Marketing Impressions

A Closer Look at HP's Community Core Team

Tac Anderson — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 20:41:00 GMT

Many of you have probably heard about the new book, Groundswell: Winning in a world transformed by social technologies.

The book was written by Forrester's Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff and published by Harvard Business Press. First off I have to say that it's a great book and you should go get it. Second I wanted to shed a little light on a portion of the book that has to do with HP.

Alison Watterson , who is mentioned in the book, is manager of Corporate Web communications and leads our corporate blogging initiatives. Among her other duties she runs a group called the Community Core Team (of which I'm a member).

This group is fascinating to me for several reasons. First off it is one of very few truly cross organizational groups that is comprised of people with Web marketing jobs throughout the company. This means that everyone in the group participates in addition to our regular job responsibilities . Each of us is passionate about social media and often (but not always) are engaged in our individual business units online social activity.

The group is responsible for reviewing and approving new blogs (not individual blog posts just brand new blogs). The group also tackles new developments in the social media space.

HP was an early adopter of corporate blogging and started having company blogs back in 2004. At last count we have 55 HP blog (hosted on HP's platform), 12 employee business blogs (not hosted on HP's platform but still about HP) ranging from printing, marketing, software development to corporate social responsibility, servers, photography and research. We have individual bloggers, group and team blogs as well as non HP guest bloggers. You can see all of these listed on the right hand side of this page along with links to our various communities and HP employees personal interest blogs.

To me this represents the perfect mix of corporate structure and Web 2.0 openness. We have a blogging code of conduct and Alison is there to fill in the gaps, but beyond that no one is there to watch over the bloggers shoulder. (With 67 blogs and even more bloggers that'd be a lot of shoulders to watch over.)

It's a great group to be involved with and learn from as we are constantly re-evaluating what's working, what's not and how to address new developments as they arise.

Technorati Tags: Community,social media,HP,Groundswell,blogging,bloggers,blogs

Using Social Networking Sites For Internal Communications

Tac Anderson — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 18:00:00 GMT

This a two in one blog post. The example I am about to share shows both the importance of allowing your employees access to social networking sites and it shows how social networks can be used for internal employee communications.

I have been a long term listener to Shel Holtz and Neville Hobson's For Immediate Release podcast and a reoccurring theme on their podcast for years now is how social networks like Facebook could eventually replace/supplement corporate intranets.

While some smaller companies are able to experiment with this, I personally never foresee a time where large enterprises will scrap their intranets. However, I do see the need for enterprises to use social networks as a supplement to their employee communication.

HP has a program called HP Demo Days. The basic gist of the program is that twice a year (After Thanksgiving and Back to School) employees are encouraged to signup and go to local retail locations where they answer customer questions about HP products.

I think this is a great program for a few reasons:

A) It helps HP sell more product during key shopping seasons
B) More importantly it helps HP employees connect with real customers, not filtered through layers of research.

Don't close yourself off to innovation

Jill Weeks is responsible for getting the word out about the program and getting people signed up. Fortunately HP is not one of those companies that restrict Internet usage at work or blocks social networking sites. After spending some time on Facebook Jill noticed how targeted the ads were that she was seeing.

It was these targeted ads that got Jill wondering just how specific you could get. She contacted Facebook and found out that you could indeed get as specific as targeting people by their place of employment.

Internal communications from the outside in

One of the things that interested Jill in using Facebook is the rise in teleworkers.

"With so many people working remotely from home we're seeing that employees are already using social networks to communicate with fellow employees."

Facebook hadn't tried this anything like this before and expressed some concern to Jill that they couldn't guarantee who saw the ad. Basically anyone in the US who puts down that they are currently an HP employee will see the ad. This was of little concern to Jill since the information being shared isn't privileged and the landing page to the ad is a secured signup page.

