Cisco hosted telephony for Northern Ireland

Posted by Chris on January 19th, 2011

A new Cisco based Hosted Telephony service is available, via selected Cisco partners, in Northern Ireland. Cisco Hosted Telephony ( otherwise known as Hosted Voip, Voice or  Hosted Unified Communications is particularly suitable for small and medium sized businesses and those with many small offices ( or small numbers of telephony users in each office ).

A representative from Cisco Systems comments:

“We are seeing an increasing demand for managed and hosted solutions in the voice space and this is especially the case for smaller businesses with less than 20 employees. FutureLine have a refreshingly new approach by addressing the key fundamentals of quality, security and ease of use and deployment. This is all underpinned by partnering with Cisco who fully understand how to manage different media provided by the various consumption models.”

Andy Brocklehurst
RSM Cisco Small Business UK

For more information please contact Clare at Futureline

http://www.futureline.net.uk/contact.html


Driving Internet Leads for UK SMB FutureLine using HubSpot – Part 3

Posted by Chris on December 23rd, 2010

Following the last blog

http://mandarainmaker.co.uk/wordpress/2010/12/21/driving-internet-leads-for-uk-smb-using-hubspot-inbound-marketing-part-2/

we got the 2 landing pages done as discussed earlier.

The visit/lead tracking system is working and we can see recent visitors details. These can be transferred to a CRM system and Salesforce.com is probably the easiest one to do this with although other are possible. We will address this shortly but for now the visit and lead records will be held within HubSpot ( they are always held in both places anyway ).

We had done some work around keywords/phrases – looking for words/phrases that were relevant but not too competitive – and we input these to the HubSpot system. We also had the HubSpot system look at the keywords/phrases being used by typical competitors. The HubSpot system identified which keywords/phrases were ” stronger ” than others.

The HubSpot system will show where the visits/leads are coming from in terms whether they are direct ( someone types in the FutureLine url ) via a Google search or from e.g. The FutureLine Blog, Social Media or Press Releases.

Typical Social Media sources would include:

– Delicious

– Digg

– LinkedIn

– Reddit

– Sphin

– Twitter

– Yahoo Answers

– Yahoo Buzz

– YouTube

 

We set up the FutureLine Blog and discussed the type and composition of beneficial blogs. It was noted that there should be ” Call to Action ” pieces at the end of each blog. HubSpot gets many of its leads via the HubSpot blog.

We also discussed what defined ” strong ” links and noted examples of these. They include e.g. links from high ranking blog sites; links from Press Release sites.

We also discussed the fact that we could ” buy ” traffic using Pay Per Click or Media buying ( CPM ).

We determined to get the ” Call to Actions ” set up on the website together with the landing pages that we had built.

We would also do more work on keywords and phrases and when we had arrived at the best words and phrases give consideration to including these words and phrases on the website and in blogs.

We would also do more research on the ” Top 10 questions ” asked by FutureLine’s customers and prospects.

Driving Internet Leads for UK SMB using Hubspot Inbound Marketing Part 2

Posted by Chris on December 21st, 2010

following the blog post

http://mandarainmaker.co.uk/wordpress/2010/12/19/driving-internet-leads-for-uk-smb-using-hubspot-inbound-marketing/

We decided that we needed to create some ” Call to actions ” on the website and that these might include the completion of the sign-up form

Win an iPad

    Sign up before 1st January

    2011 to be in with the chance

    to win an Apple iPad

which was not completed as we were in a rush to get the new website up for the Cisco Small Business Workshop.
and also a ” white paper ” or ” Top 10 tips ” to be downloaded. These would need more thinking and work.
Shortly, following consideration of the target market and messages referred to earlier we would need to do some keyword/phrase analysis.
We  have already done some posting around the following phrases:
” Cisco Hosted Voip ” , ” Cisco Hosted Telephony “, ” Cisco Hosted UC ” , ” Cisco Hosted Unified Communications ” etc etc
Further analysis will reveal the best words/phrases to optimise around.

Driving Internet Leads for U.K. SMB using HubSpot Inbound Marketing

Posted by Chris on December 19th, 2010

This blog describes an effort to drive Internet leads for U.K. S.M.B. FutureLine using HubSpot’s Inbound Marketing process.

