I can’t believe how many times lately that I’ve spoken to business owners who claim that their product or service is one of the best in their field. And I believe them. I have absolutely no doubt that they are right.

But then when I ask them how they position their pricing, they tell me they choose to set their pricing level in the middle of the market range.

Why?

To be competitive.

To me, that just doesn’t make sense. If the product is one of the best in the market, it obviously has more value than the average product. Yet, if the price is about average, the perception that gives the market is that the product must be average.

If you set your price as average, you lose all the benefit of having a product that is well above average. Even if you try to sell people on why your product is one of the best, but then tell them about your average or low price, you confuse people and they will end up not believing your claims.

You see, most people actually still believe that you get what you pay for. You really need to charge what you are worth, not only so you don’t confuse your customers, but so that you maximise your opportunities for sales and profits.

My experience with clients is that fear of competition is the main reason for not wanting to charge what they think they are worth. The fear is that if they increase their prices, they will lose customers.

The reality is that people place far greater importance on the extra value they receive from your better product or higher quality service than you may think.

Have you ever thought about the value of your reliability or the additional usage customers get from your product lasting longer? Have you ever calculated the added value your customers get from your faster delivery times or your lower return rate? You need to know these numbers so that you can use them to justify your higher prices.

That’s right. Charging average prices actually makes your ability to compete worse than if you charge higher prices.

It is actually easy to command higher prices if you also communicate the reasons your prices are higher and you appropriately justify the extra expense your customer should make now, for the savings or added value they get from their investment. You see, the problem is not a competition problem, but a marketing problem.

Most business owners are great at producing their product or service, but lack skills when it comes to marketing. The reason customers query your price compared to your competitors’ is that you haven’t actually communicated the added value they will get from you. When you give customers no other criteria to compare options, they can only resort to price comparisons.

I often find clients locked into a view that their market is highly competitive and that if they increased their prices they would lose too many valuable customers. My experience is that if any customers are lost by a price increase, it is normally the ones that are the most difficult to deal with and that you are better off without anyway.

The customers that value the extra quality or service you provide have typically been wondering why your prices are so low and have actually been expecting you to put them up the the level that charges what you are worth.

In almost every market I can think of, there are always a number of player that compete on price. Yet there are also some in that same industry or trade that charge much higher prices than the norm. Correct me if I am wrong, but it seems to me that the ones that charge higher prices are also the most successful in their field. That should tell you something.

Pricing is one of the most critical elements of profitability for any business. Yet very few operate at a strategic level in this area.

If you are trying to win work or sales by pricing competitively, it could be time to rethink your approach. You are just making business and your life harder than it needs to be. It’s time to start thinking more strategically about how you can charge what you are really worth and how you can effectively justify and communicate your extra value to your market.

Believe me, the effort will be well rewarded. The difference between what you charge now and what you are really worth, is all lost profit. Shouldn’t that be in your bank account rather than your customers’?

Greg Roworth is an business consultant and author of the book, Put Your Business on Autopilot. Discover how to create, in 7 steps, a business that really works at www.businessflightpath.com.

The section was affectionately called Creative Espresso.

In the online world, it seems there is not much demand for large graphics of this nature, despite their effectiveness at explaining an often complex message or set of principles. (We know this because we measure traffic with the obsessive zeal of a quantity surveyor on speed.)

However, when we received a polite invitation from OnlineSchools.org to post a big graphic on the rise of Facebook, we couldn’t resist. Enjoy!

[Source: PhD Online]

The Botox revolution has become the most talked about “look-young-quick” scheme in a long list of physical enhancement options marketed to us by the media and the medical industry.

Fuelled by our obsession with youth and beauty, they are only too happy to oblige our insecurities and vanity by presenting new and exciting ways for us to part with our hard-earned cash in an attempt to look less like our authentic selves and more like someone else… namely Angelina Jolie, Miranda Kerr or some other age-defying celebrity.

When did we decide that older no longer means wiser and, in fact, now means unattractive and unwanted?  When did plastic become fantastic, exactly?

Somewhere along the line it has become unappealing to let others see our emotions.  The smile and frown lines we have come to expect and rely upon, to gauge what others really think and feel, are disappearing now in younger and younger faces.  If a person’s appearance is practically frozen and expressionless, how do we know what they are thinking and feeling?  And more interestingly, does anybody even care?  Are we trying to mask the facial clues or are we also trying to cover up the expression of the underlying emotions themselves?

More communication doesn’t always make for better connection

Compared to 15 years ago, we have more than twice as many tools at our disposal to articulate ourselves in our personal and business lives, but do we really have better communication and relationships?  More and more we rely on highly impersonal means – text messaging, social media and emails – not only to keep in touch but also to convey confidential information, conduct negotiations and build relationships.  More and more we are talking at everyone but not really connecting with anyone.

Everyone knows that only 7% of effective communication is in the actual words/language used and that 93% is conveyed in the way that we say things and our body language.  Even though it is largely unconscious, we rely heavily on non-verbal cues to discern what is (and is not) being said.  Without those vital clues, we make assumptions to fill in the gaps and hope that we have presumed with some degree of accuracy.  Oftentimes, we miss the mark completely.

In essence text messaging, social media and email have become the communication equivalent to Botox.

They serve to allow us to defy time and distance by talking to and reaching more but in fact we are connecting and accomplishing far less.  Surprisingly, more is not always better than less.  What happened to the good old days when we picked up the phone and spoke to the person we needed to be in touch with or better yet, we met them in person – face-to-face?

Perhaps we’ve all just become far too busy for such primitive means?

Don’t hide the wrinkles! Show your responsibility

Now I’m not saying that technology doesn’t have its place both in business and in our personal lives. But think about it: when is the last time you shot someone an email containing sensitive information in order to avoid actually speaking to them about it?  Have you ever sent a message only to find out that the person on the other end took it completely the wrong way or misinterpreted it?

I would be surprised if you could not think of a handful of examples where you – or for that matter a client, a co-worker or a supervisor – have used technology  in order to sidestep or circumvent dealing with a difficult situation head-on. (Feel free to share your examples and reactions in the Comments section below.)