Building on the campaign, building a community

When I first saw the ad, I contacted Jill about the program (honestly I kind of geeked out about it). I think it's a great use case. The only recommendation I had for Jill was to build a group page on Facebook and encourage employees to sign up and invite their fellow employees to join.

The results have been modest so far but so has the expense. Facebook ads are cheep and are pay-per-click. The Facebook group was free and takes minimal time to set up. The important thing to remember about social media is that the best results are usually realized after the first year. It usually takes 6-12 months to gain traction and prove that this isn't just a fly by night campaign.

It will be interesting to see the effects of these efforts with each new Demo Days. I'm willing to bet that each year gets progressively better, assuming that HP continues to invest the minimal time and budget into this.

Technorati Tags: Facebook,social networks,HP,communication,employee,intranets

Farewell Vince, HP's #1 blogger

Tac Anderson — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 14:08:00 GMT

Most of you reading this blog have no idea who Vince Ferraro is. If you do it's either because you're in IT or because you've been following my career at HP.

When I started at HP, one of my new responsibilities was to help take the LaserJet blog to the next level. To their credit the groundwork had already been done and I was able to step in, add a little more rigor and best practices and watch the blog continue to grow.

Vince Ferraro was HP's most prominent blogger. So why have you not heard of him? Probably because you, like me, are a marketer. While Vince was a VP of Marketing at HP he is probably more well known among IT network professionals not social networking marketers.

Vince authored the LaserJet blog and covered all things LaserJet. His most popular posts were related to issues people had printing with Vista.

Because of the these posts, Vince's blog was featured in the book Groundswell as an example of how to address customers on the Web. The LaserJet blog really lead the way for HP by demonstrating the tangible value blogging has with building customer relationships, SEO and Analyst Relations.

I found working with Vince's blog very interesting. Vince's success wasn't about having hundreds of thousands of daily readers on his site. When I tried to pin him down on who was his audience was he'd tell me: "LaserJet customers."

Early on I struggled with this. That's simultaneously such a broad but narrow focus. If he went larger, say tech marketers, he'd have so much more *success*. If he focused it on IT professionals and brought in our engineers to guest blog, he'd probably get better pick up.

Ultimately though the LaserJet printer is a tough product to market. Our customers are very diverse and that gray/beige box sitting in the corner isn't very sexy. But by focusing on our customers Vince's blog had all the success he wanted. We worked to provide valuable information to our customers (and the analysts we knew were reading) and as such Vince's blog has been the #1 HP blog (twice as many unique visitors as the next most popular blog).

The blog was so successful that our own PR teams would pitch us along with the traditional media and analysts.

I have since moved on to a new group and Vince has now retired. I hope whoever picks up the torch will continue what Vince started.

Good luck Vince.

You can also read Jim Lyons farewell post here.

Technorati Tags: Vince Ferraro,HP LaserJet,Blog,HP,Groundswell

Reflections and new directions for Marketing Impressions

Tac Anderson — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 13:33:00 GMT

One thing is for sure, nothing stands still around here for very long. Times of change always provide opportunities for self reflection.

You may have noticed that we are now on a new blogging platform. This is a much improved scenario. Besides being a better publishing tool for the bloggers it is now much easier for you to comment. (So please feel free to do so.)

Since my last post I have been moved to the Worldwide Sales and Services group. Not to get into the details what this really means is that my focus has shifted from Small and Medium Businesses to Enterprise accounts.

So instead of doing away with this blog I am going to shift the focus. Marketing Impressions will still be focused on Marketing but will now be focused on sharing the various marketing activities going on at HP.

This isn't something I'm doing as part of my roles at HP, it's something that I feel passionate about. It's something people have asked me to do on my personal blog but I didn't always feel comfortable doing. Not because of anything I might say but because I kind of felt I was robbing HP of an opportunity to engage with their customers about their brand on their home turf. That may sound weird but it's the best way I could articulate it.

