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Agency Pricing: Who Really Won?

Wednesday, September 7th, 2011

If you read ebooks, you probably know about Agency pricing. It was the deal cooked up between the Big 6 publishers and Apple to set the price of ebooks. A class action suit is being filed to challenge the deal as price fixing, and I hope agency pricing is overturned.

But in the meantime, it’s the reality in the ebook world. Apple and the publishers banded together to put the brakes on the growth of Amazon in the ebook world. Agency pricing was supposed to make Apple’s iBookstore competitive with the idea that people would buy iPads and buy books from the iBookstore.

It didn’t quite work out as intended, and there’s a lesson in here for the entrepreneur. Yes, Amazon’s ebook growth was slowed, so that part worked. But the iBookstore has never taken off. The real winner in Agency pricing has been

Barnes and Noble

Wait a minute? Barnes and Noble weren’t even involved in Agency pricing, at least not directly. True, but they had just recently entered the ebook fray with the original Nook, and they had been struggling. Their selection had been much smaller than Amazon’s, and their prices had tended to be higher. If you wanted to buy a e-reader, the Kindle was the obvious choice, for lots of reasons.

Along came Agency pricing, and Amazon could no longer undercut everyone on price. That allowed Barnes and Noble to invest R&D money in their Nook line. Last year they released the Nook Color. By some reports, it’s the best selling tablet device after the iPad. And in the middle of this year, they released the Nook Simple Touch, which rated higher than the Kindle in Consumer Reports ratings.

What’s the lesson here? As I see it, there are two.

1. If you are on top, it’s easy to be lazy

The Kindle was truly a revolutionary device. It combined some very sweet features in one package
a. E-ink screen
b. Fantastic e-book store
c. First-rate customer service
d. Comfortable form factor
e. Wireless, “buy anywhere” ability

Unless Amazon has something amazing in their back pocket this holiday season, the current generation of Kindle isn’t that exciting. Touch screens seem to be the wave of the future, and several competitors already have touch screen readers, at competitive prices, on sale. Come on, Amazon. Show us what you are made of.

2. The little guy can win when the behemoths battle

Barnes and Noble made some good moves. They let the big guys battle it out, and they quietly invested in some nice tech. Since they didn’t have to compete on price, they had an opportunity, and they took advantage of it. Borders could have done the same, but they didn’t and look what happened to them.

Keep these lessons in mind in your own business. Don’t get lazy when you are on top, and look for opportunities when you are in second or third place. In business, you only stay on top when you are constantly innovating. Start reacting to your competition, and it may be the beginning of the end.

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Succession Planning For a Business

Wednesday, August 31st, 2011

Everyone’s been abuzz about Steve Jobs retiring as head of Apple. And everyone’s been trying to figure out what it means for the company. I’m optimistic. Why? Because I believe that Jobs is a savvy business man who has been working on his succession plan for some time.

Okay, Apple’s a big company. Sure, they need succession planning. But what about the small business owner? Well, you need it too. Even if you are a solo entrepreneur, you need to think about what happens when you are no longer able or willing to run your business.

Take me as an example. I’m a coach. If I can’t coach people, my business doesn’t exist. But that doesn’t mean that 1 to 1 Discovery dies or goes away. I’m busy writing, with one book coming out in the fall. That book will live on and can continue to influence people long after I’m not coaching. (Not that I’m planning on quitting anytime soon.)

What about your business? Do you have people you can train? Does it make sense to bring on a partner? How about a family member to continue the business?

Who should you talk to about succession planning? There are a lot of resources. A good business coach is one (like me!). You can talk to your CPA or a business broker. Perhaps a small business attorney. Or a consultant at a small business development center. There are lots of places to turn.

You’ve worked hard to build your business, even if it’s a one person shop. It would be a real shame to let it just end if you can’t or won’t continue.

Any of you want to share your succession plans? Or need the name of a good resource to discuss your plans with? Share in the comments.

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Persuasive Communication

Monday, August 29th, 2011

I received an email from a gentleman last week who had read my blog and wanted some suggestions on effective communication at work. He referred to “fancy” language as being what was listened to where his “direct” language was ignored.

