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• App of the Week: iTunes U

  By Thomas Stalcup Jr

  Posted on January 25, 2012 at 4:26 pm

  

  App of the Week: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/

  It’s not often that a company tries to revolutionize an industry outside itself. But Apple is doing just that. The company is attempting to revolutionize the education industry by providing inexpensive, interactive and engaging alternatives to university textbooks. Lost in the shuffle of the Digital Textbook announcement was a new iPhone and iPad app made by Apple called iTunes U, which now has its own section in Apple stores. What started out as a collection of free video and audio lectures from leading universities has lately become home to entire courses. ITunes U gives users a glimpse inside prestigious centers of higher education such as Duke, Stanford, Yale and MIT by providing virtual lecture halls, campuses and lecture materials.

  The new iTunes U app for iPhone and iPad looks much like iBooks or Newsstand, with a typical bookshelf layout. The difference is in the material it contains. Once users subscribe to a class they are given an immediate overview, a bio of the instructor and a course outline. Updates from the instructor upload automatically, which keeps the material fresh and relevant.

  The Posts section of this app is where Apple has really revamped iTunes U. This is no longer just a taped lecture but an entire college course at your fingertips. Posts with information about the assignment and assigned materials upload in date order. These materials can consist of audio, video, PDF or Word documents, PowerPoint or keynote presentations, links to other apps, iBooks or even new digital textbooks.

  iTunes U really comes alive in the unique, comprehensive university experience it gives the user. You can read lecture notes, watch a 30-minute lecture on, say, Energy 101 and then read the relevant chapter in the iBook that comes with the course. Assignments and materials are presented in a checklist format so you can progress at your own rate. New assignments open as the previous ones are completed. Some courses have interactive quizzes upon conclusion of the course so that you can assess your knowledge. ITunes U will also suggest related courses to continue your learning.

  iTunes U is not just for higher education. There are complete courses for K-12, including general math & science as well as more advanced classes in, e.g., geography, algebra and chemistry. Another section of the app, labeled Beyond Campus, includes materials from such august bodies as the Smithsonian, NASA and the Library of Congress. iTune U currently houses over 500,000 assignments. And the library is growing.

  Did we mention the best part? The entire thing is FREE, from the app itself to every single class. How many of you would love to take a free college course? How about in the comfort of your own home or from anywhere in the world using your iPhone or iPad? We feel this is the start of something extraordinary and cannot wait to see where Apple takes iTunes U next.

  For more examples of intriguing Apps, check out G/B’s App of the Week section.

  Tags:

  App of the Week, Innovation, iTunes, Mobile, Mobile apps, On Technology 

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• Site of the Week: Burr Pilger Mayer, Inc.

  By Kathryn Poulsen

  Posted on January 19, 2012 at 1:49 pm

  

  Site of the Week:  www.bpmcpa.com

  While surfing the web this week, we came across Burr Pilger Mayer’s (BPM) “people” page and thought it was a fun and creative take on what can often resemble your high school year book. After a few seconds on the page, the employee photos change to pictures of their hobbies and interests. Hover over an image and the employee’s photo appears again. But in place of their job title, the employee’s hobby is listed along with a short blurb on how the activity translates to their job.

  We like how the page brings out the employee’s personality in such a simple and relatable way. A reader is likely to respond more positively through the connection this approach creates than reading an alphabetical list of employees and their contact information.

  Firm differentiation is more important than ever and BPM did just that in a tasteful and unique way. BPM, you caught our eye! See for yourself at www.bpmcpa.com.

  For more examples of intriguing site design ideas, check out GB’s Site of the Week section.

  Tags:

  Accounting Industry, Design, Site of the Week, Web Design 

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• Discovering the Truth Through Product Reviews

  By Phillip Gockel

  Posted on January 17, 2012 at 3:20 pm

  

  If you’re like me, you make your online shopping decisions based largely on product reviews. And, if you have a suspicious mind like mine, you may have wondered if retail sites edit their user reviews to push particular products (usually the expensive ones). After coming across the review below, however, I think it’s safe to say that at least some online stores are honest enough to include the – shall we say – less glowing feedback.

