Apple Phones, Trade-In Programs, a Kindle Refresh and More |  |
- Apple Phones, Trade-In Programs, a Kindle Refresh and More
- New Apple Operating System Coming Sept. 18
- Customer, Tech and Social Strategies: 41 Talented Leaders Voice Their Thoughts
- 8 Social Media Analytics Tools – Including Ones You May Not Know
- Addressing the Real Problem – Not
| Apple Phones, Trade-In Programs, a Kindle Refresh and More Posted: 13 Sep 2013 04:00 PM PDT
[iPhone 5C] If you missed the news this week, there’s likely a lot you’ll need to catch up on. We’ve got you covered. Check out this quick run down of all the stories most critical to your small business. From the worlds of mobile and software technology, social media, marketing and finance, the Small Business Trends editorial team gives you the information behind the stories and more on how they affect you. Smartphone NewsThe $99 iPhone shows new direction. The iPhone 5c is here. And, despite the new low price and plastic shell, many insist it’s just a recasting of Apple’s iPhone 5. But that new low price will definitely be a draw for many small business owners. Have a look. The new flagship iPhone has a powerful new processor. And lest you thought Apple was only making budget phones now, the iPhone 5s may change your mind. Some call it a mere tweak at a high price, but with a better processor, better camera and other features, it could make working mobile much easier. Apple launches in-store trade-in program. This is actually an expansion of an existing program already run by Apple through its website. That program offers trade-ins for a lot more than just smartphones. Still, it could be convenient to upgrade your iPhone with a simple trip to your nearest Apple Retail Store. Walmart starts a trade-in program too. The mega retailer joins the party, launching a smartphone trade-in program less than two weeks after the well-publicized similar move by Apple. It seems those used smartphones in your office are of some value after all. More Mobile GadgetsGalaxy Gear is the latest smartwatch. Move over Dick Tracey! Samsung’s first stab at the smartwatch market has a camera on its wristband and will let you make a voice call…assuming it’s tethered to your smartphone. The question is whether it’s a gadget your small business really needs or could just as easily do without. The new Kindle Paperwhite arrives. Amazon says the new device offers 25 percent faster processing speed. That means faster page turning and an experience closer to that of reading a traditional book. But what will be most helpful to the mobile entrepreneur may be the extra long battery life. Software RolloutsWindows 8.1 heads to developers. The new Windows upgrade has more than just the return of the iconic start button. There’s also greater integration with Microsoft’s SkyDrive cloud storage. Read about what’s reported to be an easy and secure sign in to virtual private networks and better control over company data. New Apple mobile operating system due Sept. 18. The new iOS 7 for the latest crop of Apple smartphones will be available before iPhone 5c and iPhone 5s hit retail shelves or online stores. But what may be more interesting than what is featured in this new mobile operating system is what was left out. See details and a video walk-through here. Social Media NewsTwitter will acquire mobile ad platform MoPub. Specifically, the microblogging platform says it will acquire the mobile ad exchange for $350 million. Twitter hopes the company’s expertise will help bolster its own ad platform. That could include integrating MoPub’s real-time bidding technology. Google Plus enables embedded posts. The new Google Plus embeddable posts are certainly an attempt to follow in the footsteps of Twitter and Facebook. But that could be a good thing if building your Google Plus network is important to your business. Here are the basic features and what’s similar and different when compared to the Twitter and Facebook features. MarketingGrumpy Cat forecasts the weather. There seems no end to the marketing potential of the sad sack feline who goes by the nickname Grumpy Cat. Of course, this kitty, real name Tardar Sauce, isn’t just a face. She’s become a meme. And the mere mention of her famous Internet moniker can sell anything from coffee drinks to weather apps like this one. FinanceCapital spending remains weak. Capital expenditures refer to spending on assets that will benefit a company for more than a year. And they’ve declined by 35 percent since the Great Recession started says Scott Shane, Professor of Entrepreneurial Studies at Case Western Reserve University. Image: Apple The post Apple Phones, Trade-In Programs, a Kindle Refresh and More appeared first on Small Business Trends. |
| New Apple Operating System Coming Sept. 18 Posted: 13 Sep 2013 01:30 PM PDT
