On Rad's Radar? - conferences Archives

A Day in My Brain

2012-05-18T14:19:54Z

I was in NYC (Tribeca) this week to spend the day at a Q&A session with Seth Godin. He is a marketing guru and author of a lot of best selling business books. Like these:

Here are some of the gems that I liked.

"A "brand" is the promise of an experience." [Boy, could I riff on that one!] Brand IS the experience. Accept that most people won't like you. Build a tribe that will.

Commit to one marketplace or two. You can't chop all the trees down in the forest with one hatchet.

"It's way easier to sell water to thirsty people than to make thirsty people. It's OK to remind people they're thirsty." The corollary to that is People buy to avoid pain more often than they buy to gain pleasure.

You can try to create demand for your service, like trying to make people thirsty. Or you can find thirsty people and sell them water.

"Define failure before you start. When you reach that point, stop, learn and move on to the next thing." [It's a concept from Seth's book, The Dip]

"The secret, I think, is in understanding what matters."

"People spend their time and attention and money in places that make them feel valued." Are you making your customers feel valued?

What is the world view of your target customer? Does your marketing line up with that?

For a brief few, Seth talked about working for a start-up versus working for Google or Apple or Facebook. A start-up is about growth If you want fast-paced; to make an impact; and to learn, join the start-up. Google, Apple, Microsoft, and Facebook are in the "keep it going" mode. You won't have an impact there. You will be a cog in the machine. In our world, working for any of the billion dollar LEC's or MSO's is like working for Facebook, only a lot less cool on your resume.

What is Important to you? Tom Peters says that he can tell what is important to you from calendar. What does your schedule say about what's important to you?

It's all about Direct Marketing and Pay for Performance. (Social media is a tool of direct marketing.)

There is no road map.

It's all about connection and association. Are you connecting people?

We have mass disruption going on today. Every industry including our own is being disrupted by the Internet. Why? The Internet is the first device that is both a Receiver and a transmitter. That's the problem.

Hopefully one of these nuggets gets you thinking.

Some notes made it to this Power Point I created.

What is the Market Expecting?

2012-04-01T17:46:30Z

Tuesday I was in Vegas at the Channel Partners Conference mainly for the TCA events. At the TCA Channel Chief Summit, Tiffani Bova of Gartner and Rauline Ochs of IPED Market Bridge Alliance presented research. The take away for me was in perspective.

No one buys the way most service providers sell. That's why we are always searching for Consultative Sales Professionals. Because the whole industry sells what they want - and it is followed up by a series of me-too.

Just because one CLEC is selling Managed Security does not mean that the marketplace wants it or will buy it or that it will want it delivered that exact way. It also doesn't mean that the next eight CLEC's or service providers need to market that same offering.

The market is consuming technology differently. It enters the business via the consumer. About 70% of devices are owned by the consumer in the business environment. Only about 30% are paid for by the business. That means support for devices either isn't available or is imposed on the IT staff by the employees. That's a confusing (and expensive) way to handle it. Don't you agree?

Most of what Bova and Ochs presented had to do with mobility and Cloud. Mobility is a huge problem for most CLEC's as the model for cellular sales is unprofitable - whether they sign a wholesale, agent or MVNO contract - the margin on cellular is thin to none.

And what is prompting Cloud? Two things: ubiquitous broadband and a mobile workforce.

Ubiquitous is really hyperbole because even with 3G, 4G and wi-fi, you can't get bandwidth everywhere and even when it is available it is shoddy (like at tech conference hotels).

Mobile workforce means a couple of things. One that more businesses have accepted remote workers - whether at home locally, across the country or across the globe. The economic downturn (and all the consolidation) has translated into businesses having less workers but expecting more work. This means working at home, while on the road, etc. Hence, not just email, but the application data has to be available from any authorized, connected device. That is the beauty of Cloud.

Cloud changes the way business is done.

Read that again, because that means it has to be sold that way.