Still being relatively new to HP I know how confusing it can be to try and figure out everything we're doing. It's my hope to add a little clarity around our various marketing efforts and share with you some of the lessons we learn around social media.

I'll be reaching out to other HP marketers and looking at the marketing activities they have going on. I'll even be opening up this blog for some of them to post their thoughts and lessons learned.

If there's ever something you want me to cover, let me know. I won't make any promises but I'll see what I can do ;)

I hope you'll grab this blogs feed and join me on the next phase of Marketing Impressions.

Technorati Tags: HP,Marketing,Blog

Logoworks Now Offers Free Blog Designs

Tac Anderson — Mon, 05 May 2008 14:02:00 GMT

Many of you may or may not know that my first love is all things Web. My primary personal blog is all about new media communications and how it's affecting business. Marketing and Small Businesses are a very close second, which is why why I wanted to do this blog. Now when I can combine the two:

Web 2.0 + SMB Marketing = 1 Happy Blogger :)

Today is just such a day for me at HP. Logoworks has announced . As with all things Logoworks they decided to first give it away for free and then if you want more than that they have services that allow for the ultimate in customization.

Some of you are like me and already get the importance of blogging. Some of you out there I've probably already lost when I mentioned Web 2.0 and blogging. Believe me when I say that blogs are not just for kids and crazy people to rant about politics and cats.

Blogs are a tool. In fact WordPress (my personal favorite blogging platform and the one that Logoworks is offering free designs for) is a very powerful (and completely FREE) content management system that I have seen used for an entire company website and you wouldn't even know it was a "blog".

So if it helps, think about it that way:

Logoworks gives away free website designs

If you'd like more information Logoworks is holding a free webinar on May 7 (follow the link to register).

And what good is a newly designed website if you don't have a personalized logo to go with it? Well never fear Logoworks is giving that away for free too. (How do these guys make any money - oh, not your problem). On May 12 Logoworks will launch the newest version of Logomaker, their free logo design tool, which will be aptly named Logomaker 2.0.

Head over to Logoworks for more details.

Technorati Tags: Logoworks,HP,WordPress,Blog Design,Free blog Themes,Templates,Logomaker,website

The Emotion of Color

Tac Anderson — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 20:19:00 GMT

Today I'm excited to bring you a guest post from Corey Smith. Besides being a personal friend (and someone I could strong arm into doing a guest post for me) Corey is a print industry veteran with a diverse background in Marketing and Business. He also scored bonus points because he is a small business owner himself. If you're interested in today's topic of color, I'd also recommend the HP Labs blog Mostly Color Perception

Copier and printing industry experts assert that within the next few years business will print more color than black & white. Sort of reminds me of the paperless office promise from 1975.

The fact is, color printing is on the rise. I thought I would share the real value of color. What does color do to the emotions? How does it affect us?

First of all, color has different meanings to different cultures. Depending on your background, you may have different emotions that are aroused when you see a particular color. I will share the most common emotions that come to the average North American. Many of these meanings will carry across cultural boundaries, but I would be curious how you agree or disagree with my assertions here.

Primary Colors:

Red

Red is a very emotionally charged color. It tends to increase the respiration rate and can even raise your blood pressure. It creates excitement and can be associated with danger, war, power, strength passion, desire and love. It can even increase your appetite.

Yellow

Yellow is the happy color… it is the color of sunshine. It creates a sense of cheerfulness and helps to stimulate mental activity. When yellow is very bright, it can attract attention. It can also provide a very sharp contrast to dark colors. Yellow can have the appearance of being brighter than white if over used and can be disturbing if used too much.

Blue

Blue is a trusted color. It can provide a sense of tranquility and security. It tends to symbolize loyalty, wisdom, trust, faith, confidence, and intelligence. While red can help to increase the appetite, blue tends to have the opposite affect and can actually suppress the appetite.

