Barbara Walters Price

How to turn client objections into new sales

I just listened to this 13-minute podcast, How to Turn Client Objections into New Sales, from RainToday.com. I not only enjoyed it but learned from it.

In the podcast, John Doerr, RainToday founder and RAIN Group President, explains:

• How to respond when a prospect or client says your price is too high
• What to do when clients drag out the sales process and are unwilling to make a commitment
• How to respond when clients won't openly discuss their objections
• Common mistakes sellers make when responding to objections

We'll be using this podcast to jump-start a roundtable discussion on the topics covered as they specifically apply to our firm.  Listen here.

Biggest challenge for e-mail marketers (and marketing) in 2011

Tamara Gielen is an independent email and digital direct marketing consultant blogs at Be Relevent! E-Mail Marketing Blog.  Today she has posted a 6-minute video from Jeff Ginsberg from TheEmailGuide.com who interviewed many experts at the recent MarketingSherpa's Email Summit in Las Vegas.

There is good stuff here not only for e-mail marketers but for CMO's of professional service firms who use e-mail as a marketing tactic.  Take a look.

The 10 Coolest New Toys at This Year’s Toy Fair

Mashable reviewed this year's Toy Fair in New York.  As a mom with two young daughters, this part of the post rang true but is rather scary just the same:

As usual, the big trend in toys is KGOY or “Kids getting older younger,” or more simply, “age-compression.” In short, kids want to play with stuff their older siblings and parents play with, which is why we’re seeing so many iPhone-based offshoots this time around.

Take a look at the toys featured.  The toy that kinda gives me the creeps is Baby iCan Play iPhone case, Fisher-Price. The one that makes me laugh is the "Brick" iPhone case.

 

Is there a smaller, cheaper version of the iPhone on the way?

A tiny iPhone costing $200 with no contract?  Maybe this summer.  Read more here.

Happy Valentine's Day

I always suspected that Hallmark originated Valentine's Day, but it appears I was wrong.

Saint Valentine's Day, commonly shortened to Valentine's Day, is an annual commemoration held on February 14 celebrating love and affection between intimate companions.

The day is named after one or more early Christian martyrs, Saint Valentine, and was established by Pope Gelasius I in 496 AD.

It was deleted from the Roman calendar of saints in 1969 by Pope Paul VI, but its religious observance is still permitted.

It is traditionally a day on which lovers express their love for each other by presenting flowers, offeringconfectionery, and sending greeting cards (known as "valentines"). The day first became associated with romantic love in the circle of Geoffrey Chaucer in the High Middle Ages, when the tradition of courtly love flourished. [Wikipedia]

Happy Valentine's Day.

When Parents Text

For those of you who haven't found the website, whenparentstext.com, check it out. It's fun and funny. Enjoy!

One women in the audience found out she died last year and someone else won a coloring contest

Have you Googled your name or your firm name lately?  If not, you should. Paula Black, of the blog In Black & White, noted recently that as part of what she does in giving a speech is to Google everyone in attendance. She did that in a recent speech and not everyone there "owned" the first page of results (the first 10 search results).

Per Paula:

Take a moment to google yourself. Are you on the 1st page? Is the content substantive? Are you proud of it? Does it add to your credibility? If the answer is NO to any of the questions, you can do something about it.

Consider writing a blog and articles on a consistent basis. This is the best way to dominate your name on google. Before I started writing articles and blogging I had 20% of the first page of google. One entry was my website and the other was Amazon where my books are sold. But now? I have 90% of the first page of google and that is out of 9.2 million entries. Yes... 9.2 million. 

There are a lot of Paula Blacks. And in addition, the shoe industry names their shoe styles with women's names and they often use the name Paula and you guessed it... they ALL come in black! Who can compete with women's shoes? I did! I dominate my name on the 1st page of google. Do YOU?

Good advice - even for those of us not competing with shoes.  I own 8 out of 10 on that coveted first page of results.  If you haven't done so, Google your name and your firm's name today.  If the results are not what you want them to be, take action.

Good overview of new design and upgrades to Facebook fan pages

Hubspot Blog has a good overview of the fan page improvements Facebook announced today.  For those of you with fan pages, take a look.

Read more: http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/9510/Facebook-Announces-New-Design-and-Upgrades-to-Fan-Pages.aspx#ixzz1Dh4kGGGK

LinkedIn now has a solution for how to get all those business cards into a digital format

The solution is CardMunch.com.  LinkedIn recently acquired CardMunch.  According to Fill the Funnel:

So what did they acquire? Simply put, CardMunch scans a business card, sends it off to be converted into a digital format and then comes back to you with 100% accuracy, placed in your contacts database.  With the release of version 2.0, you can also now send off an invite to connect on LinkedIn from within the app.  No muss, no fuss.

Take a look at this video to see how it works and note the integration with LinkedIn.

 

Now, check out how easy it is to e-mail your contacts.

The problem right now is that it only works with the iPhone.  I assume an Android and Blackberry version will be coming soon.  I have downloaded and tested and it works like a charm.

Read more: LinkedIn Solves the Business Card Challenge http://www.fillthefunnel.com/2011/02/10/linkedin-solves-business-card-challenge/#ixzz1Db0Q9niH

Shut up about your goals already

Did you know that by telling someone your goal, you'll be less likely to acheive it? It seems as if when you tell others and they affirm it, your mind is essentially tricked into feeling so good about the goal through the social acknowledgement you receive from that affirmation, that it pretty much believes the goal is accomplished. So, you don't do the hard work to achieve it.

Goes against the conventional wisdom but interesting.