Oct 9, 2005

Is Your Business Information Safe?

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Officials at Indiana State University confirmed in recent weeks that the names and social security numbers of 10,420 students attending the university during the 1996 to 1997 school year were posted on the Internet due to a mistake during a database upgrade. This is certainly embarrassing for the school, but the real problem is that with someone’s name and social security number, it’s easy for a nefarious person to open a credit card or cell phone account in a victim’s name and go on a shopping spree.

Every 63 seconds, an American falls victim to identity theft. Several of my co-workers have had this happen to them within the past year, and had it not been for Colorado’s state law that allows each Coloradoan a free copy of their credit report each year, my friends might not have found out until they were turned down for a home loan or a credit card. According to attorney general John Ashcroft: “Identity theft is one of the fastest-growing crimes in the United States. An estimated 500,000 to 700,000 Americans each year have their identity stolen, and many more Americans are victimized by the crimes facilitated by the identity theft – crimes ranging from bank and credit card fraud to international terrorism.”

What happened in Indiana? More important, what can businesses and organizations do to make sure that private customer information stays safe and secure? The issue wasn’t that someone “hacked” into the system with malicious, criminal intent. That actually happened in March, when hackers illegally accessed a computer network containing names, addresses, social security numbers and other identification data of 145,000 current and former Purdue students. Rather, Indiana State University publicly posted the information on its Web site. A typical business would try to appease their customers and investors by firing the employee who was responsible for the blunder and try to reframe the issue as a person that messed up and is no longer part of the organization.

“No disciplinary action is expected,” said Teresa Exline, executive director of public affairs for the university. The university is sending letters to the 10,420 people who were “probably affected”. I’m happy that some poor, overworked graduate student isn’t getting the axe (the reports haven’t said who actually made the mistake, but universities often use graduate students as cheap labor). But what does this do to really solve the underlying issue that 10,420 names and social security numbers are now potentially in the hands of possible evildoers?

“The problem is, with identity theft, many of these thieves will not act immediately,” said Beth Givens, director of the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, a consumer advocacy program based in San Diego. “They will hold onto it for six months or even a year.” One answer is not to collect any information in the first place, but accurate information is the lifeblood of good decisions. Detailed information, such as a credit report, can help a company avoid customers likely to default on payments. When hiring new employees, accurate criminal background reports can help businesses verify whether a job candidate has been truthful on his or her application.

When doing research to screen a potential baby sitter or prospective business partner, easy access to background information aids in the decision-making process. In the university application process, social security numbers have been used to verify test scores for entrance examinations. Perhaps the most effective solution is to educate employees (and anyone else who has access to sensitive information) about the importance of keeping the information secure and private, and have strong privacy practices and procedures in place.

Note: A four-inch thick policy and procedures manual that collects dust on the shelf isn’t enough to protect information actually talking to people about safeguarding information is required. Indiana State University officials say that in the future, students won’t have to worry about the possible exposure of social security numbers because the university is working to replace them with a student identification number. Said Exline: “Had our procedures been followed when this file was created, we wouldn’t be in this situation.” Some consolation to the victims.

May 23, 2005

Tip #3: Use incentives to get people to act

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President Obama took the oath of office this week (twice, just to be sure), it’s likely going to be some time before the economy is back to where the Dow tops 14,000 again. One of the quickest ways to increase business in a tight economy is to use incentives to get people to take action. Most people immediately think of discounts, and these can be effective: Signup by Wednesday and get 10% off the project, Buy One, Get One Free, 50% Off Sale, Free Shipping for orders over $100.

However, incentives don’t have to be just discounts. One of our clients prefers not to use discounts, because their clients might then wait before making a purchase until the next marketing campaign. Instead, another way to entice people is to throw in something extra if they signup. For example, we have a new module for our PageDirector content management system that automatically detects if someone is visiting the site from a mobile platform (such as an iPhone or Blackberry), and delivers a mobile-optimized version of the site. Something like this will take us a few hours to install and adapt, but including for free could be the factor that tips them in. Another enticement could be one that’s based on timing.

For example, if we know we’re going to have a couple of days in between other projects, we can tell clients that while it would normally take 2-3 weeks to turn something around, if we’re able to get started on their project by the end of the week, we can turn it around in 4-5 days. Finally, payment terms can often make a difference, too. In this difficult economic climate, banks are hesitant to lend money. Breaking up a project into six monthly payments can sometimes mean a client can afford your price without having to secure additional financing.

May 23, 2005

Tip #2: Listen to Customers With Surveys

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If you’re like 90% of most customers, when you have a bad experience at a restaurant, you usually won’t complain. You just won’t go back. I know this was true for me (although I’ve gotten better about speaking up recently). My wife seems to be among the 10% of people that do speak up when something is amiss. She argues that ethically, it’s better to let the business or restaurant know if they have a problem (like wilted lettuce), so that the organization can correct the issue. Without this valuable feedback, the wait staff, dishwashers and others stand to lose their jobs (or see less in tips).

One of the main reasons people don’t give feedback is that they don’t want to be confrontational. They don’t want to rock the boat. It takes a lot of guts to tell someone that they didn’t do a great job. You don’t want to hurt their feelings. You know it’s not really the waiter’s fault the food was lousy… it might have been a bad supplier in the distribution process.

1. Make it easy. Make sure that you give people an easy, low-committment, low-stress way to give feedback. People are much more willing to share via email or a web-based form than to say tough things in person or on the phone.

2. Keep it short. Recognize that you are asking people for one of their most valuable assets: their time. So make sure you keep it short. Remember: the more questions you ask, the less likely people are to complete the form.

3. Ask the right questions. There is “nice to know” information. And there is “need to know” information. We’ve found that the four questions we really need to know are (rated on a scale of 1 to 10) We also give people the opportunity to give comments in a form too, but that’s optional. The most important piece of information you need to know is how likely someone is to refer others to you. If someone is willing to stake their reputation to recommend you, then they have a high opinion of you.

4. Timing is key. We automatically send out a survey each time a project is closed through our system. We’ve found, through the helpful guidance of Nancy and Judith of Brains at Work, that right after we finish a project, we have a critical window of time to address work-related issues. If the timing is right, people will give good feedback. If you wait too long, they have likely moved on and won’t care to spend time giving you information that you can use to improve your processes.

Mar 23, 2005

Hotel Privacy: Minor Human Negligence Can Lead to Major Invasion of Privacy

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I’ve written before about how businesses need to carefully safeguard the privacy of their customer’s information, but a recent privacy incident nearly took my breath away because it struck so close to home. It’s not because of what actually happened but what could have happened.

Here’s what transpired: My wife and I were recently traveling to a distant city. We both have crazy schedules, so we wound up taking separate flights. She arrived before me and checked into the hotel to take a nap. When I got to town a couple hours later, I hopped onto the hotel shuttle and was promptly whisked to the front desk.

