May 2021 Newsletters

We have three monthly newsletters. Read the latest industry trends, technology news, featured updates and great content from ProServeIT. Use the form at the bottom of the page to subscribe.

CEOs & Executives       IT Professionals      Marketing Professionals

 

Tales from the CTO

Highly Engaged Employees Make the Customer Experience...

Hello, 

May's edition of Tales from the CTO discusses brand experience from the employee lens. There's a symbiotic relationship between the customer experience  and the employee experience, as it pertains to our technology choices. Does your technology stack intentionally help to:

  • Keep your employees: Are there tools you can invest in to digitize corporate culture and create as many intersections as possible to amp up the employee experience?
  • Grow your employees: Are there tools you can select that will create and nurture employee growth?
  • Attract new employees: Do you have tools in place that would help attract the right talent to your company and help new employees understand what it means and what it's like to work for you?

Check out the video below for my tips and tricks to get started, and feel free to drop me a line at CTO@proserveit.com if you have any questions, suggestions, or feedback.

Cheers,

Jaime McMahon, CTO, ProServeIT Corporation |  Connect with me on LinkedIn

 

 

 

IT newsletter@3x-1

In this month's newsletter, we wanted to highlight some important news - Skype for Business Online is retiring on July 31, 2021. We've curated some resources to help you with what you need to know about this change.

It's So Hard To Say Goodbye... 

Skype for Business Online has been an integral communications platform for thousands of nonprofits across the globe. But, as the workforce becomes increasingly agile, data-driven, and distributed, new tools and technologies are transforming the way that we connect, share, and collaborate. So, Skype for Business Online is retiring on July 31, 2021.

If you're still using Skype for Business Online, we want to ensure that you have the information and the resources you need to plan and execute a successful upgrade to Microsoft Teams.

Workshops

#1. Microsoft Upgrade Planning Workshop:

Whether you are upgrading to Teams prior to the retirement of Skype for Business Online (July 31, 2021) or moving scenarios from your Skype for Business on-premises environment to Teams, Microsoft wants to ensure you have everything you need to navigate a successful journey. Click here for the list of upcoming workshops, then contact us to get started. 

 

#2. Skype to Teams Transition: Leveraging Office 365 to Modernize Your Workplace

In this on-demand webinar, we'll help you understand how Microsoft will be migrating from Skype for Business to Teams - what's changing, how it'll affect you, and what you can do to get ready. Click here to watch the video, and contact us to get started. 

More Resources 

#1. FAQs: Upgrading from Skype for Business to Teams

Read some FAQs on the process of upgrading to Teams and the Teams capabilities roadmap, then contact us to get started. 

 

#2. Microsoft Teams Chalk Talks

Designed for IT professionals and decision makers, Teams Chalk Talks provide a unique opportunity to learn best practices and practical guidance around some of the most popular and compelling scenarios in Teams. Learn more. 

Plus, check out these other resources:

 

What is the 6-Pillar Marketing Framework?

May's newsletter is dedicated to the main floor of The 6PM (6-Pillar Marketing) Framework (see the image below). Among many aspects of the marketing strategy, this newsletter gives a spotlight to establishing marketing objectives, which is the 2nd step of the 4-step process to your marketing strategy creation. For more details of the 4-step process, watch this recording of the previous 6PM Workshop and download this template.

The next 6PM Framework Workshop will be a deep dive in the marketing strategy. Join me at 11:30am on June 24th, 2021 to go through a step by step guide to create your own marketing strategy. A one-page marketing strategy template and use cases will be shared.

Grab Your Spot

 

Screen Shot 2021-05-18 at 8.02.47 AM


5 Tips for Establishing Marketing Objectives to Make Your CEO's Wish Come True  

Tip 1. Set short-term (goals for the current fiscal year) and long-term objectives.

Marketing is a long game. Expecting immediate results for every marketing activity isn't realistic. One example is branding. As the image above shows, working on your branding means establishing a desired perception with your target audience. It simply takes time to accomplish this and it is (and should be) an ongoing effort.

At the same time, if you are not successful in producing any short-term results and showing return on marketing investment, then you may not be able to stay to play the long game. Having a balanced approach is the key: you need to have (and achieve) both short-term and long-term objectives.

Short-term marketing objectives are the goals you want and need to accomplish in the current fiscal year. Long-term marketing objectives are 3 to 5-year goals. Coming up with realistic 3 to 5-year goals may be challenging for many marketers given that the speed of changes continues to accelerate. We may need to adjust the objectives as we go but the very thought process behind setting long-term goals help you avoid short-sighted decisions.

Tip 2. No more than 3 short-term objectives.

Having too many objectives for a given fiscal year can lead to losing focus. The recommendation would be to have no more than three objectives. If you’re just starting the marketing journey, having two objectives - one for business growth and the other for branding building - would be a good place to start. See the tip #3 and #4 below for details.

Tip 3. Your marketing objective related to "business growth".

The common item on a CEO’s wish list when it comes to their marketing investment is marketing’s direct contribution to its bottom line, most ideally within the same fiscal year. Here are some specific examples: 1) increasing the number of leads generated by marketing activities; and 2) reducing the cost per lead.

If you are just starting your marketing journey, it can be the net new leads that didn't exist before. If you have done some marketing already, it can be the increase in the number of leads that your marketing activities generate.

If you don’t have previous year’s data yet as you just started your marketing journey, then the goal for this year can be collecting and analyzing the data so that you have data you can use as a baseline the following year.

Tip 4. Your marketing objective related to brand building.

Brand building helps with not only your lead generation effort in the given fiscal year but also reducing cost per lead for the years to come. The work you do right now to build a strong brand will continue to reduce your cost per lead. The cost per lead in the first year you start investing in marketing may be higher than you’d like. As you continue to invest in brand building, your cost per lead will continue to go down. If you invest solely on lead generation via paid ads, for example, without investing in building your brand, you are losing an opportunity to reduce your cost per lead.

Tip 5. Your marketing BHAG.

In addition to the ambitious yet realistic objectives, having a BHAG (Big Hairy Audacious Goal) helps you and your team get excited and motivated to stretch. It is inspiring and motivating to have a BHAG, in both work and personal life, as it encourages you to imagine making the impossible possible. BHAG is a concept developed by Jim Collins in his book, Built to Last, if you are interested in learning about it more.


Workshop: A Deep Dive into the Rooms of the 6PM Framework

The next 6PM Framework Workshop will be a deep dive in the marketing strategy. Join me to go through a step by step guide to create your own marketing strategy. I'll share a one-page marketing strategy template and use cases.

When: 11:30am - noon EST on June 24th, 2021

Grab Your Spot 

If you would like to watch a previous workshop (the intro to The 6PM Framework), click the screenshot below. Please reply to this email if you'd like a copy of the deck.

Screen Shot 2021-05-18 at 8.44.09 AM

I will share a bite-sized marketing tip every month with this 6PM Newsletter. Crowding your inbox is never my intention. If you don't wish to receive the newsletter anymore, please use the unsubscribe link at the bottom of the email.

If you have any questions or topics you want covered in the future newsletters, drop me a line - I would very much appreciate it.

Cheers,

Mihae Ahn, MBA | Director of Marketing, ProServeIT | Connect with me on LinkedIn

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