I suggested a couple of books, not on communication, but on relationship building and persuasive language. Why?

Very often, where we get into trouble with communication is where we want one thing and the person we are communicating with wants something else. It can be as simple as “Honey, did you take out the trash?” to a husband who is in the middle of a football game to “We need to talk about your performance” to an employee who is about to be fired.

Either of the situations could lead to conflict, but they don’t have to. It’s all in how you communicate.

For example, take the first example. I’ve gotten into tons of trouble with this one. When I say, “Did you take out the trash?” what my husband hears is “Why didn’t you take out the trash?” It’s not what I meant, but he gets defensive because he thinks that’s what I’m really asking.

What I’ve learned to do may sound silly and artificial, but it works. I preface my question with a statement that makes it clear I’m just looking for information, not accusing or being nagging.

It doesn’t take fancy language, but he knows exactly what I’m asking for, and he doesn’t get defensive.

When communicating, always remember that each person has something to gain, or to lose. If you can keep that in mind and try to find “win-win” solutions, you’ll be more effective.

Look for more posts along this line in the coming weeks where I take some common communication problems and discuss how they can be handled effectively.

Are you having a particular communication challenge? Post it in the comments, and I’ll address it in a future blog post.

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Who Watches the Gatekeepers?

Friday, August 26th, 2011

Salespeople hate gatekeepers, and for good reason. The gatekeeper is there to keep the (seemingly) endless stream of salespeople from wasting the time of the business owners and other decision makers.Which makes it much harder for the salesperson to get in and do his job.

But what if the gatekeepers do their jobs too well and keep away the people who can help move your business forward?

I was meeting with a contact the other day, and she told me an interesting story about a salesperson and a gatekeeper. The salesperson was introducing himself to the gatekeeper who said, “No, we have no interest in what you are selling.”

The business owner happened through the room at that moment and stopped to say, “Actually, dealing with that problem is on my list for today. I’d like to hear what you have to say.”

This could have been trouble. The salesperson would have lost the opportunity to present his service to a willing audience, and the business owner might have missed an opportunity to address an issue in her business.

Now, as a business owner, obviously you don’t want to talk to every salesperson who walks in the door, so your gatekeeper does serve an important function. How do you ensure that you meet the people who might be able to help you and avoid the people who can’t?

Communication. Keep your gatekeeper in the loop on some of the high level challenges you are facing. No, you don’t have to mention that payroll might be tight this month, but if you’re swearing at your long distance service, make sure your gatekeeper knows that.

Perhaps you could give him or her a list at the beginning of each month of services you are interested in exploring. Train your gatekeeper to ask a few key questions to learn a bit about a salesperson and what is being offered.

Want to really motivate them to do a good job? If you save money by hiring someone the gatekeeper vetted, give your gatekeeper a bonus, perhaps a percentage of the money you saved. Think your gatekeeper will do a good job keeping out the riff raff and letting the good ones through? I think so!

Anyone else have good gatekeeper stories to share?

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How Apple Forced Me To Buy A Nook Color

Wednesday, July 27th, 2011

This post is about how loyalties can change and actions can have unintended consequences.

Until a few months ago, I did all my reading on my iPhone. I had a ton of e-reader apps: Kobo, Nook, Kindle, Stanza, iBooks and Overdrive for library books. Yes, it was a pain to keep track of what books I had in which app, but I liked the freedom to get books from anywhere.

Most of my e-book money went to Amazon because they had the best selection and usually the best prices.

Then the Sony app was rejected by Apple, who decided to finally enforce their in-app purchase rules. Everyone said the sky was falling and that there would be no e-reader apps in the App Store, and on top of that, Hulu, Netflix, Dropbox and other, similar apps were probably going to vanish as well.

Did I believe the sky was falling? No, but all of a sudden, having a bunch of apps seemed to be a pain, and uncertainty made me uncomfortable enough to consider a change.

Before all this, I was likely to have entered the tablet world with an iPad. I already knew Apple and liked their products. It was kind of expensive, but I could have justified it.

Not any more! I wanted an option that didn’t involve Apple. So, there was the first unintended consequence. Apple lost money on me.