I’ll pause from telling the story for a moment to note that the name of the city and the identity of the nationally recognized top-tier hotel chain won’t be part of this story. It’s not my intention to single out one community or one company or to get a poor front-desk worker fired because I’m creating a privacy fuss over something that could have turned into a serious privacy blunder (but fortunately didn’t).

So, back at the front desk, I gave the smiling and courteous check-in person my name (not my photo ID and not my credit card, but just simply told her my name). Perhaps it was my bubbling charisma (maybe) or my good looks (doubtful), but she smiled again, handed me a key and wished me a pleasant stay. I nodded, smiled back with a perplexed look that is probably typical of jetlagged and weary travelers, and went up to the room where my wife was sleeping. Although I appreciated the courteous and well-intentioned actions of the front-desk person, unfortunately, our world is not as safe as it once was.

My wife’s privacy, security and safety were nearly violated because no one asked me to confirm who I was. What if someone else overheard my wife when she checked in and when she left instructions for the staff at the front desk to give a guy named Jeff Finkelstein a key? Could someone pretending to be me assume a confident air and sport a trustworthy smile and receive a key to her room? This thought (and others more sinister) ran through my mind. Suddenly, even the quiet and soft notes of the music playing in the elevator couldn’t soothe my nerves. I’m sure official hotel corporate policy written on page 257 of the employee handbook clearly states that hotel staff must check a photo ID before they hand over a key to a room, especially when someone else is already in the room.

The problem is one of human error, and humans tend not to learn well from policies stated in a thick, four-inch binder that’s probably collecting dust in a storage room. We learn best from stories, from real things that happen to real people. So if you’re reading this article and you relate what happened to me to how your business or organization collects, shares and uses customer information, resist the urge to type out a terse memo to your staff. Instead, just forward my story to them with a couple comments like: Let’s make sure this doesn’t happen here.?

Mar 23, 2005

Case Study: Customer Paradigm Boosts City of Denver’s Trade Show Business by 20%

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CUSTOMER PARADIGM DELIVERS AUTOMATED LEAD MEASUREMENT SOLUTION – BOOSTS DMCVB TRADE SHOW BUSINESS BY 20%.

CHALLENGE: Increase convention & trade show business to Denver by 20%.

STRATEGY: Squeeze every lead out of each trade show DMCVB attends.

TACTICS: Automate the lead acquisition, follow-up & conversion process

ROI: Just one more lead converting into a sale = $425,000 to Denver

The job of filling Denver, Colorado’s 600,000-square-feet of convention and state-of-the-art meeting space falls to Richard Scharf, executive vice president of sales and marketing for the Denver Metro Chamber and Visitor’s Bureau (DMCVB). While a $7 billion convention renovation and many other attributes of this beautiful city certainly make Denver an easier sell, Scharf still competes with 475 other U.S. Convention Bureaus for the same meetings and events.

So when Scharf wanted to make sure Denver gets bigger piece of the trade show pie, he turned to Customer Paradigm and Get Feedback to implement a powerful lead follow-up and measurement solution. The Challenge: Thank you email:“Our main goal was to increase business delivered to the city by 20%,” Scharf said. “We needed a system to squeeze every lead out of a show possible.

Previously, we were doing pre-show snail mail and worked the leads in the booth fairly well. Business we obtained on the show floor was entered directly into our sales system.” “However, it was easy for prospect leads to get lost as managers were handling them manually,” he continued. “We didn’t have a follow-up plan established to contact everyone after the show.”

Like many exhibitors, additional DMCVB objectives included: Digital lead capture — no more lost, torn or illegible business cards that gather dust Reinforce current customer relationships Meet new customers that deliver RFPs to the bureau booth Meet new customers that request future follow-up when ready to make a purchase Contact Me Now FormSearching for Solutions The DMCVB began looking for an affordable, automated off-the-shelf lead measurement solution. They also needed a high-impact, interactive communication tool that would: Increase qualified leads Reach true decision-makers Gain critical customer intelligence “We needed a turnkey solution that wouldn’t become a regular burden to administrate or review regularly. And we needed a cost-effective system that would be easy to implement and even easier to manage,” Scharf said.

Customer Paradigm and strategic partner Get Feedback answered the call. Customer Paradigm reviewed the DMCVB’s current system in order to develop an aggressive and active lead management system that would provide the value and specific measurement that they needed. After reviewing the answers from the DMCVB, Customer Paradigm applied a proven six-step process to help convert contacts into contracts: Six Step Process: From Six Step Process: From Contact to Contract Drive Traffic to Booth. A pre-show email is sent, enticing trade show attendees to come by DMCVB’s booth. The pre-show email frequently connects sales managers with customers and prospects before the trade show. Lead Capture + Survey. At the trade show booth, leads are electronically scanned — eliminating lost or illegible business cards. A short survey at the booth further qualifies each lead for sales. Instant Email Follow-up. As soon as the lead is scanned into the system, an instant email message is sent to the visitor, thanking them for stopping by the booth. Follow-up email Messages.

The winner of the booth prize — often a digital camera — is announced in a follow-up email message one week after the event. Leads are placed into the retention marketing email newsletter — making sure that each person is ‘touched’ at least once per month. Response / Sales Conversion. Each communication allows the recipient to easily request more information in a non-threatening way. Tracking / Measurement / ROI. Sales revenue from leads gathered at the show is tracked and measured — allowing management to measure the value of each trade show expenditure.

The six step process includes a lead acquisition and measurement system, and allowed the DMCVB to track their trade show effectiveness. With built-in management reporting, individual attendee demographic overviews and instant follow-up capabilities, the DMCVB made sure that no new lead was not followed up properly. The Right Choice for Results: It’s clear the DMCVB made the right choice.

Since implementation just over six months ago, the Denver’s Metro Chamber and Visitor’s Bureau exceeded their goals with more than a 20 percent jump in business. Scharf is a believer that trade shows — planned and implemented correctly — remain a powerful way to increase business for his organization. “Regardless of your trade show budget size, integrating effective marketing and measurement systems that are at easily and affordably at your disposal will result in powerful results for your trade show programs,” he said.

Ask yourself the following questions: How do you currently gather leads? Paper vs. Digital? How do you currently follow-up with leads after a trade show? How do you measure sales revenue from leads acquired at a trade show? What would just one more sale from each trade show mean to the bottom line?

Mar 23, 2005

Tip #5: Redesign or Update Your Website

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So, in full disclosure, I know that this is a self-serving tip. After all, we do help people design, build and update their websites. But this week’s tip goes out to those who have websites that are out of date or don’t fully reflect who they are and what they do.

Nothing confuses or turns away a prospective customer like a website that is out of date. For many people, your website is the first (and sometimes last) impression that they have of your organization. So, in these tight economic times, it’s best not to turn away business with a website that doesn’t fully reflect your current business model or tell people what you do.