My point is this: if you want to build effective relationships and influence others you need to take responsibility for the effectiveness of your communication.  While it may be easier to cut corners, inject fillers and toxins or hide behind technology, the wrinkles it creates in our lives will always eventually come back to the surface and bite us on the cheeks.

Not only is it cheaper to grow old and communicate gracefully, it is also more beautiful and less addictive.

Rhondalynn Korolak is the founder and Managing Director of Imagineering Unlimited. A 16-year veteran of sales, marketing and finance, she holds degrees and professional designations in both law and chartered accounting. She is also a certified Master Practitioner of NLP, Thought Field Therapist and Clinical Hypnotherapist.

Image by daren_ck

But are these the factors that will steer Australia in a direction that will create an economically secure and culturally harmonious nation for decades to come?

It hardly seems likely.

We know that innovation is important for economic prosperity but how important is it? And what are our opposing parties doing to assist Australia become more than a mine and farm for the world?

Australia as a business (a mining business)

With this post, I hope to get readers thinking.

In particular, I hope to get you, dear Anthillians, thinking about ways that our political parties can support innovation, namely in pursuit of a secure economy, and prepare us for the day when (not if) we lose our greatest cash-cow.

I think you know where I’m heading. I’m talking about Australia after mining.

There I’ve said it. The end of mining is inevitable. We just don’t know how soon.

Going for broke

Australia is a mining nation. And we should feel proud.

We lead the world at the management of mining and we excel at the development of technologies used for mining. We should be thankful for mining and its historical impact on the Australian economy. We should, indeed, sing the praises of the industry that kept the wolves from our door during the recent global economic crisis.

Well done Australia!

The problem, of course, is that we risk becoming over reliant on one industry.

The following is an IBISWorld chart articulating Australia’s top export industries.

What this tells us is that mining constitutes Australia’s largest export industry, generating $283.7 billion of revenue for 2009/2010 — of which $128 billion was from exports.

Another way of looking at this is that Mining/Resources contribute over half of export revenue.

Occasionally, I look at the Australian economy as I do my own company. When one source of my trade (i.e. one ‘customer’ or ‘product line’) exceeds a certain percentage of all my trade (say over 25 percent), I start to worry. This is because it if I lose that one source, I’m in deep doo-doo.

The advantage I have, should such a devastating development occur, is that I can downsize.

It sounds rough but I have that option – I can cut back on overheads and cut my staff levels by the fall in trade.

But what happens when a country experiences such a fall in revenues? You can’t sack a population, can you?

Let’s briefly look at coal

China’s domestic coal market is so great, I am told, that this economic powerhouse imports only about 10 percent of what it consumes.

If China moves from importing 10 percent of its needs to having a five percent surplus to export (and hence the ability to compete with our products on the export market), prices for Australian products will inevitably fall. In fact, this export market will be lost to us virtually overnight.

Or what if someone develops a cheaper coal alternative (or steel alternative, for that matter)?

This might seem outrageous but these sorts of massive disruptive shifts happen, and frequently.

Consider the ice-barons, who controlled the shipping, distribution and trade of ice at the beginning of the 20th century. These captains of industry had built their trade over generations.

The wealthy and powerful had been transporting ice since the time of the Pharaohs.

Then one smart innovator invented the refrigerator and this industry collapsed almost overnight. This probably would have seemed inconceivable at the time. Yet, we already know from history that mining is a precarious industry to build an economy upon. (Just ask the people of Wales.)

Earlier, I described the loss of our greatest cash-cow as something that’s ‘inevitable’.

A bold claim?

Labor’s failure on R&D

Last week, I received a media release from the Office of Senator Kim Carr, Minister for Innovation, Industry, Science and Research, designed to bolster Labor’s innovation credentials by talking down the Coalition’s opposition of its R&D Tax Credit.

Quite frankly, it angered me.

This is not because I have a preference for the Liberal or National Party (my views on the Liberal Party’s innovation policies are outlined below) or any particular dislike for Labor but because the reforms proposed can hardly be trumpeted as an achievement.

The proposed amendments to the current R&D Tax Concession legislation will deliver a 45 percent refundable tax credit to small firms (group turnover less than $20 million per annum) and a 40 percent credit to companies with a group turnover more than $20 million per annum.

This is the good news.

These are the specifics that supporters of the policy are likely to tell you (with pleasure).

However, these increases in the refund rate come with many additional restrictions that will limit the number of innovators eligible for a tax refund. And, unfortunately, these restrictions are almost impossible to communicate in a sound-bite (so they remain a mystery to many).

For example, the broadened list of excluded activities are likely to hit ICT innovation particularly hard, and any form of innovation is almost impossible without some form of ICT R&D.

In a sound bite, the positives of the R&D Credit is that it will offer greater financial benefits to those that qualify. The negatives are that fewer companies will be able to claim and fewer activities will be eligible, meaning fewer innovative projects will get tax support.

Suffice to say, I have covered the weaknesses in a previous article.

But that’s not what really angered me.

The Labor Government could have passed the R&D Credit before calling the election. It had the opportunity but didn’t. The legislation was passed by the House of Representative and was forgotten during the leadership spill.

Innovators (and their tax advisers) are now upset by the uncertainty this has caused and this creates another cause for alarm.

The authors of the Global Competitive Index for 2009 (which ranks Australia 22nd) recently observed that a strong positive relationship exists between R&D tax programs, GPD and the performance of countries on its index.

But interestingly, the authors also made the more telling statement:

“…the size of the credit seems to have little impact — primarily because innovation is such a business necessity that companies rarely change their innovation activities on the basis of the availability of tax credits.”

According to respondents involved in the development of this Index, inconsistency is what most influences an organisation’s decision to invest in R&D and the extent of its R&D investment. This is because a company cannot budget and minimise risk if it does now know the extent to which it is likely to be eligible for a tax concession.

More important than size, therefore, is dependability.

It’s fair to say that when it comes to Labor’s handling of the R&D Tax Concession, the Australian business community is seriously over it.

Yet, the Liberal Party now wants to be part of the problem.

