Oct 10, 2011 | Marketing, Social Media
Finding ways to quantify the impact of investment on-line has become a real challenge for management. A dollar spent on line is a dollar not available to be spent elsewhere, so the need for a quantitative base from which to compare apples and apples is substantial, and it keeps the beanies happy.
Google Analytics is a set of free tools that can be used to ferret out the information needed to optimise any site. Currently with 130+ standard reports, and lots of opportunity to customise your own reports, the tools are of enormous value to anyone running a site. Forget all the expensive optimisation consultants, just pay a web savvy student a bit to dig around and come up with opportunities to get more out of your web ecosystem, the site, bloggs, Twitter, Digg, Tumbir, Linkedin, and so on.
Here are some lessons put out by the experts.;
- This series of videos by Appsumo offers lots of tips in a very easy to understand manner.
- Social Media Examiner, perhaps the best site for gathering information on social media has this interview with Google’s Avinash Kaushik on the use of Google analytics in quantifying activity on the web, and is a must watch for beginners to pros.
- Avinish’s blog provides a beginners guide to web analytics, 10 easy things to do to assess the effectiveness of a website, but that is only the beginning of the insight that can be gained from his blog, another must read.
- And just in case you want more….
Point is, the tools for measurement are now there, Google has an enterprise quality set for free, so there is absolutely no excuse for not using them.
Oct 8, 2011 | Innovation
Of all the eulogising about Apple and Steve Jobs that has been published since his death a couple of days ago, almost predictably, the best one in my humble view comes from Gary Hamel who looks at Apple through his lens of Strategy.
Hamel thinks about the development and execution of the sources of competitive advantage, and he applies these thoughts to Apple and the legacy of Jobs.
Oct 7, 2011 | Change, Lean, Management
A while ago I helped a mate move flats. He had only been there about 5 years after becoming a “bachelor” again after his family grew up, but the significant amount of clutter accumulated was unanticipated, and surprising. All sorts of proposals, manuals, brochures, old gear, and stuff that at some point passed the “might be useful one day” test had accumulated, and the clean out released lots of space, and a recognisable organisation for the remainder.
It occurred to me that businesses are the same, they accumulate all sorts of organisational and personal clutter that takes up valuable space and time, creating blockages and “work-arounds” in processes, effort that would be unnecessary in a cleaned, disciplined environment.
An aggressive clean-out of physical stuff, but more importantly redundant processes and rules from time to time would deliver significant productivity benefits, at very little cost.
Oct 6, 2011 | Innovation
Innovating a business model usually is about finding ways to put elements of a service delivery together differently, these days it is usually also about combining technologies to deliver an outcome that would have been impossible without both the technology and the new combination.
In the US there is a new car sharing (as distinct from rental) service, Zipcar, growing very rapidly by delivering a car-share service without the frustrating paperwork, queues, and uncertainty that is present currently in car rentals.
Simply join, and receive a “Zipcard” which activates a reader on the windshield of a Zipcar, updates your account, records mileage and location of the car, and opens the doors so you can get in and drive away. You can just turn up at a depot, or reserve over the net or mobile app, no paperwork, no hassle.
Suddenly, inner city living just got a whole lot easier!
Oct 5, 2011 | Innovation
Nothing new ever happens when the past is just repeated.
When Apple was at the bottom of its life-cycle, when they basically ran out of cash, and survival was improbable, Steve Jobs, just reinstated at the company he founded took a step that redefined the persona of the business.
He made an advertisement, aimed at the diminishing pool of customers, and potential customers, but also at the employees and other stakeholders, an ad that should be remembered as one that started the redefinition of the business that now pervades every category they create. The ad was sufficiently successful to attract that doyen of social commentators, the Simpsons, to have a shot.
Thnking differently is a challenge to most, it creates anxiety, the fear of failure, and puts people at risk from the naysayers and bureaucrats, but without them, we have no innovation, nothing different.
What a boring world that would be.