All marketing, including your website, should create a sense of trust and confidence so that it’s easy for people to understand what you do and how you can make their lives better. There are two main ways to update a site: Update the navigation and content. Often the changes to your organization will fit neatly inside your current design. Most good website designs should allow for expansion of content and services over time.

Sometimes all you need to do is revisit the content pages on your website and make sure that the information is current. If you’ve added new products or services, this can often be incorporated into the navigation of the site. You might want to update photographs on the site, and make sure that the testimonials, sample work and other information is reflective of your best work. In the best of all possible worlds, each time you add new products or services, you are able to easily update your website.

A content management system that makes it easy to add or remove pages without having to learn a lot of technical skills can help keep the site more constantly updated. Change the overall design and layout. If your business has significantly changed in the past few years (as has ours), a new design can often better reflect the changes to the organization. Our research has found that updating your website with a strong design that resonates with your target audience can increase sales and leads from the site by up to 400%.

For Customer Paradigm, we last updated the overall design of the site four years ago. Back then, we were more focused on selling software and putting on educational seminars. While we still do that, our emphasis today is helping businesses and organizations with all of their marketing needs, from coming up with logos and brochures, to designing interactive websites with strong search engine positioning. Our older site didn’t resonate with the target audience, and didn’t reflect who we are now, and where we want to go as a company.

Our new site incorporates our new logo (Thanks to Esther), and a new design (thanks to Ryan) that demonstrates cutting-edge design, subtle flash movement, with an easy to use navigation. It’s also extremely search engine friendly, too. We’ve incorporated lots of bells and whistles into the design, including the ability to personalize the site, or to dynamically change the layout of the site if someone arrives from a search engine like Google after searching on specific keywords.

Mar 23, 2005

Tip #4: Offer an Educational Webinar

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In these tight economic times, people are often looking for leadership. The organizations that can get ahead of the issues, and let people know what they should be doing in order to achieve success (both personally and professionally), are ones that are more likely to succeed. A quick, fast and inexpensive way to show thought leadership is to offer a 30 minute educational Web seminar on a topic facing your industry.

It might be a new trend, such as the rise in people visiting websites from mobile devices, and what people can do to make sure their site visitors aren’t left behind. It could be an introduction course, such as Search Engine Optimization 101 or Email Marketing 101 basics, to get people who don’t know much about a topic to learn more.

1. Limit it to 30 minutes. People have very short attention spans. Anything longer, and people won’t be likely to sign up. But most people can spare 30 minutes out of the day, especially if it can help their career.

2. Make it a Web seminar vs. an in-person seminar. Again, people have limited time. Even more so when they’re trying to do the work of three people in a jam-packed workday. If people have to leave work, travel, find a place to park, etc, they aren’t likely to attend. If it’s something they can do from their desk, they can always rationalize that they can multi-task (It will be your job to keep them riveted and paying close attention).

3. Make the sign up process quick, fast and easy. Limit the signup information to their first name, last name, email and phone. You’ll know their company information if they sign  up with a corporate email address, and their phone number’s area code will give you geographic information (Try searching on the area code in Google if you don’t recognize where a person is from).

4. Send a confirmation email, letting them know that they have registered. Many people use their inbox as a filing system, and will keep the login information handy. Or, they’ll use that as a way to add this to their calendar.

5. Send at least two reminder emails. One reminder should be 24 hours before, to let them know that the seminar is tomorrow. Then, send another reminder one hour before, so that they’ll have the login information handy.

6. Be prepared that 50% of the people that register won’t log in. As compelling as your seminar may be, their job comes first. So if something comes up at work (i.e. their boss ropes them into a meeting), people will likely defer and not attend. (Don’t take this personally.) It’s always best to provide a video recording of the webinar to everyone who registered after you complete the seminar.

7. Let your fingers do the walking. We recommend using a conference line system, where everyone dials into a phone number from their telephone, and may have to enter in a conference ID. There are many low cost options available, and if you opt to not use a toll-free number (where you have to pay a per-minute charge for each person), you can keep costs to a minimum.

8. Use Powerpoint or create a web presentation. If you have a presentation with PowerPoint slides, you can also have people log into a system where you can control what slides people see. Again, there are many low cost options available. But you can also just email the presentation to people, post the presentation online for people to download, or even save  your PowerPoint slides as a Web presentation, and ask people to follow along. This will further save money and keep your costs down.

9. Make sure that your presentation is something people “Need” to know. Not something that’s “Nice” to know. If your topic will somehow make their life better, faster, cheaper, easier, help them avoid pain and embarrassment, you’re on the right path.

10. Start on time, and end five minutes early. If you start the presentation late, you’re rewarding the people who come late, and penalizing the people who show up on time. Have people visit www.time.gov (one of my favorite sites). End five minutes before the thirty minutes are up, and open it up for questions. If nobody asks a question, you can often have a simple question and answer prepared to prime people to ask additional questions (some people don’t want to look like they don’t know all of the answers). If you get a lot of additional questions, let people know at the 30 minute mark that they can drop off, but you’ll stay on the line to answer additional questions.

Mar 23, 2005

Tip #6: Reach Out With An Oversized Postcard

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 One of the most cost-effective ways to get in front of new and existing customers is to send an oversized postcard. While email is also a valuable way to stay in touch, the fact is that some people respond better to direct mail. Why use an oversized postcard? It’s cheaper than a tri-fold brochure or letter. Even with full color front and back, an oversized postcard is a lot less expensive than paying for folding and an envelope.

It will often get hand-delivered to each recipient. Most companies will distribute a post card or other direct mail piece right to your recipient’s desk. If your postcard is big, bright and colorful, it’s likely to get attention It works for both new customers and existing ones. A postcard is an easy thing to send to past customers letting them know about new and upcoming events, products or services. And it’s also easy to rent a targeted direct mail list to help acquire new customers. Overall postal volume is down. Have you noticed that you’re getting less mail than you used to? Most companies are cutting back on direct mail, and the post office is trying to figure out if they should stop delivering mail on Tuesdays to save money.

With this trend, there’s an opportunity for your message to get through easier. With less overall mail coming to each person, there’s a greater likelihood that people will pay closer attention to your mailer. Here’s an example of a postcard we just did for my wife’s organization, Adventure Rabbi. In the past, we’ve sent out a tri-fold brochure or a four page business letter with a brochure.

This year, to save money, we opted for an oversized postcard: Sample Postcard - Front Side The front has two photos on it (I took them) that features upcoming events. The psychological goal for using these photos is to allow the recipient to place themselves inside the photo and say, “Yes, I’d love to take part in this experience.” The back of the postcard uses the same color theme, and features a message that goes into more details about each upcoming event.

The back also has a series of smaller photos that attempt to connect with the recipient on an emotional level, and cause them to visit the website to sign up for the Ski Retreat or Passover Seder in the Desert. Here’s the back: In a tight economy, where discretionary income for travel is at a low point, reaching out with a postcard saved the Adventure Rabbi organization money, as well as enticed people to spend money.

