I recently completed a short interview for Sales website, Salestarget.co.uk, which you can read here (note that I’ve been photographed in Starbucks – those that know me won’t be surprised).

You forget just how much you’ve done sometimes, the experiences you’ve had, the tips and tricks you’ve picked up, people that have passed through the business, how it all started.

Starting out, twenty odd years ago, selling was a different game.  For me, it was a Vauxhall Cavalier, a bag of 10ps, a wallet with the business cards of all my key customers in and a lot of miles listening to the radio.  Relationships really mattered and much more was done by phone and visits, than e-mails and long arm support.

I’ve previously blogged about something I call “Real-actionships” which is how business still does ultimately rely on relationships, human to human contact.  Social media channels allow you to stay front of mind more, no doubt about that, but to win business, relationships still matter.  See this blogpost about Social2facial too.

Linkedin have just launched a new tool called visualiser.  It takes your network connections then cleverly groups your connections visually, based upon connections that you have in common.

From the clusters that get generated, you can quickly understand the myriad of connections that exist between your contacts, whilst also getting a graphic visualisation of the types of people you are connecting with.

For example, this is my map.  In the blue area, I can identify these relationships as being people I know in the Manchester/NW area.  Orange is connections from the office equipment industry, green is industry connections in the I.T. space and pink staff or colleagues.  The larger the node, the more contacts that individual has.

By clicking on any one of the nodes, you get a quick profile of the individual aswell as a quick visualisation of all the people that you are both connected to.  It’s a great way of quickly establishing who you have in common, across industries or regions.

Infographics are becoming de rigeur in helping us process information in today’s time strapped, data driven world.  I think this is a pretty cool new tool that will help you take stock of your network at a macro level. The more you play with it, the more it makes sense.

Personally, I limit my Linkedin connections to people that I have met or know in person, otherwise it becomes a bit of a zero sum game, thousands of people you don’t know.  Quality over quantity any day for me.

Coming up with new ideas normally takes the route of sitting with a stack of post-its and trying to fire out as many thoughts as you possibly can.  However, there are a large number of methods/frameworks to assist you and perhaps give you some added stimulation when trying to come up with something new.

Lateral thinking gives you some additional avenues to be creative.  We used some of these on an internal workshop yesterday, let me share three of them with you.

1.  Random object. Pick a random object and then describe how that object is going to help you solve your problem. The fact that it is a random object gets the creative juices flowing.

2.  Breaking the Rules? How would your problem/challenge/opportunity come to life if there were no rules, organisationally or otherwise.  It stops people thinking about what is achievable based upon the business/world works today.

3. How would someone else tackle it? I’ve previously written posts about this, relating to Richard Branson and Michael O’ Leary.  It always delivers great results.

Many of these techniques can be easily learned.  I’ve attended some great workshops with innovation and lateral thinking expert Paul Sloane who has written books on the subject.  Great guy to follow on Twitter, always posting interesting and stimulating stuff.  Main thing is, sometimes brainstorms aren’t good enough on their own and you need an extra little bit of something to sieve out the gold.

Mobile marketing.  Mobile search.  Mobile me.

The next decade will be the decade we remember for it’s advance in mobile technology.  Signalling the shift to location based shopping, services and convenience.  Apps are coming out by their droves and one that caught my eye recently was this one from Red Laser which I think gives an indication of where it’s all heading.  Using an i-Phone, you simply scan a products barcode, the app then identifies it and presents the current web pricing for that product from it’s database.  Instant price checking and hugely convenient.  Just one thing to do, scan the app.

From the user feedback so far, it seems the pricing isn’t perfect in their back end database, that can soon be corrected.  It’s the process that interests me more. Another shift in the way people shop, instant comparison pricing and perhaps a decision to not “buy it now” but buy it when you get home, if the price is significantly different.  Retailers watch out.

Mobile search is where it’s going to be at, presenting your website in a mobile friendly way.  Manchester Search specialists theEword have already cottoned onto this and have a tool in development which will effectively convert your site into a mobile friendly version, which I consider to be an essential step for all businesses moving forward.  Pay per click and search engine marketing also takes on a new persona, with specific activity needing to be done in parallel to your conventional SEM.

What’s evident is that the future is about mobile, the customer journey, convenience, location based marketing and immediacy.  If you’re not working on “mobilising” your digital resources, you should be, it’s where it’s all heading.

