We've decided to go with hard floor coverings (tiles or floorboards) in the living areas of the home and carpets only in the bedrooms. This will wear better if we decide to rent the property.

We got a quote back today for this:

$1600 for carpets
$4400 for tiling/floorboards

Total Cost: $6000

When we get closer to the house being actually built we'll decide on the actual floor covering we want.

Went and saw the salesman in his office today to sign the building contract. First piece of good news was that the house plan was given the preliminary go ahead from the local council despite the problems I discussed yesterday. Of course there is a chance that they may change their mind and we may end up having to alter the plan to comply with some bureaucratic requirement. This could potentially mean more costs.

The building contract we signed was the standard contract offered by the Housing Industry Association here in Australia. Using the standard contract, written in plain English makes the whole process a lot easier to understand. The salesman was great and took us through every section of the contract and explained its purpose and potential effects on us. Key things that came out of it are:

The whole process took a bit over an hour and included some preliminary selections for the house such as the shape of internal archways. It would have taken longer but the salesman's printer ran out of ink and some of the paperwork was not signed. This will be mailed to us in the next week.

In spite of not signing some paperwork with the main contract signed and the deposit paid the actual process of building can start. This will include drawing up a site plan, conducting soil tests and writing engineering reports, and submitting the plans to council for development and building approval. We've been told 3-4 months from today we can expect the foundations to go down. Here's hoping it's only that long!

OK we're back from holidays today. I spent a couple of hours marking up copies of the house/land layout for faxing out to suppliers for quotation purposes. I had four marked up plans showing:

1. Retaining wall positions and height plus including the design table for the walls as supplied by the engineering report.

2. Areas of the house to be carpeted and areas to be tiles.

3. A site layout showing likely stormwater drainage and including a total length of stormwater likely to be required.

4. A site layout showing the total area to be paved and the area of the driveway to be paved.

Once I'd prepared these drawings I faxed each one to several suppliers asking for quotations within 7 days. These quotations will help with our own budget but will also be supplied to the bank for finalizing the loan process.

Much walking around of display homes today. Before I get into the houses we've looked at I'll just quickly discuss the market that we see our home targetting and the requirements we believe these segments have.

1. Two mid level income couples with no children or 1-2 very young children.
2. Couples looking to downsize with no children at home

With these two segments in mind we see the primary requirements of the house as being:

1. High street appeal, a front elevation that is fashionable and attractive. But nothing too 'leading edge' that may look dated too quickly.
2. Internal fixtures that give an impression of quality without going too over the top. The suburb where we are building will not support a house that is fitted out with the best of everything, but certainly some improvements will be looked for by younger couples looking for some 'wow' factor. These improvments will largely be confined to the kitchen and bathrooms, as these allow for the greatest amount of individualization.
3. An internal layout supporting either a young family, or a couple with diverse interests. To us this translates to a 3 bedroom or 2 bedroom + study configuration. It also means that a separate master bedroom bathroom (en-suite) and living area are vital.
4. 2700mm (9ft) ceilings for a feeling of extra space.
5. Covered outdoor entertaining area.
6. Low maintenance modern garden.

Based on these requirements, and the size of the land we found ourselves looking at the villa homes (suitable for a 8.5-10m (28' to 33') frontage) and courtyard (suitable for 38' to 43'frontages) homes. The width of our land (11m, 33') means we are restricted to single garage versions of the courtyard homes which are almost universally double garage designs. We are happy to settle on an existing design of a contract builder as we believe this will lead to the house being completed faster and will lower the overall cost of building.

The two designs we saw today were the:

No need to make a decision yet. We're still waiting for a lot of design brochures to arrive from different builders, I'm sure we'l find what we want.

The contract on the land settled today. As of 12:00pm we are the proud owners of another 330 sqm (about 3700 sq ft) of vacant land. It all happened today without any interaction on my behalf, other than receiving a phone call from the real estate agent, the home loan broker, and the conveyancer all telling us the contract had settled.

Dropped the payout check for the land into the conveyancer. Other than having a car accident on the way it all went smoothly.

We received the final payout figure on the land, $64,034. My wife went to the bank and drew a bank check for the amount. Man I could buy a nice car with that money ;-).

BankWest couriered the loan documents for the land to us today. We duly signed them and couriered them back to their lawyers here in town. So that part of the loan is closed out.