Mar 22, 2005

Tip #1: Ask For Referrals

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If you’re like me, you’ve been barraged with news of colleagues, friends and family losing their jobs, or businesses that are having a tough time weathering the current economic climate. With banks failing, companies shedding jobs, and whole sectors of the economy in chaos, it can be discouraging.

After talking to many of our customers, we’re going to devote our next eLearning Series to “Six Inexpensive Ways to Increase Business In A Tight Economy.” All of these suggestions are tried and true: we’ve either done them for ourselves or for our clients. Let me know if you have additional suggestions, as we’re happy to share tips and techniques with everyone else.

Tip #1: Ask For Referrals The first tip – Asking For Referrals – is a tried and true method that leverages chains of trust. Unlike traditional advertising, word of mouth referrals can be a top way to generate new business. Why? Referrals are based on trust. The highest compliment any customer can give to a vendor is the compliment of saying, “Your company has done so well, I’m willing to risk my personal reputation and recommend you to someone else.”

Because a referral comes with this type of implicit trust, it’s a lot easier for a new prospect to become a paying customer. If someone you know and trust gives you a recommendation, that carries a lot more weight than a glossy print ad or a TV spot. (Not to say those don’t work, too, but they’re not quite as powerful.) One of the most successful things that the winner of the recent US Presidential election did was create a system that asked people to ask their friends to support a candidate and get out and vote. Several hundred million dollars in TV advertising, as well as loads of technology also helped. But it was paid for by contributions raised (in part) using referral-based networking strategies. (Sorry to digress into politics; we did all of the early email marketing for the Howard Dean campaign, when they first started and had a $25-per-month hosted website.)

The greatest example of successful referrals I’ve ever seen was back in the dot-com boom days when I was working for a $47 million venture-backed company. I spoke to one of the investors who put in $12 million in venture capital into the company – based on a referral; he did no due diligence but simply trusted a colleague. (Email me back if you want to know how his investment turned out.)

Before I delve into specifics for creating a successful referral strategy, I’ll first state a couple of quick assumptions. First, I’m going to assume that your company does a reasonably good job at providing a product or service to the majority of your customers. You’ll never be able to please everyone, but as long as most of your customers have a positive experience with your organization, seeking referrals can be extremely effective. If people really don’t like your company, but are forced to buy from you for contractual or monopolistic reasons, you have bigger problems to work on than building a referral network.

Second, I’ll assume that you enjoy a broad client base that spans across several vertical industry categories. If you have a very narrow industry focus, clients could worry that if their competitors use you, they could lose a key competitive advantage. In this case, you should probably focus on expanding your products and services to new markets. So, if your customers like and trust you, and don’t feel competitively threatened if they refer you, here are suggestions to create referrals from your customers:

1. Ask For Referrals. People won’t think to refer others your way unless you let them know that this is important to you. In nearly every email I send out I have a line below my signature that says: We love referrals! Our Referral Promise >> It’s a not-so-subtle reminder to let people know that you’d welcome new clients. In the last 30 days, I’ve personally sent 1,093 emails through Outlook (I just checked), plus many more from my Blackberry. This is in addition to our weekly newsletter. It’s a great way to spread the word.

2. Give People Your Referral Promise. The last thing a person wants to do is refer their friend, only to have them hounded endlessly by a sales person. We put our referral promise on our website, and we stick to it. Here’s what it says: Our Referral Promise: If you refer others to us, you have our heartfelt thanks. One of the highest forms of trust in business is sending friends and colleagues along to us. We know that your trust in us is hard-earned, and we pledge to take care of anyone you send our way. We are happy to set up an initial meeting or phone call, but then it is up to the client to pursue the conversation (we won’t hound them endlessly).

If the referral isn’t a good fit for either party, we’re happy to make additional recommendations that will allow them to accomplish their goals. We promise to do what is in the best interests of a potential client. Metaphorically speaking, we can teach a person to fish, we can act as a seasoned fishing guide to navigate difficult waters, or we can fish for them and prepare a complete meal. We also list the Problems We Solve, as well as list our Typical Client Profile. Visit here to see the page.

3. Reward People Who Refer Business to You. While most people are happy to refer you to others, some people respond to a gentle incentive that’s good for them. It might be 5% off their next purchase or project, a gift certificate to a favorite restaurant, or a set of free movie tickets.

Mar 21, 2005

Website Mistake #1: No Way to Contact Your Company

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No Way to Contact Your Company? The first mistake to avoid is one we see all the time: There’s no way to contact a company from their website. Did you know that one of the top reasons your current customers visit your website is to get contact information, like a phone number?

I’m sure you’ve had the same experience. You want to contact a company, so you go to their website and poke around. After a few minutes of not being able to find a way to call a real person, send an email or fill out a web form, you give up, never to work with the company again. Many companies try to hide from their customers, and make it really tough to find a way to contact them.

This usually comes from companies trying to avoid the high cost of having someone answer the phone or respond to emails. They usually hide behind a philosophy that everything you might need can be found on their website. But in the real world, websites are difficult to navigate, and often you want to talk to a real person to answer your question. Or at least fill out a contact form. We recommend putting your phone number in at least two places on every page. On our site, for example, our phone number is built into the navigation:

Customer Paradigm Website screenshot showing phone number

Mar 21, 2005

Top Ten eCommerce Tips for Your Website #10: Tribute To Carol Susan Roth

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It’s with a heavy heart this week that we at Customer Paradigm mourn the passing of a wonderful client, Carol Susan Roth. After a long battle with brain cancer, she passed away earlier this week. She was my wife’s literary agent and mentor – getting her a book deal for her 2008 book, God in the Wilderness with top publishing house Doubleday.

Carol and I worked together on many projects, too, including her website and marketing, PR and websites for many of her clients, too. She was listed as one of the top 25 Literary Agents in the country by Writer’s Digest, and helped bring the Dalai Lama’s message to the United States. We’ve set up a message board for friends and colleagues to leave messages for her family on her website – AuthorsBest.com

Carol Susan Roth – you’ll be missed! Jeff

Mar 21, 2005

Top Ten eCommerce Tips for Your Website #9: Unique Selling Proposition

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 As a follow-up to tip #1, How Fast Does Your Site Load? we recently upgraded the DiscountDecorating.com site to a newer and faster server. (The older server couldn’t handle the 575,000 pages per day of traffic and was slowing down the browsing process.) The result? 40% increase in orders — just because the site loads faster.

eCommerce Tip #9: Unique Selling Proposition

Customers Are In Control. Photo of Capitol Peak by Jeff FinkelsteinWhy Buy With You (vs. Another Site)? Customers are in control. With the Web, it’s easy to go elsewhere with a few clicks of a mouse. In the pre-Web days, geography dictated customer choice. If you were in the Denver, Colorado region, for example, you were limited by the retail stores in your area. Or, perhaps there was a catalog you could order out of. But with the Web, a company is now competing globally. In order to compete effectively, you need to have a Unique Selling Proposition. Unique Selling Proposition What makes your site different than another? Here’s a short list I’ve compiled over the years: Unique Selling Proposition

Lowest Price. Everyone wants the lowest price. Especially in difficult economic times. Yet it’s best to not solely compete on just the lowest price. Many consumers are happy to pay just a little bit more if you have a trustworthy website, and make it easy to purchase.

