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Archive for June, 2011



Max Fose

06/21/2011

Lessons from Apple Stores: It’s About the Customer, Stupid
12:01 pm by Max Fose

Last week, the Wall Street Journal uncovered some of the secrets of Apple’s success in a long piece headlined, “Secrets from Apple’s Genius Bar: Full Loyalty, No Negativity.”

I actually think my headline captures the lessons better. It’s about the customer and training your employees to think about the customer.

At the core of Apple’s in-store success are three things:

  1. Customer interaction
  2. Staff training
  3. Attention to detail

I don’t know about you, but that sounds pretty much like every business success story I’ve ever heard or read.

What was really interesting was what the Journal called Apple’s “unusual sales philosophy,” to help customers solve problems. Quoting from the employee manual:

“Your job is to understand all of your customers’ needs — some of which they may not even realize they have.”

As a consumer, I can tell you that’s dead on.

As a business owner, I can tell you that’s what I want from my colleagues.

Get that, and you’re a winner. (Just like your customers.)

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David Haase

06/10/2011

Email Etiquette: Do cc:’d People Need to Respond?
11:51 am by David Haase

It happens bazillions of times a day.

Worker No. 1 sends an email addressed to Worker No. 2 and cc:s Workers No. 3-6. (Or worse, No. 1 sends it to multiple addressees AND cc:s even more.)

So, who is responsible for responding? Just the primary addressee? Or all of the cc:s as well?

It’s an epidemic of CYA, for sure. As the email sender, if I don’t leave anyone out, no one can blame me for not seeking their input/informing them.

Well, all right, but who’s responsible for answering. (Generally, the more people listed, the fewer answers generated. Everyone assumes everyone else is taking care of it.)

I say, only addressees need to respond. If multiple addressees are listed, coordinate. Everyone can just ignore it.

What do you say?

No Comments

Paul McKay

06/08/2011

Let’s Get Over ‘Above/Below the Fold’
12:39 pm by Paul McKay

People scroll.

They have for a long time (and for a lot of reasons), so let’s get over the talk about whether content should appear above or below the “fold”.

The fold people are talking about comes from a dying, dead tree-based technology, i.e., newspapers. News above the fold, i.e., the top half of the front page of the newspaper, was considered more important than news below the fold.

We’re not doing newspapers anymore.

No question, early eye tracking studies like this one showed two things:

1. The natural preference of English-speaking peoples to read from top to bottom and left to right, which led to the “F” rules.

2. Content that appears below the first screen (there’s that below the fold thing) was rarely seen because early Web users did NOT scroll.

    Well, they scroll now. Blogs taught them that. Smartphones with tiny screens and long lists of options taught digital screen users how easy it is to scroll.

    One of our favorite usability experts, Jakob Nielsen, gave his blessing to scrolling more than a year ago based on his research and eye tracking.

    That said, The Most Critical Information should still appear at the top. That’s common sense, not Web site design.

    Second, home pages and section pages ARE different from secondary pages, which tend to (and should) be devoted to single topics and greater detail. That’s where scrolling is more likely to occur.

    So, let it go. It’s OK to scroll.

    Right?

    No Comments

    Paul McKay

    06/06/2011

    Social Media Specialists a Dying Breed?
    11:11 am by Paul McKay

    Lately, talk among our colleagues has turned to the question of whether “social media gurus” have a future.

    Our quick answer is, no and yes.

    Social media experts — people who ONLY consult on which social platform to use and how to use it — had a future only as long as social media was a sideshow.

    Those sideshow days are long gone.

    Social media have become another tool in the digital communications toolbox. Like Web sites and email and interactive DVDs and on and on.

    So just as we still need design experts and technical experts to come together to implement an overall digital strategy, we also need people who focus on what the latest social media tools and techniques are and who track the best social practices.

    But all of those efforts have to be integrated into a digital whole — and that digital piece (or pieces) has to fit into the overall communications, marketing or advocacy strategy. Many pieces working as one. That’s how it has to be.

    Back in the day when the “webmaster” sat off in a corner all alone, those of us working in digital encouraged (begged for) the inclusion of the WWW address on the stationery and prints ads and TV buys.

    That cross-pollination that we were after makes even more sense in a world with a plethora of media consumption options.

    The gurus who thought social media could be a stand alone were wrong then and are a dying breed now.

    What’s your take?

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