Although I'm involved in it, and obviously not objective, I'll try to stay as descriptive as I can describing the company's business model and value proposition.
AdverStore.com has redesigned the process for creating online advertising creative campaigns, in order to make it more efficient, fast and inexpensive for micro and small companies. Advertisers and webmasters can even create free banners to try the service.
]]> Simply put, it is the path for individual, micro and small companies to access the same high quality professional advertising designs big companies do, at an inexpensive cost and through an extremely easy process.They select hundreds of different businesses from all industry sectors and then research and design different possible communication approaches for each specific business.
Then, through in-house and worldwide network of Professional Ad Designers
1. Design different creative campaigns for each communication approach
2. Develop different creative pieces in different ad formats (static, animated, flash, etc.) and sizes for each campaign and
3. Create templates ready to be easily customized by the clients
1. Choose her company's business
2. Choose the format and size of the ad she needs and browse the different creative proposals
3. Choose a template and easily customize it with her company's name/logo and copy or claims
4. Download it ready to use it immediately in her online campaigns
Everything has been designed to be extremely easy for non-expert advertisers, fast and inexpensive.
Then, in less than five minutes and less than $5 a small business marketer can have professional looking ads for her online campaigns.
I think this is an innovative approach that can start making an interesting change in the way online advertising creatives are designed and a good way for small companies to access professional design at affordable prices.
Internet advertising has found a completely new industry configuration, were traditional industry players don't play the main role anymore. Big advertisers, big publishers, big agencies and big media planning companies are loosing their control over this market. The main players of this new market are micro and small advertisers, micro and small advertising supports and the companies that supply with the technological platform for creating a market among them. We could say that everybody wins with this new configuration (except traditional players, of course) and that the market is more perfect, transparent and distributes the value in a fairly manner than before. I will analyze this revolution in more depth in the future, but for now I would say that this industry sector is already working on 21st century parameters.
However, other related markets have not made this revolution yet. Advertising design is one of them.
As stated, hundreds of thousands of advertisers around the world, small and big, are already used to planning and controlling their advertising campaigns in "self-managed" form and with a total immediateness (creating a campaign and have it online takes less than ten minutes) through systems like Google Adwords, Yahoo or Microsoft.
However, up to know now all this process has focused on text advertisements, since the elaboration of advertising creativities (gif, flash, advergames, videos, etc) is still being driven in the traditional way. Management of online campaigns has become simple and efficient, but the process of making and distributing creative pieces for that campaigns remains slow, inefficient and expensive.
For having i.e. an image ad to upload to her online campaigns, an advertiser still has to find and hire a professional designer or a creative agency, define a briefing for the communication approach with them, wait for their creative proposals, choose among them and finally tune the details. It is a slow process, expensive, with little variety of choice and inaccessible to the major part of micro and small companies that have started to advertise online. It is too expensive for them and they are not used to this process. It is a traditional process for the traditional advertisers: medium to large companies. But these will not be the big part of the business anymore. Additionally, it does not have the immediateness (tests can not be made and act immediately according to the results), the main advantage of Internet for marketers and advertisers.
Advertising design, as we know it, is becoming totally obsolete and there are starting to appear innovative business models in this industry that will change it radically. In further posts I will analyze some of them.
]]>That's the beginning of this strategy. Hire talented people for jobs where they have to switch their brains to an stand-by position.
2. Think that they will be motivated just by their salary
Everybody knows that smart and creative people just care about money. They don't care about challenging jobs, appealing projects or start-ups, having flexibility to develop their jobs or being part of an outstanding team.
3. Never explain them the companies overall strategy.
They need just to know what they have to do. After all, who needs to know the global strategy, besides the CEO and a few other?.
4. Don't be transparent.
Never show them the companies performance, the retribution policies and how much their colleagues are earning for the same job.
Avoid being you who explains company's changes or bad news. It is always better they know through rumors.
5. Never pay attention to their suggestions or ideas
Just tell them it is a great suggestion and you will think about it, and of course do nothing. Or better, tell them that it's not their job to think about how things have to be done, but doing what the have been told to do.