Greatest Selection of Products. The DiscountDecorating.com site, for example, has over 30,000 products on their site. Their top selling product accounts for less than 1% of their total revenue. They are thriving because they offer a tremendous selection of products — none of which are top sellers.

Free Shipping. The reason we like to go to retail stores? We don’t have to pay for shipping. Instead we have to pay for gas, time to drive through traffic, and parking. If your product doesn’t weigh that much, free shipping may be a great way to convince people Upgraded / Expedited Shipping. Offer to expedite someone’s order and place them at the start of the line – people will often pay slightly extra for this. Unique Selling Proposition

Ship Products Quickly. Nobody likes when they place an order and it takes the company two weeks to process it. People will often pay slightly more if you are able to guarantee that orders placed before 2:00 pm will ship that same day, for example.

Quick Checkout. We covered this in detail in tip #2 – How Easy Is Your Checkout Process. Keep in mind that most people don’t want to create an account or take 15 minutes to go through your order. Keep it quick.

Coupons. I just placed an order at a store because I had a $5.00 off coupon. The total order was $299, but for $5.00 off I went with one company over another.

Best Customer Service. In an age where a lot of companies want to hide, including your phone number on every page will help reinforce the notion that you care about them. United Airlines, for example, makes it really difficult to find their phone number — I tested it recently and it took more than seven clicks to find a phone number.

Great Return Policy. What happens if the product doesn’t work? A great return policy may be the tipping point for someone to purchase with your company vs. another.

Comprehensive Information About Products. When I want to buy something online, I like sites that help answer all my questions. Instead of wondering, “Will this product work with my system?” a site that has detailed information will alleviate the tension and allow someone to make an informed decision quickly. The more information you have about a product, the more you and your organization are perceived as experts in the field. The site that has the most amount of information about a product often wins. It’s perceived as more relevant to search engines (search engines love content).

Easy to Navigate Site. If you’re like me, you’ve left a site and gone to another one, because the navigation of the site was simply too confusing. If your site makes it easy for a customer to find what they’re looking for, that site will often do much better than one that’s not well designed.

Great Search Engine Optimization. The #1 search engine result gets about 42% of the clickthroughs. The #2 search result receives about 11% of the traffic. If your site is at the top of the search engines, you’re perceived as more relevant by your customers.

Autographed by the Author. If your site is selling books, you can often charge more (or make the sale) if you have books that are autographed by the author. There’s something tangible about having the author of a book sign it — it increases the perception of value. Authors are usually happy to sign books, especially if you pay for the shipping.

Blessed by a Priest or Rabbi. Okay, this is a pretty unusual unique selling proposition. But if you have a gift shop for your local congregation, having a spiritual leader bless the objects is a nice added touch that a big box retailer can’t compete with.

Summary: It’s tough to have an eCommerce website that hits all of these points. But make sure that you have at least one or two if you want your site to be competitive.

Mar 17, 2005

SEO Case Study Update: Publish Your Content As An eBook

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A quick update to last week’s Web marketing tip about publishing your book as an eBook. One of the books, 12 Strategies for Search Engine Optimization, is now available on Apple’s iTunes bookstore! This comes on the tail of Amazon’s big new press release that says Amazon is now selling 80% more eBooks than hardcover books. (LA Times Article). How did I get my free eBook into iTunes?

Acquisition Marketing Strategy:Update: Publish Your Content As An eBook

Last Week, I created two eBooks. This week, they are available to the more than 3 million iPad users through the Apple bookstore. The really good news: there are very few free business books, and people are hungry for content. After publishing it last week (see the previous issue if you missed the whole story), I opted-in to have the book published with Apple. And more than 250 people have downloaded it so far, too. Here’s how it looks when you open it up to a page in the iPad book reading app. I selected a page that has a couple of images embedded into the text:

eBook in iTunes

iTunes – Book Search If you open up the book store on your iPad, and search for “12 Strategies,” the book will appear:

Clicking on the book gives more information about it:

iPad - eBook review and description

Download the two books:

12 Top Strategies for Search Engine Optimization (SEO) (free eBook) 12 Critical Strategies for Effective email Communications (free eBook)

Book Reviews Help This book has now been reviewed by two people… and this helps quite a bit in the search results and perceived relevance of the book:

Review by: Robert A. Boyd on Jul. 13, 2010: Book Review - 5 Star Rating This article gave me a compact and concise outline of how search engines work, and how to take advantage of their features. It is clear that the author knows his stuff, and is willing to share it freely. As a Smashwords author concerned with promoting my own works, this is just the sort of thing I need. I strongly recommend it.

Review by: Jim Stock on Jul. 19, 2010: Book Review - 5 Star Rating Really Good Book with lots of Good information. Thanks.

Summary. People are hungry for free content. If you have something that’s interesting and relevant, an eBook might be a great way to get in front of more people in a permission-based way. I hope you found this case study helpful – please let me know if you’d like help with your online marketing or eBook Publishing.

Mar 17, 2005

SEO Case Study: Publish Your Content As An eBook

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Thanks to everyone who came to see me speak at last weekend’s WordCamp Boulder 2010 event. They packed the room (standing room only out in the halls) for my Search Engine Optimization talk about Word Press sites. The session was recorded on video, but it’s not yet uploaded to their site. I’ll send out a link when it’s ready. This week’s Web Marketing Tip focuses around eBooks. If you have interesting content, you may want to consider publishing in an eBook-friendly format to reach new customers for your business or organization.

Reading an eBook from an iPad

Rabbi Jamie Korngold, the Adventure Rabbi, reading a passage from her forthcoming book, God Envy: A Rabbi's Confession (Jewish Lights Publishing, 2011).

Acquisition Marketing Strategy:

Publish Your Content As An eBook

Free eBooks to reach new customers. I wanted a new, novel way to reach out to new customers. Every week I write an eLearning column like this one, and over time, I’ve amassed a significant amount of content. I know that not everyone has the time or desire to go to the www.CustomerParadigm.com website to read each article, and so I bundled two of the main topics into eBooks that people can download onto their eBook Reader. I have an iPad (as I’ve written about before), and it’s such an amazing way to interact with content. Especially with free content. I’ve tried out a number of free books, only to then buy titles from the same author in the iTunes store.

Reaching an elite audience.  At the beginning of 2010, there were 2.1 million US adults who owned electronic book readers. With more than 3 million iPads sold since then, the number has more than doubled in the first half of 2010. eBook owners (Kindle, iPad, eReader and more) are 87% more likely to have a household income of $100,000 or higher annually, and 111% more likely to have obtained a Bachelor’s or post-graduate degree.