It's easier to sell email, because everyone has email and it is almost a requirement. Selling unified messaging gets more complicated. Unified Communications and Collaboration is just too complex of a sale, of an explanation, of an implementation, of a deployment. That's where the service providers want to go, but they neglect the challenge of the sale. There is a lack of the story, the sales triggers, the value proposition, the WHY, and of course the on-boarding.

One thing Bova pointed out was that VDI (virtual desktop) sales have grown in EMEA (Africa and Mid-East) while have stagnated in North America. One reason: VAR's have too big a quota with HP or Dell to take a 500 desktop refresh to VDI instead of selling 500 desktops. Not just the quota for the discount, but to sustain Gold level service. It's the same with Cisco, Microsoft, etc. VAR's will keep selling what they sell for 2 reasons: First, to maintain the current level of vendor support to continue to service current clients in the manner that is expected (or even contracted). Second, making the changes to shift business to an MSP or all service model is complicated and expensive. Bova suggested firing clients and employees to create the business you will need in 5 years, but that's easy to say from a consulting seat. Not so easy from a business owner perspective.

When EarthLink told its channel partners in Tampa that it only wanted Multi-Site multi-access opportunities, it didn't come right out and say that it would stop selling T1's, but that was the underlying message. (And ELNK did tell me that 1GB and 10GB private line, even ON-net, was not what they wanted to sell.) That's one way to start planning for where you want to be. Say no while being specific about what you are looking to offer.

As a whole I don't think the service providers have any idea what buyers are buying or why. Just because you WANT to sell MPLS with security or Hosted UC&C or whatever, doesn't mean that prospects will actually BUY it (that way).

When does something become a commodity? When the customer buys it directly online.

For non-commodity services, you need a well trained sales force that understands the brand, the value proposition, and the target. As an industry we aren't there yet.

I'm going to leave you with that.

Coming soon two posts: (1) Master Agents are like Pharma Reps. (2) Tech Data versus Master Agents.

Channel Manager Best Practices

2012-02-17T17:10:58Z

On Tuesday, March 27 at 11:30AM PT, the Technology Channel Association (TCA) will hold the first ever Channel Managers Best Practices Forum at the Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas.

TCA's mission is channel education. The TCA holds monthly webinars for members and has developed a Certified telecom Professional program. In Vegas, the TCA will be holding our 5th Channel Chief Summit alongside this Channel Managers forum. With this event, channel managers will have the opportunity to network and learn from their peers. Four Rock Star Channel Managers will discuss some of their best practices such as:

Balancing 80/20

Maximizing the MMR of the Agent

What is your #1 job responsibility?

How do you balance agent business interest with corporate interest?

Internal relationships

Setting Agent expectations

Lunch will be provided!*

The 4 Channel Manager Rock Stars chosen by TCA members are:

Charles Lomond of Airespring

Crystal Farley of Megapath

Sherrie Hiller at Telepacific

Chris Schubert of Telnes Broadband

Space is limited. Register today!

(*Most of the ticket cost is the lunch from Caesars.)

Enchanting Keynote at Parallels Summit 2012

2012-02-16T17:05:07Z

Guy Kawasaki was the keynote yesterday morning for the Parallels Summit 2012 in Orlando. (Vodka bar was open at 8:20 AM!)

Guy talked about the key points from his book,Enchantment .

One is You Must be Likable. Richard Branson of Virgin is likable. He has a real smile- a Duchenne smile. A Duchenne smile leads to crow's feet. One factor in being likable is to accept others, no matter the color, politics, religion, looks, tattoos, etc. Have a YES Attitude. How can you help other people?

The second point was to Achieve Trustworthiness. In sales, people have to Like you and Trust you to buy from you.

Amazon, Zappos, and Nordstrom have established Trust, because they give customers trust first (with their return policy).

Guy spoke about Bakers. Be a Baker, not an Eater. Bakers know they can always bake more. Bakers are more trustworthy than eaters.

A way to gain trust: Agree on something. Start with that.

Point 3 was Do Something DICEE - Deep Intelligent Complete Empower Elegant

Enchant people with great stuff.

What goes into the ecosystem: software, docs, support, installation, webinars, follow-up, and more for a complete and total product system. More importantly a great customer experience (UX).