FutureLine ( http://www.futureline.net.uk/index.html ) is a U.K. based Hosted Voice solution being promoted to SMB’s and SMB resellers in conjunction with Cisco Systems. FutureLine addresses a particular demand from small SMB’s ( say 1-50 telephone users ) for a Cisco based hosted voice solution. The FutureLine solution allows small SMB’s to adopt Cisco solutions at a very low initial cost and then to upgrade seamlessly and inexpensively and grow as the business grows.

As a Hosted or SaaS ( Software as a Service ) solution it is believed to be best practise and important that the FutureLine website and FutureLine marketing messages be found by interested SMB buyers via Internet search.

It is believed that FutureLine’s target market will find FutureLine via Internet search to a very large degree and indeed the Internet Marketing efforts carried out so far bear this out as there have been a number of leads and indeed sales that came from Google searches.

I have been aware of HubSpot for some time ( see earlier blog posts on them ) and there are a number of interesting parallels here. For example:

  • HubSpot’s founder, Brian Halligan, founded HubSpot when investing in and mentoring SMB’s. He realised that a different marketing approach was required to really drive sales.
  • HubSpot has a dual focus on the SMB end user and the SMB reseller as with FutureLine.
  • HubSpot has a very sales orientated approach which fits with the sales philosophy that we and FutureLine believe in. We all believe in tracking visits, leads and actual sales.

Those involved in this effort are already aware of some of the main principles of on Internet marketing e.g. the importance of relevant content, on and off page optimisation and good, powerful links.

We are also aware of the main components of the HubSpot solution e.g. website usage tracking, content management, SEO, CRM etc etc

We also have a network of experienced and potentially suitable contacts and resources, including website designers, SEO specialists, Social Media Marketing experts, CRM consultants, HubSpot qualified resource, Sales and Marketing specialists, P.R. Experts and Business Strategy and Business Value Creation specialists.

We decided that, in this instance, whilst it was obviously very important to generate leads for FutureLine it was also important to work through and prove the HubSpot process thoroughly.

It was decided that the first tasks included a thorough review of FutureLine’s target markets ( even though this has been done before ) which are broadly SMB end users and SMB ICT ( voice,data, PC/Server/Application ) resellers and a review of the message to each of these target markets.

It was also important to install HubSpot tracking and content management code on the FutureLine website so that we can gat a clear picture of the situation regarding visits, leads and sales , now and in the future.

Further posts will follow as we work through the effort.

Cisco Telephone Systems in Dorchester Dorset

Posted by Chris on January 14th, 2010

If you are looking at buying Cisco Telephone Systems in Dorchester Dorset

then I highly recommend that you talk to Clare at Poundbury Systems on 01305 259849.

I have been in the business to business information technology industry for more than 20 years and specifically I have been involved in the Cisco Systems community since around 1993 when I started the national Cisco Gold Partner Voyager Networks. I have known Clare and her husband and business partner Mike since then.

If you are a Small or Medium Business in the Dorchester or Dorset area Poundbury provide computer and telephony systems and related software, hardware and networks to small and medium sized businesses. They have many years of experience of doing so and are technically very competent.

They aim to use plain English wherever possible rather than technical jargon and they focus on what technology can do for your business.

Many of thier customers have confirmed that they live up to thier philosophy and objectives and you will find their testimonials in thier news section.

Please contact them for clear, simple advice on how to make technology work for you.

You can find out more about Poundbury Systems by visiting thier website http://www.poundbury.com/ or buy calling 01305 259849 and asking for Clare.

You can find out more about me by Googling my name.

Teamwork are we being true to ourselves ………?

Posted by Chris on January 10th, 2010

Working together as a team is often key to the success of a particular task, had you ever thought what part our own ‘persona’ plays in the overall team success.
Our persona represents our public image. The word is, obviously, related to the words person and personality and comes from a latin word for mask.

So the persona is the mask you put on before you show yourself to the outside world. Although it begins as an archetype, by the time we are finished realising it, it is the part of us most distant from the collective unconscious

At its best, it is just the “good impression” we all wish to present as we fill the roles society requires of us. But, of course , it can also be the “false impression” we use to manipulate people’s opinions and behaviours, and, at its worst, it can be mistaken, even by ourselves, for our true nature: Sometimes we believe we really are what we pretend to be !

That’s food for thought……..

Richard Spooner – Sales Coach


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