Launch Clinic

PDFs are great but not a substitute for content

I find it really annoying when companies put minimal content on their web sites but feel like they’re doing visitors a favor by providing links to PDF documents. This is lazy, pure and simple. Even worse is when they’re too lazy to optimize the PDF for online use and I have to endure downloading a 10MB 1-page brochure. Bad form. We’re in the 21st century now and this kind of stuff should be outlawed.

The real question I have is “Is all that wonderful content you have in those PDFs may getting indexed by the search engines?” After getting some conflicting answers to this question I went on my own search to find an answer. I see that some PDFs are clearly indexed. Use this Google search command on your web site to see which PDFs are indexed:

site:yourwebsite.com filetype:pdf

I stumbled on this great post about PDFs and SEO by Gary Pool (@garypool) over at the Search Engine Optimizician blog, titled SEO to the Max – Search Engine Optimization for a PDF. Read this post and end the arguments you're having about whether your PDFs are getting indexed or not. Normally we just rip a PDF from an existing document and link to it. 

Did you know there are things you should be doing to make sure PDFs are properly indexed?

PDFs are great, as long as they are an option. Because, hey, some guy might need to print something out to take to a meeting. But for goodness sake, make sure the content is available in HTML too. And if you want to make sure that Google, Bing and Yahoo will actually index it, follow Gary Pool’s advice.

3 tips for product launch marketing success (part 3)

The final article in the 3 tips for product launch marketing success series explores techniques you can use to discover the buying process without making the Sales team feel like you’re treading into their territory.

Successful marketing teams know that an understanding of the buying process is fundamental to product launch marketing success

Part 1 discussed the need to develop an empathetic understanding of buyers through the use of a tool called a buyer persona profile. In complex B2B sales we’re likely to encounter multiple buyers, each with their own set of problems and agendas. This requires multiple buyer persona profiles for each person that will influence a buying decision for your product or service.

Part 2 connected the buyer persona profile to the buying process, which is the missing component of many product launch marketing programs.

The sales team owns selling

Now I want to share some tips with you on how you can discover the buying process without freaking out the sales team. There’s a big turd you could step on without even realizing it. The selling process is the domain of the sales team. The moment you appear to be encroaching on that territory you are opening yourself up to a lot of unwanted attention from said sales team. They will be wary of your nosiness and could see it as a threat. And being that they are usually better connected to the CEO, they will win.

Buying process vs. selling process

Most likely you’ve been exposed to the concept of a company’s selling process. It’s the flow of steps that lead to a sale from the perspective of the salesperson. Sometimes the steps in a selling process are well defined and implemented in a sales force automation system (insert your favorite rant here). Other times it’s an informal process. Yet other times it’s completely ad hoc.

The buying process on the other hand represents the sequence of steps the buyer goes through to make a buying decision. It shows where each buyer persona gets involved in the process. If you think about how you buy a car for your family you’ll immediately connect that the way you want to buy a car isn’t in alignment with how the car salesman wants to sell it to you.

Discovering the buying process

There are three things you can do now to get you started on figuring out the buying process. These activities should be done together as part of an ongoing effort because buying processes change. Sometimes it’s because of a regulatory change and other times it’s because of the economy, for example.

Interview your top salespeople

Do this first. It’s a good way to get an understand of how your company sells and it gives you an opportunity to build bridges with the sales team. However, I want to leave you with a caveat shared by Mike Bosworth in his book CustomerCentric Selling. The top 10% of sales guys aren’t always capable of describing the selling process that makes them successful.

You are looking for patterns in the selling process across a number of interviews (avoid a single data point). When the pattern reveals itself you are ready to proceed to the next step.

Win/Loss analysis

At Pragmatic Marketing we can’t say enough about the value of Win/Loss analysis as a tool to gain insights about what’s working and what’s not – products, buyers and marketing programs.

There are two important points about Win/Loss. The first is that the sales team shouldn’t do them. Period. They are too close to the sale and are not in a position to be objective. Second, it’s an open-ended interview, not a survey.

Win/Loss analysis reveals details about the buying process, which buyer personas are involved, and when they get engaged in the buying process.

Buyer persona research

In Part 1 you learned about the importance of building buyer persona profiles. As you conduct research on your buyer personas, you should regularly probe into how the buyer buys. What steps do they go through? Who approves the purchase? How long does this take in your company?

Connect marketing programs to the buying process

Now that you’ve developed your buyer persona profiles and have an understanding of the buying process, you have a blueprint for mapping marketing programs to each step in it. Instead of reacting to demands of the sales team for the sales tool du jour, you can systematically connect marketing programs to discrete steps in the buying process with a more focused approach that influences buyers at the right step at the right time.

Are you constantly reacting to the sales team’s request for one-off sales tools?