Today, I received another media release from Minister Carr’s office criticising the Coalition for revising its stance. Yes, today, we witnessed another backflip.

In what the release describes as a “cop out”, the Coalition has decided to retain the existing R&D Tax Concession for now, with the concession that it may need to make improvements.

It seems that for whichever party you vote for, the restricted and confusing concession is here to stay. And neither party is willing to adopt a clear position on which types of R&D should be given tax support and which shouldn’t.

Can we rely on neither party on this important issue?

Liberal’s short-sightedness on the NBN

At the same time, the Coalition’s proposed reinvention of the National Broadband Network (NBN) simply has me depressed.

Last night, on the ABC’s Lateline, Tony Jones while interviewing Stephen Conroy, Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, repeatedly asked the Minister to justify why Labor’s proposed $43 billion NBN plan will cost Australians, per head, more than what’s being spent by governments on broadband in the US, in Europe and in Britain.

The question is based on the premise that it’s a dangerous thing not to follow these other economies. In fact, it assumes that we might be better off pursuing a broadband target that is below what is available elsewhere.

What the hell!?

Since when does anyone — a human, a business, an economy — ever excel by benchmarking itself below the competition?

Like many people who already work and live in a ‘digital industry’, it’s hard to emphasise what a significant positive impact the roll-out of a NBN will mean for enterprise in Australia. It is a game-changer and couldn’t come at a better time. (Please read on.)

Its goal is to provide an Open Access Network providing download speeds of 100 Megabits per second to 93 percent of Australian homes and businesses. It will also require the creation of 47,000 new jobs over the next eight years and will support 25,000 jobs every year until completed

The Coalition is offering a $6.3 billion alternative to provide what the Coalition’s Tony Smith described last night as a “decent” low-end speed of just 12 megabits per second. (Describing a speed as ‘decent’ could be likened to describing a blind-date as ‘nice’. It’s hardly an endorsement.) And, under the Coalition’s plan, 70 percent of the funds will not be allocated to infrastructure spending until 2014.

The two-part argument proposed by the Coalition for scuttling Labor’s plans (other than to simply scuttle Labor’s plans) is that technology will only get cheaper and that there is a risk that the program will be mismanaged and the cost will blow out.

These two criticisms seem incongruous.

Yes, Moore’s Law has already proven consistent in most cases associated with internet.

So far, Conroy’s eight year plan has progressed on schedule and within budget. If technology improves, these are gains that stand to assist with the program’s roll-out.

As a highly valued mentor of mine once said, if you aim for the stars there’s a greater chance that you’ll reach the dunny roof. Mediocre goals produce mediocre outcomes.

Further, did I mention that the NBN roll-out will require the creation of 47,000 new jobs over the next eight years and will support 25,000 jobs every year until completed? (Yes, I did and it’s worth saying again.) These are jobs that will educate and drive Australia… beyond mining.

So, why would I move to Iceland?

In the not-too-distant past, Icelend went bankrupt.

It’s hard to imagine how this could happen to a country but it happens and Iceland has been the latest economy to be dragged through the process.

Michael Lewis is probably the best and most readable chronicler of Iceland’s current financial state. He blames a mono-culture. For 1,000 years, Iceland had one industry, fishing. The industry developed into one where toughness and risk-taking were the only way to succeed.

When fishing made Iceland wealthy and secure, many Icelanders moved away from the unpleasant work on the boats to a more sophisticated and glitzier line of work, investment banking. And we all know how that went.

Today, only 18 months later (depending on when you document its bankruptcy as occurring), Iceland is a hotbed of innovation. It is rebuilding its economy as a new media haven and tourism hotspot. Watch the video.

Yet, it took disaster for its national leaders to dump the focus testing and ask the truly important questions — to become innovative and actually lead.

So, what will create an economically secure and culturally harmonious nation for decades to come? That’s the question that will be guiding my vote this Saturday and Anthill’s editorial agenda over the longer term, whichever party is the victor.

Now cue cart-wheeling citizens of Iceland and dance!

This election could well be remembered as the one where focus groups took control, where success was won by the opponent most able to determinedly avoid sharing an opinion. This has not been an election about grand visions. It has become a contest of the least controversial.

That’s why it’s forever reassuring to witness the rise of an opinion that is not built on a sound-bite or caters to the common view.  This 12 minute ‘Special Comment’ was YouTube’s fourth most watched clip yesterday. In it, MSBC anchorman Keith Olbermann responds to factually incorrect reports about a community centre being built at ‘Ground Zero’ in New York.

There Is No ‘Ground Zero Mosque’

Sure, it’s sentimental and it ends with an awkward hat-tip to Edward R. Murrow. But when was the last time that you witnessed an Australian leader share an opinion that could be contentious but was designed to change opinions and inspire?

Every now and then we receive an unsolicited plea by a concerned reader with a passionate view to share. Today, Don E. Morgan, the inventor of the cone-head™ liner for helmets shares his experiences and views on innovation in Australia.

The appalling treatment of inventors and innovation by governments and politicians in this country is a national disgrace.

The federal government can spend something like 2.6 billion dollars on a disastrous program putting Pink Batts insulation in Australian homes but fail to help Australian inventors and innovation.

As the inventor of the cone-head™ liner for helmets, which won the 2007 Invention of the Year award on the ABC’s New Inventors program and in 2009 was voted top 10 in Australian Anthill’s Smart 100 innovations, I have been a little more fortunate in my endeavours than other inventors and innovators.

That’s not to say that things have been easy.

I did receive a small grant in 2000 from the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB). Yet, that has been the only financial support that I have received from Australian government programs or Australian companies.

Instead, I was forced to take my innovation offshore.

When funding is hard to find

As it was, the small grant money that I gratefully received was not enough to cover the basic research costs.

I put in nearly twice as much money of my own to scientifically prove that the new shock absorbing cone-head™ foam liner was superior in absorbing an impact force when compared with current hard foam liners found in motorcycle and bicycle helmets.

You’d think, once you had proven something scientifically worthy and superior it would be all downhill from that point – but that wasn’t the case.

