Social Media Enablement Program specifically aimed at IT resellers

(Press Release) Palo Alto, CA January 29th  The Social Media Academy, leading provider of Social Media Education and Research Services to business customers, today announced the launch of a Social Media Enablement Program specifically aimed at IT resellers.  The goal is to help channel partners acquire social media skills that help them grow their business by better meeting the needs of customers.  Vendors are being asked to sponsor this education as a way to improve the health of their channel. Continue Reading →

Social Media Academy to bring more transparency into social media knowledge

PDF (Press Release) – Palo Alto, CA The Social Media Academy, who was one of the first social media training and education institutes, is engaged in bringing more transparency into the fast growing social media industry. A transparent certification program shall help understand what people know, what experience they gained during the education and what focus the education had.

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Why is Tony Hsieh Zappos CEO (online shoe dealer), John Chambers, Cisco CEO (high end network equipment) or Richard Branson Virgin CEO (travel) so much behind Social Media? Continue Reading →

Social capital is to social media what a Google page ranking is to search engine optimization. The difference is that a high Google page ranking means that – if people are looking for a company that does what you do – your company can be found. It infers a level of popularity and increases the chance that people will check your company out. This is fine, and if your company website makes a good first impression, you then increase the likelihood of someone making direct contact with you. Continue Reading →

Social Media Methodology Round Table #2
NCP Model Webinar presentation

Speaker & Details:

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ROI = Return on investment.  Now, what do you invest in?

a) Technology:

LinkedIn – it’s basically free
Twitter – It’s free
YouTube – It’s free
Facebook Fan Page – It’s free
Blog on Blogger – It’s free
So the technical infrastructure is free.

b) Resources:

1) Finding out what is on top of your customers mind:
Let your sales people read your clients ‘time line’ in the morning for 30 minutes. It’s the same amount of time they spend grinding through email spam. It’s free.

2) Socializing with your customers:
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We appreciate everybody who attended our intro webinar Certified Social Media Strategist Program 2010.
If you were unable to make it or would like to share it -the following recorded webinar provides in-depth information

For a quick review of the presentation, you can also access the slides on Slideshare.

Leadership Class starts September 08,   -

Master Class begin October, 27

More info

…I was bragging about the comments from the Social Media Academy alumni and their Leadership class experience in the Social Media Academy. Here is what they say:

If you have any questions or need additional information – I am here to help

Marita

my social sites at: http://www.xeesm.com/maritar

The old sales process model (a generic version) :
- Prospect Identification or lead
- Initial Contact
- Customer Qualification
- Needs identification
- Product evaluation
- Negotiation
- Closing

BUT:
- Lead flow dried out,
- The initial contact ends on somebodies voice mail or email spam filter
- We are happy for any sign of an interests rather than “qualify a prospect”
- Needs identification is done by the prospect using the internet
- Product or brand selection is done through trusted networks and not based on a sales person’s suggestion.
- Only the last two steps remain pretty much the same. But how do you get there?

IS THIS THE END OF SALES?

Certainly not – but sales need to change as customer behavior changed.
For get the blah blah blah about “better listening to your customers”. We all know we do that.
If you dive deep in how Zappos (online shoe dealer), Cisco (high end network equipment) or Virgin (travel) does it, you will notice that there is actually no real difference between B2B or B2C – and no real difference whether it is a $60 product, a $600 service or a $600,000 project.

So what is the difference between the companies who actually grew during the down economy and those who failed – even had to file chapter 11?

You may find some interesting points of view here:
http://www.socialmedia-academy.com/blog/index.php/us-program/leadership-class/intro-webinar-2010-01-20/

Learn what it takes to consult a corporation in social media. This is not your how to tweet or build a fan page training. Become a Certified Social Media Strategist. Intro Webinar Recap

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Resellers want (and need) their vendors to help them with social media.  And vendors should jump at the opportunity because research shows resellers that are engaged with social media are growing faster than resellers who are not yet online. Continue Reading →