The Strategy.In this case, the strategy was to combine the content for these two eLearning Series into two free and downloadable books:

The Process. Here’s the basic process:

  • Using a basic Word document, strip out virtually all formatting, including page numbers and other information. Paste in your content, and organize it using one basic font.
  • Create a book cover, using a 600 x 900 pixel sized graphic (vertical orientation).
  • Use software to convert the Word document into the following formats: ePub, TXT, PDF, RTF, MOBI, LRF.
  • Use an online publisher to submit the book to content providers.

Download Each Book:

  Title:
   12 Top Strategies for Search EngineOptimization (SEO)
   ISBN: 978-1-4523-5191-9
12 Top Strategies for Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Online Reading (HTML):
Kindle (.mobi):
ePub (iPad, open format):
PDF (home printing):
RTF (word processors):
LRF (Sony Readers):
PDB (Palm Devices):
Plain Text (no formatting):
Pain Text (view in Webpage)
  Title:
   12 Critical Strategies forEffective email Communications
   ISBN: 978-1-4523-9716-0
12 Critical Strategies for Effective email Communications
Online Reading (HTML):
Kindle (.mobi):
ePub (iPad, open format):
PDF (home printing):
RTF (word processors):
LRF (Sony Readers):
PDB (Palm Devices):
Plain Text (no formatting):
Pain Text (view in Webpage)
RTF (word processors)

Book Review. Review by: Robert A. Boyd on Jul. 13, 2010: Book Review - 5 Star Rating This article gave me a compact and concise outline of how search engines work, and how to take advantage of their features. It is clear that the author knows his stuff, and is willing to share it freely. As a Smashwords author concerned with promoting my own works, this is just the sort of thing I need. I strongly recommend it.

Instructions for iPad Users.These two books should be available through iBooks soon (Apple iTune’s Book Store). But until they are available, you can add them to your iPad easily:

  • Download the .ePub file by clicking on the link above.
  • Open iTunes
  • Click on Books on the left menu
  • Drag the .ePub file onto the books area
  • Synch your iPad — the eBook will now be ready to read on your iPad

Summary. A few days ago, I uploaded my first eBook, 12 Strategies for Effective Email.It’s now been downloaded 74 times, reaching a new audience of readers in a permission-based way. I hope you found this case study helpful – please let me know if you’d like help with your online marketing or eBook Publication.

Mar 17, 2005

Social Media Case Study: Facebook Places

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This past week, Facebook rolled out a new system called Places that lets your Facebook friends know where geographically you are located. What is it? How does it work? Should you sign up? What are the risks? And what does it mean for businesses who want to interact with users using geo-location technology?

Social Media Case Study: Facebook Places

The Next Big Thing? Or Are You Asking To Be Robbed. 

Facebook Places: Facebook spent several years watching other companies try to figure out how to make geolocation relevant. Companies like Foursquare or Gowalla allow users to “check in” at a coffee shop, restaurant or other business, and then receive rewards, including discounts or coupons. At the base level, the appeal (especially to younger people in their 20s and 30s) is that you can find where your friends are hanging out, and then congregate. How many times have you later found out that you were in the same place at the same time as a friend, but weren’t able to connect? It’s happened to me. So this winter, for example, I might be skiing at Copper Mountain, and I might want to see if any of my skiing buddies are anywhere near me on the mountain. My phone, using a GPS chip, can know my location, and can broadcast it out to other people (presumably with permission).

Here’s Why Facebook Places Is Cool: I don’t have to ski alone. I can connect with friends who are there, but I just didn’t know that they were close by.

Here’s Why Facebook Places Is NOT So Cool: It really wouldn’t look good if I was trying to play hookey from work when my location is broadcast out to everyone. More importantly if permission settings aren’t set properly, it could let people know I’m not at my house in Boulder, and they could then break in. (Note: I have an alarm, and a watchful neighbor who owns a lot of guns).

Requirements: In order to use the system, you’ll need to either have an iPhone with the latest version of the Facebook application, or you can access it via your mobile browser. Your mobile device must support HTML 5 and geo-location in order to work. My Blackberry doesn’t support this (it’s an older one), but the iPad works really well.

Testing Out Facebook Places: I tested out Facebook places on my iPad, and was able to “Check In” at my office. I went to touch.facebook.com, and choose the office so that I didn’t have to worry about privacy:

 

Facebook Places - iPad Checkin

When I clicked on the “Check In” Button, the application asked for my location (which I approved) and this is what showed up on my Facebook profile in the browser:

Facebook Posting for Facebook Places

Clicking on the “Customer Paradigm” location brings me to a page, where I can see a map, a description of the company and other information:

Facebook Map Location Layout

(Nobody else has checked in here yet.)

Industry Statistics: Facebook has 500 million users, while Foursquare checks in at around 2 million people. So geolocation is still new to people, and the verdict is still out as to whether or not people will want to broadcast their location to their friends, businesses and the world. When you dial 911, there’s an expectation that in exchange for rapid response by police, fire and medical personnel, your physical location is broadcast immediately. As a former EMT, minutes matter when it comes to medical situations, so finding a person quickly is paramount. I’ve written about the privacy implications for this in the past, “Your Cell Phone Tracks Your Every Movement.” The difference is that instead of law enforcement and the phone company knowing where you are at any given time, all of your “friends” now can have access to your location-based information, too.

Privacy Settings: If you’re planning on using the Facebook Places system, make sure that your privacy settings in Facebook are set to how you would like them to appear for your friends, friends of friends, or everyone. My Facebook settings are set so that only my bio and favorite quotations are shown to everyone. Places I check in to are set for Friends Only.

Facebook recommends these settings, however, where everyone is able to see my status, photos and posts:

If you click on “Customize Settings,” you can set Places to show where I am to only Friends, Friends of Friends, Specific People, or hide them from others:

One thing to keep in mind is that even if you have set some of your settings to Friends only, by default, your friends can also check you into places. I’ve disabled this… mostly because I have a few friends (no offense, but you know who you are) who might think it’s funny to check me into a place that might not be 100% professional as a “joke.”

Implications for Businesses: I’ve been an advocate for geo-location targeting in the past. If someone from France visits your website, for example, it’s easy to check this from their IP address, and then deliver content to them in their language. This is a nice touch, and is often welcomed by users who are surprised and delighted that you’re going the extra mile. However, businesses will need to avoid the creepiness factor of “spooking” people by “stalking them” as they visit or check into a retail location. Right now, Facebook has not yet opened up this data to businesses for marketing to individuals, but have reserved the right to do so in the future. Register

Your Location: Make sure that you register your location before someone else does. It’s easy to do, but requires that you’re a Facebook user to do this easily.

Facebook Places - register your location

You’ll need an EIN # or Federal Tax ID, as well as official documentation proving that you’re a real business or organization.

