Four thousand years ago, somewhere in Mesopotamia, a prescient soul texted a lover. The sender memorized some verse, stirred up some clay, unsheathed his reed stylus, etched in the cuneiform script, baked the tablet in the sun, and lugged it to his heart-struck recipient. Today, in high tech and beyond, our messages are instantaneous and electronic, but that’s not necessarily progress.

 

If we are to step off this hurtling machine, we must reassert principles that have been lost in the blur. It is time to launch a manifesto for a slow communication movement, a push back against the machines and the forces that encourage us to remain connected to them. 

Although Freeman is decrying e-mail’s tyranny, he’s not calling for its assassination:

Many of the values of the Internet are social improvements – it can be a great platform for solidarity, it rewards curiosity, it enables convenience. This is not the manifesto of a Luddite, this is a human manifesto.

The manifesto has 10 tenets. I love number one: Don’t send. Freeman doesn’t mean don’t ever send. Just don’t go out of your way to create e-mail bloat with “thanks” messages, unnecessary forwards, micro reports, or provocative statements that are sure to spark discussions better held offline. After all...

As most people now know, e-mail only creates more e-mail, so by stepping away from the messaging treadmill, even if for a moment every day, you instantly dial down the speed of the e-mail messagopolis.

Hmm, don’t send.

To see the next nine tenets of the manifesto, join me in turning off your Blackberry or iPhone and opening the book. Here, watch me turn it off… I’m turning it off ... right … now… oops, just one second.

Getting your customers to come to you with their success stories
  
A best practices award program is a contest your company/organization creates, manages and orchestrates to reward customers for outstanding product/service implementations. At the end of the contest, winners are acknowledged, creating positive visibility.
 
In addition to pleasing winning customers – deepening your partnership with them – a best practices program has a very useful residual effect: it gives you high quality references. Because customers want to participate and win, they put in the time and effort to share perspective filled with detail and ROI benefits. This kind of “pull” campaign is a welcome addition to the tedious “push” outreach to seek out and find customer references.
 
How are winners selected?
 
Success is measured using a variety of factors you determine. Some ideas include:

• innovation;
• measurable cost savings;
• productivity gains;
• process improvements;
• quality improvements;
• time savings;
• unique and innovative applications;
• anecdotal commentary about value and business impact.

• product;
• vertical market;
• application type;
• ROI;
• geographical or sales region;
• innovation categories;
• etc.

• philanthropic donation in the customer’s name to the social cause of their choice;
• dinner with customer and your CEO;
• social media buzz;
• all expense-paid trip to your annual user conference;
• “guest of honor” status at your awards dinner;
• all expenses paid vacation;
• tickets to sporting events, concerts, theatre;
• consumer electronics;
• product discounts;
• leased vehicle for one year;
• etc.

An important note: it’s important to do the right thing for each customer, factoring in ethical considerations, timing, relationship subtleties, politics, economic realities and organizational cultures when assessing prizes and compensation.

How do I do it?

Follow these 10 steps to a successful best practices program:

1. Create a small team to drive the effort.
2. Gather to discuss the concept. Create submission and measurement criteria. Brainstorm a catchy program name, categories and awards. Consider existing customer touch-points to launch the program (i.e. user conferences; seminars; webinars; etc.). Discuss the viability of using sponsors. Work in enough lead time to solicit entries and select winners.
3. Create digital overview creatively describing the program, process, prizes and payoff.
4. Get it out there 6-9 months – possibly 12 months - in advance of your deadline.
5. Engage your sales force and other customer-facing employees to send reminders, field questions and encourage customers to participate. Incent your people to deliver customer entries.
6. Create an area on your Web site to promote the program. Use social media to inform and promote.
7. Gather submissions; appoint objective judges to evaluate and determine winners. Judges can include past winners (once the program is off the ground); current customers, industry analysts, luminaries, partners and bloggers. Share submissions with the evaluation team.
8. Select the winners and get the awards in motion.
9. Announce the winners and prizes at your Best Practices event.
10. Promote the winners and case studies via social media, your Web site and in other ways.  