I was notified by phone that the refinance for our existing home went through with no problems and we should see the $65,000 less fees in our account by close of business today.

My wife and I sat down and did a decision matrix on the three designs we're considering. It became pretty clear that the Heathcote (AV Jennings) and the Portland Mk2 (Fairmont) were the two we would be choosing from. The other design just feels too small, and the bedrooms coming off the main hallway is a real negative to us. The outcome of the session was that price would likely be the final deciding factor. I should say that the price is not just the building price, but also the likely time to build and the associated interest costs. My wife will call both builders during the week and get some ball park prices on the upgrades we will need.

by: Jeff PalmerHilton Head Island was the first ecologically-planned destination in The United States. Light pollution ordinances are in effect across the island to protect the habits of the loggerhead turtles which sometimes confuse the lights of dwellings and street lights with that of the ocean. Protections are in place to protect the beautiful live oaks and palmetto trees which cover the

by: Priya F ShahCancer cells and normal cells are known to respond differently to nutrients and drugs that affect glutathione status.Numerous studies have shown that tumor cells have elevated levels of glutathione levels, which confers resistance to chemotherapy drugs.One of the challenges of cancer therapy is how to deplete tumor cells of glutathione, so as to make them more vulnerable to the

by: ARA Content(ARA) - A decade ago, research into angiogenesis-inhibiting compounds was still in a relative state of infancy. The principle itself was not new -- as far back as the early '70s, there was speculation that human cancer tumors could not grow beyond a few millimeters in diameter without obtaining their own blood supply. But opinion was still divided in the scientific

by: Simon MitchellEinstein, a genius scientist of the 20th century, and central to the new energy physics, stated that ‘a problem cannot be solved by the same mind set that created it’. Cancer is a case in point. Cancer is a dis-ease that stems partly from the products of the mechanistic, anthropomorphic and exploitative philosophy at the heart of our culture, which we tend to ignore. Its

by: Simon MitchellBelow The World Health Organisation (W.H.O.) summarise what we know about cancer from scientific research:Cancer is largely preventable: by stopping smoking, providing healthy food and avoiding the exposure to carcinogens.Some of the most frequent cancer types are curable by surgery, chemotherapy or radiotherapy. The chance of cure increases substantially if cancer is detected

400,000 New Yorkers Breathed the most Toxic Pollutant. Asbestos Poisoning Symptoms. Are you at Risk?by: Tadas TalaikisRecent study of U.S. government provides the latest evidence of a systematic cover-up of the health toll from pollution after the 9/11 disaster, which doctors fear will cause more deaths than the attacks themselves.Belfast Telegraph says, The Bush administration suppressed

by: Warren MatthewsWhat do you think about this? * Overall cancer risk reduced by 37% * Overall reduction in cancer mortality rates by 50% * 30% reduction of colorectal cancer.Sounds like the sort of claims someone standing on a soapbox trying to sell snake oil would make... but SURPRISE... these statements are coming from the mainstream... and the results are from simple natural

by: Jimmy AtkinsonMesothelioma is a rare cancer that attacks the body's mesothelial cells around the organs. The mesothelium provides a protective membranous lining for the internal organs and allows moving organs (i.e. the heart and the lungs) to glide easily against adjacent structures. The names of the three regions of mesothelial cells that provide protective coating are 1) pleura, the sac

by: Darin IngelsMen with prostate cancer who take supplemental lycopene in addition to surgical removal of the testicles may experience less active disease, less bone pain, and live longer than those who only have surgical removal of the testicles, according to a new study in British Journal of Urology International (2003;92:375–8). This is exciting news for millions of men who have to undergo

by: Rich McIverLewis and Sholnick have announced the publication of some simple precautionary steps can be taken to avoid high risk situations in regards to asbestos and mesothelioma.Mesothelioma is a rare form of cancer caused by exposure to asbestos. It refers specifically to a cancerous tumor which involves the mesothelial cells of an organ, usually the lungs or abdomen. Despite being

Paul HoodOn Sept. 30, 2004 Merck announced a worldwide withdrawal of Vioxx® (rofecoxib). Vioxx had previously been prescribed in the treatment of arthritis and pain. Worldwide sales of Vioxx in 2003 were an estimated $2.5Billion and the drug was marketed in more than 80 countries around the world. This is one of several recent pharmaceutical products to have been put in the spotlight by both the

