and web folks to get out of Dreamweaver will not be easy.

Stay tuned for more on this as we draw closer to Seybold!