Business users may be waiting to get their hands on the iPhone 5c and iPhone 5s unveiled by Apple in a special announcement Tuesday. But before that, Apple iOS 7, the new operating system on which both new phones run, will be ready for download. The Apple iOS 7 operating system will be available next week as a free software update for iPhone 4 and later, iPad 2 and later and for the iPad mini. It will come loaded on all subsequent Apple mobile devices including the two new smartphones set to go on sale Sept. 20. What’s Missing from Apple iOS 7An official announcement from Apple lists a huge number of features available on the new Apple iOS 7. See a walk through of the operating system for iPhones and tablets in the video below. But what may be more important for business users is what will be missing. A so-called “iCloud keychain” originally present in the beta edition of the operating system was expected to allow more integration with the cloud. But that feature was yanked before release of the Gold Master edition of Apple iOS 7 to developers this week, reports MacRumors. It’s possible the feature is planned for release with OS X Mavericks, the next version of the operating system for the Macintosh computer later this year. The keychain was intended to allow Apple’s iCloud to remember account names, passwords and credit card numbers and have Apple’s browser Safari insert them at the proper time giving users convenient but secure access to all their accounts while mobile. The keychain feature suggested more integration with iCloud across all the Apple devices you or your business might be using. And that integration could eventually work seamlessly with Apple’s new TouchID software also introduced at this week’s product and software event. With the touch of a finger, a small business user or a small group of trusted employees could access your business files and accounts from anywhere with relative security. Obvious Parallels with Windows 8.1There are obvious parallels here with Windows 8.1, which just shipped to hardware developers. That software provides greater integration with Microsoft’s own SkyDrive cloud storage system and secure sign in from any device including one-click access to virtual private networks. Of course, devices running Apple iOS 7 should be able to connect to iCloud using instructions found on the Apple website. But a more convenient integration would be a huge plus for small businesses seeking to access the cloud from multiple devices and searching for an alternative to the Windows environment. The post New Apple Operating System Coming Sept. 18 appeared first on Small Business Trends. |
| Customer, Tech and Social Strategies: 41 Talented Leaders Voice Their Thoughts Posted: 13 Sep 2013 11:00 AM PDT
"The only limits are, as always, those of vision." – James Broughton How do the most successful companies in the world of business leverage technology for business benefit? How does their journey through the social media landscape allow them get more out of the social Web? And how have they transitioned from providing customer service to consistently delivering great customer experiences that lead to loyalty and brand advocacy? Below we delve into the minds of industry thought leaders in the SlideShare at the bottom of this article. The quotes are the outgrowth of the thought-leader interview series I’ve hosted for the past two years here at Small Business Trends. We grabbed some of the best quotes we could remember — inspirational and thought-provoking quotes. From Terry Jones, founder of Travelocity, to Laura Thomas of Dell. From Christian Taylor of Payvment to Jon Ferrara of Nimble. From Loni Stark of Adobe to Cindy Bates of Microsoft. Some quotes introduce us to new concepts like Zuora CEO Tien Tzuo’s thoughts on The Subscription Economy. Others reinforce tried and true ideas, like Brian Solis on what happens when we lose our footing. These and many more thought leaders voice their ideas to inspire you, and give you insights for your business. We invite you to take advantage of the wisdom this collection of business leaders shared with us over the past two years — and in keeping with the times, we’ve also made it easy for you to tweet shortened quotes if you like: "Email lights the fire and social fans the flame." Tweet This Quote from Gail Goodman, CEO of Constant Contact "If somebody in a business exhibits that natural tendency to interact in social media, let that person lead it." Tweet This Quote from Laura Thomas of Dell On social customer service: "I’ve found that customers want the right experience, at the right time." Tweet This Quote from Frank Eliason of Citibank "A social business [has social] embedded into the company's workflow… into the soul of the company." Tweet This Quote from Sandy Carter of IBM "Ecommerce on Facebook is not just throwing a store up on Facebook." Tweet This Quote from Christian Taylor, founder of Payvment "It's not just about how to listen, but to have a good team that can act & capitalize on opportunities." Tweet This Quote from Cory Hartlen of Salesforce "The new generation of customers now using social media…want to hear directly from the brand." Tweet This Quote from Tu Nguyen of Gongshow Gear "Once something goes up on social media, you don't have control over it anymore.” Tweet This Quote from Chris Bucholtz of CMSWire "Attention is scarce and when attention is scarce… there is flight to quality." Tweet This Quote from Loni Stark of Adobe “Influence is the ability to change someone's thoughts or actions… you can't do it