Outgrow.me Spotlights Successful Crowdfunded Projects

Outgrow.me Spotlights Successful Crowdfunded Projects
Go Social: Why Phone Support Still Matters
Turn Visitors Into Buyers: Benefits of Retargeting
You Didn’t Build That, You Were Just Lucky
Facebook Purchase of Instagram Finalized

Posted: 10 Sep 2012 01:00 PM PDT

Crowdfunding sites like Kickstarter and Indiegogo have helped many startups and entrepreneurs get much needed funding for their ideas and projects. But what happens to those projects once their campaigns are completed? Without all the visibility that comes with launching a campaign on this type of site, the new products or services that have received funding can fall flat. But now a new site is attempting to put the spotlight back on those new products and startups once they've actually launched.

Outgrow.me is a marketplace where consumers can browse projects that were the product of a successful crowdfunding campaign. With this new site, people who helped to fund projects on sites like Kickstarter and thought "that would be a great product to own," can actually make purchases and benefit from their investment.

Of course, you don't have to be a funder to browse products on the site – anyone looking for new and innovative products from new startups or individuals can sift through the selection of completed projects.

From games to gadgets to books and more, the variety of products available on the site provide proof that crowdfunding can be successful. Of course, that's not always the case, but for those that do make it, sites like Outgrow.me can help them to succeed after making it over that initial funding goal.

Users of the site can filter products by those available for immediate order or those available for pre-order. They can also search by type of product and price range.

Prospective buyers can see how much funding the project received and when the campaign was completed. If they decide to make a purchase, Outgrow.me directs them to the company's site where they can order their new product.

For startups and entrepreneurs that are considering using sites like Kickstarter or Indiegogo to fund their new products, but who might be wary since some fail to reach their funding goals, Outgrow.me can provide a place for those projects to get the visibility they need to be successful long term.

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Go Social: Why Phone Support Still Matters

Posted: 10 Sep 2012 11:00 AM PDT

Social media is permanently changing the customer-business relationship, giving consumers more power than ever to voice their opinions and shape a brand's fate. However, when it comes to customer support, is social media leaving the customer behind?

With live web chats, customer support pages on Facebook, customer support on Twitter and direct messages (DM), social media provides wonderful new channels for customers to connect with their favorite (and not so favorite) brands.

But What About The Plain Old Phone Call?

Phone Support

A recent New York Times article illustrated just how hard it is to reach a social technology company on the phone:

“Twitter's phone system hangs up after providing Web or email addresses three times. At the end of a long phone tree, Facebook's system explains it is, in fact, "an Internet-based company." Try email, it suggests.”

While some may see the shift from phone support as a sign of the times, any business needs to evaluate if it's right for their customers.

Last year, American Express produced the 2011 Global Customer Service Barometer. Would you be surprised to hear that the majority of customers in the U.S. were most interested in resolving issues speaking on the phone with a real person?

In the study, American Express asked respondents if they were "very/somewhat interested in resolving customer service issues" using a range of methods (see Figure 1). 90% of U.S. respondents said "speaking with a real person on the phone." Compare that with just 22% who showed interest in handling a support issue via a social networking site. And then, compare those findings with the customer service priorities across many companies today.

Very/Somewhat Interested in Resolving Customer Service Issues Using the Following Methods

Differentiating With Customer Service

As a small business (who needs to compete with some rather big fish in a mature market), we made the important decision early on to differentiate with customer service. We always provided live phone support (no automated phone systems here) during our business hours, but we decided to up the ante even more. We began providing free business phone consultations to everyone who wanted one.

We increased our investment in phone support, so we could give more customers more personal time. We even increased our prices in order to maintain the higher service levels. And as a result, our sales have grown; we have more repeat business; and we just got a top rating from a "secret shopper."

Phone support doesn't just benefit your customers. Talking to customers one-on-one is the best way to truly take the pulse of your customer needs and find out just how your company is doing.

Metrics and market data yield fantastic insight, but nothing beats personal conversations with the people that make up your target base. That's why I frequently jump into phone support.

Nothing Beats One On One Conversation

No matter how big your business gets and how much staff you bring on, I always advise business owners and top management to stay as close to their customers as possible by talking one on one. Think of customer support as free market research.