LIKE, TRUST, DICEE and LAUNCH.

Launch your product by Telling a Story. Guy says, "Plant many seeds." In other words, tell lots of people, because you have no idea how it will TIP.

Enchant the Influencers. You just don't always know who they are. kawasaki suggested reading Influence by Robert Cialdini. A point in that book was to Invoke Reciprocation. "I know you would do this for me."

Guy says that SXSW was what made Twitter tip (not the A-Listers who use it today).

When telling your story, stop talking tech - calories, MB's, CPU, etc. It's not about calories, but how many miles I have to run to burn it off. It's not how many GB's, but the number of songs or customer records or whatever that it will hold.

Kawasaki gave the example of My Key by Ford, which allows parents to program the car via the key they give their teenager - how loud the stereo can go and how fast the car can go. Great story. Good UX (user experience or benefits).

Another Point: Overcome Resistance by Re-Positioning the Story or by providing Social Proof. For the iPod, social proof was the white earbuds.

Sell the Dream, not the tech. What will it do? What will it be like to own it and use it? Use the technology to Enchant the audience. Social media is a way to enchant by providing value, information, insight, assistance. Social media also means fast, flat and frequent.

3 Pillars: Trust, Quality and Likability.

In the break-out session with Guy, he was asked about the commodity business (like web hosting, since we were at Parallels show. Parallels is a control panel for web hosting companies.) "If you truly believe it is a Commodity that you sell, You Lose." If YOU don't believe that there is something Unique or Valuable about your product -- or that the client is better off with YOUR service -- get out of the game. You can't win. Bah-bye!

Two images to look at: HERE and THERE. If you need help figuring out how to market in a hyper-competitive space, call my office at (813) 963-5884.

5 Tips for Speakers

2012-02-08T22:54:00Z

I'm not the best speaker. I'm still nervous and anxious before every talk, even when moderating. But I prepare for every talk - whether I am a moderator, panelist, keynote, trainer, or co-host. Here are some things that speakers do wrong:

1. Relying on PowerPoint. When technical difficulties occur as they often do, speakers are not prepared to talk without the slides, the crutch. Be ready to talk without a microphone and without the projector.

2. Don't read me the slides! I have been reading since I was 4. I don't need you to read me the slides. I need you to tell why that slide was included in the first place.

3. Have some emotion. Tired or hungover is no way to present. Energetic or passionate is preferable, but at least speak up and into the microphone.

4. Respect the audience's time. Yes it is your time to speak - and you have something (hopefully prepared) to say - but remember that the audience likely paid money to be there. It has to be valuable; not just your talking points.

5. Tell a story or be Engaging. This speaks for itself. If everyone is heads down on their phones, take the hint. (They aren't all tweeting about how profound you are.)

Is it tweet worthy? Have you said anything worth tweeting? Not the ultimate test, but certainly some gauge of audience reaction is social media.

In the end, would you want to listen to you?

In a previous post I mention that teaching is part entertainment. That may not be what you signed up for (to be an entertainer), and I am not saying be Jack Benny, but your points will come across better if you present them well.

Look for me in Miami Beach Next Week

2012-01-26T17:59:23Z

Next week is ITEXPO East 2012 in Miami Beach at the convention center. I arrive around 11 AM on Tuesday for Editor's Day. There are a number of all-day events going on Tuesday like InsightPRM's Sales Management training and the Avaya seminar.

Not surprisingly, most of the buzz around the show is on Startup Camp Comms, which is Thursday at 4 PM with keynote from Sir terry Matthews, founder of MITEL. Four start-ups will be pitching as well.

I have 5 slots this time.

Wed. night on the show floor at the CVX Expo stage, three agents - Dan Vidal, Josh Anderson and myself (fueled with cocktails) will answer questions from Martin Vilaboy, Editor-in-Chief of Channel Vision magazine about issues facing the Channel. Consolidation, Competition, Commissions, Cloud, UC, and the decline of the PSTN. The fun starts at 6:30. Straight from the Shooters: Candid Conversations on Issues Facing the Channel. Details here.