Robert MorgenCopyright 2005 by http://www.organicgreens.us and Loring Windblad. This article may be freely copied and used on other web sites only if it is copied complete with all links and text intact and unchanged except for minor improvements such as misspellings and typos.My wife has had 10 tumors removed from her breasts. The first two and the last two (1 each breast each occurrence) were

Marilyn PokorneySince the late 1800's Asbestos has been mined and used commercially. The use of Asbestos dramatically increased during World War II and since the early 1940's millions of Americans have been exposed to asbestos dust working within industries where initally the risks were not known. There has been widespread exposure to Asbestos by workers within shipyards, mines and mills,

by: MesotheliomaFirms.comMesothelioma is a deadly cancer that is caused by exposure to asbestos fibers, and this cancer can reduce lifespan to a matter of months from the onset of symptoms. Over recent years, the number of mesothelioma cases coming to light has risen quite dramatically, and in line with this, the number of mesothelioma lawsuits being filed has also increased. Because mesothelioma

by: MesotheliomaFirms.comThere are many attorneys around today, some of who specialize in particular areas of law and others that deal with a wide range of legal issues. When it comes to a sensitive and often complicated area such as mesothelioma litigation, it is always advisable to go through a specialist mesothelioma attorney with experience and contacts within this field. Having an

Has The Cure For Cancer Been Here All Along?by: Jane JarvisCancer treatment and medication is a multi-billion dollar industry--so why would hospitals and pharmaceutical companies want a cure?Have you ever heard of a doctor giving someone with stage 4 or 5 cancer a 90-100% chance of success at beating the disease? I didn't think so. Well, there is a way you can beat these dismal odds. If you, a

by: Richard WassellIt was American workers on the world's first atomic bomb who became the first industrial victims of beryllium, a rare but especially light, stable and strong metal whose toxic dust can kill those who breathe it.Now Seafarers doing ship maintenance and have used Jasons De-rusting and de-scaling guns (also known as J-gun or Jasons pistol) raise concerns about exposure to

Mesothelioma Trust Fund Senate Bill RejectedSo the Senate blocked the mesothelioma trust fund bill, 2290. Well, maybe next time, Orrin Hatch. Mesothelioma Trust Fund Senate Bill Rejectedmore info hereOriginally Posted on 11/06/2005 22:37:39Content source: http://bobrboobd.blogspot.com/2004_04_23_bobrboobd_archive.html#108273301196512546

Campaign Attempts to Derail Senate Bill 2290, Asbestos Victims Trust FundHere is an article I found about the Senate Bill regarding the mesothelioma victims' trust fund. Campaign Attempts to Derail Senate Bill 2290, Asbestos Victims Trust Fundmore info hereOriginally Posted on 11/06/2005 22:29:35Content source: http://bobrboobd.blogspot.com/2004_04_18_bobrboobd_archive.html#108235099169357181

Google DirectoryWhoa! Apparently, there is this search engine called Google which has a directory about mesothelioma. Google Directory - Health > Conditions and Diseases > Cancer > Mesothelioma. Who'da thunk it?more info hereOriginally Posted on 11/06/2005 22:22:31Content source: http://bobrboobd.blogspot.com/2004_04_16_bobrboobd_archive.html#108210473504158949

Environmental Watchdog Group Publishes Listing of 243 Asbestos-Laden LocationsSometimes I used to wonder if anyone would do this.Environmental Watchdog Group Publishes Listing of 243 Asbestos-Laden Locations. Well, it's about time, isn't it?more info hereOriginally Posted on 11/06/2005 22:15:26Content source: http://bobrboobd.blogspot.com/2004_04_16_bobrboobd_archive.html#108210458497514356

WikipediaI love Wikipedia.more info hereOriginally Posted on 11/06/2005 22:02:21Content source: http://bobrboobd.blogspot.com/2004_04_14_bobrboobd_archive.html#108200687491644780

Mesothelioma Victims Fight Against Proposed LegislationI was trying to find a website on cat food and I came across this beautiful article. Mesothelioma Victims Fight Against Proposed Legislationmore info hereOriginally Posted on 11/06/2005 21:47:16Content source: http://bobrboobd.blogspot.com/2004_04_14_bobrboobd_archive.html#108196373013106592