I spent another three to four years desperately trying to obtain funding from governments and get a manufacturer interested. On three occasions, I applied for the Queensland Government Innovation Start-Up Scheme (ISUS) and each time I was unsuccessful.

The third rejection was the lowest point in my journey as an inventor. This was the time when Peter Beattie was the premier of Queensland and had the view of making Queensland the ‘smart state’ of Australia. However, while happy to pour billions of dollars into biotechnology, the State Government’s interest did not seem to extend to clever inventions/innovations.

So, in desperation, I took my invention overseas and licensed it to a major helmet manufacturer based in Hong Kong.

The process of scientifically proving my invention and my struggle to find a suitable overseas manufacturer cost me and my family hundreds of thousands of dollars.

The actual development and manufacturing of a cone-head™ helmet would have cost me millions of dollars, which was beyond my means. The fact I couldn’t receive government support or industry support in Australia left me no choice but to license the cone-head™ design to a major overseas helmet manufacturer.

We must stop the innovation drain

Ideally, if I had been given support by the government or industry to start up a company, then the development, manufacturing and marketing of the helmet would have been controlled here in Australia, instead of all being lost to an overseas manufacturer.

The first helmet manufactured with the cone-head™ design is already selling overseas in Europe, USA and Canada (under the brand name Kali Protectives) and within weeks it will be imported into Australia. The helmet using the cone-head™ design has already won two major prizes in Germany and the United States.

Recently, other desperate inventors have been approaching me, asking for my advice about how to take their inventions overseas to be developed and manufactured. All the inventors have the same complaint: the lack of support from Government and big business.

Australia is currently in the grips of an innovation drain.

Both the federal and state governments are guilty of this deplorable treatment of inventors. In simple terms, they don’t seem to care two hoots about innovation if it is not related to big business.

In the meantime, Australian jobs, wealth and intellectual property are being forced overseas by inept, shallow and short-sighted governments and politicians who don’t deserve to be there representing Australians who want to make a difference.

The senseless wastage of Australian smart inventions and innovation to overseas must stop now.

Don E. Morgan is a physicist, inventor, educator and motivational speaker. He is a consultant in crash investigation, product development and manufacturing in China and Taiwan, as well as a member of the Australian Institute of Physics (M.A.I.P.).

Image by Capture Queen ™

We are looking for a charismatic solo entrepreneur (or aspiring entrepreneur) to take part in an innovative documentary film project.

If you are an outgoing, entrepreneurial, ambitious man, aged 28 to 45 and available to travel overseas for up to two weeks sometime in the next couple of months, then this project could provide you and your business with extensive exposure to a national and international audience.

This is an exceptional opportunity for self-promotion as part of a professional film production project.

It sounded like an adventure that might be of interest to our readers. So,we checked it out.

It is an initiative of The Hallway, a Sydney based digital marketing and advertising agency. The project is top secret. Based on this video extracted from The Hallway website, however, it’s not hard to guess the project’s agenda.

John Jameson Productions – Case Study Video

Whatever the purpose, it involves free international travel with unapologetic opportunities for blatant self-promotion. Sounds like fun. So, here’s the link: http://www.smallbizdoco.com.au./. (We notice that the form incorporates no privacy clauses. Just so you know.)

Competitive grants have been fertiliser to many innovative small businesses (in a good way).

With the demise of the $1 billion Commercial Ready Grants program and the launch of the $196m Commercialisation Australia Grants program, you might be forgiven for thinking Commercialisation Australia is a bad thing for Australian start-ups and innovation – or worse, a death knell for great ideas.

I beg to differ. There remain effective vehicles to get support for research and development. Every researcher will wish there was more, of course, but a highly competitive environment for research grants brings better ideas to the top.

Is it solely great ideas we want, or do we really want to build great businesses? Commercialisation Australia is about ensuring that great ideas – developed ideas that can demonstrate a clear path to market with minimal technical risk – are able to be converted into viable, successful commercial ventures. Now, there’s an idea!

The journey is part of the reward

A new competency is being built – not just a capacity for more transient light-bulb moments, but a capacity to develop ideas into business plans that incorporate business models.

If it succeeds, not only do researchers, entrepreneurs and innovative firms have great products, but they have differentiated business models. They have embarked on a journey using a systematic approach to understanding their cost structures and revenue streams.

This has led them through an analysis of the key activities and resources required to create sustainable businesses. They have assessed the key partners that will give them a fast start, and made contact, signed contracts and obtained commitments.

Instead of a bright idea looking for a market, the ideas become acquainted with target customer profiles, their existing solutions to these problems, the competition and other beasts that reside in the eco-system for every new product.

Distribution and customer relationship is not something to be found, once the product is ready – it is strategically identified, and the value proposition to customer and channel well understood and tested.

Surprise, surprise: if this business model is as innovative and exciting as the good idea it is proposing to take to market, a lot of people will be interested in this as an investment of their own. If the government won’t fund it – after all, there is only so much money to go around – then the hard work has been done in getting the idea investor-ready.

Success stems from having a sustainable business model

So you really do want the money – where do you sign up?

Traditionally, you call up some mercenaries – grant application consultants. They’re experienced at bashing your application into shape to meet the criteria, submitting it to Commercialisation Australia on your behalf – but all care, no responsibility. The outcome ends up in the lap of the Commercialisation Australia board, and the outcome depends on the quality of the competitors.

If your business model is well founded, however; if you’ve spent time on your business model, understanding its structure and modelling its profitability, not only will you have a competitive grant application, you’ll also be equipped to discuss it with your key partners, private equity or venture capitalists.

Six Myths of Commercialisation Australia have been exposed by Adrian Spencer. Allow me, if I may, to add one more:

Myth 7: Commercialisation Australia is about commercialising good ideas

Commercialisation is about funding great business models.

Indeed, the whole structure – including case managers, skills and knowledge, experienced executives and proof of concept as well as the Volunteer Business Mentor program – all are about sustainable, high-performance business models and are a great addition to creating successful high growth Australian businesses.