by force.” Tweet This Quote from Michael Wu of Lithium “[Ask] how do we tie social, social metrics and social analytics back to… business objectives” Tweet This Quote from Justyn Howard, founder of SproutSocial “Today's marketers … are the people building community and engaging customers in a dialog…” Tweet This Quote from Kevin Cochrane, CMO of OpenText On the so-called death of email: “…people are spending as much time in the emails as before.” Tweet This Quote from Rich Rao of Google "I think we are going to… see new cloud businesses blossoming… a revolution in entrepreneurship." Tweet This Quote from Cindy Bates of Microsoft "A lot of the small businesses that survived the downturn [did so] using technology." Tweet This Quote from Connie Certusi of Sage North America “Small businesses… can now afford to use the best in class software… in the cloud.” Tweet This Quote from Chris Cabrera, CEO of Xactly "We expect from every website what we get from the very best website & get frustrated when it isn't." Tweet This Quote from Terry Jones, founder of Travelocity "The cloud can offer the ability to compete with larger companies with lower cost." Tweet This Quote From Steve Cox of Oracle "Information on an iPad is a living, breathing thing. On paper it is dead…." Tweet This Quote from Jim Fowler, InfoArmy founder "When you lose your footing you start to lose your relevance." Tweet This Quote from author Brian Solis "Small businesses are still struggling with marketing. Focus on fundamentals…like directories…" Tweet This Quote From Tom Byun of Yahoo! "Expectations every quarter are raised to a new bar with a new device coming out or a new application…." Tweet This Quote From John Hernandez of Cisco "I like to think of marketing automation as the orchestra conductor." Tweet This Quote from Phil Fernandez, founder of Marketo "People’s tolerance for a product that…doesn't look like it works very well is small & getting smaller." Tweet This Quote from TA McCann of RivalIQ "It was buyer-beware — now it is more seller-beware.” Tweet This Quote from Simon Berg, founder of Ceros "The new way of thinking starts with the customer." Tweet This Quote from Tien Tzuo, CEO of Zuora "Workflow automation, by itself, is [not] going to be a competitive advantage going forward." Tweet This Quote from Umberto Milletti, founder of InsideView "The whole customer journey and experience is radically shifting. And most companies aren't prepared." Tweet This Quote from Jon Ferrara, founder of Nimble "Customer experience…is all of the different ways you interact & all of the different touch points." Tweet This Quote from Ginger Conlon, Editor of Direct Marketing News “When you look at a customer’s lifetime value … customer service is almost more important than sales.” Tweet This Quote from Matthew Trifiro, CMO of Heroku “Early customers are crucial … [they] are going to help you figure out who your market is.” Tweet This Quote from Pam O’Hara, founder of Batchbook "Collaboration is … built into almost every single business process you can think of." Tweet This Quote from Daisy Hernandez of SAP "The best form of sales is really education…." Tweet This Quote from David Cummings, co-founder of Pardot "Customers exist in a context of a life cycle – acquisition, transaction, delivery, support & advocacy." Tweet This Quote from Jeff Nolan, Ping Identity "Consumer switching hasn’t necessarily been a new thing. But it has reached a new plateau." Tweet This Quote from Robert Wollan of Accenture "Big data is a new term and a not so new term…." Tweet This Quote from Tamara Gruzbarg of Gilt “Most people hate the idea of giving up value that they know they already have acquired.” Tweet This Quote from Bruce Bedford of Oberweis Dairy “Social… has drastically changed the relationship that businesses have with their customers.” Tweet This Quote from Sean Whiteley, formerly of Salesforce.com "Your job is to take care of the customer; your job is to make that person leave happy." Tweet This Quote from John Pepper, CEO of Boloco "Customers still call our president… It is really important [to be] connected to the customer." Tweet This Quote from Annie Tsai, DemandForce "Customer experience is not only about what the customer gets, it is about…how you get a win/win situation." Tweet This Quote from Ed Kolsky, founder of ThinkJar The post Customer, Tech and Social Strategies: 41 Talented Leaders Voice Their Thoughts appeared first on Small Business Trends. |
| 8 Social Media Analytics Tools – Including Ones You May Not Know Posted: 13 Sep 2013 08:00 AM PDT Social media has so many metrics to track – how do you make sense of them all? Even more confusing, there are so many tools out there:
Today we’re going to focus on the latter — tools that are particularly strong when it comes to metrics and analytics about your performance. Here are 8 social media analytics tools that will help you measure how well you are performing and whether you are making progress: Adobe Social
