Craving for attention..

By Rajesh Setty on Wed 25 Oct 2006, 12:01 PM - Leave Comment

We all do that.

Companies do that too – sometimes overtly and sometimes in a very subtle fashion.  One of my friend told me that the movie “The Italian Job” was sponsored by BMW as part of a marketing campaign for Mini Cooper. I also heard that it will cost a fortune to get some product featured as part of the TV show “The Apprentice.” I can see why. In the world of Tivo, companies have to find other ways of getting people’s attention. And, they are willing to pay a big  price for that.

I saw two simple examples recently.

Here is a key to a room in Econo Lodge – sorry to be more precise here is the image of a key card for a room in Econo Lodge. As you can see, it features an advertisement for Pizza Hut with a local number (Anaheim) that will make it easy for the guests to order Pizza. A person can either look up something in the yellow pages or he or she can quickly dial the number on the card to get food. Leveraging the space on the key card to play on the convenience factor.

Second one is a card that they were handing out when people came out of Lego Land. It says clearly that someone might instantly win $25,000 and the way to check is to swipe the cards on a computer terminal closeby. There were many terminals actually and people were in a queue to check this out. It was also very clear on the card that it was sponsored by some resort company and they were actually conducting a survey right then and there and getting all the information from you to see whether you were “qualified” for them to make you an offer.

On one hand, the consumer is overwhelmed (actually bombarded) with information and on the other hand, the companies are relentless in their pursuit to get the consumers attention!

Posted under Compelling Offers, Main Page.

Paying the right price

By Rajesh Setty on Tue 19 Sep 2006, 11:37 PM - 3 Comments

We all want a good deal. Don’t we?

What if we get a deal that is too good to be true? That happens very often actually.

Example: When you read a VERY good book. Think about the price you paid for that book. Isn’t it a steal?

One of the great lessons that I learnt from one of my earlier mentors was learning to pay the right price. Valuing stuff the way they should be. It has served me well in my life.

Those who know me closely know that I buy a lot of books – a few hundred every year. Most of the time I buy multiple copies of the same book. My criteria is simple. If I get a lot of value from a book, I want to give back in some way. The easiest way is to buy multiple copies of the book and give them away. While I may not make the author rich individually, I can at least act as a catalyst to spread his or her ideas.

While it is never a good idea to pay more, paying less is not good either

Posted under Compelling Offers, Main Page.

How can I get more traffic to my blog?

By Rajesh Setty on Tue 19 Sep 2006, 10:41 AM - 4 Comments

This is the #1 question that I get asked when there is a discussion about my blog. I am sure there are other bloggers who are reasonably successful who get asked the same question.

I have written about blog traffic before and others have too. There are strategies and then there are tactics. In this short piece, I actually want to focus on a question that should precede the above question and that question is:

What compelling REASONS are there for people to take a chunk out of their time and spend it on your blog? What is the ROII? What is the opportunity cost for your readers?

Blog traffic strategies and tactics are plenty and are available in the books and the Net. However, the answer to the question “Why should I get more traffic on my blog?” can be provided only by you.

Posted under Compelling Offers, Main Page.

Dissecting an offer: $99 + one day -> ROI greater than 400% ?

By Rajesh Setty on Tue 11 Jul 2006, 11:16 PM - 1 Comment

Although I am not a biology student, today I got fascinated by dissection. First, I wanted to dissect the goose with the golden egg and now my attention is on an offer that is supposed to be compelling.

Here is an offer to consider:

The ad says – “Now Hiring Home Typists: $99 One Day Training Program. Earn $1000 – $7000/Week At Home!”

Digging deeper, I saw that this is from a training institute that will teach you data entry and working a couple of hours a day, you can make money starting from $1000.

Here’s a simple way to disect this offer:

I am sure none of us even look at these kinds of offers. However, the fact that these advertisements continue to appear (just like those Nigerian scams) almost everyday, something seems to be working for the advertisers. So, whatever we can do to raise awareness on “how to think through such offers” we got to do.

Have a great Wednesday all of you!

Posted under Compelling Offers, Main Page.

Beyond Code July Promotion (in assocation with 800-CEO-READ)

By Rajesh Setty on Thu 06 Jul 2006, 11:30 AM - Leave Comment

For those of you who are long-time readers of my blog, thank you. For those of you who are new, welcome!

Those of you who are interested in buying my book, my company Foresight Plus, LLC is partnering with 800-CEO-READ to bring this July promotion. If you buy the book through 800-CEO-READ, you will get a few additional materials that have never been published before.

You can read all about the promotion at Buy Beyond Code.

The promotion runs throughout the month of July.

Posted under Compelling Offers, Main Page.

Designing and communicating incentives – Reader participation invited!

By Rajesh Setty on Mon 26 Jun 2006, 10:54 PM - 9 Comments

Three months ago, I wrote about the need to understand the power of incentives. What I forgot to mention that all bets are off if you don’t know how to communicate those incentives to the right people.

Here is a recent request to participate in a survey. The target audience is people who are maintaining their own websites/blogs – basically knowledge workers.