For example, FreshBooks (a company that really gets customer service) has its employees do a rotation in customer support, giving all team members the opportunity to hear from customers directly and understand their pain points. FreshBooks CEO, Mike McDerment, even spends some time on the support lines, as it helps him stay in touch with FreshBooks' customers and reinforce the energy around the company's customer service culture.

Of course, the key here is to move away from the traditional concept of customer service as a cost center, where efficiency (i.e. getting people off the phone as quickly as possible) is the valued metric.

Think Of It This Way

Every interaction your customers have with your company is an opportunity.

Customer support can be considered the most important of all these opportunities. If a customer is calling, they need your help. How your company fulfills that need will have a profound effect beyond that immediate support need. It will impact your customer's enthusiasm, loyalty, referrals and repeat business.

Phone support can boost sales. It just might be harder to measure. And those companies that build bridges to their customers – including both social media channels and 'back to the basics' phone calls – will be the ones that humanize and differentiate their brand.

Customer Service Photo via Shutterstock

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Turn Visitors Into Buyers: Benefits of Retargeting

Posted: 10 Sep 2012 08:00 AM PDT

When you browse the Internet, you probably notice very personalized banner ads following you around. Often, when you visit a particular company site but don't purchase, that site will drop a cookie so the company may then serve you relevant ads to bring you back. This is a form of online advertising called retargeting, behavioral retargeting or remarketing.

retargeting

Retargeting has proven to be a highly effective way to convert customers. Consider how distracted we are as we do online research or purchasing. Phone calls, emails, or chat windows regularly interrupt me, for example. These interruptions result in my abandoning a shopping cart or forgetting what I was doing entirely.

Retargeting is rapidly become an integral part of online marketing and advertising for one simple reason — it works.

You can effectively capture those visitors who have already expressed interest in your products or services and never completed a purchase. As consumers, we are going to be served ads no matter what, so why not have those ads be for the things we are interested in?

Below, I’ve listed a quick look at some of the best (and more affordable) retargeting companies that can help you get your campaigns started.

Retargeting Companies

Google Remarketing: Built into your existing Adwords account, Google makes it easy to begin remarketing on the Google Display Network, with very flexible pricing.

AdRoll: Set up a campaign in minutes and gain access to prime online real estate with AdRoll. They've been around since 2007 and they know what they're doing.

ReTargeter: ReTargeter offers a comprehensive starter package for just $500. Known for their stellar customer service, you even get a dedicated account manager working to make sure all of your needs are met.

Fetchback: Fetchback offers a full product suite to make sure your campaign is set up in the way that is most effective for your business.

One Tip

Don't overdo it. Make sure you limit the number of times you serve ads to the same people so as to not scare away someone who could become a very loyal customer.

You don't want to be the creepy company that doesn't appear to value privacy because it follows its customers all across the Internet.

Retargeting Photo via Shutterstock

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You Didn’t Build That, You Were Just Lucky

Posted: 10 Sep 2012 05:00 AM PDT

Just when it looked like President Obama's now famous "if you’ve got a business, you didn’t build that" line was history, the President decided to clarify his remarks to a Norfolk, Virginia television station. He said, "Obviously, I have regrets for my syntax. But not for the point, because everyone who was there watching knows exactly what I was saying.”

american businessman

If we look at the context in which the President made his remarks, we can see that he meant that entrepreneurs don't succeed by their efforts alone; others, including the government, made their successes possible by building the infrastructure that they drew upon to succeed. Back in July he said, “If you were successful, somebody along the line gave you some help …. Somebody helped to create this unbelievable American system that we have that allowed you to thrive."

The Republicans have jumped on the opportunity to paint the President as anti-business with the repeated sound bite "you didn't build that." While it's great for politicians when they can attack their opponents with line that fit on a tee shirt, the Republicans are oversimplifying their philosophical disagreement with the President. While it takes more space to highlight the Presidential candidates different philosophies about the source of small business success, those differences are stark, and it's important to highlight them.

