January 2009 - Direct2Dell

Today, we are unveiling the Dell Social Innovation Competition site. It is a place where university students from around the globe can make a difference in the world by putting great ideas into action. To make it happen, we partnered with the RGK Center at the University of Texas and the team at salesforce.com. Here's how it works:

The competition website opens on Monday, February 2, 2009.  Students will submit innovative ideas to start a For-profit or Non-profit business that will address a global social issue. Everyone can view these ground-breaking ideas and vote for the ones that have the most potential. The winner of the competition will be awarded $50,000 to start a business and put their idea into action. See the full details of the competition here.

The Internet and technology have made world a much smaller place, and we are passionate about supporting the needs of the global community. Our Dell Philanthropy team supports initiatives involving things like digital inclusion, diversity, and sustainability, and the Michael and Susan Dell Foundation provides on-going support of education around the world.  Our goal with this program is to inspire students all over the world to create and share ideas that can make a difference in all these areas and more.

We hope you or a student you know will take a moment to submit an idea, and spend some time voting on the ones you think will have the biggest impact. We believe that anyone can have a profound impact and appreciate those who take a moment to participate in our competition. Doing so is a way to show support for the future entrepreneurs who can change the world!

We will keep you updated on each round of the competition and plan to feature some of the most innovative ideas over the coming months through places like Direct2Dell, Facebook, and IdeaStorm.

See the vlog posted below for more about the competition.

Good luck!  We can't wait to see what you will come up with.

We have quite a few updates on Ideas Implemented over the last few weeks.  Check them out!

• Dell's Website must work with Firefox running on Linux
• More RAM!
• Sell more desktops without monitors, keyboards, etc
• Smaller rubber feet that don't fall off
• XPS 730 Memory Upgrade
• BACKLIT KEYBOARDS!!!
• Begin using SSD flash memory on laptops and axe moving parts to eliminate noise and reduce power consumption and boot times
• What happened to SSD's on laptops???
• Push SSD in notebooks esp the 1330
• Logging-in triggers Firefox NoScript XSS violation blocking

Hopefully, you have noticed the likes of Jesse_L, Chris_B, and Chris_M actively participating on the site.  They have expertise in many areas and are happy to join your conversations.

If your business has seen sales decline in past months, you're not alone.  Our first instinct when cash isn't coming in is usually to cut spending, but the current recession actually presents a great opportunity to create future sales- if you spend wisely on these efforts.  Finding a quality lead generation company can be an especially good investment when the economy is bad. Think about it: most of your competitors are probably figuring out ways to save money and cut back, and advertising is low hanging fruit for company budget cuts.  Using an organized pay-per-lead strategy will give you a head start on sales while allowing you to make sure every dollar spent still has a positive ROI.

A quick search for "lead generation company" produces literally hundreds of results.  How can you separate the best companies from the rest of the pack?  Here are some of the things you should do before choosing one to partner or work with.

• Lead Quality. Qualified leads should have verified contact information from a real person who remembers requesting price quotes. Ask for an overview of the sources they use to drive the leads (i.e. pay-per-click, organic traffic, or affiliate partnerships). Stay away from co-registration lead sources or incentive-based lead generation unless you are comfortable with the specific campaigns.

How is the company verifying the lead? Most companies use automated methods to qualify the leads which can work, but make sure the company has a refund policy in place then if you receive incorrect information.  We often see fax numbers come through as phone numbers which is a dead lead because no one is able to get in touch with the person. The company should call every lead before it is passed on to you, or at least, that is the method we use at Resource Nation. It obviously costs us more, but our businesses that use our service has a higher contact rate and can win the deal.