Naturally, I looked at the Kindle since I spent most of my e-book money at Amazon. But I’ve never liked the look and feel of the Kindle. I prefer a soft keyboard to a hard one on a e-reader. And I love touchscreens.

The Sony products were beautiful but too expensive.

So I looked at the Nook. I could root it and still run the Kindle app. It supported all the other bookstores, except iBooks, and I wasn’t interested in buying from them anyway.

So I bought my Nook Color. And still haven’t rooted it. I like the stock operating system. I like the way the reader functions. I like having all my books in one place!

So I still buy a few books from Amazon, but only ones that are DRM-free, and I convert them to Nook format. I can buy from Kobo, Sony and Barnes and Noble. I can get library books, and I don’t have to mess with a bunch of apps.

So where do you think I spend most of my e-book money now? Yes, at Barnes and Noble. They are the easiest. I can buy, download and be reading within minutes. All the other stores require me to hook my Nook up to my computer. Not hard, but why bother if I don’t have to?

You know what’s ironic? I had been right. The sky didn’t falling. All the e-book apps are still available, without direct links to stores, but I never cared about that. But now I have my Nook, and I’m not going back to reading on my iPhone.

So what’s the moral of this story? Well, Barnes and Noble provided a good product that meets my needs. But that’s the small part. Understand that customer loyalty is fickle. I was loyal to both Apple and Amazon. But they didn’t meet my needs, so now I’m loyal to Barnes and Noble. But that could change in the future as well.

Customers are only loyal as long as you listen to them and meet their needs. Stop doing those, and you’ll lose them. Maybe not right away, but eventually something will make them uncomfortable enough that they will look for another option.

That’s good for your competitor. But not for you.

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Tags: marketing, Relationship building, reputation
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Networking Like A Novelist

Monday, July 25th, 2011

I was critiquing a short story last week, and the author was overloading me with info dumps. That’s where an author stops the action to give us all the background information he or she has painstakingly researched or invented.

I realized that it reminded me of some people I’ve met at networking events. I’m sure you’ve encountered them too. They are the ones who can’t shut up and make our eyes glaze over with tedious details of their services.

Authors shouldn’t do and neither should networkers.

“But,” you say. “I’ve just got to tell people this stuff. Or they won’t be able to understand how to refer me.”

Fair enough. I’ll grant that your audience needs a certain amount of information to be interested in hiring or referring you. So, follow the same advice I give authors who tend to info dump.

Give it to us in small bites, interspersed throughout the story, or, in your case, the networking conversation. Tell us some stories. Most of what you need people to know can be communicated most effectively through a story. Stories will engage us and make us ask questions. Tease us a bit. Keep the best part until the end. Make us ask “So what happened?”

These are the same techniques used by good authors to keep us reading their stories. Or buying the next book in the series.

So if you’re not sure how to maintain an engaging conversation at a networking event, go read a something by your favorite author. See what techniques he or she uses to keep you interested. Take those ideas and incorporate them into your next conversation.

And then come back here and tell us how it worked for you!

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Tags: communication
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Self Care and Entrepreneurs

Wednesday, July 6th, 2011

I know, this isn’t a usual topic for me, but it’s been coming up with my clients, which is usually a sign I need to write it.

Being a entrepreneur can be a great thing. We all the ones who call the shots, and we can have a lot of flexibility. But great flexibility also leads to great responsibility. In most cases, when things go right, we can take the credit. And when they don’t go right? Exactly. We are responsible.

This can lead to great highs and lows emotionally, and it’s important to manage those so we can be effective. And make more money.

One of my clients was feeling trapped. He thought he’d lived the best years of his life, and that enjoying and living those years had “squandered” resources he needed now. He felt convinced he’d never get himself back on track financially.

Did I mention that he also hadn’t slept well for several weeks?

I have another client who goes through cyclical depression. Obviously, when she’s depressed, set-backs look worse and successes look less exciting. And when she’s up, everything goes pretty well.

Both of these are good examples of why self-care for entrepreneurs is so important.