  HDMI cables have become a staple within any media or entertainment system. It’s commonplace to pay anywhere between $5 and $100 dollars for a cable. However, one seller was asking a whopping $1095.99 for an HDMI cable. This is clearly well above what should be considered reasonable – it is not as if this particular cable had any extras that made the astronomical price justifiable. Finding an absurdly overpriced product for sale isn’t uncommon, of course (take this “I Am Rich” iPhone app for example). So when consumers strike back with an acid review like the one that follows, it makes me feel like the order of a crooked retail universe has been restored just a little bit:

  “I bought this HDMI cable around Christmas time. Even though I just had a small 20-inch vacuum tube television and VCR-laserdisc combo player, my favorites immediately were up-converted to High Definition… My advice is simple: spending $1,000 on your mortgage, college education, retirement fund, or some boring investment is SOOOO short sighted. Make a decision for the rest of your life. Buy. This. Cable. IMMEDIATELY.” – Customer review from BestBuy

  Perverse as it may seem, reading this kind of sarcastic review helps me keep my faith in humanity.

  Tags:

  Customer Service, Feedback, On Technology 

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• ROInterest

  By Joe Walsh and Sue Stock Allison

  Posted on January 13, 2012 at 12:25 pm

  
  
  

  Like many of you, we’ve learned that the highest immediate return on marketing dollars is realized in interviews with existing clients.

  Think about it. The cost of interviews with a professional interviewer is somewhere in the neighborhood of $1,500 per client. Let’s do the math. $1.5k is less than a quarter-page ad in a glossy trade or a table at a charity event. Hmmm. Nothing against ads or the rubber chicken dinner circuit (we do each regularly and believe in the long-term value of both), but for immediate returns, smart marketers also invest in client interviews.

  Done right, client interviews are a demonstration of genuine interest. They show that you listen, they strengthen bonds, discover growth opportunities, reveal service issues (large or small), unearth personality conflicts or broadly spot cracks in the relationship foundation. In short, they have a direct link to preserving and increasing revenue. Don’t take our word for it:

  “The fact that they are even bothering to conduct this interview with me makes me think much more highly of them and makes me think they truly value this relationship, which bodes well for the future.” –Law Firm Client

  “They are the only outside firm that does this client interview and that’s very valuable to me. And quite honestly, with the cost pressures I face internally, it’s easier to talk about that with you than with them directly.” –Law Firm Client

  “Just asking, ‘Are we doing a good job? Is there anything else we can do?’ They learn about the business that way.” –Accounting Firm Client

  “We’ve been a client for decades, we even share the same building but rarely see each other … in ways we feel like we are taken for granted, like an old marriage where you drift apart under the same roof.” –Law Firm Client

  I’d like to do interviews, but face the “over your dead body” issue.

  There are too many on the client front lines that don’t understand (or fear) the difference between their chats with a client and an in-depth interview designed to elicit deep-seated emotional reactions and root causes of problems.

  We’ve often heard partners and managing directors dismiss formal client feedback programs with, “I keep in touch with my clients; I’d know if there were a problem.” Unfortunately, it is too often the case that they only think they would know if there were a problem.

  Keeping in touch with their clients, while critical, tends to be social or issue-specific. Not rising to the level of a formal client interview, it fails to address details of problems or even potential business opportunities.

  How do you overcome “powerful” internal objections to client interviews or satisfaction programs? That’s a management issue, not marketing, but maybe we can help. If you can’t get backing from your firm’s top leadership, a champion from the partnership can still help you get started. With the right advocate, it takes only a success story or two to get the ball rolling.

  I’m going to do (or do more) interviews; how do I do them right?

  Assuming you can get the program launched, how do you make the most of your investment? Here’s some guidance:

  Choose the right technique
  Sounds rudimentary, but client interviews need to be interviews. With the best intentions, many firms, in lieu of interviews, elect to send anonymous mail or web surveys. They drop a survey in the mail. Or send out a web survey as a link in an email. Write ‘em up. Send ‘em out. Easy, right?

  Wrong.

  Your clients are sophisticated decision-makers who expect your personal interest. Something faceless mail or a web survey can’t provide. A mail survey does little to reassure a client that you really care about what they think or are prepared to act on their response. If you’re asking them to remain anonymous, that’s precisely how they’ll feel.

  Moreover, with anonymity, you can’t take specific action. You don’t get to ask a follow-up question. And the lack of personal interaction prevents the client from telling you about a lurking issue your initial question may not have anticipated. In a good phone interview under the right circumstances, you’ll find out information you didn’t anticipate discovering. That is, if you’re asking the right questions the right way.