Secondary Colors:

Orange

Orange is the combination of the happiness of yellow and the energy and strength of red. It symbolizes creativity, determination, enthusiasm and success. In addition orange indicates affordability. Because of its similarity to red, it is great to promote food.

Green

Green tends to suggest endurance and stability. It represents harmony, growth and freshness. Green indicates safety. Obviously, it is associated with money and wealth. With the interest in “green” products, it is the only color that can promote organic foods and products effectively.

Violet

Violet or purple combines the energy and strength of red with the stability of blue. It represents nobility, ambition, power and luxury. It symbolizes extravagance and wealth and is often associated with dignity, independence, wisdom and magic.

Others:

White

White is purity, goodness, light and innocence. It is considered perfection. White is generally positive and simple. Often it is the color of charitable organizations, low-fat foods and dairy products.

Black

Black is elegant, powerful and formal, but can also be associated with death. In marketing, it is dignified. In certain contexts, black is very negative (blacklist, black humor, etc). It can also denote prestige.

Technorati Tags: color,emotions,design

Corey Smith is the Chief Web Architect for Prospect Builder and maintains a blog on business and technology

Save on Paper Printing

Tac Anderson — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 15:08:00 GMT

I just came across Lifehacker's Easy Ways to Reduce Wasted Printer Paper, which mentions the PC Magazine article Three Steps to the Paperless Office. This sparked some thoughts from Vince on printing and printing waste:

"The challenge of printing less is complex. Although there are many applications and areas where people are printing less, there is such a proliferation of information (enabled by the digital transformation of information on the web) that even if people print fewer pages per content topic, there is just a lot more content areas to print out."

One of the "evils" printer manufacturers (like HP) are accused of, is trying to trick people into printing unneeded pages.

This just is not true.

I personally believe that if every page printed creates value to the person/business that printed it then everyone wins. That's my goal of this blog; help small business owners gain value from the marketing material they produce. There are times when printing is needed and can create great value for your business. Wasted paper does not create value, it just creates waste.

That's the reason HP created tools like the Print View Software. HP even has a great list of tips to help you save money.

Customized Customer Marketing Material

Tac Anderson — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 20:56:00 GMT

There is a great video out on YouTube that was put together by HP that demonstrates the power of a little bit of creativity and the ability to print your own marketing material.

I was impressed with the customization and turn around time of this project, not to mention the quality of the pieces.

Technorati Tags: Marketing,Case Study,Video,Far and Away,HP

Tac Anderson is the Web 2.0 Strategic Lead for the LaserJet business.

What's in a name?

warrensander — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 13:40:00 GMT

Arguably one of the hardest decisions I've ever had to make when starting a new business is choosing a name. For us non creative types it can be horrible. Especially if you are starting a company with other people. You then have the additional difficulty of finding a good name that you all like (and one that you can get a good URL for).

I've come across a few good post lately that make suggestions on naming:

William Lozito of the Naming Blog points to an article in the Wall Street Journal about the importance of naming.

The Small Business section of the Wall Street Journal has a very good article up entitled “Name That Firm,” that indicates that “selecting a name is one of the most important decisions a company will ever make.” A sentiment that I completely agree with.
The article looks at some common pitfalls that come from not putting enough thought into the naming of your company and your brand.

He then also points to several articles about rebranding

Funnily enough, the Chicago Tribune has a great piece up about rebranding, something many people wind up doing when their first effort at naming and branding starts to wilt. Of course, this is also a pursuit that occupies the time of many a name consultant.

Tate Linden over on the Thingnamer blog has some good suggestions

Distinctiveness:

Distinctiveness is a feature, not a benefit.
So whether you're paying $50 or $500,000 for your spiffy new name and brand you're not paying for distinctiveness - you're paying for the brand's ability to multiply the effectiveness of your marketing and to hold down sales costs. It just so happens that distinctiveness is one of a slew of factors that can lead to those results.
Simple:

Why does simple work for naming? Two reasons:

People have a limited amount of attentional capacity.
People remember simple things easier than they remember the hard stuff.