How much more power would your product launch marketing programs be if they were based on how the buyer buys?

3 tips for product launch marketing success (Part 2)

In Part 1 of this series I stated the reason why product launch marketing programs fail is because they fail to influence buyers.  To get an empathetic understanding of buyers is through the use of a tool called a buyer persona profile. I also stated that in complex B2B sales we’re likely to encounter multiple buyers, each with their own set of problems and agendas. This requires us to build a buyer persona profile for each person that will influence a buying decision for your product or service.

(Buyer personas are covered in much more detail in Pragmatic Marketing’s Effective Product Marketing seminar)

In Part 2 I’m going to connect the buyer persona profile to the buying process, which is the missing component of many product launch marketing programs.

Buyer persona profiles are a marketing tool

First a little more about buyer persona profiles:

• They are a tool for marketing
• They are not to be shared with Sales - ever
• They represent a typical buyer in a market segment (but can never be perfect)
• They go deeper than demographic information
• They give us perspective about how the buyer might behave
• They allow us to get inside the head of a buyer

In the end a buyer persona profile is a marketing tool that gives us the buyer insight we’re missing. It allows us to connect marketing programs with buyers in a way that compels them to take the next step in making a purchase.

The buying process

A lot of attention is placed on the selling process, but how much time do you dedicate to understanding the buying process? The selling process is how we want a sale to go down. The buying process is how the buyer will buy – step by step. When the two are out of sync, marketing programs are all over the map and the ability to predict the outcome of any given sale is almost impossible.

What’s the first action?

Stop for a moment and consider how your buyers might go about the process of buying your product. After they acknowledge they have a problem that needs to be solved, what do they do next? If they’re like me they do a Google search using words and phrases that describe the problem in a way that’s familiar to me. I wouldn’t search for an air movement device, but I would search for a fan. Can your buyers find you online or are you invisible?

Are you providing enough information?

Once they’ve found a set of potential suppliers that can solve their problem, they might spend some time educating themselves on your company and your offerings before they make a call or fill out form on your web site. Are you providing enough information on your web site to enable them to self educate or are you forcing them to contact you before they are ready? Is there negative information they might find during their search that would dissuade them from considering your company?

Different buyers, different steps

If every buyer were involved in every step of the buying process our job would be much easier. But this isn’t the case. One buyer gets the whole thing started and the rest get pulled in as the buying process progresses. And the number and type of buyers will change depending on economic conditions. You will discover that in tight economic times more buyers are involved in the buying process.

Once the buying process steps are defined, map which buyers are involved in which steps. It doesn’t have to be perfect, it has to be a representative example which you will use to focus your product launch marketing efforts.

Now supply the missing pieces

With a basic understanding of the buying process and when each buyer gets involved, you can map your marketing programs (and sales tools) to each step in the buying process. It becomes obvious what is in place and which buyers you haven’t fully addressed. So instead of reacting to requests from the Sales team you can proactively develop marketing programs that influence each buyer from one step in the buying process to the next.

Next Step: How to discover the buying process without annoying your Sales team

The final article in the series will explore techniques you can use to discover the buying process without making the Sales team feel like your treading into their territory.

Are you building product launch marketing programs around the selling process or the buying process?

Is your company’s selling process in sync with your buyer’s buying process?

Read Part 3

Gobbledygook Grader: just how crappy are your marketing materials?

In my commitment to provide innovative and unique approaches to product launch, I am pleased to introduce  a tool that is focused on helping you deliver next generation, high performance, flexible, world class, new and improved, robust, optimized and cost effective marketing materials that produce desirable outcomes. In terms of entertainment value added and leverage, Gobbledygook Grader is the easy to use, leading provider of gobbledygook grading tools.

The text above got a Gobbledygook Grade of 0 out of 100.  I win!

Gobbledygook Words

This content contains 21 words that are considered gobbledygook (they are overused and lack specific meaning). For more information about Gobbledygook words, read "The Gobbledygook Manifesto" by David Meerman Scott, bestselling author of The New Rules of Marketing & PR and the hit new book World Wide Rave.

The following gobbledygook words were found: commitment , cost effective , easy to use , flexible , focused on , high performance , in terms of , innovative , leading provider , leading provider of , leverage , new and improved , next generation , optimize , outcomes , pleased to , robust , unique , value add , value added , world class

Technorati Tags: launch,marketing collateral,gobbledygook

Product Launch in an Agile World

I was preparing to deliver a webinar on Product Launch in an Agile Worldrent a car bulgaria and it brought up memories of my days as a developer (fond mostly).  While I’m very familiar with Agile at a conceptual level I wouldn’t claim to be a practitioner. That’s for the Agile experts.  However, I’m passionate about launching software products and I find it fascinating how Agile has become such a concern for Product Management, Marketing and Sales.