Summary: The word is still out, but look for Facebook Places to grab a lot of attention in the coming months. I hope you found this case study helpful – please let me know what you think of Facebook Places or any interesting features you’ve discovered.

For more Social Media Blogs >> Read Here

Mar 17, 2005

PPC Case Study: Lead Generation For Direct Oil Investment

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Thanks for all of the positive feedback last week about the Brooklyn Autism Center’s fundraising case study. I heard from so many people who forwarded it along to their friends at non-profit organizations. This week, with oil in the news, I want to focus on a different client — one that is looking to generate leads for investment in oil exploration. Sound like a tough sell? It’s counter-intuitive, but we’ve started to generate great results!

The Background:

Right now, with the BP Oil Spill disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, there’s intense interest in alternative energy, and preventing future disasters from happening. Like it or not, the world is addicted to fossil fuels. Here in Boulder, Colorado, about half of our office rides their bikes or walks to work each day. But I know it’s not realistic to ask everyone to give up their cars – the US economy and infrastructure is largely based on the car as personal transportation. At Customer Paradigm, we take environmental issues seriously, and have done a lot of work for Greenpeace and solar energy manufacturers, too. We’ve built sustainable development software planning tools for the Global Environmental Management Initiative (GEMI.org). We’ve also worked with BP, Shell and other energy companies to help them with marketing campaigns. But an interesting trend has also emerged. With the oil spill in the news, pricing for direct investment in oil exploration has fallen to low, low levels.

 

The Goal: Our client, Andy Leib, is an independent broker who helps bring investors and companies together. He wanted us to use search engine marketing to drive leads from Australia and UK. We’re also helping the company, wwXploration, drive US and Canadian leads, too.

 

Our Pitch / Idea: Jesse Schultz and I listened closely to Andy. We tried to understand what motivated the end user to want to invest directly in oil exploration (high returns, and tax benefits if it didn’t work).

 

The Strategy:Drive leads via geo-targeted Cost Per Click (CPC) advertisements on Google, Bing, Yahoo and Facebook. Traffic would be sent to a dedicated landing page on the wwXploration.com website, and code would be placed on the site to make sure that if a lead came in from overseas, special trackable phone numbers and contact forms would be displayed. Our goal was to create a compelling, trusted experience for site visitors.

How the Campaign Worked

Step 1: Build the Landing Page Before driving traffic via paid search engine advertising, we first needed a solid way to ‘catch’ them when they came to the site. Previous statistics for the wwXploration.com website showed that their conversion rate was dismally low. The conversion rate is calculated by how many people who visited the page and then filled out a contact form, or picked up and the phone and called the organization. One of the reasons their conversion rate was low in the past was because they merely sent everyone to the home page of their site, and “hoped” that people would fill out a form or pick up the phone:

CPC Home Page

(Sending leads directly to the home page of a site is known as the “Kiss of Death” in PPC Advertising.) Instead, we created a landing page that allowed people to find out more information in a concise way:

CPC Optimized Landing Page It tries to consolidate all the information that they need to know onto one short and simple page, and asks them to fill out a form for more information. And if the end user clicked through to other pages on their site, we used special tracking codes to insert the international phone numbers and contact forms that would go directly to Andy, for a quick response. Here’s the standard header on the website for US-based clients:

CPC Header with phone #

Here’s the trackable header on the website, with international phone numbers, that follows the end user around the site when they come in from a PPC campaign:

Likewise, the footer navigation at the bottom of each page changed if the user came in from overseas. Here’s the standard navigation with US-based phone numbers:

Here’s the footer if they came in from the /Invest/ landing page from overseas:

Step 2: Drive Leads Via PPC Advertising  Once the landing page was set up properly, the next step was to create pay per click campaigns in Google, Yahoo, Bing and Facebook. Pay Per Click, for those that aren’t familiar with it, works when your advertisement is listed on a search page (i.e. Google.com) when someone types in specific keywords. You don’t pay for advertising impressions… only when someone actually clicks on your advertisement. This is how Google generates the majority of their revenue. Here’s an example of a PPC Ad on Google:

CPC Advertising Sample

As I’ve written about before, it’s really easy to waste money doing pay per click marketing. For the campaign, we created specific ad groups to geographically-target the ads to people in Australia, the UK, New Zealand and other areas. We created literally thousands of permutations for keywords for advertising, so that if someone searched on a keyword, we could capture their click for the lowest cost possible. We also put in lots of negative keywords (so that the ads weren’t displayed when someone had the term “free” in the search. Contact Form: Main Call to Action The landing page featured a contact form, which invited a person to fill it out and learn more:

CPC Contact Form

As soon as it was filled out, the wwXploration team received an alert email letting them know they should contact the person right away:

CPC Email alert message after filling out contact form

Results

The second day the campaign ran, the client received four phone calls and three contact form submissions — way ahead of expectations. They’re thrilled with the initial results so far. Client Feedback: “The phone just keeps ringing with great leads! I’m really happy.” In summary a well designed landing page, with strong calls to action, combined with Pay Per Click Marketing generated strong leads within two days of activating the campaigns. I hope you found this case study helpful – let us know if we can help with PPC advertising campaigns for your organization. To have Customer Paradigm contact you about PPC Advertising Campaigns please fill out the contact form below or call us toll free at 888.772.0777 or 303.473.4400.

Mar 17, 2005

PPC Case Study: A Novel Use For Google Adwords

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by Over the weekend, I was thinking about a novel and quick way to use Google Adwords to help fill a spot for a local child care center (and avoid being stuck with a $450 bill).

Micro-Targeted CPC Campaign

A Novel Approach to Using Google Adwords: One of the things I really like about an advertising platform like Google Adwords is the ability to micro-target campaigns. In the past, if you had a very specific item you wanted to sell or promote, the only avenues were direct mail, print advertising or TV / radio. But those are expensive, mass-marketing tools. About a year ago, I was on the hook for a day care spot for our daughter. We had signed up with this amazing place in north Boulder, but then a spot at a place two minutes away opened up. Instead of driving 30 minutes each way (back and forth) for a total of 1 hour each day, we found something a lot closer. But I was stuck with a committment for $450 per month to the other place, unless they were able to fill the spot. There’s high demand for quality daycare in Boulder, as there is in many towns. But I didn’t want to wait an entire month and be stuck with the bill.

Local, Micro-Targeted Ad Campaign:

I leveraged the Google Adwords, and created a very basic campaign. Now I’ll be the first to admit that I have a bit of an advantage: I’ve been working with the Google Adwords system since it first came out in 2002, and the system is second nature to me. However, this is a more compelling, easier-to-apply example than the 750,000 keywords we manage for a site like DiscountDecorating.com. And the campaign’s goal was not to drive a lot of signups for the center. It was to drive a single signup. So the strategy was a bit different than a normal campaign.

