This morning I am preparing to speak to Cisco channel managers, account managers, and channel marketing. The topic – Event Marketing. Challenging Presuppositions Years ago Tim Ferriss, Author of The 4-Hour Work Week figured out how to accomplish more in a few hours than most of his sales colleagues could accomplish in an […]
This week I am out traveling the midwest – it’s 100 degrees and climbing,…meanwhile I am taking every moment I can in the evenings to work on several great business opportunities….here’s a peek. 1. My Making Money w/ Security Class has been revamped to include more managed services selling as well as the great security […]
From Vendor to Adviser Quote: The discovery process is exactly the place to reposition you and your organization as advisers. I’ve talked about various kinds of assessments; penetration tests, vulnerability studies, optimization studies, risk analysis, proof of concept, etc. It doesn’t matter what you call it, the point is; you have access, so use it. […]
When I say educational marketing, I mean that the presentations, collateral, blog posts, etc. shed new light on subjects your prospects are interested in. One of the first educational events I personally attended (as a prospect), was just after having received great news, “Your wife is going to have a baby!” It was our first […]
My favorite marketing platform is local events. My first major lunch & learn came on the heels of moving from an IT position to a presales support role in the wide area networking (WAN) space. A major manufacturer sponsored our meeting, the marketing was taken care of by our in-house marketing person, sales people were […]
A couple of attendees emailed questions regarding competitive advantage…following Wednesday’s Cisco sponsored webinar. I thought it might be helpful to address this here: (Q) Why is Operational Efficiency or Risk Mitigation easier to sell than Competitive advantage? First, it’s important to note, I did not say you can’t sell using competitive advantage as your value […]
In 1995 Geoffrey Moore brought us ground-breaking information in his book entitled, Inside the Tornado. This book was required reading for many technology manufacturers, including HP, a strategic partner of my employer at the time. Using a standard marketing normal distribution curve, Moore showed us how market adoption changes when you start talking about technology. […]
When I first entered the technology consulting business, my new manager referred to our firm as a VAR (value added reseller). VAR! He said it with pride as though it meant something special. Coming from a large bank where we referred to our services providers as vendors and VARs, I knew this was no complement. […]
When was the last time you raised your fees? If your business still quotes T&M most of the time, now is the time to make the change. If you set fixed price fees based on estimated time, you might consider moving to “value pricing” this year. Don’t wait; it’s the New Year, meaning people are […]
Traditional thinking says that more sales will lead to a higher income. Here is one more example demonstrating the deception in this type of thinking. I frequently come across sales people working for smaller VARs, selling into small mom & pop companies. These customers don’t spend much, so the deals are smaller, yet the VAR […]
High Tech Business Growth 