Archive for October, 2010

Pumpkins, Spices, and Seasonal Marketing

Ah yes, fall is finally here. I just love when the seasons change. The temperature has dropped and as the leaves begin to change colors, the air seems to have a new, crisp smell to it. I pull out my coziest  sweaters and decorate my door with an autumnal wreath, but it doesn’t really feel like fall until I have a Starbuck’s Pumpkin Spice Latte in my hands. Okay, so I’ll admit it, I am incredibly susceptible to seasonal products. Come December, I won’t rest until I have the Edy’s brand pink, Limited Edition, Peppermint Ice Cream piled in a bowl in front of me. The sad thing is, I don’t necessarily even enjoy the seasonal products as much as I enjoy the idea of them. In fact, every time I take my first sip of my Pumpkin Spice Latte in the fall, I remember that I do not like the flavor.

So how did Starbucks convince me that their Pumpkin Spice Latte is an integral part of fall?  Well, the drink makes me think of pumpkin patches and hayrides and pumpkin pie, and ultimately it reminds me of celebrating the holidays with my family as a child. I associate their product with precious memories.

You don’t have to be a multi-billion dollar business, like Starbucks, to take advantage of seasonal marketing techniques. So, how can small online businesses utilize seasonal marketing techniques to increase sales? Here are a few ideas:

• Change the website appearance to reflect the holiday/season. This could mean changing the color scheme or adding an image or phrase.
• Create special limited-time offers for certain seasons or holidays.
• Make it easy for website visitors to donate to a charity that is related to the season/holiday.

Have you made seasonal changes to your website that have benefited your business? What worked for you?

Tweet This Post

Archive for October, 2010

Lego Models: The New Windows Phone 7

Anyone checked their homepage recently? Anyone have an iGoogle homepage?(Wonder if they ripped that off Apple…?) NO? Well if you do, you know you can customize it and get various news feeds from different news sources.

I have a PC World news feed on my homepage and when I was looking at it this morning, the headline said Microsoft sends out Windows Phone 7 Mockups Made Of…Lego Bricks. So, I clicked on it and found this article. PC World speculated that the Microsoft folks were inspired by the Lego iPad, shown here. I don’t think so. Looking at the photos provided by Engadget, the Lego version of the Windows Phone 7 is one ugly thing. The picture of the real one shown in the photo looks way cooler than the Lego model.  According to PC World’s article , the new Windows Phone 7 launches in New York(Figures,the day someone launches a cool tech product in DC, I will show up to that event.) on October 11, of this year. PC World is still speculating on the list of carriers for the phone, but the list includes all four major US cellphone companies.  The phone manufacturer is still unknown, but the list includes HTC, Toshiba, Samsung, LG and Dell to name a few.

So what exactly is the Windows Phone 7?  PC World has a neat little slideshow explaining that.(Quick little shout out to PC World, you guys are great!) Some of the highlights:

• a mobile Windows Office
• the only(currently) Xbox live app on a phone
• the phone lets you manage its content from the web
• makes it easier to find your lost

The rest is just what every other phone can do. Why buy it? I have no idea. Because it’s new and shiny? Because you’re an early adopter? Because you do a lot of work on your phone? Surprisingly enough, I couldn’t find a PC World article that dealt with that issue. If anyone has a good reason for buying this phone, let me know.

Extra!(because this post is way too short)

Want more Lego models? These sites have some incredible and strange ones.

Popular Mechanics: I liked the Lego Difference Engine and the Lego Air Conditioner(which actually works!)

Huffington Post: I liked the Lego Capitol, the Lego Man(actually Iron Man, but made out of Lego’s),Milk and Lego’s( is that actually milk in that Lego glass?), and the Lego Soccer Stadium(someone had way too much time on their hands)

Mashable: I didn’t know the Twitter mascot was named Ollie. I’d like to see the Google logo made out of Lego’s in a museum somewhere. See the iPhone unpacking slideshow(Mashable has a link) and the Google Chrome Logo video is epic.

Anyone else feel like a five year old watching/looking at these?

Tweet This Post

Archive for October, 2010

Google's Next Game Changer: Google TV?

I was reading this article in the USA Today the other day about how Google’s next big product launch this Fall is going to be Google TV.  Google TV promises to bring a more user-friendly web interface to our TVs than the consumers in this country have ever seen.  Google’s vision seems to be to offer up web content side-by-side with the same television programs that we have been watching for years. Google also plans to offer an “app store” where consumers can buy free and paid applications that can run on the set-top boxes that will also be required to use this new service.

Whenever I think of the Internet on my TV I always think of those annoying wireless keyboards and terrible user interface that I have been finding in hotel rooms for over a decade for a $5 per day fee.  I always thought that the major flaw in these systems was the terrible user experience – it is always very difficult to navigate the web on these systems because of the lack of a usable mouse and the slightly different web browsers that never seemed to support the web content I wanted to see.  Google seems to be promising a solution to these problems by simplifying the browser and keyboard and supporting all standard web technologies.

I am still going to wait until I am able to use the new Google TV interface to form my opinion but I am hopeful that if any company can successfully bring the Internet to our TVs that it is Google.  If they can convince consumers that the Internet on their TV is the same or comparable to the Internet on their PCs, then I think they have a good shot at being successful here.

On a side note, I also wanted to mention that today Skype announced that they have released a version of their product that is compatible with Android, the up and coming operating system for smart phones. Watch for the popularity of these mobile video calling applications to grow in the near future!