  Treat the interview as a conversation, not a questionnaire
  When firms are looking to survey their clients, they spend a huge amount of time and resources designing the questions they want to ask. They want to be able to draw statistically valid conclusions about their client base, therefore eliminating any chance of “interviewer bias.”

  Certainly, having objective feedback is important. But when the people matter as much, or more, than the end product, then the manner and method of the interview are at least as important as the questions that are asked!

  This is about relationships, not statistics, (although you can have both). But no matter how beautifully designed your questions, to be effective they must appear to your clients as a conversation; colleague-to-colleague.

  Ask questions the right way
  What do you really want from your clients in interviews? You want the truth. You want them to be forthcoming. How do you get that? Imagine your best friend just found out that their father was admitted to the hospital with a form of cancer. You can question your friend as a friend or as an interlocutor at a call center. Here’s how the latter works:

  “I just heard about your father. What hospital is he in?”
  “St. Luke’s.”
  “When was he admitted?”
  “Late last night; I was still at work.”
  “Who is his doctor?”
  “Dr. Know-It-All. I don’t like him, but everyone says he’s the best.”
  “What’s going to happen next? Will they run some tests?”
  “Yes, he’s scheduled for an ultrasound tomorrow; that’s kinda scary.”
  “Are you optimistic about the outcome?”
  “Yes.”

  Now imagine you respond like a real friend:
  “Wow, I just heard about your father. How are you holding up?”
  “It’s really stressful. I’m worried to death about him.”
  “I bet. What’s your biggest worry right now?”
  “Honestly, it’s not his diagnosis, but I just don’t know this St. Luke’s hospital; I don’t know anyone who has ever been in there.”
  (pause) “You seem really worked up about that; it’s a big deal, huh?”
  “Well yeah, of course. I mean, he has Dr. Know-It-All working on him, but there’s just something about him … ”
  “Hmmm, so this doctor sounds like he really knows his stuff but something bothers you about him.”

  You may not realize it, but you can have this friend-to-friend (or colleague-to-colleague) conversation and still include standard questions and standard ratings. In the second example, the interviewer is engaged, curious about what’s going on, tracking what the other person is saying and present in the conversation.

  If you don’t have the needed interviewing talent in-house, an experienced interviewer can achieve the same level of empathy, strengthening the relationship between YOU and your client.

  Be prepared to take action
  One misstep we see firms take too often is spending the time and effort to gather client feedback, then ignoring the results. Big mistake. Perhaps the biggest.

  Why?

  Clients expect action. In doing interviews for our clients, we can’t tell you how many times we’ve heard the interviewee say that it was seemingly pointless to talk to us since “they expressed their issues last year and no action was taken.”

  Your program will pay off only when you acknowledge the raised issues. You are expected to take action with specific steps to correct identified problems and to take advantage of newly discovered opportunities. A best practice is to schedule a face-to-face meeting to assure clients that their feedback is understood and has been addressed.

  “Our firm won new work at top rates, new opportunities in an overseas office and new attorney introductions when our client service team acted on each potential opportunity uncovered by one client interview.” –Law Firm CMO

  Return on interest.
  In a world where ROI is questioned in all marketing activities, client interviews have many advantages, not the least of which is that they should pay for themselves. Beyond the numbers, they are highest forms of interest you can show in a client and they should yield many happy returns.

  Tags:

  Big Ideas, client interviews, Client Loyalty 

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• Greenfield/Belser Holiday Cards Rank Highly This Season

  By Joe Walsh

  Posted on January 12, 2012 at 11:46 am

  

  Congratulations to our client McMillan whose holiday card was ranked by Precedent Magazine as one of the top five law firm holiday cards in 2011. This year our charge was to deliver holiday delight while highlighting the firm’s reach across Canada and beyond. With well wishes from each of McMillan’s office locations, we did just that in our storybook holiday tour, delivered on the face of an iPad. A nice mix of tradition and technology. Click here to take a look at McMillan’s full holiday card.

  For something completely different, take a look at another great Canadian firm’s 2011 e-card, rated a top ten internationally by another well known industry pundit. Who said all law firms are alike?

  Check out the Stewart McKelvey’s full card at www.stewartmckelvey.com.

  Tags:

  Design, Innovation, Marketing 

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• Who Cares About 82 Design Awards?

  By Burkey Belser

  Posted on January 9, 2012 at 12:44 pm

  

  Tags:

  Awards 

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