In a new study that's sure to give Twitter critics more ammo, Rutgers University researchers reveal that the majority of Twitter users remain self-absorbed tweeters. The study divided 350 Twitter users into two camps: informers (who post informative tweets) and meformers (who post mainly personal updates). Eighty percent of us fall into the latter camp.

While some might interpret these findings as a setback for using Twitter as marketing and community-building mechanism, it's not really. Self-indulgence can be a powerful motivator. It's all in how you leverage that tendency to shape your campaign.

1. Relate to your audience – We’re all attracted to ideas and messages that support our own core values and beliefs. Understand what will hit home with the people you’re trying to persuade; what will turn them on and off. Don’t try to persuade them about something they’ll instinctively reject. Find common ground first. Gain goodwill by highlighting values the audience and communicator hold in common.
2. One-to-one still rules – Whenever you have the chance to establish rapport face-to-face … do it. In-person communication is still the best. Be very conscious of non-verbal codes of communication, i.e., the body language you convey. It’s not just what you say, but how you say it.
3. Be logical – Effective persuasion is thoughtfully supported… so use facts and compelling evidence. But don’t over-do it. Facts alone do not persuade.
4. Offer up social proof – Third parties viewed as independent and objective are inherently perceived as more credible. This approach supports our natural tendency to determine if something is true by instinctively finding out what other people think (especially people we respect).
5. Repeat yourself – Saying it once doesn’t cut it. All the research shows persuasion works best when you sustain a concise message over time. The other key is to communicate in different ways, not just one way. Figure out what will resonate best with your target audience.
6. Package it up – We all have short attention spans. We glance, barely notice, skip and skim. Take complicated thoughts and ideas and wrap them with bright paper and a shiny bow. Use simple messages, colorful analogies, bold statements, catchy phrases. Package up your thoughts…make top 10 lists, write captions, create slogans.
7. Visualize it – Find ways to visually convey messages with symbols and images. American patriots used this technique way back during the Revolutionary War – drawing a cut-up rattlesnake, for example – to convey the need to mobilize and unify the founding states. This concept holds true today. People “get it” more quickly when they see a picture. There’s never been a better time for a visual approach, thanks to the Internet.
8. Use emotion – People are persuaded when they experience something. Envelop persuasive messages – and the people delivering them – in such a away that people feel, as well as hear, your message. 
9. Keep it light – Life (and business) is serious stuff; many people are tired, concerned, skeptical, nervous and scared. Make your case by lightening up. People will relax and listen better.
10. Tell stories – Facts are important, but they’re not enough. Get your point across by telling stories. Develop characters, build narrative, create drama, make it real. If you’re talking about a new product, paint colorful pictures of how your product will make lives more interesting and overcome challenges. Help them envision the better place it will take them to.
11. Don’t be myopic – Studies repeatedly prove that people opposed to an idea are more likely to be persuaded to an opposing position when presented with both sides of an issue.
    
    
12. Convey competence – Make sure people understand your experience and insight. Don’t brag about it; just share it at appropriate moments in a low-key way.
     
13. Be confident – Persuasive communications aren’t hesitant, they’re confident. Convey enthusiasm and conviction.

 

• builds two-way communication with your customers
• creates a persona that’s three dimensional vs. one dimensional
• an otherwise stilted brand can become approachable
• it’s arguably the most personal form of communication  
• gives your company a voice
• creates transparency and builds trust
• more real time than traditional communication  
• triggers a conversation that builds community over time
• imparts authenticity
• yada yada yada

Before explaining how blogging plays a central role in generating sales leads, I emphasized the need to get search engine optimization (SEO) right. That’s where the journey should begin. SEO and blogging go together; they're buddies. Once the SEO foundation is laid, a company can move forward with blogging which is one of the best ways to create pages that are keyword dense and optimized.

Remember that blogging isn’t an occasional thing; you need to do it often enough to build an authentic voice and aura of authority. That typically means daily or at least weekly. Nothing looks worse than a withering blog without a post for weeks or months.