My first client needs to get some sleep. When his brain is rested, he’ll be able to look at his situation with more clarity. The irony is that he has some excellent possibilities he’s working on. He just needs to be well rested so he can make them happen. In just a few months, his situation can be completely reversed.

My other client understands her cycles, and we have a deal. She can’t make major business decisions when she’s in the bottom of her cycle without checking first with someone (like me). She needs someone else who isn’t depressed to use as a second opinion, and she has committed to using her support system when she needs it.

Know yourself. Know what brings you up and what drags you down. Know how much sleep you need and make sure you get it. Remember vacations. Even if you love your business with a passion, you will benefit from some time away to get rest and perspective.

Take care of yourself, and you’ll take better care of your business, which in turn will take care of you.

Anyone else want to share your best method of self-care?

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Stock (non-Rooted) Nook Color as Tablet

Monday, June 13th, 2011

When I bought my Nook Color several months ago, I intended to root it and turn it into a full Android tablet. However, my first (and only) attempt to root it did not turn out so well. Then the Barnes and Noble app store opened up, my Holy Grail app, Evernote, appeared, and I decided maybe I could get along with just the stock OS.

For the last week or so, I’ve been deliberately treating my Nook Color as a tablet to see how it functions, and overall, I’m going to say it’s certainly no iPad, but it’s meeting most of my needs.

Keep in mind that most people use a tablet for the following:

1. Web browsing
2. Email
3. Social media
4. Video
5. Music
6. Games
7. Light word processing and document management
8. E-books

I’ll discuss and rate the Nook Color in each of those areas.

1. Web browsing (4/5)

The Nook Color has a pretty good browser. Pages load quickly over WiFi (the Nook Color has no 3G option), and they look good on the 7″ screen. The browser supports flash, and I haven’t spent much time watching streaming video, but what I have watched rendered just fine.

You can switch between mobile view and desktop view, though most of the time I use mobile view. I only give it 4 stars because you do have to zoom in on most pages to really read them, and the touchscreen is, well, touchy, so I’ve hit my fair share of wrong links. I rarely have that problem on my iPhone even though the screen is much smaller.

2. Email (3/5)

I give it 3 stars only because of the browser and webmail. The included email app is pretty awful, but I do use it. It’s awful because it hangs on “loading messages” frequently, and it doesn’t cache any messages on the device. Each time you load the app, you have to load all the emails, even ones you’ve previously looked at.

Webmail is probably the better way to view email on the Nook Color. When I’m on the go, I just use my iPhone, which has a much better email app.

3. Social Media (2/5)

Again, it’s only that good because of the browser. There’s not yet a decent Twitter or Facebook app. Seesmic is available, but it seems to kill battery life. I think it’s constantly trying to check for new messages, even when it’s not connected, and I couldn’t find an option to toggle that on or off. Also, clicking on a link doesn’t open the web browser. The main reason I wanted to use the Nook Color for social media was for the bigger screen to read links.

If the official Twitter and Facebook apps show up or Seesmic fixes the above problems, I’ll reconsider my rating.

4. Video (4/5)

I converted Master and Commander to a mobile format and watched on the plane home from Dallas a couple of weeks ago. Other than some odd pixellation (that could have been from the conversion), it worked great and kept me quite entertained.

5. Music (no rating)

I just use my iPhone for music, so I haven’t tested the feature.

6. Games (2/5)

The device should work fine for games, but there are very few available right now. You can get Angry Birds and some puzzle games, but that’s about it. Until there’s a better selection, if you must have games, get an iPhone or iPad.

7. Light word processing and document management (4/5)

This is what I use it for the most (well other than for e-books), and with Evernote and Quick Office, it’s been great. Quick Office loads from either SD card or my Dropbox folder, and it’s a decent tablet word processor. Cursor movement isn’t as easy as on my iPhone, which is why I’m only giving the Nook Color 4 stars, but I’ve been making it work. I’m also getting faster with the soft keyboard. I don’t think I’ll ever achieve iPhone speed, but I’m getting there.

Evernote just works great, and I’m now using it for all my meeting notes.