6. Enhance competitiveness among team members
It is the right path to get people engagement with the company and a great working environment that will retain the best employees.
7. Avoid they have any control or responsibility over the work they are doing
If she is a software engineer, just let her know about the code she is writing, not the overall project. If she's a content reviewer just let her know about the articles she has to review.
Don't set up medium term goals over which employees can plan their work and achieve their goals.
8. Never tell them how good they are
That's a terrible mistake. They could believe it and maybe ask for a better job, a salary increase, or worse, going to the competition (anyway that's what you are trying to do with this advise isn't it?)
9. Control them
Everybody knows that you cannot trust people and strict control is necessary. Set innovative rules as being at work at a certain hour, or not having the possibility to solve personnel issues while being at work, so they will increase their stress and obviously work better, etc.
10. Support yes-man and isolate people with a critical sense
That's the definitive one. Because as you are the smarter guy in the company you only need people to tell you how good you and your company are. Don't let those newcomers tell where and when your are going to crash.
There are a lot of other things you can do too, but for now just do these 10 and be sure you'll retain only those guys than can't find a better place to go. That is what you are trying to do, isn't it?.
Nevertheless, it seems this is starting to change a little bit, as in the last months, several so called Web 2.0 start-up companies have been posted to be auctioned on eBay.
Some of them, like Kiko, an online calendar that can be used in the web browser, had a successful result, as they sold for more than 250.000 $, an amount far higher than the reserve price. Other were not so lucky or they are in the middle of the auction process, as CrispAds.
Anyway, regardless of the specific results of these pioneers, what this trend shows is a need for a different way of cashing out some projects or companies. Maybe we will see very soon a site specialized in start-up auctions, a place where founders that want to sell their recently launched projects, whatever reason they have, can follow a more efficient process to do it.
It does not seem the best alternative for all kind of companies, but I am sure this is the beginning of a process that will lead us to new ways of carrying out acquisition processes. A more transparent, standardized and effective way for all the people participating in the deal. It's not new, it has already happened to other sectors that were inefficient and have been fully transformed.
And you, would you sell your company on eBay?
They are value centered companies and they make a lot of efforts to motivate and coach their employees and collaborators. They are transparent organizations, so they communicate their vision and strategy to those who have to implement it, regardless the degree of responsibility, and they disclose other aspects of the company's policies (as remuneration policy). The lack of such transparency is usually the source of a lot of problems (explicit or not) in companies with a more traditional culture.
They are companies that establish rewards and bonuses based in collaboration and team work, more than in individual basis, thus reinforcing cooperation and collaboration instead of internal competition among employees. Companies where management is focused in leading, coordinating and coaching, not controlling.
Summarizing, they are companies that have defined an developed an innovative organizational culture, that will allow them to be more competitive in a knowledge based economy that requires people talent.
]]>If yesterday we talked about human resources, today we talk about people and team management. If yesterday working was an obligation for everybody, today (and increasingly tomorrow) more people want to link their jobs with the passion for something they love to do. Yesterday jobs were for life and tomorrow we will participate in a lot of projects during our lives.
Competition between peers should become cooperation and collaboration. Presence in the workplace should be replaced by rewarding and analysing people performance through goal achievement. Control and supervision must be replaced by help and coaching to achieve those goals.
Traditional companies´opacity should become total transparency if they seek to attract talented people teams. And these people are not yes men/women anymore, we need them to to have a capacity to criticize, detect problems, think about better and different ways to solve problems and do things.
As people are not resources anymore but the main company's asset, we have to find out ways to imply them with the company's goals and vision. For that reason, we should give up talking about human resources management and talk about internal marketing. And the Chief internal Marketing Officer (or Chief People Officer) clients are the company's employees and collaborators, so she should attend their needs with the same perspective, for the company's better benefit.
I know that maybe you are thinking about what is happening right now in your company, and what I am saying may sound crazy. But that's the way. If people are not happy working for your company, they will not stay, as it used to be.
So if you are an entrepreneur or manager, you'd better think how work philosophy is changing and implement work innovation in your company to succeed in the future.