Mesothelioma Alert out of SpokaneI found an article about new mesothelioma cases in Washington: Mesothelioma Alert out of Spokanemore info hereOriginally Posted on 11/06/2005 21:43:11Content source: http://bobrboobd.blogspot.com/2004_04_14_bobrboobd_archive.html#108196186005978666

American Cancer Society HomepageThe mothership- American Cancer Society Homepagemore info hereOriginally Posted on 11/06/2005 21:40:06Content source: http://bobrboobd.blogspot.com/2004_04_13_bobrboobd_archive.html#108192415493448834

Biden circumvents Congress, approves $106M ’emergency’ arms sale to Israel | 9 Dec 2023 | The State Department announced on Saturday [a slower news day, of course] that the U.S. government has approved a military sale to Israel worth around $106.5 million, as the Israeli military continues fighting Hamas militants. In a press release, the […]

Comer says special counsel indicted Hunter Biden to ‘protect him’ from House GOP investigation | 8 Dec 2023 | House Oversight Chair James Comer told CNN’s Jake Tapper on Friday he believes special counsel David Weiss indicted Hunter Biden to shield him from his scheduled deposition next week in front of Comer’s committee. “My concern […]

Putin announces 2024 presidential bid –About 70% of Russian citizens believe their current leader should seek another term in office, according to a recent poll | 8 Dec 2023 | Russian President Vladimir Putin has announced that he will seek reelection. Should he win, it will be his fifth term as head of state. The […]

U.S. blocks UN Gaza ceasefire appeal | 8 Dec 2023 | The U.S. has cast the lone dissenting vote against a proposed UN Security Council resolution that would have demanded a humanitarian ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war amid rising civilian casualties in the Gaza Strip. Thirteen member states voted in favor of the resolution, which […]

Hunter Biden was indicted Thursday on nine charges – including three felonies | 7 Dec 2023 | Hunter Biden was indicted Thursday on nine charges – including three felonies – in part for allegedly dodging over $1 million in taxes while living a hard-partying “extravagant” life over a four-year period. The three felonies leveled against […]

UNLV mass shooter mailed ‘white powder’ to 22 university scholars before rampage, carried list of targets | 7 Dec 2023 | The scorned professor who [allegedly] slaughtered three University of Las Vegas faculty members also sent 22 letters containing laced white powder to collegiate scholars across the country before Wednesday’s shooting rampage, police said. Anthony […]

New charges against Hunter Biden expected Thursday | 7 Dec 2023 | New federal charges against Hunter Biden are expected to be filed Thursday in California, two sources familiar with the matter told NBC News. Details of the charges from special counsel David Weiss were not immediately known, but one source said they are tax-related. […]

CDC issues health alert to U.S. doctors over subtype of monkeypox spreading in Congo that kills one in ten and is more infectious –Alert warned clinicians to test patients traveling from the Congo for the virus | 7 Dec 2023 | Doctors in the US are being told to look out for a more deadly […]

Nevada grand jury brings indictments against alternate electors in 2020 election | 6 Dec 2023 | A grand jury convened by Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford has brought felony indictments against six individuals who served as alternate electors after the 2020 election as the Trump campaign worked to secure recounts to verify the results of […]

Texas AG Paxton says Pfizer might have lied about efficacy of COVID vaccine, could be 1% effective | 6 Dec 2023 | GOP Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton says that he believes that pharmaceutical company Pfizer may have lied about the efficacy of the COVID-19 vaccine and the effectiveness could be as low as one […]

10 Tips for Effective Time Management
Does having "too much to do and not enough time to do it" sound familiar? If so, it's time to work smarter, not harder so you can increase productivity decrease stress and have more time for fun! Leading Brisbane recruitment-to-recruitment company, Galaxy Recruitment offers the following tips to help you get the most out of your time.