Speaking to a Treasury Select Committee on Monday,  Barclays CEO – Bob Diamond remarked “The big banks need to stop apologising for mistakes which led to the global financial crisis.”  I’m sure the two thousand or so workers from Manchester City Council who have today learned that they are to lose their jobs, totally agree.  “They’ve said sorry, so why should we be bitter?”  That makes it alright, an apology.   Not! Perhaps Mr Diamond might treat them all to a small drink up with his reputed £8M bonus that he is set to receive this year.

In a way, the people I don’t feel need to apologise for the banks behaviour are the thousands of bank workers in branches, customer support centres and campuses across the UK.  They are having to be the front end to the bitterness that many will foster for a long time, particularly those affected by job losses.  It’s the City boys where the blame firmly lies, many of them still sitting on the millions they made selling toxic debt to each other in the merry go round of hysteria.  Anyway, not planing to rant, wanted to quickly talk about the idea of the “jobless economy.”

With the public sector reducing headcount, clearly the private sector needs to grow to boost the economy.   Many businesses, having laid people off or re-organised, may well be reluctant to take new headcount on in the short term, opting to do more with less, in case there are any more – ahem – surprises.  2011 will be the year, where nervousness will exist in all areas of the economy.  Macro level forecasts take time to kick in.  So, whilst the public sector and related private sector companies with high public sector dependency make short term cuts, the private sector will be looking for new business, whether that be export or home market.

This transformation of growing new business in new markets won’t happen overnight.  New strategies need to be implemented, sales cycles need to be gone through, prosepcting, meetings, proposals, further meetings etc.  So, 2011 may well be a time where business does more with less.  Sweating assets (human and other) will be where it’s at, so whilst the economy may grow slowly, the number of jobs may not follow in the usual cycle.  Hence, we may well remember 2011 as the year of the jobless economy.  Let’s hope not.

“Yuh, I’ll have venti, skinny, de-caff, wet, latte to go please.”  Sound familiar?  The social media channels were awash with buzz about the re-design of the Starbucks logo today, customers old and new debating the why’s and wherefore’s of Starbucks dropping the Starbucks name from their logo and the word “coffee”.  Do you like it?

Clearly, something is going on behind the scenes.  In the UK, Costa coffee have really challenged them on the High Street and other chains such as Coffee Republic and Nero are all chipping away at their market share.  Their response has been to upgrade the stores, with a new look, more focus on space and being a destination. 

However, the logo re-design is a global initiative, so it’s obvious that there is a bigger plan brewing (working a nice coffee related metaphor into the post).  My guess is that they want to move away from being singly associated with coffee.  Starbucks = Coffee in anyones language same as Google = search.   Dropping the word coffee could lead them to re-position stores to serve alcohol and other related foodstuffs, expanding their footprint and share of wallet.

With one eye on the bigger picture, new markets is where it’s at moving forward, the mermaid image representing being the key logo/brand mechanic across cultures/languages – brave move.  There’s certainly been an outpouring of feedback, positive and negative, from experts and armchair commentators. 

I talked a lot about “glocalisation” in 2010, the rejection of global chains as consumers look for more authenticity in their lives, searching out better quality or localised suppliers in favour of the big brands.  Starbucks have had a brilliant decade behind them, whether some new look shops and a new logo will be enough to address this? We’ll see.  What’s obvious is, they may not be able to continue their rate of growth without a new strategy, new markets and some new products (breadth and depth).

Starbucks also need to continue to expand their “perkonomic” activity, such as free wireless, to continue to add further “perks” to justify the price of a cup of hot milk with a coffee shot in.  Still, one thing you can say, we’re all talking about them, so phase one of their comms plan must be in the bag.  Cheers!!

If they’d paid me a quarter of a million in brand consultancy, I’d of said “remove the word coffee and don’t mess with anything else.”  Job done – award won.  Otherwise, what are they?  The brand formerly known as Starbucks?

Ah, little Johnny riding his bike without stabilisers, quick grab the camera!  A familiar tale to many a parent.  The funny bit is when the Johnny sees you with the camera, looks at you awaiting approval, loses his balance and falls off!! 

The metaphor works for business too.  If you spend too much time looking at what’s closest to you, rather than what’s down the road, it’s easy to fall of your methaphorical bike too.  Short term distractions are exactly that, distractions, and shouldn’t demand too much of your time. 

It can be the same with competitor gazing.  If you spend too much time trying to beat them using their methods, all you’ll become is a cheaper version of them, rather than a business with a more unique proposition.  Spending all of your time trying to grab the camera time with a customer, salami slicing your pricing and margins until they are wafer thin.

So, as you think ahead for 2011 consider how to keep your eyes focussed on the road ahead and avoiding the distractions, which consume time, profit and energy.