If the $2m Early Stage Commercialisation Grant sounds attractive, and you think it might give your idea and your business a step up, be assured that if you approach the application with the right attitude, the outcome of the grant application will not be the determinant of your success. The quality of the business model will be.

The process of ideation around your business model can be a lot of fun, engage your talent and develop a clear plan of where you are taking your business. The support for this activity requires an understanding of the business model canvas – the building blocks that make up your business model. It requires analysis of the options and selection of the best.

This investment of effort will be much more critical to the success of your business than the Commercialisation Australia grant you seek, yet will make you even more competitive in the highly competitive grant funding arena.

Andrew Weller is Topline Growth Advisor at Indigo Partners. His passion: creating high performing businesses incorporating disruptive business models, proven sales and B2B-marketing methods incorporating trends including China and social media.

Photo: e-magic

Managers are gearing up for a task which often provokes feelings of dread. Employees are preparing themselves for something frequently described as “loathsome”.

It’s the annual performance review, a customary annual corporate practice which is anything but performance-enhancing. In fact, it can be a major cause of poor performance and low motivation in the workplace.

It is now time for managers to face the truth about yearly reviews and see them for what they really are – mostly ineffective, outdated and pointless.

The traditional annual performance review rarely does anything to improve staff motivation, sense of purpose or output. In fact, it is usually a means to validate expenditure, lobby for bonuses and often to justify the review itself.  People simply don’t like doing them and that goes for both managers and staff.

But what’s the alternative?

It’s pretty straightforward. And it’s not rocket science. Managers should scrap annual reviews and switch to giving weekly feedback instead.

Simple performance science tells us that to improve, we need feedback. And the more immediate it is, the more likely we are to progress.

Recent research from the University of Alberta in Canada has found the mere thought of getting immediate constructive feedback will encourage performance improvements.

The research, titled Motivation by Anticipation: Expecting Rapid Performance, looked at the performance of students who thought they were going to get feedback anywhere between 0 and 17 days after a project was delivered. Those who expected to get their feedback immediately did much better, whereas performance got steadily worse as the gap between execution and feedback was increased.

Providing fast feedback is the way forward for all managers, but the process does have its risks.

Managers can presume it will be too time-consuming. Employees can fear micromanagement or criticism. For managers, the trick is not to see it as an extra burden on top of a busy schedule. Learn how to do it right and you’ll never look back.

The keys to making employee feedback effective

Firstly, it’s coaching, not a review. Every employee feedback survey that I have undertaken sees staff complaining about a lack of coaching and mentoring. It is sporadic at best and completely absent at worst.

Coaching is not rocket science but an alarming number of managers don’t do it well, or at all. It’s about the simple art of asking and listening.

Feedback needs to be consultative, straight-talking and genuinely aimed at improving the skills of the team member. Coaching needs to be relaxed and conversational and by contrast, annual performance reviews are not structured this way.

Secondly, address one thing at a time. KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) are the Jekyll and Hyde of the workplace – they can be good, or very bad indeed.

If employees have no KPIs, they won’t know where start or how to improve. But if they have 30, they probably pay them little attention because they can’t remember what they’re supposed to be improving.

Don’t overload – just focus on one key area at a time.

And thirdly, be consistent. Most employees are conditioned to believe feedback initiatives will fizzle out. When they realise it’s going to be regular and constructive, the benefits will start to kick in. They will begin to feel more supported and engaged. And managers will see the eventual results in retention levels and overall performance of their team.

On the other side of the coin, not every manager wants to provide regular feedback and not every employee easily receives it.

But every manager needs to face the reality of annual reviews, and every employee deserves the best chance for improvement. Perhaps the traditional annual performance review needs its own evaluation.

Originally a performance coach for elite sporting teams and athletes throughout Australia and the USA, Tony Wilson works with executive leaders in many of Australia’s leading organisations to create a culture of high performance. His new book, Jack and the Team that Couldn’t See, will be published in August 2010 and available to order at: www.tony-wilson.com.au

What's Gillard doing? Read on.

Yes, inherent in this headline is a bold claim. However, given the snoringly-dull progression of the election so far, it hardly could be considered an outrageous one.

It’s been an election dull enough to bore even the most Machiavellian of political pundits. (I know this first hand. The Anthill office is full of them, united only in their melancholy.)

About the only colourful aspect, so far, has been the language our leading candidates have elicited from the Fourth Estate: The axe-wielding ‘ranga’ versus the budgie-smuggling mad monk.

And even these don’t compare in subtlety and nuance with jibes of our political past. For example, Sir George Houstoun Reid, Australian Prime Minister in 1904 and 1905, after a backflip on the issue of Federation, was nicknamed… wait for it… “Yes-No Reid”!

Okay, perhaps subtlety and nuance have never been a strength of Australian political dialogue.

With nothing much ado on the frontlines, it seems that the only option left for those in the commentary box is to… well… comment on the commentators.

Fortunately, in the age of digital media, analysis has never been more interesting.

BuzzElection: Election insights from the social web

While our political candidates might not have adopted Obama’s 2008 campaign’s playbook or embraced Twitter to the extent seen in other national elections, the role and influence of social media can no longer be denied.

It was, therefore, only a matter of time before one of the media monitoring services launched a tool to analyse the election on the social web.

First, or at least most proactive, has been BuzzNumbers, which describes itself as “Australia’s leading provider of social media intelligence and monitoring services”.

Its tool for analysis is called, BuzzElection. According to the media release:

BuzzElection provides real-time coverage and analysis of the election, dubbed as Australia’s first ever “Twitter Election.”

The site delivers a comprehensive overview of election coverage across online forums, social media sites, and twitter, offering a breakdown of coverage by topics, city, state-by-state analysis, and the Top 100 Influential Tweeters.

It’s actually kind of impressive, identifying the top most influential Twitterers (Would you believe that @SunriseOn7 ranks at number three?) and the trending topics.

Among the top issues discussed are Climate Change and Immigration (Climate Change is well in the lead as a hot topic). The most active tweeters located in Sydney and Canberra.

Click here to see which topics are trending right now.

electionWIRE: Video views and news

Last week, Vibewire announced the launch of electionWIRE on YouTube, “a dedicated channel for young Australians to have their say and to report the news of the Federal election their way.”