Finally, Stephen Topfer at The Small Business Blog has some great tips on choosing a name including:

Using a mind-mapping software to brainstorm
Be descriptive but not too specific
Be aware of copyright issues
How your name will translate internationally (best to think ahead)
Can find a good Web address that goes with the name.

Photo by Hot Flashes/Tonja

Technorati Tags: Naming,Rebranding,NameWire,Thingnamer,The Small Business Blog

Tac Anderson is the Web 2.0 Strategic Lead for the LaserJet business.

Extreme Identity Makeover

warrensander — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 18:25:00 GMT

When you first start your business you often don't have much money to spend on a professional designer, so you bootstrap it. You have a friend or friend of a friend do it, or you go with a basic text logo or clip art. It get's you started and is "good enough".

As your business grows you get to a point in time where your logo may not represent who you are or it might look dated (I hear that 80's look is coming back). What do you do now? You still don't have a ton of money and you have even less time to work through some huge creative process.

John Hardesty, a good friend of mine, CEO of Tricycle Consulting and a really good designer to top it off, recently wrote a post on how to identify if your logo is in need of a makeover. Does Your Logo Match?

If you determine that you qualify for a new look he has seven questions that can save you a lot of headache, time and money if you can answer these *before* you begin your design process.

What makes you different?
Who is your audience?
What emotions do they experience thru your service?
What brands do they associate with other than yours?
What are the first three words that come into your mind when you think about your business?
How about the first three words from your customers?
What are the standards in your industry that people recognize quickly?

Every good designer will walk you through some sort of process like this but it's a good idea to know the answers before picking a designer.

HP has been sponsoring a new section of Small Business Trends and as part of that sponsorship Anita Campbell has been going through the design process with Logoworks for one of her smaller sites - Help my logo is so 1999. She makes some interesting points about the old design of her site:

The logo — in fact that whole site – looks “hobbyish.” So it has colored my perception of how I treat the site. It’s always the lowest priority.

She then goes on to walk her readers through the design process. If you'd like you can even check out the initial designs she got back and vote on which ones you like best.

Technorati Tags: design,logo,logoworks,tips

Tac Anderson is the Web 2.0 Strategic Lead for the LaserJet business.

Expert Advice from Business Bloggers

warrensander — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 17:27:00 GMT

I can't believe I forgot to post this. With our spring product launch and new Marketing Impressions portal it slipped my mind. Last week we announced the winners to our Top Business Blog Contest. If you'd like the back story on this you can read Anita Campbell's post on the topic. Posts by Anita were also featured in 3 of the winning categories.

This isn't the last you'll hear about ebooks from me, I love 'em.

We have compiled 5 ebooks worth of business advice. This is top level professional advice from some of the Web's best bloggers. We have also made the ebook templates available for free download so that you can create your own ebook.

Ebooks are great for marketing. You can use existing content from white papers or blog posts you or your company has done or write all new fresh content. They make great handouts at conferences or leave behind on sales calls. They're easy to read and colorful, fun yet professional.

Basically ebooks are the modern day equivalent of white papers. Another great resource for ebooks is ChangeThis.

ChangeThis is creating a new kind of media. A form of media that uses existing tools (like PDFs, blogs and the web) to challenge the way ideas are created and spread.

The great thing about content on the Web is that once it's created it can be infinitely re-purposed. The problem with content on the Web is that there's so much it becomes difficult to find. Packaging your best content for customers is extremely valuable. Not only do you give them great information, you save them a lot of time. Sometimes that's just as useful as the information itself.

Technorati Tags: ebooks,marketing

Tac Anderson is the Web 2.0 Strategic Lead for the LaserJet business.

