New iPad from Apple: Have you seen it yet?

All the buzz this week has been about Apple's new iPad. What do you think about it? Will you go out and buy one when they hit the stores?

I'm sure most of the early adopters and techie people will jump at the chance to buy one, especially since Apple has priced them in an affordable price range. But how do you think business-to-business applications may use this new tool? Right now, most of my clients are still PC based and use a Blackberry rather than an iPhone for text messaging and retrieving e-mails. So, do you think this technology will be widely used in businesses at some time in the future?

I, for one, can see it being a great tool to display my portfolio or provide a really beautiful presentation when I'm pitching a client. And, also as I am sitting in a meeting, I can take notes using the word processing capability of Pages. I, of course, being in the marketing and advertising profession, am an Apple fanatic, anyway.

But, I see this technology going even further at some time in the future. Think of all the applications that can be written for such a device. Wireless and portability are the wave of the future. Even Steve Jobs said, "Apple is a mobile devices company" in his keynote speech when he introduced the iPad on January 27, 2010. The new tablet is positioned as a product in between the iPhone and the laptop. I'm not saying your desktop computer is technology of the past but mobility is definitely the buzzword of the future.

Marketing Research: It's Chicken Soup for Your Marketing Plan

I just returned to the office after attending a trade show in Palm Springs, CA. While I was there I was approached by someone who was starting a new company and wanted to get some market research to confirm this entrepreneur's thoughts and ideas about a particular marketplace. I got to thinking that many of my clients don't often add market research as a component of their annual marketing plans. And I wondered why not. Of course, if you are starting a new company, I thought it would be wise to confirm your theories about the market trends but why don't established companies want to budget even a little bit of money to either purchase marketing research or design their own market research study? And even if they do spend the money, why does the report usually sit in a desk drawer and never is read or analyzed?

Well, I'm not sure that I've come up with a good answer, but I think sometimes we don't want to see or hear the truth. If your company is humming along at a pace that is comfortable to you, you probably don't want to hear that you should be moving in another direction. Or, if your company is making buggy whips, for example, you don't want to hear that the automobile has replaced the horse and buggy. I'm being facetious, of course. But, I think most of us plod along doing the same thing year after year because that's all we know how to do or because it's just too difficult to push that boulder up the hill. We don't want to make waves in our company. We don't want to get caught in the political crossfire. So, we don't do any market research.

Time to change your attitude about market research. It is an invaluable tool to either confirm that you are headed in the right direction with your marketing strategies or to pull you in the right direction. For example, if you find out that the particular market you currently serve is trending downward and that some other technology is replacing it, why wouldn't you want to re-applicate your product line or create an entire new product line to continue to serve your customer's needs?

Market research doesn't need to be expensive. There are two types of market research. The first type is called Primary market Research. This is research that you gather yourself. You could hire a market research company and spend thousands of dollars, but you may already have much of the information you need in-house. Talk to your sales reps. They can be a great source of industry information about your competitors, about your customer's wants and needs, and about general industry trends.

You can also plan a small focus group in conjunction with a trade show where you know your target audience will be attending. Develop a short 5 question survey and distribute via e-mail or on one of the social media sites. All of these ideas are very cost effective and easy to accomplish.

The second type of market research is secondary market research. You can find much of this type of research on the Internet. Some companies typically will sell their research studies for a fee. But, there is a lot of information for free on the Internet. You can garner this type of information from trade associations, government databases through the Freedom of Information Act, and don't forget your local library.

So, make a resolution for 2010 to gather information about your products, your customers, your competitors, or industry trends. You'll be able to make better strategic marketing decisions with good solid marketing data in hand.

Nurture Marketing

Have you heard of Market Nurturing or Lead Nurturing? Well, just as you tend to a seed with plenty of water, fertilizer, and sunshine, so also should you tend to your sales prospects.

So often we treat all of our sales prospects the same and put them into the same box. But, they all aren't the same. And heaven forbid that we treat all our customers the same. They each have unique characteristics and needs.

Did you know that many of the sales leads generated by marketing get ignored by sales reps because they are not sales-ready leads. So, don't listen to your sales reps who say that these leads aren't "hot". Help move those prospects further along the continuum towards a sale. Cultivate the relationships by being a good resource or a trusted advisor to your prospects. Here are a few suggestions to convert those leads to sales:

• Target the right people in the right company.
• Find out their buying process.
• Study your ideal customer.
• What are their priorities and challenges?
• Set a goal, for example, to have one relevant touch every month.
• Categorize your leads by their place on the continuum, such as in the beginning stage, intermediate stage, or sales-ready.

So, nurture those leads. Engage your prospects and nurture them to become sales-ready.