For years Product Management, Marketing and Sales have complained that Development can’t deliver products on time with the right mix of capabilities.  I’ve lived on every side of that problem and it’s never enjoyable to be on the Development side of the discussion when promised features are missing.   Now Development steps up to the plate and embraces a way to get things done faster, with more completeness and higher quality, and the triumvirate has heartburn.

I’ve been talking with people in Product Management, Marketing, and Sales whose Development teams have embraced Agile (with varying degrees) and many are freaking out.  The more I dig into it the less I see where there’s a problem.  Let me explain further.

Product Management is responsible for identifying Market Problems and developing Market Requirements.  We’ve been teaching that for 15 years at Pragmatic Marketing - nothing new here. Development translates the Market Requirements into a product.  Check. Product Marketing drives the launch process, develops sales tools, trains the Sales team and coordinates with Marketing Communications to develop marketing programs to support Launch goals.  Check.  The Launch comes and the Sales Team does their thing.  Check.

Where everyone outside of Development is getting all hung up is with predictability. But they’ve grown accustomed to what I believe to be a false sense of predictability.  That big, monolithic, waterfall documentation that defines all the features that will be in the next release becomes obsolete just about as fast as you hit “save”.  Assumptions about what is possible will change.  Whether you like it or not there’s never enough time to go back and change the original product requirement docs because there’s a date that needs to be hit.

With Agile development methods, Development focuses on short iterations.  Each iteration produces 100% of something (coded, tested and ready to go).  If you’ve decided that the best time to launch the next release is October, work backwards through the iteration schedule and choose an iteration that will be completed prior to the Launch planning window.  This will be the iteration you can trust to be completed.  But realize that you may not know the exact release content until the iteration is complete.  Even better though, you will see evidence that the release content is done.  Here’s where I’m going to ask the folks in Marketing to be a little flexible.

During the Launch planning and readiness window Development will continue to plow ahead and work on more iterations.  As each iteration completes, you need to ask yourself if there are features in those iterations that justify inclusion in the Launch without negatively impacting the Launch date.

Here’s the deal.  If you’re a Product Manager, make sure you’re doing your job and keep feeding Development with what needs to be done next. If you don’t they’ll just start creating what they think is cool, whether it has any marketability or not. Development, you don’t get to decide when a release is ready to Launch.  That’s a decision for Product Management. Acknowledge that Marketing and Sales need a longer window to plan and ready the rest of the organization than a few weeks.  They have a limited capacity to absorb rapid releases.  All those great features you’re building will just get buried.    Marketing continue what you’re doing.  Your world is one of dates and timing.  Release dates still matter.  A product launch is about generating sales velocity and you need enough time to plan for an effective Launch.

Here’s a link to the webinar for more on this topic.

Sales Velocity Webinar replay available

Thanks to everyone who attended the Product Launch Readiness: Planning for Sales Velocity webinar today.  The webinar was recorded and is now available for replay here.  Feel free to replay it as much as you want and be sure to pass it along to friends and colleagues (family might be pushing it).

There were a large number of questions that I will do my best to answer over the next few days.  The answers will be posted on the webinar archive landing page.

The very kind comments were welcomed and humbling.  Thanks also to the new Twitter followers!

Thanks again.

UPDATE: I forgot to mention that the slides from the presentation and a buying cycle funnel like the one I used in the webinar are available for download by going to:

http://www.pragmaticmarketing.com/request

After entering you will see a listing of webinars and stuff related to the webinar.  You’ll need to enter your name and email address to get through.

Webinar tomorrow: Planning for Sales Velocity

I just completed the slides for a webinar I’m giving tomorrow morning at 10am Pacific titled Product Launch Readiness: Planning for Sales Velocity.

The topic originated by asking the question, “Why do some products takeoff at launch (sorry, bad pun) and others appear to start strong and fizzle out like a lawn dart?”

I’ll address specific ways to stack the deck and create an environment that ensures Sales Velocity.

You won’t get any boring death by PowerPoint.  I’ve got lots of visual slides that will move quickly, so you will need to fasten your seatbelt and put your tray in the upright position.

To signup for the Planning for Sales Velocity webinar go here.  It will be recorded and available for playback on the same day.  I’ll write another post with the details when the recording is available.

Lack of organizational readiness is the #1 killer of successful product launches. You’ve identified a market problem that is pervasive, urgent and the market is willing to buy. You’ve developed a great product that satisfies the need. You are ready to go to market, but are you confident that the rest of your organization ready to sell and support your new offering? You could easily lose an entire quarter or more while the rest of the organization catches up. Learn some of key secrets to a successful product launch that can set the stage for sales velocity.

