Personal Emails For Business Information Can Be A Winner

Chart: Use of Business Email Address vs Personal Email Address When Registering for Content Copyright 2007: KnowledgeStorm Inc. All rights reserved

The first of these two charts should comfort vendors who use a content marketing strategy: 72% of users said they always provide a valid name when registering for content, and 68% said they always give a valid email address.But look at the types of email address being submitted: 44% said they use a personal email account, such as Gmail, Yahoo! or Hotmail. Vendors often view such addresses as less qualified when analyzing responses to their content registrations, yet a business exec may want to use a personal account for several reasons, such as the desire to reduce clutter in their business inbox. Since more than two-thirds of users said they always give a valid email address, don’t automatically discount those Hotmail or Yahoo! accounts.

Check out this Marketing Sherpa article in its entirety for some other illuminating data which might make you rethink how you look at lead generation.

Price/Quality/Service Equals Value

A friend asked me to lunch on Friday and kept it a secret where we were going right up to the moment we arrived in the parking areas of this industrial mall. Up to this point he spoke of how delicious the food is and how it has become his favorite place. Up to this point I was thinking we were going to a 5 star restaurant given the build up delivered to me on his favorite place. I was not disappointed.

We walked into a hole in the wall industrial space that can not be more than 1000 square feet in total space but the line that went out to the door moved fast with Greek family efficiency. The restaurant is The Pita Grill in Mississauga, Ontario, Canada, on Maingate and Eglinton. I would love to include a web link but they don't see a need for website at this time.

The efficiency of service was carried out by what appeared as the sons cooking and warming on vertical spits large pieces of roast beef, chicken, and lamb. The father/owner was taking the orders and the daughter, it would seem as they all had a family resemblance, would prepare the order with an abundance of choices for the pita pocket. The pita which is very large and stuffed to perfection and then rolled and toasted for that uniqueness that can only be found in a small out of the way place that the locals are no longer keeping a secret.

When we sat down with our two large chicken pita's and drinks the bill was less than $15.00. Price, Quality, and Service, converged and made the lunch with my friend next to a big screen TV better than my anticipated 5 star lunch. My friend is a Marketing Professional and in his subtle way he demonstrated how simple marketing can be for a small business. Word of mouth advertising is still the number one way to generate business. Of course, I like to think big so just imagine what this Greek family could do if they decided to create a website that furthered growth with delivery to the many offices in their area who can't get away but would like their lunch catered. Ahh, a combination made in Marketing Heaven.

North American Marketers Are Xenophobic

In Japan, consumers have access to data or marketing information at the click of their mobile phone camera. With a picture taking a read of an image found in most places in Japan from billboards to magazines to products the Japanese consumer can get product information and even the company website URL stored into their phone for access later at home or in the office. This image is called the QR Code. The reason I'm writing about this is I just read an article by Lane Michel titled Mobile Advertising: Your Phone Is About To Ring. North American Marketers are looking at our mobile phones as a way to get to us even deeper through our mobile internet accessed and GPS located phones. Don't they get it? WE HATE THIS INTRUSION.

If they took the time and looked at how marketing is done outside their xenophobic bubbles they might see that countries like Japan are light years ahead of us here in North America. The QR Code is not intrusive and has the same desired result including collecting consumer habit information. WAKE UP MARKETERS AND LOOK OUTSIDE OUR WORLD!