• Example form. Ask to see samples of the forms used to gather leads. Forms should be detailed enough collect relevant information, but simple enough that potential leads will fill it out fully. Make sure the form clearly articulates what will happen once the visitor clicks submit. The last thing you want is to contact leads that are not really interested in your product. If the lead will be sold to multiple companies, make sure this is clearly stated in the form so you know how many companies you are competing against.
• Following up and Best Practices. The lead company is responsible for providing leads from real people who are truly interested in your service. They should NOT be responsible for your ability to close the sale or to even get in touch with the lead. Here are a few tips to win business when using a lead company:

1. Try to contact the lead within minutes of receiving their information if possible.  The first 1-2 companies to contact the lead statistically close more leads than the companies that follow up several hours or even days later. ServiceMagic vendors tend to follow this rule which is why home improvement professionals using their program have success.  

2. If you don't reach the lead on the first try, leave a nice message and follow up immediately with an e-mail.  Make sure to provide information and some high-level pricing in the email.  Do not just send an email telling the lead to call you because your competitors are already calling the lead trying to close the sale. It is your job to track them down. 

3. If you don't receive a response from the lead after you've left a message, implement a system to follow up over a 7-day period.

• Billing. Lead generation companies are a great marketing source because the ROI is very easy to calculate if you track the results. E.g. If you purchase 10 leads for $10/each, and you close one new customer, you are paying $100 for each new customer. For small businesses and companies just starting out, it is a valuable marketing tactic that still keeps your marketing budget low. If you test out this type of program, make sure you purchase enough leads though to truly understand your ROI. When signing up, ask about set up fees, return policies, and monthly minimums, and volume discounts.

All in all, lead generation can be a very cost-effective method to quickly scale your business. And yes, I'm biased!  If you offer a quality service and your sales team can follow up quickly and clearly state your value proposition, lead generation can help grow your business.

As a result of the input of our customers and hard work of our employees, 2009 is ramping up to be a banner year for our sustainability efforts here at Dell.  Our packaging announcement last month has been getting some attention from IT and environmental blogs, our recycling programs and partnerships continue to evolve and expand, earning kudos this month from the EPA, and just today we learned that our sustainability program earned a spot on the Global 100 Most Sustainable Corporations in the World list for 2009.  This comes hot on the heels of a recent CERES report that ranked Dell number 3 out of 63 companies on their climate change strategies. 

This recognition would not be possible without the great ideas submitted by our customers and the hard work taking place across every department of the company, such as reducing operating (and environmental) costs by powering our Round Rock campus on alternative energy, expanding our ever-growing line-up of energy efficient computers and servers and our commitment to the reduction or elimination of environmentally-sensitive materials in our product offerings (all of our products are EU RoHS compliant in every country we do business).  This is coupled with an operational strategy that makes sustainability and transparency top priorities, and our supply-chain management which requires our suppliers to manage, improve and report their greenhouse gas emissions as a consideration for future business. 

While recognition like this is always inspirational, our work continues, and you can expect more progress on the green front very soon.  In the meantime, we invite you to catch up on the latest and greatest via ReGeneration.org. You can also join the conversation in our Green Room forum.  And as always, we encourage your continued ideas and input on IdeaStorm.  Looking forward to hearing from you!

I first met Andy Sernovitz in person when I interviewed him back in November of 2006 at the time we were unveiling our Blog Policy that we developed with the Word of Mouth Marketing Association (WOMMA to a lot of folks).

For those of you who aren’t familiar with Andy, he was a founder CEO of WOMMA, the author of Word of Mouth Marketing,a blogger and teacher. These days, besides being the CEO at GasPedal, he runs the Blog Council, which is a sometimes unpopular private organization of large companies that utilize social media tools to connect with customers.

Update: I should have clarified after my previous sentence that Dell was a founding member of the Blog Council. Back when it launched I thought it was a good idea, and still do.

In this 15-minute, audio-only interview, Jacqui Zhou who runs Direct2Dell Chinese discusses a range of topics with Andy. In it, he shares some insight into WOMMA and the Blog Council as organizations, discusses some trends in social media marketing, and offers some tips on creating and running organizations that focus on common objectives.