Wed. at 11 AM, I moderate the panel, Social Media Channel Integration, about contact centers integrating social media into the work station in room B210. The discussion will be about business drivers for social media; 4 steps to utilize social media in the enterprise; and hurdles to incorporating SM in the contact center.

At 2:30 on Wed., in room B116, I will be moderating a panel titled Educating the Channel with Industry Standard Certifications. It's a topic that is close to me because the TCA, which I helped found, is all about educating the Channel and rolled out a certification program last year. This will be a good conversation about how we need to education the sales channels as well as the marketplace in order to sell services like UC, Cloud and managed services.

The fun panel will be on Friday morning at 9 AM: Does Your Business Have a Social Media Strategy? Chief Head of Lettuce Antony Francis is an old pal, who likes to get cranky with me, so this panel will rock. You will leave with more info than you thought possible at 9 AM on a Friday in room B210.

At Noon on Friday catch me at the 4GWE session about Fixed Wireless as a wireline replacement (in room A109). Do you think fixed wireless can replace copper?

Look for my tweets from @radinfo and say HI if you see me.

Are You Going to ITEXPO?

2011-12-28T18:48:18Z

It's just about a month away from ITEXPO East 2012 that starts January 29, 2012. The Lowes Hotel is already sold out in Miami Beach.

I am moderating 4 sessions this time. Here they are:

2/1/2012 @ 11:00-11:45am - TRACK: Customer Engagement -- "Social Media Channel Integration"

2/1/2012 @ 2:30-3:15pm - TRACK: Next Gen Service Provider -- "Educating the Channel with Industry Standard Certifications"

2/3/2012 @ 9:00-9:45am - TRACK: Customer Engagement -- "Does Your Business Have a Social Media Strategy?"

At 4GWE on Friday the 3rd at Noon, I will be moderating "Wireless Access Open For Business" where we will be discussing fixed wireless as a last mile access choice. Then we will have an open discussion, kind of an Un-Conference.

You can register for ITEXPO or MSP World or Cloud Comm Summit for $99 until 12/31/11. You can register for 4GWE here. CVX for Agents and VAR's is no charge.

Asterisk workshop on the 31st is free (with any registration).

Julius Knapp, Chief of the Office of Engineering and Tech at the FCC, will be one of the keynotes.

Another keynote is Terry Matthews, chairman of Wesley Clover, MITEL, Newbridge and Counterpath.

Let me know if you are attending so we can meet up for coffee or for the Gathering Dinner.

Why Attend ITEXPO?

2011-09-14T06:10:21Z

So at most ITEXPO's, we try to put together a dinner where we invite everyone to come have dinner and meet someone new. (It is a dutch treat sometimes, but TMC's Anthony Graffeo picked up the tab Monday night.) Great connections have been made here. Nothing like sharing a meal and conversation with someone new.

Great presenters and content going on all the time. (Yes, some presenters could prepare better and get rid of the PowerPoint crutch, but overall.)

Pictures tell the story. See a bunch more here:

Why I Am Skipping Connections

2011-09-06T16:11:48Z

Next week I will be in Austin for ITEXPO from Sunday till Thursday. It starts the fall conference caravan. There are so many conferences in October it is crazy: TelcoTV, COMPTEL, WISPA, FISPA, MUMS, Broadsoft Connections, Metaswitch User Forum, STC and a cloud thingy or two. I can't wait for November!

I do more than 15 conferences a year. Many do not have an actual return on the investment dollars (show pass, hotel, airfare, expenses and meals). I have to consider them branding opportunities or important networking occasions. One show that many of my clients attend is the Broadsoft Connection show in Phoenix. I have been debating this for a while and I'm going to skip it this year.

One reason is the ROI. There has not been real ROI in the two years that I have attended. Many of my clients already bought their softwswitch - Broadsoft in most cases - and have gone to market with a Hosted PBX offering. Most of the big carriers have too, including XO, TDS, Comcast, Cox, Windstream and C-Link. Doesn't really leave anyone to consult with on go-to-market.