Vibewire is a non-profit youth organisation providing media, arts and entrepreneurial opportunities and events for young people. And YouTube is the world’s most popular online video community (in case you didn’t know).

Unlike most ‘build it and they will come’ social media campaigns, electionWIRE features video news, interviews, opinions and debate from “a team of recruited and trained Vibewire Youthscape reporters”. Their video reports are supported by citizen contributors from the YouTube community.

According to the electionWIRE website:

The new recruits are stationed across Australia, armed with cameras, guided by questions and ideas posted to the electionWIRE YouTube channel, and supported by a senior editorial team.

The community can submit and vote on videos, suggestions and ideas that interest them most via the Google Moderator tool on the channel.

Whether they’re talking about youth unemployment, immigration, the ETS, homelessness or health, electionWIRE reporters will be asking the hard questions and getting unpredictable answers.

It was once said that a letter to a politician represents the views of a thousand voters.

I’m not sure how a video might rate but it’s especially pleasing to see one organisation embracing channels likely to be more familiar to this emerging set of influences, who are unlikely to write letters (and even less likely to call talk back radio) but might just video their views.

GetUp.org: Using satire to shape politics

Many Australians will have heard of MoveOn.org, the US non-profit lobby outfit that has raised millions of dollars to run advertising to support US candidates it identifies as “moderates” or “progressives”.

Inspired by MoveOn.org, GetUp.org was founded in 2005 to help voters to “keep the Howard Government accountable” after it won a majority of seats in the Australian Senate.

The organisation operates by raising money, through pledges, so that it might, therefore, place ‘crowd-funded’ advertising.

Here’s a sample of its work in action:

Julia Gillard Coffee Ad Parody

So far, the campaign to fund this particular advertisement has raised over $125,000 in small $30, $50 and $100 increments.

And then there’s the parodies

Most people would now agree that a modern interpretation of the Fourth Estate includes bloggers, vloggers and random YouTubers. (Unless you represent the ye olde guarde or are a producer of Media Watch.)

And if the views and, therefore, passions of the great-digital-unwashed are anything to go by, the most memorable aspect of this election will be the affairs that made it possible… namely the back-room dismissal of former PM Kevin Rudd.

And while the campaign might be dull, we can always rely on the resourcefulness and boundless creativity of the world-wide-web, coupled with the now iconic Hitler Finds Out meme (until the copyright owners of Downfall exercise a take down notice).

The creators of this hilarious video disabled the embedding option. So, you’ll have to follow the link to watch the clip: Hitler Downfall – Kevin Rudd Video (NB. Salty Language Warning: High).

And if that doesn’t turn you on, there’s this heart-racing spoof, again from GetUp:

Election Thriller – GetUp.org

So, what next for the election?

If this election is going to maintain even a modicum more of our attention, until voting day, we can only hope that Tony Abbott decides to bring back his pink triathlon onesie or that Julia Gillard gets the opportunity to enunciate more vowels. (We were so looking forwurd to the debate.)

If you, dear readers, can think of any other ways to make the election more interesting or know of another organisation that already is, leave a comment below. Please!

In this third and final article in his series on how businesses can and must develop socially-conscious practices to survive, Steven Howard concludes by forecasting the new relationship between consumers and business.

1. Consumers are demanding their brands have a social purpose
2. Don’t just show consumers charity: show them your conscience

The Era of Rsponsibility

Let me begin with a statement that I firmly believe in. It has been the central theme of this series:

Authenticity and trust will be two of the key cornerstones for corporate reputations in this Era of Responsibility.

This will come not only from your policies and public pronouncements, but from the actions and beliefs of your employees.

I highly commend to you this four-minute YouTube video featuring Corporate Philosopher Roger Steare, Professor of Ethics at London’s Cass Business School, in which he says, “Money is simply a promissory trust. When we break promises and we break trust, we destroy money, which is what we have seen in the past two years on a global scale.”

Roger Steare Champions Business Ethics

If it’s broke, admit it: embracing transparency

I have spent the better part of the past six months in the United States observing media trends, researching numerous topics and industries, and discussing the state of society with a highly diverse mix of professionals and lay people. The reaction I see coming from the recently completed Decade of the Double Zeros is a segue into an Era of Responsibility.

Those organisations which take the initiative to help solve the problems of society, including the environment, will be the ones rewarded with loyal customers.

Those organisations which take immediate, clear and transparent responsibility for fixing any problems they cause – including immediate acknowledgement of their errors, sincere apologies for their mistakes, rapid action to fix their messes, and the required investment to prevent a repeat of the problem – will be forgiven by customers and go unpunished.

Those which do not will quickly lose customers, loyalty, sales, and profits as their misdeed will promptly and swiftly be broadcast through all Web 2.0 channels (as seen in the recent high-profile meltdowns of the Tiger Woods, Toyota, and BP brands).

Every Boardroom and every senior management team should be asking themselves, “What lessons are there for our organisation from the way Toyota and BP have handled/mishandled their recent responsibility challenges?”

Are you studying up on Corporate Responsibility?

The era of responsibility is not a fad that will pass and be quickly forgotten once economies retreat to substantial growth levels.

It is a trend that is going to impact elections, market share, social institutions, and the composition of the various stock market indices around the world. Like most trends, those who get in front at the beginning will be the ones who remain ahead as the tide carries others along.

I read with great interest earlier this year that La Trobe University’s Graduate School of Management will present Australia’s first Masters Degree wholly focused on corporate responsibility – the Masters of Corporate Responsibility.

I, for one, cannot wait for the day when MCR degrees outnumber MBA degrees.

Hopefully this initiative by La Trobe University will catch on like wildfire at universities across the world.

Until then, I suggest you enter the Era of Responsibility with due caution and with the principles of morality, humanity and doing the right thing in business as espoused by Corporate Philosopher Roger Steare in the above video clip and in his book “Ethicability.”

And remember, authenticity is required when engaging customers and stakeholders in the Era of Responsibility.

More importantly, every organisation has a responsibility to ensure that our children inherit a better world.