]]>The way we did things yesterday (the past) has nothing to do with the way we should do them today and tomorrow (the future), and we should be prepared for that.
Yesterday we were talking about huge company conglomerates, but today we talk about networks of companies. Yesterday we talked about company hierarchy, while today we have to talk about people networks. Yesterday we called them suppliers and distributors, but today we'd better call and consider them our value network. Yesterday we talked about stability and slow bureaucracy, today we are talking about everyday change and alliances. Yesterday was the time for centralized control, but today is time for decentralization and delegation.
Yesterday we talked about self-centered and product-centered organisations, while today we talk about absolutely client-centered organisations. Yesterday, humans did jobs that machines can do perfectly well, but today we must talk about avoiding any single process that does not contribute with a real value for the client. Yesterday we talked about "real" organisations, meaning by that sharing the same physical space, but today we should talk about virtual organisations.
It is pretty obvious that companies and organisations of the future (for the leading ones is already the present) will have nothing to do with the organisations in the industrial economy and the way of managing and organising people has to be radically different. People with capacity to lead competitive companies in a global information economy require other type of organisations. Are you driving that organisational change in your company or organisation?.
]]>If we look at Wired magazine's criteria to choose their list of more wired companies we find four priorities of the "wired" companies:
1.- Strategic vision
2.- Global reach
3.- Killer technology
4.- Hunger for new ideas and impatience to put them in practice
I would add two more:
5.- An organisation culture absolutely oriented to innovation (in connection with #4) and to constantly find new and better ways to do things.
6.- A goal that goes beyond "creating value for our shareholders" and centers the company in an innovative manner of making life easier and happier to people.
Of course these criteria are being applied to already consolidated companies, but I think are also applicable to new start-up companies, that in my opinion should have, at least in mind:
1.- An elevated goal or mission that makes the world a better place ("let people better access to information", "everybody can fly", "everybody can access to knowledge" or "allow micro companies access to easy technology") and drives the organisation development, making it attractive to people to collaborate with.
2.- An strategic vision that develops the mission in an absolutely different an innovative manner for providing value to users or clients
3.- A global approach just from the beginning, and a well settled strategy to support that global reach. And, of course a value proposition from which a global growth capacity can be expected
4.- A killer technology platform that, again, supports that global reach and make things absolutely easy for everybody using it. Note that I think the most important is the platform, not the technology itself.
5.- The commitment to built an organisational culture that enhances hunger for new ideas, innovation and new ways of doing things. And that stands the dark side of doing so: mistakes and failures.
6.- The capacity of constantly rethinking the organisation and the business model
And finally, I would say to find venture capitalists that understand those priorities from the beginning, which probably will be the most difficult one to achieve for new companies.
]]>It is more important to build teams of people that achieve the goals according to the company's entrepreneurial vision. It is necessary to create organizations where everybody (with outstanding talent or not) can develop their best personal capabilities and that these capacities are addressed to achieve the corporate goals and mission. The company efforts must be addressed to design an organisational system that generates and uses talent from everyone in the company.
Trying to get the best from our people through corporate team building policies, establishing a concrete corporate culture and values, making our company a place where people want to work because it is a good place to stay and develop their capacities, is the best way to compete in the knowledge economy. That will keep us out of the obligation to constantly seek for the "prima donnas" and entering in the retribution auctions.
We have to take into account that, nowadays, the real talented and creative people, like to work or engage themselves in projects where they can develop their capacities, they can be implicated in the organizational goals and vision, and where they are treated with respect and dignity. Definitively, they want to be happy doing their jobs. And we have to build organizations where they can find that.
]]>The same reflection can be done about the cost of supporting a high traffic volume in a website. This was also an important part of the cost of starting web business and maintaining it. Nevertheless, the huge competition among Internet services providers (ISP) and the constant drop in data transfer costs make again that maintaining a high traffic volume site at this moment costs a fraction of what it was some years ago.
Definitively, all this elements configure an scenario where the barriers to start web business have considerably diminished.