1. Set Goals and Plan
As the old saying goes, "by failing to plan, you plan to fail". Set your goals and develop a realistic plan for your direction.
2. Prioritise and use a To-Do list
Differentiate between the urgent tasks that produce short-term outcomes, and the vital tasks that produce long-term outcomes. Rank your priorities by numbers, colours, or symbols - use a system that suits you.
3. Learn to say "no"
It's a small word, yet many people find it extremely difficult to say "no"! By saying "yes" to everyone just to please them, you may end up overcommitting and letting them down instead. If it helps, remember to phrase your response so that you are saying "no" to the project and not the person. e.g "No, I can't take this project on right now. I simply don't have the bandwidth to complete the task properly."
4. Delegate
If you can, delegate routine activities that aren't part of your core competency. Remember you are delegating, not abdicating!
5. Avoid procrastination
Procrastination usually sets in when a task is perceived to be difficult to achieve. Try breaking your task into smaller milestones that you can satisfy systematically. Crossing off these smaller tasks as you complete them helps you make track of your progress and keeps the end outcome within sight.
6. Be flexible
Be realistic about your goals and allow time for interruptions, distractions and the unplanned "emergency" - they are inevitable.
7. Plan around your "Prime Time"
If possible, plan your tasks in accordance with the the time of the day that you perform at your peak. If you're a "morning person" plot your work schedule around fulfilling the challenging tasks during the day, and the more routine aspects of your work such as data entry, responding to emails or making telephone calls during the afternoon. If you're more of an afternoon or "night owl" reverse the order.
8. Keep a journal with you at all times
Always be ready to write down your best ideas in an instant - you never know when a killer idea might strike! Your journal should also be used as a goal-tracker that you can go through weekly to make sure you are on track.
9. Reward yourself
When you meet your goals and objectives, be sure to celebrate your success and achievements. A bit of positive reinforcement now and then serves to remind you why you are doing what you do for a living.
10. Effectiveness over efficiency
Although you should aim for both outcomes, try not to bog yourself down in processes if they add no value to the outcome. In the scheme of things, completing tasks effectively is much more important than doing things quickly.
Source: Galaxy Recruitment

The latest South Australia median house prices for December 08 is up. Overall, both metropolitan and regional areas have dropped in prices. With the worldwide economy deteriorating and the Australian economy moving into recession, house prices will continue to drop.

MORE than 10.6 million Australians will receive cash bonuses under a $42b Government plan to boost the economy.

As the Reserve Bank prepares to announce another cut in official interest rates this afternoon, the Government has released details of its plan to support up to 90,000 jobs. It also revealed a $22.4 billion fiscal budget deficit will blow out to $33.3 billion by 2009-10.

Under the economic stimulus package:
FROM March, families eligible for Family Tax Benefit Part A will receive a $950 Back to School Bonus for each eligible child.One-off $950 payments will also be made to: AROUND 1.5 million single-income families who receive Family Tax Benefit Part B; FARMERS and rural-dependent small business owners receiving exceptional circumstances assistance;YOUTH Allowance, Austudy, Abstudy and Education Entry Payment recipients;FROM April, workers earning up to and including $80,000 will get a $950 tax bonus;THOSE earning $80,000 - $90,000 will get $650;PEOPLE earning between $90,000 - $100,000 will receive $300.

The Government will also: INSTALL free ceiling insulation in 2.7 million homes;CONSTRUCT 20,000 public and social housing dwellings and 802 Defence houses;DOUBLE the rebate to landlords who install insulation in rental properties to $1000 INCREASE the Solar Hot Water Rebate from $1000 to $1600;SPEND $850 million on fixing roads, building boom gates for rail crossings and building community infrastructure such as town halls, libraries and sport centres.

Schools will also benefit: ALL 9540 Australian schools will receive up to $200,000 for maintenance and building works; EVERY primary, special and combined Prep - Year 12 school will receive money for large-scale infrastructure such as libraries and multi-purpose halls;ABOUT 500 new science laboratories and language learning centres will be constructed in high schools.Meanwhile, businesses will be eligible for a share of $2.7 billion worth of investment tax breaks. Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and Treasurer Wayne Swan will hold a press conference this afternoon to discuss the plan and the budget and economic outlook.

Avoiding the Blame Game Between Sales and Marketing
by Anneke Seley
coauthor, Sales 2.0: Improve Business Results Using Innovative Sales Practices and Technology

One of the strategic prerequisites of Sales 2.0 — the use of innovative sales practices enabled by technology — is the alignment of sales and marketing. Organizations often have different executives with separate goals, perspectives, and compensation-plan objectives running sales and marketing. This can lead not only to internal unrest but also to negative customer experiences or perceptions of your company, not to mention poor sales results. Those companies that engineer their organizations to guarantee sales and marketing cooperation, however, achieve both competitive advantage and improved revenue.