Tweet This Post

Archive for October, 2010

A New Entreperneur's Motto: Try to Win Each Day

Marty Schotenheimer giving small businesses and startups inspiration

So as many of you may know, I am from the Cleveland/Akron area and a lifelong Browns fan.  Yes, I am celebrating Sunday’s first victory of the season, but that is another story.  My point is the great former Browns coach Marty Schottenheimer used to tell his team – “Try to win every play.” I believe his thinking was, forget the first half or second half or all 60 minutes of the game.  Break the game of football down to the smallest element and that is each play.  Win each play, and you increase your chances of winning the game.  It really is a good way of looking at the game of football.

The Entrepreneur’s Dilemma: This got me to thinking about the overwhelming odds that most entrepreneurs, startups and small businesses face.  We are up against larger companies, better funded competitors, new products being launched every day and the challenge of just trying to get our names out and keeping our customers happy.  These and the many additional challenges that entrepreneurs face every day can be overwhelming.   They often drown even the strongest and most driven people who take the entrepreneurship plunge.

Just one of these challenges is entrepreneurs, startups and small businesses are faced with being pulled in every direction.   The job of focusing is so difficult (as we discussed previously).  How many of you can not even send an email out or quickly resolve a customer inquiry without being interrupted a hundred times?  We get half way through a three line email and it takes us two hours to get the rest of the email completed and by the time we are done we do not remember what we were responding to in the first place.

A New Approach? So taking Schottenheimer’s football quote, lets try to apply it to our small businesses and startups.  How do you win each play as an entrepreneur?  Here are some tips for us to try:

1) What do you control? Refocus your lens on the issues, tasks, projects and deliverables that are under your control. Forget the rest or at least do not spend a lot of time on items that are outside of your control for your business.

2) What can you attack? Make a daily list of these issues, tasks, projects and deliverables that are under your control and attack them in bite sized pieces.

3) What small steps can I take? The reminder is do not focus on trying to get everything accomplished at one time.  That approach will get you overwhelmed. Instead, take small steps each day and the snowballing effect of this forward motion will eventually help you make progress on your list.

4) What is my daily plan? Take time for an “internal huddle” each morning to plan out your day and what items you want to accomplish for your business.  Even if it is just you taking 5 minutes, it will be worth it.  The alternative is just jumping into the day and letting your emails, telephone calls and employees dictate what you do.  Fight that urge.  The huddle helps you assert some degree of control of your day as Inc Magazine discussed here.

5) How can I give 110%? By concentrating on these smaller steps and items that you control, that should help you really focus your efforts and energy on particular tasks.  That then helps you concentrate your efforts so you can do the best job possible on that task.  This is much better than being distracted and trying to still make progress on these tasks.

6) What is my daily progress? Repeat, repeat and repeat.  And oh yeah, also measure your progress too by giving yourself a scorecard of what you get done.  That way you can track how well you are doing.

Because I am such a huge Browns fan (and I also want us all to succeed at KikScore!), I am going to commit myself to taking these steps to see if I truly can win each day.  I will let you know what progress I make.

Please let us know how you “win each day!”

Tweet This Post

Archive for October, 2010

Searching for the Nonexistent Website

You’re in the mood for Chinese food tonight. You use Google to pull up a list of several Chinese restaurants in your area. The name of a particular restaurant grabs your interest. The phone number and address are listed, but you want to know more. Do they have steamed dumplings? Is the setting formal or casual? Why haven’t you heard of this place before? You don’t see a website for the restaurant, but you figure they must have one, so you continue searching. Fifteen minutes have passed and even though you have read several reviews of the restaurant, you still haven’t found the website. You still don’t know if they have steamed dumplings! At this point you’re annoyed, and hungry! Why don’t they have a website? They must be unprofessional, behind the times, or just lazy. You don’t waste any more time on this restaurant.  You pick the next restaurant on the list, one that is linked to a website.

Does this sound familiar to you? Have you ever spent far too much time searching the Internet for a particular website, only to discover that…there is no website? Maybe you were looking for a doctor’s office, a plumber, or a Chinese restaurant. How did you feel when this happened? I feel beyond irritated in such scenarios. A product of my Internet-dependent generation (18- to 29-year-old “Millennials”), I’m accustomed to accessing an absurd amount of information and services with the click of a button. Using the Internet, I can learn a language, view satellite imagery, and even find my soul mate,  but I can’t get an accurate profile of what services/products a company offers its customers! Am I asking too much of small businesses? Is there a generational divide here? What do you think?

Tweet This Post

Archive for October, 2010

What Makes a Good Partnership for Your Business

No matter what type of product or service your business provides, the question of partnerships will come up.  There are several types of structures a partnership can take,  but it usually breaks down into two real forms: Complementary and Marketing.  Complementary relationships focus on offering a service to an existing platform (and group of potential customers for your business).  Marketing relationships is really just an offshoot of that, but the focus is less on filling a need than attracting the attention of an audience. 

Which is right for your business really depends on your product and the potential audience.  For example, we here at KikScore just announced an integration with Shopster.  To us, it really is an ideal arrangement.  First off, it broadens the awareness of our product and has been generating a lot  of new customers.  But it also filled a need for Shopster — providing a cutting edge trust/security service for its platform customers.  In other words, we’re providing a service that is needed to a customer base that we both want to reach. 

Sounds pretty straightforward, right?  But it’s not.  You need to find the right partner.  Our integration and relationship with Shopster would never be successful if we didn’t share the same view about customer service and quality. It’s hard enough to build concencus with your own team, but unless you communicate well with your partner, and are on the same page, things can get really difficult.

We’re feeling pretty good about our newest partnership, and we’re excited about the buzz it’s creating, but it only reinforces all the preparation and deliberation we took in working with Shopster.  So here’s to partnerships and finding the right one.  We feel we did.

Tweet This Post