I have to attend as a Channel Partner (with a $2500 price tag), but the actual value for that investment is questionable. A logo on a member portal isn't exactly worth it. There hasn't been clear benefit for that money demonstrated or expressed. It seems very telco to call it "Channel Partner", when it seems the real meaning is "help us sell our stuff".

Another reason is the current state of my relationship with Broadsoft. The VP of Marketing has not been cordial since I broke the story of BSFT acquiring Casabi last year. In fact, she told me at CPExpo in Vegas that she doesn't like me. That's fine. There are people I don't like, too. I still do my job though. Pulling two consecutive no-shows for conference calls with clients that we share (that run Broadsoft) leads me again to wonder about the Channel Partnership that I paid for last year.

In addition, this conference will increase travel in October to 21 days on the road. It would be nice to cut that down.

Without clear expressed value for the Channel Partner ticket, I have no grounds to go other than to hang out with clients, which is a good reason until you factor in the $4K price tag. The alternative is to do what is so common today: just show up and hang around. (You can buy a lot of drinks for $2500!) Many vendors do it at conferences, including Broadsoft.

Want to have coffee? You can see me in Vegas the week before Connections or at ITEXPO next week or at other shows in October. Ping me to meet up.

InterOp 2011 in Vegas

2011-05-11T20:17:58Z

Sungard booth at InterOp. With all the Cloud talk I thought more than just Rackspace and Sungard woul dbe here.

InterOp is all about the racks ;)

VARs are Replacing Agents

2011-04-03T13:35:04Z

In an article in Channel Partners magazine, Master Agents discuss how all their future growth will come from VAR's. Carriers are chasing VAR's for any growth in Channel numbers. Where does that leave the Agents?

Well, Agents can partner with VAR's to be the telecom provisioning department. Or Agents can start getting uncomfortable or irrelevant.

Exam the fact that most Agents do not want to sell cellular. Part of it is the commission structure. Part of it is that Agents are at a disadvantage selling cell phones - in available models, discounts, and plans. But the top two cellcos want the Channel to sell mobility because they don't want to be phone companies. That's an impasse.

Look at Hosted PBX. Agents ignore it for the most part. I was surprised that my panel on SIP Trunking at the CP Expo about adding value to the SIP sale ended up being about the fact that Agents have to get used to the idea of selling SIP. What? Five years after the first SIP panel, Agents still have to be convinced that SIP is taking over? Wake up, people!

And when you do sell it, you sell it as a cheap replacement for PRI. Deep sigh!

Then there is the whole IP, Internet, Cloud situation. The Internet is not a fad. Broadband sales are growing at 1% a year. That means you have to start taking on other forms of revenue - and most of that revenue will be ATTACHED to the Cloud.

Agents typically have only sold to on the WAN side of the demarc. VAR's typically take the LAN side of the demark, except when they also host servers and applications (like MS Exchange) for clients, but that has been mainly on-premise servers until recently.

VAR's typically touch more Layers of the OSI Model than Agents. Agents sell at Layer 2 (transport) or Layer 3 (Internet Access). Rarely do Agents do cabling (Layer 1) or apps (Layer 7). VAR's however touch Layers 1, 2, 3 and 7.

The scenario playing out today reminds me of when Agents only sold LD and they would ride that into the sunset. It looks like we will see that again. With commission changes, channel structure changes and product changes, something has to give.

Here are some suggestions for the Agents:

First, Get your CTP certification!
Start networking with Microsoft, IBM, Cisco and HP partners. Even Xerox and Ricoh dealers.
Plan on spending at least 90 minutes per week online learning about services that your favorite carriers are offering. It's time to expand your knowledge and your own portfolio.(TCA has monthly webinars and so do most of the carriers.)
Join the local technology association to learn about any new cloud providers that you can get to know and become comfortable with.
Get used to the idea of being uncomfortable. Growth only happens when we are outside our comfort zone.
Attend a conference or two to meet potential partners or providers or just to get some deeper knowledge.
If you are stuck, call me.

Good luck!

