Want to generate business? Write a book.

If you've ever thought about writing a book and wondered if the effort would be worthwhile, a new study suggests the answer is a strong "yes." Mike Schultz of RainToday.com interviewed 200 authors of business books to find out how they did it and how it impacted their ability to do business. RainToday offers articles, case studies, and research designed to help service business rainmakers and marketers work more effectively.

The results:

- 53% of authors reported a "strong" or "very strong" influence on their ability to charge higher fees

- 76% indicated publishing a book had at least some influence on their ability to close deals

- 83% reported at least some improvement on business with current clients as a result of publishing a book

In short, consultants and agency execs seem to agree that publishing a book helps them to be seen as gurus whose services are in demand. Mike has published his findings in a report for those who are interested in learning more about how publishing impacted the authors, how to go about getting a business book published, and how to market it effectively.

A few more statistics from the report:

Management consulting, marketing, and training were the most common book subjects, collectively accounting for more than half of the 590 books published by these 200 authors. IT consulting followed with 11% of the total.




63% of authors said that publishing a book had a "strong influence" or "very strong influence" on their ability to generate new clients.


The three most effective methods of marketing were internet marketing, trade media coverage, and direct marketing to existing clients.

Go ahead, unleash your inner author. It's worked for my friends Yvonne DiVita and Jay Lipe -- it may also be a path to greater success for your business.

*****

Terms: publishing a business book, writing a book for business, book marketing

The Web marketing portal: WebMarketCentral.com

Contact Tom Pick: tomATwebmarketcentral.com

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Katrina's Forgotten Victims: The Disabled

Due to accident, illness or age, many Americans depend on their wheelchairs. To people who have lost the use of their legs -- or, in some cases such as the late Christopher Reeves, the use of most or all of the muscles below their neck -- a wheelchair is much more than a mode of transportation. It is their freedom to move, their legs, and the place where they spend a great deal of their waking hours.

Particularly to those who need a true "rehab" wheelchair, their chair is a very personal item. It has to fit their height and weight, support them properly given their limited muscle control, and have a drive control mechanism appropriate for their specific disability: toe-controlled, finger-controlled, or, like Christopher Reeves, controlled by the puff and sip of their breath.

During and immediately following Hurricane Katrina, hundreds of wheelchair-bound people were rescued; that's the good news. The bad news is that, in most cases, their chairs were left to the ravages of rising Lake Pontchartrain. Our federal government, in its wisdom, couldn't find money in the $262 billion dedicated to hurricane relief efforts to buy appropriate replacement chairs for these individuals.

Yes, yet another example of your tax dollars not at work.

Just before Christmas, I had the opportunity to make the acquaintance of Bruce Bayes, the CEO of Custom Mobility. Bruce's business acumen (he has built the largest rehab dealership in the southeastern U.S.) is matched only by his passion for serving those with disabilities. After Katrina, he felt that he had to do something. His efforts have helped many disabled victims of Katrina, but more remains to be done.

So how can you help? Please visit this site.

God bless you.

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Web Marketing News Headlines

Granted, this is a lazy way to post, but if you haven't checked them out, the Web Marketing News and E-Commerce News pages on WebMarketCentral are a great way to keep up with what's happening. Here are a few of the headlines you may have missed if you haven't visited those pages lately (or grabbed the RSS feeds from them):

Amazon.com Reportedly Considering Ad Network
Information Week 8 Feb 2006
Amazon.com is reportedly looking for beta testers for a possible contextual advertising network that would place third-party links to products on the online retailer's partner Web sites...

SMB community targeted by spam
Computer Weekly 8 Feb 2006
Spammers are hitting SMBs harder than larger companies, according to the annual report by Postini, a provider of integrated message management products. The report suggests that SMBs were sent nearly 50 spam emails per day per user in 2005, almost four times the number that large companies were sent daily...

Anti-spam initiative
Computer Crime Research Center 8 Feb 2006
Maybe this is where it starts to change. Two of the world's largest e-mail providers, America Online Inc. and Yahoo Inc., have said that they will soon start giving companies the option to pay for guaranteed delivery of e-mails to the inboxes of their subscribers...

E-Mail Marketing Best Practices
E-Commerce Times 8 Feb 2006
Producing consistent, predictable results at the push of a button is the dream of every marketer, but can only be accomplished by following some simple rules. Although an important step forward, the CAN-SPAM act only provides a legal platform for e-mail marketing...

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The portal for Web marketing resources -- WebMarketCentral.com

The Age of the Micromarket?

Back in ancient times (that is, before 1996), big companies and big brands ruled the market. Then came the dot-com boom. With the internet and manufacturing lot sizes of one, virtual companies were supposed to spell the end of big brands and usher in the age of the micromarket.

What we've ended up with instead is an odd dichotomy of mass and micro. On the one hand, big brands still rule in many cases: Coke and Pepsi; Bud and Miller; GM , Ford, Daimler-Chrysler and handful of other large auto makers. Even the internet -- supposedly the ultimate micromarket vehicle -- is dominated by Amazon, Yahoo and Google. And of course, no industry is more dominated by one brand than computer operating systems, where all alternative operating systems combined don't generate 10% of the revenue of Windows.

And yet, simulateously, markets are indeed becoming more micro. When I was in high school (too long ago), there were only a handful of teen subcultures: you were either a Jock, a Nerd, a Burnout, or a Quiet One. Today, the pelthora of adolescent cliques include auto shoppers, band geeks, Crombies, emo kids, goths, preps, wavers, rejects, skaters, punks, hippies and several more.

Radio station formats in my youth were pretty much limited to top 40, country, news, religious, and polka (seriously). Now, radio formats include adult album alternative, classic hits, classic rock, college, modern rock, oldies, and just plain "rock," just within the rock category alone.