The Official Launch of the Marketing Impressions Portal

warrensander — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 16:11:00 GMT

Today is the official press launch of HP's new Small and Medium Business solutions. This includes new printers from LaserJet and OfficeJet as well as new supplies coming out this spring. The press release also highlights many of the resources that HP has available, such as templates, software and partnerships.

In future posts I want to dig into these resources in greater detail but for now you can you can read the press release here and you can check out the newly launched Marketing Impressions portal here.

The Marketing Impressions portal, besides being the companion site to this blog, is intended to be a one stop shop for all of the resources that HP has to help the SMB do more of their own printing in house, which will save them time and money. I encourage you to check back to that site (which can easily be found at hp.com/go/marketing) as we will be updating it frequently over the next few months.

Tac Anderson is the Web 2.0 Strategic lead for the LaserJet business. He also has his own blog over at www.newcommbiz.com.

Pre-release of the Market Success eBook

warrensander — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 21:50:00 GMT

HP is pre-releasing a new eBook six months before it's available for purchase, and making it available for free. The book will be download-able one chapter at a time.

9 Steps to Outstanding Market Success

Chapter 1: Focusing

- Available now

Chapter 2: Innovating

- March 15, 2008

Chapter 3: Prospecting

- April 15, 2008

Chapter 4: Budgeting

- May 15, 2008

Chapter 5: Branding

- June 15, 2008

Chapter 6: Being found

- July 15, 2008

Chapter 7: Promoting

- August 15, 2008

Chapter 8: Connecting

- Sept. 15, 2008

Chapter 9: Growing

- October 15, 2008

The book covers advice and tips ranging from design to creating online word-of-mouth. I was lucky enough to receive an advance copy of the book and would highly encourage you to sign up for your free copy.

Friend and fellow blogger, Oliver Fritcsh, is one of the authors, you can check out his marketing blog (be sure to give him a hard time about updating more regularly).

I'd be interested to get your feedback on the book and this type of marketing from HP. In my opinion I'd rather use our marketing dollars creating valuable resources for our customers than just throwing advertising at you. If you find this useful we'll definitely do more of it.

Tac Anderson is the Web 2.0 Strategic lead for the LaserJet business. He also has his own blog over at www.newcommbiz.com.

Helping business owners be better designers

Marketing Impressions — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 12:56:00 GMT

Anyone who knows me, knows that I'm not a designer. I'm not even sure I could open Photoshop (ok, I could but after that I'd be worthless). Most small business owners fall in this same boat. That's why HP's In-House Marketing initiative is so exciting to me. By offering up a whole slew of resources like templates, classes, software and partnerships we can save small business owners money while helping them make money (aka get more customers).

HP is a recent sponsor of the Small Business Trends new Marketing Tips section. In general this is shaping up to be a great collections of marketing tips. One of Anita's first posts was on how to design your first logo. This is a great mix of general design principles as well as some how-to pointers.

Tac Anderson is the Web 2.0 Strategic lead for the LaserJet business. He also has his own blog over at www.newcommbiz.com.

From blogs to business cards

Marketing Impressions — Fri, 08 Feb 2008 16:11:00 GMT

The very first business I owned was a skate shop. I remember when I received my first set of business cards for MY business. It made owning my own business seem real. Anytime someone asked what I did, I eagerly whipped out a card and thrust it into their hand.

Business cards have always been my favorite piece of marketing material.

It’s the piece of collateral used the most.

It’s concise, to the point and tells an entire story about you and your company. At least it should.

Often your brochure, pamphlet, flyer or business card will be the first (and sometimes only) interaction you’ll have with your potential customer. We want to help you make the most out of that chance.

Our goal with this blog is to bring you, the best tips and tricks to help you get the most out of your marketing material. We’ll be pulling expertise from inside as well as outside of HP. We’ll try and keep it informational, entertaining and useful.

So bookmark the site or grab the RSS feed and join us.

Tac Anderson is the Web 2.0 Strategic lead for the LaserJet business. He also has his own blog over at www.newcommbiz.com.