8. E-reading (5/5)

Not surprisingly, it’s pretty darned good at that. I’ve used a number different e-book readers, and the Nook Color is my favorite so far. I’m not going to say much more about it because there are tons of reviews of the Nook Color as ereader out there, but I figured it would look odd if I didn’t at least mention it.

Overall, the Nook Color running the stock OS is very usable as a tablet. I’m missing some features (like decent email and social media apps) that I could get if I rooted it, but I can use my phone for those functions. Mostly I want it for documents, reading, light web browsing and the occasional movie. It does those things very well, and I’m confident in the coming months that there will be apps to address its glaring flaws.

Plus I’ve heard rumors that Netflix is coming to the Nook Color. Now that would be amazing!

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Bin Laden is Dead

Monday, May 2nd, 2011

Nothing I could say today comes close in importance, so I’m just going to ask for a moment of silence to honor those who died on 9/11 and have died in the battle against terrorism.

Here’s hoping for more peace and less violence in the future.

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Review: Nook Color

Friday, April 29th, 2011

I haven’t done a gadget post in forever, and I’ve been having a lot of fun with my new Nook Color. This post piggy backs off my last post about knowing what your customer wants. (Which is totally NOT a lame excuse to write about my new gadget. Nope.)

Anyway, I’d been looking for a way to play around with Android for a while, but I didn’t want to buy a new phone, and the Android tablets were too expensive. Then I read that the Nook Color was basically an Android tablet disguised as an ereader. I haven’t had a dedicated ereader in a couple of years, so I decided to give it a try. I’d read about “rooting” it to make it a true tablet, and I probably will do it someday. But it wasn’t something I wanted to tackle right away.

Let me digress for a moment to talk about the customer service at Barnes and Noble. I’d window shopped ereaders at Best Buy and Borders and discovered in both places that I knew more about the products than did the sales people. So I assumed the folks at Barnes and Noble would be equally clueless. Not so! I’ve talked to three or four guys at the Nook counter, and, with one exception, they knew their stuff and gave me ideas. In fact, one salesperson told me about the upcoming update that would make the Nook even more tablet-like. Good job, Barnes and Noble. The Amazon Kindle is their biggest competitor in the ereader space. Yes, you can buy a Kindle now in certain stores. But if the salespeople don’t have a clue, where’s the advantage? Barnes and Noble devotes a lot of space to the Nook display, and with good people showing them off, they are giving good service to their customers.

So I decided to wait a little longer on the rooting and got the new update on Monday. So far I am liking the device, and the new update. Now we can buy apps. Granted the selection is limited right now, but I expect that to change.

Adding more tablet functionality was a very good move by Barnes and Noble. There’s a need for an inexpensive Android tablet, and the Nook does it quite well. I don’t want to be locked into another contract, and all the contract-free Android tablets are either too expensive or crappy quality. The Nook, however, works well, is WiFi only (so no contract) and is only $249. By upgrading so users can buy apps, Barnes and Noble has responded to a need. Face it. Most people aren’t going to be power users. They will want a few apps and a cheap device. The Nook will do it. Smart Barnes and Noble. Fill that niche and attract more NookBook buyers.

It’s a good reading device. The backlit is very bright, so I keep it turned all the way down most of the time, which is good for battery life. I get between 2 and 3 days between charges, unless I’m camping. Then I get about 1 1/2 to 2 days. I do LOTS of reading while camping.

It’s okay, but not great outdoors. You need to be in the shade to read the screen comfortably. My husband’s old Sony 505 (with E-Ink) totally wins there.

The web browser is pretty good. The only trouble is the responsiveness of the screen. It’s much easier to tap links on my iPhone. With the Nook, half the time I tap the wrong link unless I zoom in to make the text very large.

The new email app works fine for me. I’ve only got my gmail coming in now, but it looks nice, and responding is easy.

My favorite app so far is Fliq Notes. Silly that the darn thing didn’t come with a native note app. It’s not a great app, but I can create and email notes, which was all I wanted.

It’s not going to replace my iPhone for productivity. I’m still mostly using it as a reader, but I like it for that. And I like that I have some light tablet functionality for when I want/need it. Can’t beat the price. $249 for a reader/tablet combo? Works for me.

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