Steven Howard is a Melbourne-based marketing consultant, author, professional business writer, and Non-Executive Director in both the profit and non-profit fields. He is also Chief Strategist at Howard Marketing Services (www.howard-marketing.com).

“Like Big Brother they are inaccessible and omnipotent,” says Victoria Buckley through a statement distributed by AAP Medianet.

“They are completely opaque. I can’t know whether the problem was me calling Facebook ‘philistines’ on my page, others’ comments disparaging Facebook for their actions, or my linking to outside media that had used the original images I had on my site.”

You may wonder what got Victoria, the owner of the elite Victoria Buckeley Jewellery Company, so worked up?

Well, it all started with the nipples of an enchanted doll making headlines the world over.

Images of uncovered doll nipples (yes, doll nipples) posted on Victoria’s Buckley Jewellery Facebook page, to promote her Sydney store, rubbed some people the wrong way.

The page, with over 2,000 fans, attracted the ire of Facebook and a threat to close down the page if the photos were not removed. Victoria was then forced to delete the photos and post them on a separate Facebook fanpage appropriately named, “Save Ophelia – exquisite doll censored by Facebook.”

The alternative page was a special dedication to Facebookers who wanted to discuss art and what constitutes nudity, and quickly garnered at least 500 new members. The defiant act prompted administrators of Facebook to delete the photos and, ultimately, close down this second group.

Choosing not to risk her company page and her precious relationship with her fans, Victoria then made the difficult decision to remove links to all of the international media coverage attracted to the story, together with dozens of insightful and encouraging comments from supporters.

Fortunately for Victoria (and unfortunately for the considerate commentators), it seems that this final act of caution was premature.

On 12 July 2010, the Sydney Morning Herald reported that Facebook had admitted it made a “mistake” in removing the photos. Facebook said in a statement:

“We’ve investigated this further and determined that we made a mistake in removing these photos. Our User Operations team reviews thousands of reported photos a day and may occasionally remove something that doesn’t actually violate our policies. This is what happened here.”

For Victoria, the saga has ended in a reversal of the policy, following a swag of positive, international media coverage.

While it’s often said that all publicity is good publicity (unless you’re Facebook), not everyone has the media savvy to exploit a seemingly dumb case of corporate bureaucracy.

Has anyone else suffered at the hands of such mindless community censorship? If so, leave a comment below.

Instead of watching another culinary car-wreck send a willing contest home, I got to see a misconceived marketing stunt launch an unwilling donkey into the skies above the Seas of Azov in southern Russia.

Flying donkey shocks beach-goers in Russia

According to the UK Telegraph and various Russian reports, the donkey ended up airborne as a result of an impromptu advertising campaign by several Russian entrepreneurs to attract beach-goers to their private beach.

Yet, surprisingly (like der), the stunt turned sour when the donkey began screaming in distress. Watching children began to cry, and the donkey’s landing was less than perfect.

Apparently, donkeys don’t like being strapped to paragliders. Who’da thunk it?

The seven stupidest marketing stunts of all time

Of course, the ‘Paragliding Donkey’ stunt got us thinking. Based on dim-memory, subjective reasoning and a (slightly self-conscious) desire to create a traffic accumulating list of massive link bait longevity (like this one), we’ve created what we’re (rather ambitiously) calling…

The seven stupidest marketing stunts of all time!

(The stunts are presented in no particular order.)

Vodafone Streakers

For all the good things Vodafone has done for the world (like… ummm… this is awkward), its infamous 2002 ‘expose’ of a publicity stunt created an unhappy legacy for future brand managers of the  telecommunication giant.

In case you somehow managed to miss it, Vodafone’s “accidental” brand awareness exercise involved two streakers with Vodafone symbols painted on their naked bodies, who took to the field during a Bledisloe Cup match in Sydney.

The event generated enormous publicity and a storm of criticism. On balance, it’s hard to see how a household name could have benefited from the exercise.

Vodafone broke the cardinal sin: The publicity stunt must support the brand identity.

Just ask Janet Jackson.

Janet Jackson’s ‘Wardrobe Malfunction’

The pop singer also learnt this rule the hard way, back in 2004, when a ‘wardrobe malfunction’ (adding a new expression to the lexicon) ‘accidentally’ exposed  her right breast, partially covered by a nipple ring, for nine-sixteenths of a second. Jackson copped a fine, that was later overturned, while the NFL announced that MTV, which produced the half-time show for Super Bowl, would never be involved in another half-time show again.

The theme of the half-time show was intended to promote MTV’s Rock the Vote campaign to encourage younger people to get out and vote. Once again, the message scored the least exposure.

Cartoon Network ignites Bomb Scare

On January 31, 2007, much of Boston and the surrounding cities of Cambridge and Somerville was shut down and put on high alert when a mysterious electric package was spotted near a subway.

The device had wires coming out of it and was suspected to be a bomb.

Of course, the offending objects turned out to be battery-powered LED placards with an image of a cartoon character called a Mooninite. (Of course!)

The placards were part of a guerrilla marketing campaign for Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film for Theaters, a film based on the animated TV series Aqua Teen Hunger Force on Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim late-night programming block.

A high ranking city official claimed that the ‘devices’ were so realistic that a Bomb Technician decided to detonate one rather than take the chance of it being a real bomb.

Two young marketers were arrested for the stunt and the head of the Cartoon Network resigned.

Let’s just say, the campaign bombed.

Vegemite’s iSnack Attack

Few Australian marketing campaigns have copped more consumer and industry criticism in the recent past than Kraft’s first foray into social media marketing.

The crowdsourcing experiment, designed to name a new version of Vegemite, delivered an omnibus of naming options from Vegemite fans (10,000, in fact).

Yet, according to speculative newspaper reporters at the time, the final name, iSnack 2.0, was chosen by a panel of “marketing and communication experts” to appeal to a younger market, capitalising on the popularity of Apple’s iPod and iPhone.

The choice immediately drew almost universal criticism. Several critics also pointed out that the name is not even original; iSnack is the name of an energy bar manufactured by South African company PVM Products and is also the trademark used by an American Corn Chip manufacturer (iSnack).