BTW, growth doesn't mean adding cable providers to just stave off the reality. You need to get deeper into IP, Apps, Cloud and the customer's total IT and telecom spend.

Talking with a Regional CLEC

2011-03-18T17:19:22Z

Twelve minutes with Clay Colvin of Georgia Business Net, a regional CLEC in Georgia, talking about the business of being a CLEC and why conferences (such as FISPA's Service Provider Summit) are helpful for small businesses. It was a good conversation about the CLEC world.

Agent Open Call

2011-02-08T05:59:26Z

I am a Certified Telecom Professional now. On the TCA Open Agent call this Friday at 4 PM, we will be talking about CTP, tips and tricks, and trends that will affect Agent revenue. Register today here. This is the slide deck that I crafted as I was thinking about the call.

Agent Open Call slide deck

It's the Content Stupid!

2011-01-20T07:15:20Z

At a networking event on Monday night in Tampa, I ran into an SEO guy, who proceeded to explain that Google search results (SERPs) would be all paid soon. He didn't know the difference between an SEO strategy and managing a PPC (pay-per-click) campaign. (The Cranky Bastards discuss this on this week's podcast - and I will be discussing SEO and Lead Gen with TMC's Anthony Graffeo Friday).

I tried to explain that organic SEO will always work - meaning content like crack will beat any paid campaign. If I have the best, most relevant content that is updated regularly, I win the SERP war. Page 1 Baby!

It's always about content.

As we head into conference season with the ITEXPO East 2011 in Miami Beach, attendees will be seeing a change in the content from panels. Instead of each panelist presenting, each panel will be a conversation with heavy audience participation.

This shift started with a blog post from Scott Stratten that centers around providing the audience with crack-like content (in other words, content that they get addicted to). TMC has a long history of providing not just industry news, but various viewpoints and analysis from many contributors in the Industry about our Industry. In a 2.0 world of UGC (user-generated content), it was time to incorporate as much interaction with the audience as we can. It should be interesting. Content is still King!

I organize BarCamp Tampa Bay which is an UN-conference for techies and creatives with no agenda. Each morning anyone that wants to present can sign up for a slot to do so. Passionate people make great presenters because they have an enthusiasm for the topic that they are talking about. I love that. (You'll see that from me if you watch my Net-Head talk on the CVX Expo at 3:15 on 2/3.)

Watch Thomas Howe or Rich Tehrani talk - passion baby. Gary Vee style. It's something to aspire to if you are sitting on a panel, because if you just want to read me your brochure or your slides, you are boring (and probably bored!). Tell me what excites you about your company, your industry or your services.

If Only the Presenters Improved

2010-11-10T13:53:24Z

I organize a few events. I present at a few conferences. And I attend about 15 each year. I rarely sit through a whole presentation. Why? I'm bored. The presenter is bored. I'm not kidding. (In Phoenix one presenter looked so bored of having to present the stats and graphs.) No one practices or prepares for sessions. They read you the slides.

Let's face it if I plunk down between $1295 and $2995 for a ticket, should the content be golden? Shouldn't the presenters care about what they presenting?

I'm helping put together a couple of agendas now. I don't want a panel of 3 or 4 unless they are going to argue. Seriously. Even then I would rather have a panel of 2 and the other 2 ask questions from the audience.

Have you heard of BarCamp or IGNITE or Pecha Kucha? Google them. BarCamp is Un-Conferences, which means the agenda is created that day by people that show up to share, learn and present. At BarCamp Tampa Bay 2010, some attendees asked for a Twitter 101 session, so we grabbed a few people and held a session.

IGNITE is like Pecha Kucha in that it's a presentation of 20 slides that are automatically advanced. (see the above YouTube as an example of Ignite).

We have so many examples of good presentation - DEMO, TED, IGNITE, Steve Jobs - all available for viewing 24/7. If you are presenting at a conference in 2011, I beg you to take the time to prepare. Even a little. Think beyond yourself. Think about the Audience. The people that paid big money to glean some knowledge from these session. They did not come to hear you puke marketing speak at them (you have your CEO to do that at the keynote).