Adobe Social is a part of the umbrella suite of products under the Adobe Marketing Cloud. This is one of those multi-purpose tools. You can post updates to social channels with it. You can place and manage promoted Facebook posts from within Adobe Social. You can use it for listening to buzz and following conversation trends on social sites. You can collaborate with a team. On top of that, it provides social analytics. One of the notable features is its predictive analytics. According to the site, “you can see how well a post will perform before you publish it. Adobe Social also gives you recommendations on ways to improve your posts.” Adobe Social is not the best choice for very small businesses and solo entrepreneurs. The website doesn’t have pricing readily available. That usually means a solution that’s priced for larger enterprises, not for the most price-sensitive small businesses. Social Motus
Social Motus is a relatively young application out of Australia. It covers Facebook and Twitter — only. You get tools to manage your Twitter and Facebook accounts to track targeted conversations, monitor your brand, prioritize your conversations, and even track conversion rates to funnel it all into ROI calculations. Using Social Motus, you can monitor your brand, industry information, content performance, and niche updates 24 / 7, set up keyword match filtering, and assign monitoring or engagement tasks to your social media team. You can respond to priority messages from within the application itself. The social analytics feature on Social Motus helps you to track conversions, shares, reach, clicks, and other metrics. Cyfe
I love executive dashboards. They help businesses stay on top of key performance indicators (KPIs) that matter. With a dashboard, you can see how your business is doing at a glance. You don’t have to jump around to a dozen applications to get an update of the status. But a typical dashboard is an aggregator of data brought in from other sources. A dashboard is really just a way of presenting data that has to be collected in other places first. So that means, even with a dashboard, you need another application to collect social media data in the first place. The benefit of dashboards is that they make sense of data — and present it in a meaningful way that’s convenient. Cyfe is one such executive dashboard and it is priced for small businesses that have a need to view a lot of Web-based data – stats on social media, Web traffic, server statistics, email marketing stats, and other relevant business data. Imagine seeing graphs and charts on your computer screen first thing in the morning or glancing at them throughout the day. It would help you stay on top of what’s happening in your businesses at any point in time. Parts of the dashboard are plug-and-play. Cyfe offers pre-built widgets to sync up data from various apps you use and display it in your dashboard. For instance, Cyfe can pull in stats from email marketing software AWeber, so you can monitor performance indicators about your email marketing right in your dashboard. The number of applications you can sync to with pre-built widgets is still fairly limited. But a message on the website says more are coming soon. And never fear — you can create custom widgets to pull data from just about any data source on the Web to your Cyfe dashboard, if you’re willing to do some extra work to set them up. One neat feature is that you can create public URLs and show a dashboard of say, stats about your website, to the world. Or you can keep everything private, too. Cyfe offers a free version and a premium version – some features discussed here are available only in premium (currently an affordable $19/month – less if you pay annually). DashThis
DashThis is another dashboard application. This Quebec-based application seems especially suited to agencies that manage the online presence for or help market for a number of different clients. The focus appears to be on creating dashboards for Google Analytics, AdWords, Twitter stats, YouTube Channel views, landing page conversions, and more that are related to marketing. There’s one big difference between dashboards and other types of social media monitoring tools. The focus in a dashboard is tracking statistics and displaying them. You’re not going to have the ability to, say, update your Facebook status like you would from within a multi-function tool such as Hootsuite. DashThis.com gives you a way to assimilate, condense, track, and record your performance over time. It's flexible and offers a white label reporting function for agencies so you can brand your reports with your agency’s brand (if you run a digital marketing agency). The company also will create custom reports for you. PageViral