As you can see, the participant has no idea what the incentive is but knows that he or she has to invest 30 minutes of time giving all sorts of information that will benefit the company that is conducting the survey. May be some people will fall for it and spend those precious 30 minutes. I talked to ten people and eight of them said they will pass this “opportunity” and the two of them said they want to participate. Probing further, I found that the two wanted to participate because they were curious to know what the company wanted to know.

Now, the key thing to remember is that the eight that don’t want to participate won’t tell the survey creator that they are not participating. They just move on.

What can we learn from this? Create the right incentives and communicate them if you want to use incentives to motivate people to act in a certain way. Otherwise, just make a request without an incentive. The results probably may be almost the same.

Here’s a call for reader participation:

Question:

What’s in it for you?

Posted under Compelling Offers, Main Page.

Advertisement or service or both!!

By Rajesh Setty on Sat 27 May 2006, 8:00 PM - 2 Comments

You can have the cake and eat it too.

The other day I ordered a couple of books from Amazon. I got a shipment notice from them yesterday. Of course, being Amazon, the notice had every detail that I was looking for including an USPS tracking number

---

---

Since I was reading this email from my gmail account, on the right side there was an Ad from USPS but it was almost like a service. Here is the ad:

---

---

You click on the ad and it will take you directly to the landing page where your shipment is tracked. Of course, you can do that through Amazon too (but that would require you to login to Amazon and click again on a separate link.)

So, hats off to USPS for using this advertisements to serve!

Posted under Compelling Offers, Main Page.

Personal Branding for Technology Professionals – Now in NXTbook format

By Rajesh Setty on Wed 17 May 2006, 10:36 AM - 6 Comments

More than 10,000 people have seen the “Personal Branding for Technology Professionals” eBook in the last three weeks. Thank you for your interest and support.

Now, the same eBook is available in the NXTBook format as part of the launch of their NXT Big Thing online publication. Now, who is NXTbook Media and what is NXT Big Thing?

NXTbook Media™ optimizes print for use on the Internet using a standard Web browser to expand the reach and effectiveness of the world’s leading publishers.

The NXT Big Thing is produced as a free publication by NXTbook Media, and includes thoughts, trends and essays from some of the brightest minds in business today.

I am happy with what NXTbook format and hope you will like it too. Here is the link:

NXTbook: Personal Branding for Technology Professionals

Update 05/18

Thanks to Erik Hansen at Tom Peters Company: More on Brand You

Posted under Compelling Offers, Innovation, Main Page.

Thank you; “Personal Branding for Technology Professionals” – statistics so far

By Rajesh Setty on Tue 25 Apr 2006, 9:08 AM - 2 Comments

The first day of the launch of my new ebook (PDF, 40 pages) titled
“Personal Branding for Technology Professionals” was great. Thank you
for the warm reception. Here is the image showing some statistics so
far.

Here is the link to the FREE book again (right click to download)
eBook: Personal Branding for Technology Professionals

Also, special thanks to the following people who linked to this immediately and are helping me spread the message.

1. Guy Kawasaki
2. David Maister
3. Phil Gerbyshak
4. Ravi Char of Musings on Information Security
5. George Reavies of Frontline Leadership Trends
6. Andrew McCaskey of Slashdot Review
7. Jason Darrow of Java Entrepreneur
8. Bill Grosso at Wander, Think, Repeat
9. Shaun Orpen at For Immediate Release
10. Reinout van Rees
11. John Keegan

I am honored. Thank you.

PS: If anyone else has linked, I don’t know about it. Please send me a quick note at “rajesh301 AT gmail DOT com.” Thanks.

Posted under Compelling Offers, Main Page.

FREE eBook – Personal Branding for Technology Professionals

By Rajesh Setty on Sun 23 Apr 2006, 8:13 PM - 7 Comments

I have been fascinated by the work of both my heroes Tom Peters (Brand You) and Seth Godin (Purple Cow) for quite a while. My series on Ways to Distinguish Yourself is an offshoot of my passion on this subject. Technology professionals need to brand themselves more than anybody else as the consequences of not doing it can be losing your job to someone offshore. Excellence in commodity skills can only take you so far.

Earlier this year, I wrote two columns on this topic for CIOUpdate

1. Jan 30, 2006: Personal Branding for Technology Professionals – Part 1
2. Feb 27, 2006: Personal Branding for Technology Professionals – Part 2

This eBook is the result of a few months of research and writing and of course, lots of help from lots of people. You will see that Personal Branding is no longer a “nice to have” thing. It is no longer a luxury. Earlier it might have provided the much required competitive advantage but now, you almost require it to survive and thrive.

Special thanks to the following people:

Also, I have to thank the sponsors for funding the research leading upto the book and writing this eBook. These companies have been instrumental in ensuring that this book remains “FREE” for you.

Here is the link to the eBook (right mouse click and download the PDF document)

eBook: Personal Branding for Technology Professionals ( 40 pages PDF )

I would love to hear your feedback and comments. I stopped short of
promising that you will get your value for money. It’s FREE. So I guess
I have to make a promise that you will get more than the value of money

---

Want multiple printed copies?

---

Posted under Compelling Offers, Main Page.