Register here

Why Finance is the Key to any Launch

I was speaking with a product manager last week who was describing the challenges of managing a cross organizational team while getting ready for the launch of a major enhancement to an existing product line.  When she described the team I asked her why finance was absent.  She indicated that product management would engage finance and accounting at the end of the process, three weeks prior to the go live date.  In my mind this was a mistake - albeit a common one - and I told her why.

What is finance focused on?  Pricing, billing, investment, legal and revenue recognition to name a few.  Without all of these issues identifed, agreed to and in place, a new product or service cannot launch.  In almost every case finance is part of the team that approves any new product initiatives.  The company looks at them as the conscience of the organization.  They are not only actively engaged at the outset but they need to be part of the team that helps manage the full product lifecycle including launch.

In addition, finance can be a product manager’s best friend in terms of tracking investment pre-launch and revenue post-launch.  They don’t just contribute to the cft, they actually are the lynch pin in delivering product readiness and ultimately measuring success or failure.  Not only that, you really don’t want to upset the area of the organization that signs paychecks and approves expenses.

It is interesting however that in many cases a lot of pms are intimidated more by finance than their customers.  Work with the CFO.  Find a member of the finance and accounting team that you’re comfortable with.  You would be suprised as to how you can lower the risk of launch delay or failure if you have the money men and women actively engaged.

Launch Blunder #2 - You believe you know what the market wants

If you’ve done your homework, surveyed the market and have the data to prove your position, skip this post. If you believe you understand the market and don’t need to talk to the market to validate your opinions read on. Maybe it’s your ego or your arrogance that prevents you from talking to the market. Maybe it’s fear. Either way, statistically, you’re a train wreck waiting to happen.

Let me walk you through it. You worked in an industry for a number of years. That experience gives you a sense of intuitive understanding of the industry and what makes it tick. More than likely you were in a mid-level position where you had the benefit of seeing life in the trenches. During this time you saw a set of recurring problems and maybe even formulated some technical solutions to address them. You presented your ideas to management, who didn’t embrace your enthusiasm for the problem. You’re frustrated, hurt and maybe angry. You develop an “I’ll show them” attitude and strike off on your own.

In your spare time you develop a prototype and begin to show it to your peers. Your peers give you glowing feedback and reinforce your sense of importance. You are on your way to being rich.

You get introduced to angel investors who are struck by your enthusiasm and command of the problem. They give you the seed capital you need to take your idea to the next level. You hire a few developers with the goal of moving from prototype to commercial ready.

You spend the next 6 months heads-down developing the solution. You know what features need to go into the product. After all, you lived the problem and know how to fix it. There’s no time to survey the market and talk to decision makers. You know the problem and you have the answer.

Three months into the project you begin to get feedback from the team about specific features that might be missing. They’re smart guys so they’ve started poking around to identify competitive alternatives and what they’re offering. You’re annoyed by the distraction. The competitors don’t get it. You have the answer.

Your team delivers the product in 6 months on budget as planned. Investors are happy with your project management skills and assure you they can help raise more money when needed. It’s now reckoning time. The product is ready and you’re ready to launch.

You start your product launch carefully. Since you don’t have a big budget you prefer to do a soft launch and to get the product into the hands of a few customers. You reach out to the peers in your network, get a few meetings and demos. You are encouraged by the glowing feedback.

Then nothing happens. No sales. No interest. Nothing.

You panic. It must be the price. We must have the wrong sales guys. Marketing is a waste of money. The prospects don’t “get it”.

Money is running out and your team is demoralized by the lack of sales. They doubt your expertise in the problem and the market. Did they just spend 6 months of their lives building a product that no one wants to buy? How could this happen? They feel betrayed.

It’s happening everyday to startups and big companies. And it can be easily addressed by setting aside some of the arrogance and getting out to talk to the market before it’s too late. What is the problem (in their words)? What are they doing to fix it now (in their words)? How important is this problem in the grand scheme (in their words)?

Product Launches on a Bootstrap Budget

We will be delivering "Product Launches on a Bootstrap Budget" starting on Tuesday April 8.  As the title suggests this webinar is targeted toward organizations with limited launch budgets but still need to maximize results.

Product Launches on a Bootstrap Budget is a 1.5 hour webinar with a live instructor. The webinar will focus mainly on tactics and readiness, with an emphasis on what needs to happen in order to build momentum. Of course, it’s all about how to launch with the least amount of resources.  We’ll cover different tactics you can use "out of the box" that can turn your launch from ho-hum to high-impact.

The techniques you will learn from this webinar have been proven in years of product launches.  While the technologies we use behind the tactics evolve over time, the fundamentals stay the same.  Your messaging needs to resonate with your prospect’s problem, your prospects need to find your solution, the product needs to work, your sale teams needs to know how to sell the value of the solution and your customer support team needs to be able to address any problems along the way.

To learn more about this webinar, follow this link.