If Facebook is a large part of your social media outreach strategy, and you’re very active on Facebook, then PageViral may be right up your alley. With more than 1.1 billion users on Facebook, the social site can be a huge traffic earner, brand builder, and a lucrative channel – especially for B2C firms (businesses that sell to consumers, not to other businesses). If Facebook is at the core of your marketing efforts, then you will want as much analysis of Facebook interactions as you can get. And that’s what PageViral gives you. Most of us are familiar with Facebook’s own internal analytics, called Facebook Insights. Think of Page Viral as Facebook Insights on steroids. For instance, the Page Viral website says you get “instant notification once your content is no longer visible on fans’ news feed.” Try getting that from Facebook’s own Insights! Page Viral gives you a single Facebook dashboard with data such as audience analysis, demographics, activity analysis, multi-lingual segmenting and sentiment analysis, decision analysis, content analysis, audience reporting and charting, metrics, and page evaluation. If you have just a few hundred fans or a Facebook presence that is on life support, Page Viral will be overkill. But for brands that are particularly active on Facebook, it could be worthwhile. SimplyMeasured
SimplyMeasured is another tool that focuses exclusively on analytics and measuring – rather than on updating your social presence. It does monitoring, competitive analysis, benchmarking, and analytics, providing reports and analytics data online as well as in Excel format. SimplyMeasured offers granularity. You can drill down into specific data regarding a single Tweet, a Google+ update or a Facebook status update. SimplyMeasured is targeted toward large enterprises and agencies that manage dozens if not hundreds of social media accounts. The site calls itself “Enterprise Grade Analytics & Reporting.” They say it is used by 30% of the top 100 Global Brands. The service is pricey, starting at $500 per month, and up. However, for small businesses they offer “free reports” that help you analyze, say, how your Google+ page is engaging, and which updates performed best. Moz Analytics
Spending an insane number of hours on social media while indulging in small talk won't help if you don't know what kind of impact your "small talk," "managed engagement," and "brand conversions" have for your business. Marketing intelligence lies in how your social content helps you to bring the kind of results that you seek. That's when social search, conversation monitoring, and analytics tools come into play. Moz's new analytics does more than just give social metrics and analysis; it ties it together with other facets of your marketing. Your social activity, link building, guest blogger outreach programs, branding, and other lead generation tactics flow into a single system giving you an overall view of how your content works for your business. Moz started out as SEOMoz, then changed its name. But the origins reflect that the company’s focus is much broader than just social — it’s on how your business performs online. Moz offers other tools, which we have covered in our review of Moz search engine tools. Presently Moz Analytics is in beta and you must request an invitation. HootSuite
Hootsuite is one of those multi-function social media tools. You can use it to update your status and manage your social presence on a multitude of social media accounts. It also offers analytics and reports, which is why I include it here. You can post updates on a wide range of social media accounts: Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+, YouTube - just to name some. Hootsuite is also helpful to plan and schedule social updates in advance. For example, you can use the "auto-scheduling" feature for automated social media workflow. On top of the updating functionality, HootSuite has built-in analytics and reporting feature for metrics such as engagement, follower/fan growth, and best performing updates in real time. Reports can be sent to you via email. Hootsuite’s reporting is very limited in the free offering. Even at the Pro level it won’t be as in-depth as some of the other solutions we’ve covered today. But for time-starved small businesses that only have a small amount of time to devote to monitoring their social media performance, Hootsuite’s analytics may be more than enough. I once called Hootsuite “the gold standard for managing your social media accounts” in a small business — and I still feel that way. For an in-depth look at the pros and cons, see my detailed review of hootsuite. Conclusion Of course, this isn't an exhaustive list. Remember to check out our 20 Free Social Media Monitoring Tools, for more. So, we are curious – what social media analytics tools do you use? Please let us know in a comment! The post 8 Social Media Analytics Tools – Including Ones You May Not Know appeared first on Small Business Trends. |
| Addressing the Real Problem – Not Posted: 13 Sep 2013 05:00 AM PDT
I worked in a few businesses where you’d regularly have to don safety glasses and/or a hardhat and venture into the shop to discuss or observe some manufacturing issue. And every time I’d go out there, I’d see the “Days Without A Lost Time Accident” sign and, unless something had happened recently, think nothing of it. Then, more than ten years later, I’m folding laundry and listening the radio and like a bolt out of the blue this cartoon appears in my brain fully formed. That happens pretty rarely and it’s always much appreciated. Maybe I should hang a sign next to my drawing table – “Days Without an Epiphany Cartoon.” Then again…. The post Addressing the Real Problem – Not appeared first on Small Business Trends. |
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