Want help with your CPC Advertising or Lead Generation? We Can Help! Please call 303.499.9318 or 888.772.0777 to speak with a real person. Or click here to have a real person contact you now >>

 

1. Geo-Targeted to Boulder, Colorado: To get started, I first choose a geo-location target: 20 miles surrounding the 80304 zip code in Boulder, Colorado:

CPC Campaign Ad settings

2. Keyword Selection: Next, I selected broad keywords that would expand the reach.Here’s a list of some of the keywords I choose: preschool preschools preschool in Boulder preschool daycare child care service education preschool kids preschool preschool montessori day care Boulder day care Boulder CO preschool Boulder need preschool Here’s a graphical view of the keywords in the Google Adwords interface:

Keyword selection for CPC advertising

I created exact match, phrase match and broad match variations, with 85 keywords in total. Again, we do this quite a bit, so this is something I have a tool that can expand keywords quickly and easily.I also added in some of the common negative keywords (such as free) to prevent the ads from showing up when those keywords were displayed.

3. Wrote Ad Copy I created a couple of ads, based on previous experience of knowing what might work and put them in place with Google Adwords:

I like asking a question, as it’s engaging.I also like to include the phone number in the ad, too, as it allowed me to get more traffic, but not have to pay for a clickthrough through Google.

4. Set An Ad Budget & Let It Run I then set a budget of $20 per day for three days (what I was willing to spend), and then let the campaign run.

Campaign Results: From August 12 to August 15, the campaign had the following results.

Advertising Impressions:
3,707
Clickthrough Rate:
0.19%
Number of Clickthroughs:
7
Average Cost Per Clickthrough:
$0.20
Average Position of Ad:
3.8
Total Advertising Outlay:
$1.41

(Plus my time, of course. It took me about an hour to get this set up. And then probably an extra hour of time watching it.)Within three days, the center had received many phone calls, and the spot had filled (getting me off the hook). It was the best $1.41 I’ve spent in quite a while. And I helped someone find the spot that they needed. Summary:Even if you think Google Adwords won’t work for your overall sales budget, a micro-targeted campaign can often create significant impact. I hope you found this case study helpful – please let me know if you’d like help setting up a micro-targeted PPC campaign for your business.

 

To have Customer Paradigm contact you about Micro-Targeted PPC  Campaigns please fill out the contact form below or call us toll free at 888.772.0777 or 303.473.4400.

Jan 25, 2005

Cell records used to punch hole in suspect's story

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By Alex Dominguez The Associated Press Originally published December 17, 2004. Baltimore Sun

Whenever a cell phone is on, somebody somewhere can use it to track its owner’s movement. Investigators used that little understood fact about cell phones to punch holes in suspect Aaron Speed’s account of how he spent the morning of the fire that damaged dozens of homes at a pricey Charles County subdivision, court records show. And experts say it will be used increasingly in criminal and civil cases such as divorce where one’s whereabouts are at issue.

“They could say ‘OK, Mr. Brown your cell phone was in this hotel room at this time and date,’” said Jeff Finkelstein, president of Customer Paradigm, a Web development and privacy consulting firm in Boulder, Colo. “The information about where people are is going to be available and if the information is there, then often it’s possible to have it subpoenaed in a court of law.”In the Charles County arson case, investigators compared cell phone records to where Speed, the security guard charged in the case, said he was just before the fires started.

For example, Speed allegedly told investigators he was home in bed when a colleague phoned to tell him of the fires. But records obtained from his cell phone service showed the call went through a cell phone tower closer to the scene, court documents show. Whether we like it or not, cell phones track our movement when they are on, prompted by the need to let emergency crews know where to respond when they receive a 911 call from a cell phone, said Lara Flint, staff counsel for the Washington-based Center for Democracy and Technology, a nonprofit civil liberties organization.

“It’s very much an evolving issue and one where we are starting to focus on whether reforms are needed,” Flint said. “In this case, it sounds like it was justified, but we still need to have a clear set of guidelines on when that information needs to be obtained. “Whether or not investigators use the information, cell phone companies already have it.Alexa Kaufman, a spokeswoman for Cingular, said the cell phone company has a group that deals specifically with law enforcement subpoenas.

Cell phones have been used, for example, to track down a woman who was locked in a car trunk by a kidnapper, she said. Flint said most people don’t know it but many cell phones allow the GPS function to be set to work only when 911 is dialed. However, the phone call records of which towers were used will still be available. Flint said the same laws that govern wire taps and when it is appropriate to listen in on a phone call should be used for location information.

“That’s exactly the direction we need to head with location information, especially because this going to be more and more of an issue,” Flint said. “Car navigation systems have this ability, PDAs have it. We’re heading down a path where this will be a more ubiquitous part of our daily lives.”

Jan 25, 2005

Cell records used to punch hole in suspect’s story

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By Alex Dominguez The Associated Press Originally published December 17, 2004. Baltimore Sun

Whenever a cell phone is on, somebody somewhere can use it to track its owner’s movement. Investigators used that little understood fact about cell phones to punch holes in suspect Aaron Speed’s account of how he spent the morning of the fire that damaged dozens of homes at a pricey Charles County subdivision, court records show. And experts say it will be used increasingly in criminal and civil cases such as divorce where one’s whereabouts are at issue.

“They could say ‘OK, Mr. Brown your cell phone was in this hotel room at this time and date,’” said Jeff Finkelstein, president of Customer Paradigm, a Web development and privacy consulting firm in Boulder, Colo. “The information about where people are is going to be available and if the information is there, then often it’s possible to have it subpoenaed in a court of law.”In the Charles County arson case, investigators compared cell phone records to where Speed, the security guard charged in the case, said he was just before the fires started.

For example, Speed allegedly told investigators he was home in bed when a colleague phoned to tell him of the fires. But records obtained from his cell phone service showed the call went through a cell phone tower closer to the scene, court documents show. Whether we like it or not, cell phones track our movement when they are on, prompted by the need to let emergency crews know where to respond when they receive a 911 call from a cell phone, said Lara Flint, staff counsel for the Washington-based Center for Democracy and Technology, a nonprofit civil liberties organization.

“It’s very much an evolving issue and one where we are starting to focus on whether reforms are needed,” Flint said. “In this case, it sounds like it was justified, but we still need to have a clear set of guidelines on when that information needs to be obtained. “Whether or not investigators use the information, cell phone companies already have it.Alexa Kaufman, a spokeswoman for Cingular, said the cell phone company has a group that deals specifically with law enforcement subpoenas.

Cell phones have been used, for example, to track down a woman who was locked in a car trunk by a kidnapper, she said. Flint said most people don’t know it but many cell phones allow the GPS function to be set to work only when 911 is dialed. However, the phone call records of which towers were used will still be available. Flint said the same laws that govern wire taps and when it is appropriate to listen in on a phone call should be used for location information.

“That’s exactly the direction we need to head with location information, especially because this going to be more and more of an issue,” Flint said. “Car navigation systems have this ability, PDAs have it. We’re heading down a path where this will be a more ubiquitous part of our daily lives.”

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