Anyone thinking seriously about why some small business owners are more successful than others realize that there is merit in President Obama's July comment. He's right when he says, "if you’ve been successful, you didn’t get there on your own. There was a great teacher somewhere in your life…. Somebody invested in roads and bridges…. Government research created the Internet so that all the companies could make money off the Internet." Whether you are a trucking company founder who benefited from the country's transportation infrastructure ; an Internet entrepreneur whose company drew upon the nation's investment in the ARPA net; or a hardware store founder whose third grade math teach taught her the basic skills necessary to later manage cash flow, everyone who runs their own company somehow benefited from the actions of others.

But the nation's infrastructure is available to all of us. It is there for people who didn't start companies and people who started them but weren't successful. So how do we explain why some Americans are more successful at starting businesses than others? One way is to say that some people are smarter and work harder than others.

President Obama doesn't think it's that. Back in July he said, "I’m always struck by people who think, well, it must be because I was just so smart. There are a lot of smart people out there. It must be because I worked harder than everybody else. Let me tell you something — there are a whole bunch of hardworking people out there."

This view puzzles me. If so many people are smart and hardworking, like the President says, and we built this great infrastructure that contributes to the success of entrepreneurs, then why isn't everyone an equally successful entrepreneur? It seems that the President believes the answer must be luck.

The Republicans disagree with this philosophy. They don't deny that the system in which we operate helps entrepreneurs to succeed. In fact, they think that it's very important to provide the right context – good legal system, effective capital market, and an absence of onerous and arbitrary regulation – for small business owners to make money. But they recognize that some people are smarter and work harder than others. And that intelligence and hard work allows them to get better outcomes than others who also had great teachers and who lived in a country where the government built roads and bridges and funded the Internet.

The difference here isn't in the stark contrast of the sound bites, but in the subtlety of emphasis. It's a question of what matters more to the success of certain American entrepreneurs: the "unbelievable American system that we have that allowed [them] to thrive," as the President describes it, or their intelligence and hard work?

I think you know my answer. When it comes to explaining entrepreneurial success, I believe that differences between people matter more than the President thinks.

American Businessman Photo via Shutterstock

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Facebook Purchase of Instagram Finalized

Posted: 10 Sep 2012 02:30 AM PDT

Following an announcement back in April, the sale of photo sharing company Instagram to social networking giant Facebook has finally closed. Businesses have already discovered the benefits of using Instagram for marketing. Here are some details about the big sale, what happens next, and how others are already using the service as a powerful social networking tool.

Come Together

All in the family. Noises from the Facebook camp since the acquisition suggest a commitment by the larger company to develop Instagram independently and to continue serving its community. It remains to be seen whether users of the service will see any change with the new ownership. Facebook Newsroom

The latest milestone. The closing of the Instagram purchase happens just as the company reached its latest milestone of 5 billion photos shared. Though it cannot yet compete with Facebook’s astonishing 300 million photos uploaded daily, it still represents a popular channel through which entrepreneurs can communicate. The Next Web

The next chapter. The closing of the sale already has the tech universe speculating about what will happen next. Here’s what tech writer Josh Constine predicts. Instagram’s founding team will stay on for a while but are likely to drift away over time. Meanwhile, Facebook is expected to take on a bigger role in product development. TechCrunch

Taking Care of Business

Adding some flair. Instagram offers online entrepreneurs the opportunity to quickly create original images that tell a story about their business, product, or service. They can then add hashtags and keywords, and share the photos over numerous platforms from Facebook to WordPress. Social media writer Holli Friedland offers advice on how to use the tool to give your company an added oomph. Social Networking for Business Growth

Burnishing your brand. Entrepreneurs have started realizing how creating powerful images with Instagram can build a business brand. The possibilities are endless, claim bloggers Janette Speyer and Alison M. Brown who, in this post, also suggest plenty of examples for creative online business owners to take their brand to new levels with the photo sharing service. Web Success Team

Improving their image. Speaking of brands, some big ones are already using Instagram to boost their presence with photo sharing. Red Bull, Starbucks, Audi, and Nike are among big established companies that are already using the service in different ways to reach customers. Don’t let your business be left behind! Econsultancy

Getting into the act. And last but not least, some small business owners have started getting the idea too. In this post from the National Federation of Independent Business, three small business owners share how they used Instagram’s service to market their own companies. Have a look and see if any of their ideas resonate with you. NFIB

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