One company that exemplifies a high level of collaboration between sales and marketing is newScale (link to newScale.com), a company that offers IT service catalog and service portfolio management software solutions. This is due to the close working relationship and shared compensation-plan targets of the company’s EVP and head of sales, David Satterwhite, and VP of marketing, Mark Hamilton. Their partnership commitment is so strong that they not only co-develop integrated programs and practices, but they also make presentations as a team. These executives’ dedication to collaboration, elusive in many companies, earned them a market-leading position in its field, with more than 1.5 million users worldwide, including 20 percent of the Fortune 50.

David and Mark are evangelists of sales and marketing communication and collaboration at the top level.

They make it a priority.
Both believe alignment has a critically positive impact on both top- and bottom-line results and frees them to focus on making their numbers. They also stress that it is a prerequisite to a healthy and productive company culture.
David and Mark maintain their commitment to alignment by considering each other members of their management teams, attending the other’s management meetings, and holding weekly one-on-one meetings or phone calls. They treat the annual marketing plan as a customer proposal, with sales being the customer, and share staffing and head-count planning.

They develop shared rules of the road.
This includes assuming a positive rather than adversarial intent on the part of the other department, which they model at the highest level, and recognizing that they have a shared ultimate metric of success — revenue growth — on which compensation in both sales and marketing is based.
David underlines the importance of upbeat psychology, as well as personal relationships, in business. By coaching his sales team to give marketing staff the benefit of the doubt when something goes wrong and by helping them resolve conflicts through trust, he avoids hours of management “therapy” and keeps his group focused on sales effectiveness and efficiency.

They leverage each other’s strengths.
David contributes his sales instincts for what produces revenue, understands what motivates his customers to buy and his sales team to sell, and has highly developed skills negotiating and winning deals. Mark is expert at operations, systems, and processes, distilling and analyzing complex concepts, and seeding and growing markets.

They collaborate on designing and implementing sales tools and technologies.
Price lists, closed-loop lead processes, weekly sales tips, win/loss programs, and continual surveys of marketing-program effectiveness are some of the tools the company developed that have passed the sales “sniff test.” Because they are designed by both sales and marketing, they actually get used.
Mark describes the difficulty he faced getting newScale’s sales people to report on lost deals. Sales people like to celebrate successes, not dwell on failures. By documenting the deals they haven’t won, sales people may feel they bring attention to their weaknesses in sales process or skills. When he asked his marketing group to call “lost” customers, though, Mark uncovered a solution to the problem of engaging the sales team. The calls revealed that many customers weren’t lost at all, as they weren’t happy with their chosen alternative solution to newScale’s product. Though newScale’s sales team didn’t win these sales initially, these customers became part of the pipeline a second time through Mark’s calling program. The sales group happily adopted the program when they understood it as a sales campaign that could unearth recycled, newly qualified leads.
Mark also recognized an opportunity to improve lead qualification and pipeline building using products from Genius.com (link to genius.com), but he wouldn’t dream of signing up to try them without running the idea by the manager of David’s deal-development team. Genius’ products truly support a Sales 2.0 (link to phoneworks.com/sales20) collaboration between marketing and sales by allowing reps in both departments to track and act on important data on potential customers (such as who is responding to e-mail messages, and what web pages they are looking at right now and for how long). By including the sales team in the evaluation and decision-making process, Mark succeeded in bringing a valuable sales tool into the company that is enthusiastically embraced by the lead qualifiers.

As customer requirements and economic conditions change, the old way of selling — independently of or in contradiction to marketing efforts — doesn’t work. Sales 2.0, the evolution of the sales function, includes rethinking sales strategy, people, process, and technology. With a business strategy that emphasizes sales and marketing alignment and collaborative planning and execution, companies will stay competitive and achieve sales success.

Anneke Seley is the CEO and founder of Phone Works, a consultancy that helps large and small businesses build and restructure sales teams to achieve predictable, measurable, and sustainable sales growth. As the 12th employee at Oracle, she designed the company’s revolutionary inside sales operation. Her book, Sales 2.0: Improve Business Results Using Innovative Sales Practices and Technology, is available at online retailers including amazon.com, bn.com, booksamillion.com, and borders.com. For more information, visit www.sales20book.com.