In "Nobody Home," Pink Floyd's obligatory big band doleful missive about life on the road, David Gilmour complained of having "thirteen channels of sh*t on the TV to choose from." Thirteen? Today, basic cable usually comes with more than 100 channels, and satellite systems offer 500 channels or more.

Micromarkets are a hot topic in publishing, restaurants, and etailing among other industries. There are few markets more mature than the insurance industry, which began in London in the 1600s. And of course there are a handful of very, very large insurance that most people are familiar with: AIG in life insurance, Allstate in homeowners, and State Farm in auto. Yet the industry is still amazingly dynamic, and includes its own micromarkets such as insurance specifically for "black cars" (taxis and limousines) and for classic cars.

So, where are we exactly? We're at a stage where the best entreneurial opportunities exist in micromarkets. To return to the beer analogy for a moment, nobody's going to line up investors to create the next Budweiser, but they might get funding to create the next Summit. Small companies innovate, big companies consolidate. The best new ideas still come out of garages. The challenge for marketers is to choose the right subculture or micromarket, and then use today's micromedia to bring the right message to the right people.

*****

Terms: teen subcultures, Pink Floyd, micromedia, etailing, micromarket

The portal for Web marketers: WebMarketCentral.com

Contact Tom Pick: tomATwebmarketcentral.com

Caribbean Marketing

I just got back from Aruba, on a "free" trip that's going to end up costing me dearly -- though that is a topic for another post. Although focused on the tourist trade, Aruba has not yet become as commercialized as many other sunny tourist desinations. The lack of marketing sophistication is charming in its own way.

For example: Aruba has a spectacular national park. But the park has no visitor center or gift shop -- only a small museum at the entrance in the park, in a private residence which is up for sale. For anyone with an entreprenurial streak and a desire for the island lifestyle, there's a prime business opportunity for you. If you're curious, the asking price is $250,000 U.S., but the park rangers thought that was overpriced for the local market, so you may be able to get the property for less.

The island has lots of gift shops, but it seemed that 90% of the merchandise was the same. And the prices were the same in the hotel zone as downtown. Clearly, the Arubans haven't learned the lesson of American hotels and airlines regarding convenience pricing.

Finally, you can take a jeep tour of the island where tourists are permitted to drive the jeeps -- with no check of their license or even having to give their name. This practice would drive (pardon the pun) American lawyers and insurance underswriters nuts.

In short, the island is small but beautiful. The climate is sunny and pleasant as one would expect, though always breezy. Aruba is a romantic destination to bring your loved one, but not as promising a place as other Caribbean and Mexican vacation spots to find love, as some of my single counterparts discovered. The natives are friendly, but not excessively so.

*****

Terms: convenience pricing, Aruba marketing, Caribbean marketing

The Web marketing portal site: WebMarketCentral.com

Contact Tom Pick: tomATwebmarketcentral.com

My Top 10 Marketing New Year's Resolutions

Here are my marketing resolutions for 2006. Feel free to steal these, or leave a comment to share your marketing (or life) resolutions for the new year.

1. I resolve to understand my customers better. What drives them, what motivates them, and how to reach them in a way that is helpful -- never intrusive.

2. I resolve to try to blog more frequently and eloquently.

3. I resolve to put a real effort into making trackback work effectively.

4. I resolve to try to determine why dmoz.org has become so awful about adding new sites.

5. I resolve to try to get back to reading the Marketing Sherpa Best-of-Weekly newsletter on a regular basis. It is the best marketing newsletter on the planet.

6. I resolve to learn more than necessary, and teach as much as possible. Marketing Profs is a great resource for online marketing wisdom. You can find a great summary of life lessons here.

7. I resolve to be more strategic in my thinking and planning.

8. I resolve to write more clearly and effectively. And avoid using sentence fragments. Really.

9. I resolve to build more bridges than I burn.

10. I resolve to be a better dad and husband. Work is important, but it's not the most important part of life.

My bonus 11th resolution is to try to get back to communicating more regularly with my online friends, including Yvonne at Lip-Sticking, Jay at Smart Marketing, Albert at Marketing Edge, Skip at Marketing Genius, Kelly at Kelly Allan Associates, and Thad at Moreover.

Best wishes to you for a happy new year, whatever your resolutions may be.

*****

Terms: marketing resolutions, marketing wisdom, business blogging, Moreover Technologies

The portal for Web marketing strategy: WebMarketCentral.com

Contact Tom Pick: tomATwebmarketcentral.com

Email Newsletters vs. Blogs Part 2

My post several weeks ago about the emergence of blogs and the decline of the e-newsletter drew a thoughtful comment from Monty Loree of Express Marketing. Mr. Loree contended that "With direct email, you're in control of staying in touch with people and inviting them back to your site." While that's indusputable, my point was that you don't need a traditional email newsletter to accomplish that task.

As Suzanne Falter-Barns points out in her blog here, collecting email addresses from your blog visitors is both easy and a great supplement to RSS feeds. Then, rather than sending out a traditional e-newsletter -- with all of the planning and formatting that requires -- you can simply send a brief note to your email list each time you post (or weekly if you are posting more frequently than that) inviting your recipients to revisit your blog and check out your latest musings.

Your blog becomes the content container for the information you would have previously included in your e-newsletter, but with all the advantages of blogs -- timliness, informality and search engine-friendliness.

You can also feel free to copy my "build your own newsletter" concept. It may appear lazy, but I prefer to think of it as innovative.

*****

Terms: email newsletter, e-newsletter, business blogging, internet marketing

The Web marketing portal: WebMarketCentral.com

Contact Tom Pick: tomATwebmarketcentral.com