]]>Surprisingly, among other subjects that would allow me to obtain the best from my employees, it offered solutions to solve problems as “workers abuse in requesting many permissions” or to end “the abuse of Internet and the email in my company (employees waste hours and hours using the computer for particular aims)”.
So, thank you very much for the information, but with this industrial economy approach, where people were not so important and really treated as "human resources", neither I will obtain the best from my employees and collaborators nor, surely, I will succeed as an entrepreneur in the knowledge economy.
If the entrepreneur's job must be to control if her collaborators surf or not the Internet for personal purposes, or if they stay one hour more or less in the office (not working, that it's not the same), that means she is not doing what she should: establishing a vision, defining concrete objectives for each one of her collaborators, giving them tools and motivating and implying them in the achievement of those goals.
And if after achieving the objectives they can solve some particular subject surfing the Internet or take some morning off, well, better for them. They will be happier in our company and more motivated. People are not human resources anymore, at least for companies that want to succeed in the global knowledge economy, where success depends on creative thinking, innovation and new ways of doing things.
Innovation is not only to invent a new technology or a new product. Innovation must be in every single part of our company. And obviously organization and people management is a crucial one.
]]>Therefore, a source of innovation in the business concept can come from a radical rethinking of the traditional business process management for an specific company or for a whole business industry sector. We are not talking about reengineering in order to simply trying to optimize processes, but to deeply rethink the way how things are done.
An example of rethinking business process management in our company would be asking ourselves if a lot of the processes that rely on the company's staff could be done by the clients themselves, with greater value for them and for the company.
If rethinking what we are doing is a superb source of innovation, rethinking how we are doing it, it's an excellent one too. We have the experience of Dell that totally changed the manufacturing and distribution processes of PC industry. Or the experience of companies as Vistaprint which is doing the same in the printing industry.
Surely, we can rethink our company's business process management in a different manner in order to obtain a competitive advantage. We should do it before our competitors or an outsider if we want to stay in the market.
]]>We are getting to the point that most of the population use Internet in some way, whereas five years ago the network was a strange thing for the great majority, and for an important number of those already connected, it was just the beginning of their experience with the Net.
Another important fact to analyze to find differences between 2000 and 2006 is the type of Internet connection. If five or six years ago most were low speed connections, currently an increasing portion of people have access to broadband connections, through cable or DSL lines. This is important, because these kind of connections allow to support functionalities that were impossible with slow connections, as rich Internet applications, video, etc.
All these factors are the reason why some business ideas that years ago seemed the result of foolish visionaries, and that underestimated the timing in which the described evolution would take place, now make sense as the maturation of the potential market is already taking place.
]]>Just one example: according to the figures of Google's third quarter 2005 report, their advertising revenues for that period were 1.559 million USD, 99% of total Google revenues for that quarter. And this is only the beginning.
Microsoft and Amazon have already seen the potential of this market and they are already completing its own contextual advertising systems to eat a piece of the enormous pie that will suppose this industry in the next years. In fact, Microsoft launched its Microsoft Ad Center last month and it's for sure that will be a tough competitor to Google and Overture.
There is no doubt that the huge competition that will take place in this industry is good news, as much for the advertisers as for web site publishers. For advertisers, mainly smallest ones, it is the opportunity to develop Internet campaigns at affordable budgets. For publishers, the opportunity, finally, to make their advertising-based Internet business models profitable.
]]>On the other hand, in the last edition of Wired magazine, it is analyzed what already begins to be denominated as a new boom of Internet companies, at least in the USA. An example of what I am saying is that the mergers and acqusitions market related to Internet companies is starting to grow again. Nevertheless, without entering into the exaggerated valuations that were used just before the bubble explosion.
Another data to consider is that 1999-2000 business plans are being recycled an used again. Business plans that were never developed, or that failed at that time because the market was not prepared yet or because a bad execution.
Probably the models were good, but they went ahead to its times or they were executed with the prevailing irrationality at those moments. But, what has changed five years later? Several possible reasons arise to explain why ideas that failed years ago could be a success in the future. I will analyze them in the next articles
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