Companies Missing Big Opportunity to Turn Customer Pain Into Competitive Gain, Says CMO Council Report

Despite overwhelming agreement on the importance of customer experience and word-of-mouth, senior marketers admit their companies are failing to take decisive, company-wide action to integrate customer voice and experience into key business and marketing processes, according to a new study by the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) Council.
Sponsored by Satmetrix, the Net Promoter Company, the study, titled "Giving Customer Voice More Volume," revealed that a surprising 58 percent of the 480 executives surveyed said their companies do not compensate any employees or executives based on customer loyalty, satisfaction improvements or analytics. Some 38 percent said their companies have no programs in place to track or propagate positive word of mouth among customers. In addition, only 29 percent said their companies rate highly in their ability handle and resolve customer problems or complaints.

The CMO Council study underscores critical deficiencies in the way companies measure, optimize and leverage customer experience to drive loyalty, improve brand value and increase business performance and growth, including:

-- Insufficient availability and aggregation of real-time customer
experience data across touch points that should be shared across the
organization

-- Poor use of customer interactions to collect insights and intelligence
or maximize up-sell and advocacy opportunities

-- Lack of Internet processes and systems to track online word of mouth
and drive customer advocacy

-- Intermittent or deficient monitoring of customer experience that fails
to provide true and timely insights into problems and opportunities

-- Too few compensation programs tied to customer experience, loyalty and
satisfaction gains

"Customer experience is one of the most critical determinants of brand strength and business growth. Yet, most organizations and senior marketers suffer from major blind spots and gaps in the way they interact, handle and respond to customer issues or problems," said CMO Council executive director Donovan Neale-May. "CMOs must assume ownership for the customer experience and establish enterprise-wide measures and disciplines to ensure continuous improvement. We are missing a major opportunity to turn customer pain into competitive gain at every touch point through better use of web and contact center technologies and processes."

Customer listening, learning and leveling are critical qualities that need to be part of an institutionalized corporate culture, notes the CMO Council. Yet, survey data demonstrates that most companies are not taking advantage of these opportunities to drive company-wide performance improvement and business growth. Instead, most companies treat customer interactions around service situations and incidents only as a problem that needs quick resolution:

-- Only 38 percent of companies gather customer insight from customer
engagement situations.

-- Just 32 percent look for ways to turn problems into new sales
opportunities, and only 15 percent introduce new products or services to
further monetize the relationship.

-- Merely 17 percent use the opportunity to identify and cultivate
potential customer champions and advocates.

While companies have a long way to go in turning detractors into brand advocates, senior marketers are clearly aware of the importance of customer experience. In fact, 83 percent of respondents said it is either "essential" or "increasingly important" in driving brand advocacy and business performance. In addition, 84 percent said positive customer experiences and word of mouth have helped their brands and businesses grow. There were 44 percent of respondents who admitted that high-profile negative customer experiences had at some time compromised their brands.

Only 31 percent rate their company's commitment to customer listening highly, but another 35 percent say it is "getting better." Although 34 percent of respondents said their companies have made no changes to the way they track and analyze customer experience in recent years, it can be seen as a positive development that 45 percent of respondents say their companies have taken steps to better integrate and analyze customer data. Another 39 percent said they have increased personalization and intimacy in their customer communications, 20 percent say they have embraced intelligent Internet analytics and 18 percent are capturing real-time information at the "point of pain."

"Companies must become more sophisticated and committed to both leveraging customer experience as a key business metric and instituting company-wide processes that drive improvement," said Laura Brooks, Ph.D. and vice president of research for Satmetrix. "The Net Promoter Score has been proven to be the most reliable customer metric for business growth, but measurement is not an end in itself. Companies need to commit themselves to understanding the key determinants of their score and continuously strive to improve their customer experience competitiveness." Brooks is co-author, with Satmetrix CEO Richard Owen, of a new book, titled "Answering the Ultimate Question," that offers a new operating model for NetPromoter success.

Other key findings of the study include:

-- Nearly two-thirds of companies do not have a formal Voice of Customer
program in place.

-- Only 13 percent of companies have deployed real-time systems to
collect, analyze and distribute customer feedback.

-- While 74 percent say they receive customer feedback via e-mail, only
23 percent say they track and measure the volume and nature of these
messages.

-- Customer voice has gone online, but only 14.5 percent track word of
mouth on the Internet

-- Only 12 percent are using a word-of-mouth marketing platform to drive
online customer advocacy.