Splinter Cell Stunt Attracts Armed Police

It’s typically not a good idea to wander over to a bar and threaten patrons with a fake pistol as a way to promote something.

And yet that’s exactly what happened in April of this year in New Zealand when an actor showed up at a bar with bandages wrapped around his hands and a black imitation handgun, which he proceeded to point at the people drinking outside, causing panic and sending them diving for cover.

Police officers said they could not tell the gun was plastic until they had taken it from the actor. The stunt, to promote the release of Xbox title Splinter Cell Evolution, was understandably condemned by police.

Charges were laid on the night. But not, unfortunately, on the credit cards of aspiring gamers.

Toyota’s ‘Stalker’ Game

Viral games have become pretty common in marketing. For example, if you sign up for a game about an upcoming movie, one of its characters might send you e-mails and leave you telephone messages with passwords in them to help you navigate a complex website.

Last year, Toyota launched a game called The Other You to promote the Toyota Matrix. The twist was that you weren’t playing for yourself. You signed up an unwitting friend. Then that friend got stalked by a stranger who called them and said they were going to come to their house.

Yup, uninvited stalking sanctioned by Toyota. Of course, when a Los Angeles woman finally discovered that Toyota was responsible for threatening e-mails, a link to a fake MySpace page, a fake bill in her name for trashed hotel rooms and other forms of ‘pretend stalking’ that terrified her for five days, she sued for $10 million.

Surprisingly, that came as a shock to Toyota.

Now it’s your turn…

So, what’s number seven? The paragliding donkey, of course! If you know of any others, leave your comments below. If there’s a video to embed, we’ll embed it.

It’s taken us over two and a half years and our social network www.museum30.ning.com is finally an established online community in the cultural sector.

It’s a network for museum and library professionals who, in the past, had few ways of sharing knowledge between themselves. We now have over 2,400 members.

This figure might not be a large in comparison to established commercial sites but, in a setting where no product or service is being sold, it’s not bad!

So what’s the problem?

The platform we’ve been using (Ning) is now offering greater functionality at a price. While we already pay for its premium services, its new product range offers us greater flexibility to build and grow the network to include services that would be of interest to our network.

If we go down this path and decide to use these services to grow the community, we’ll need to ask our members to pay.

In true online form, we asked the community by conducting a survey. Responses ranged from “won’t be paying” to “why not charge xxx thousands for membership?”

So how do you take a free service, which functions because of the goodwill of its members and community managers, and create a paid service?

Here are some of the thoughts that are likely to guide our organisation:

1. Consider establishing your network as a not for profit organisation.

This offers your membership the certainty that you are not “selling out” and gives you a basis (and all the legal stuff you need) to establish new paid services

2. Establish a board.

Consider your most active contributors as potential board members. They’ve helped you grow, have a vested interest in you continuing to succeed and are most likely the ones who will continue to offer their thoughts on future developments. Not only can they help guide the future of the network, their regular contributions ensure that the content remains diverse and entertaining.

3. Consider a mix of free and paid services.

In our case, we built traction by running “offline” conferences. In the future, we’re looking to develop an online webinar series, podcasts and training modules. These will be a mixture of free and paid services so that our membership can participate as best suits them.

4. Schedule your time.

We started our network by being willing and able to devote whatever time it took to thank members for joining, answer all queries, contribute to stories, opinion and events. Over time and as membership grew, it became more difficult to maintain this level of commitment. We now have to be realistic about whether we continue offering a service that we can’t support with the time and dedication it truly takes, or risk undoing everything we’ve established in the past two and a half years.

5. Distribute on multiple platforms.

If your network has been successful for a particular sector, is there content in there that would be of interest to a broader audience? If so, consider which platforms best suit potential new audiences and promote your content there. In our case, radio interviews on the national broadcaster have brought new audiences to our site. This suggests that we could potentially offer podcasts of content with similar themes on ITunes, thus broadening our reach and bringing new members to the wealth of information within our network.

6. Respect your members.

You’re only here because they chose to be! When developing new services, consider how best they suit the needs of your membership. Survey them! Get their feedback on what works and what doesn’t and ensure you offer services that are in keeping with the ethos of the network (that goes for advertising too!)

These are just some of our thoughts starting out.

Over the next six months, we’ll be tracking the evolution of our network from a free to paid service. It would be great to hear your thoughts and gain your feedback!

Angelina Russo, PhD is an Associate Professor in the School of Media and Communication at RMIT University in Melbourne. She researches the connections between technology and communication from a design perspective. She is co-conveynor of the Museum 3.0 network and has recently established a new network for sharing stories of handmade design.

This rule is hard to digest if you have learnt your trade in a print dominated field. But it’s got to be said:

19. No matter how much effort you put into making a document or anything look perfect, it will always appear different on someone else’s computer or printed out.

Maybe I shouldn’t have used the word ‘perfect’. But it is not my choice. It is what I hear.

I am often asked:

“How do I guarantee that a document or email will look exactly the way I want on the recipient’s computer?”

My answer may sound unacceptable but you’ll have to accept it.

“You can’t!”

Even the Portable Document Format (PDF) can only do so much.

“But David, how can that be so?”

Well, let’s take the example of a corporate logo rendered in a set of very specific pantone colours. These colours are precisely defined by their component light wavelengths. Perfectly reproducible you may think.

But no. Let me show you why.

On the monitor you are looking at now press the menu button. You’ll see something like this:

Colour settings? What?

Yes, you can adjust the way your monitor displays colours. If you can do that the recipient of your document can do it also.

Now apply the same revelation to printers and their different inks, brands, papers and so on.

Right now, you are probably starting to think it is a miracle that your document would look anything like you intended, let alone approaching ‘perfection’ in any way.

Let it go. If you want your project completed in a timely fashion, move on.

Perfect in a literal sense is nonsense. It doesn’t exist. ‘Perfect’ as in ‘fit for its purpose’, on the other hand, is most definitely achievable.

David Moore has 25 years experience in the computer industry and is now Principle PC Hater at ihatemypc.com.au.