Aaron Kahlow

The inaugural Online Marketing Summit in Phoenix attracted more than 200 search and social-media marketers May 20 to the downtown Sheraton convention space.

The all-day event, organized by Aaron Kahlow, CEO of Online Marketing Connect, featured several keynotes and then presentations broken into three tracks: B2B, B2C and Social Media Integration.

Based on the comments of attendees, the summit produced numerous nuggets for navigating the ever-changing online landscape.

This is the first of a six-part series.

Creating a ‘Center of Excellence’

For mid-sized to large companies, the social media/online department is no longer a pair of folks working in their own silo and trying to get the rest of the organization to listen to them.

Companies realize that everyone is having conversations online, and that it’s in their best interest to participate.

What Back Azimuth search consultant Bill Hunt and Autodesk senior manager Maura Ginty described, however, is the importance of bringing that communication to a higher level.

Hunt described creating a “Center of Excellence” within a company. It would comprise four “pillars”:

• Uniform KPIs: The organization determines what they will measure in terms of online participation and why. Instead of trying to gather all types of data, a company should select only those that are relative to its objective and can provide actionable information.
• Education: When it comes to search and social media, a company needs to know what it’s doing, when it’s doing it and how it’s doing it. One issue is what keywords or tags should be used across all marketing divisions.
• Force multipliers: If a company can establish some basic standards and rules, the message will be more unified. A company needs to actively manage its portfolio of brand assets for best effectiveness and analyze processes to see that efforts are not being duplicated.
• Engagement: Commonality is great but the center of excellence’s impact will rely on customer service. For this reason, a company needs to set up scenarios and document the actions expected by front-line personnel. Furthermore, if keywords being used by the online marketing are repeated by the team pushing out emails, the company’s search presence will be enhanced.

In a reply to a specific question about gaining a higher presence in search engines, Hunt recalled his days with Procter & Gamble and the importance of “shelf space.”

“You want to seek out multiple positions in search,” he said.

Ginty said one of the problems companies face in social media is “publishing without listening.”

“There’s inconsistent reporting, goals are experimental only and there is an absence of a common strategy,” she said. She showed an image of a lot of building blocks collapsed on a table.

Instead, an organization needs to coordinate its marketing efforts with the public-relations team, and with its technical support and customer-service folks. She suggests identifying one person who “listens” and then distributes questions to the individuals who can best produce answers.

Interactions may occur on a company website or blog or forum. But she emphasized that your customers are on YouTube, Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter.

“That is where the party is happening,” Ginty said. “You need to go there and listen.”

This may be as simple as doing a search of the company name or product. The team should develop a template for how to interact with customers.

She particularly encourages companies to use YouTube.

“Create an advocate for the customer,” she said. “Produce a video that helps them.”

Maura Ginty of Autodesk shares some ideas on integrating a digital strategy throughout an organization. Bill Hunt looks on.

What was the program like? What did it involve? Was it tough? Are you happy with your decision to go back to school? What will you do next?

At this risk of looking self-indulgent, I thought I would summarize my 21-month MBA experience for my friends. (And, yes, this is an endorsement of the W.P. Carey program!)

The First Year

Forty-three individuals stepped into the Exec classroom in Tempe in August 2008. (Thirty-six would make it to May 2010.) Six came from Intel. Another nine had jobs in high-tech industries. Five of us were, or were about to become, unemployed. Seven were female. Five flew into town from out of state to attend. I was the only journalist (big surprise).

The schedule called for the class to meet for full days every other Friday and Saturday. Each morning would be one class (perhaps financially oriented) and each afternoon a different class (likely dealing with management subjects). There would be team assignments for rotating groups of four or five, individual assignments, papers, midterms and finals.

The first “class” was actually a three-day orientation, called Strategic Decision-Making. It introduced everyone to tips for analyzing business case studies – and introduced class members to each other. There was some “Apprentice”-like rivalries but they were mooted.

The key message from Professor Dan Brooks was that decision-making could be quantified, through framing, evaluating and weighting of choices. His message: The brain is a muscle — use it!

The program began in earnest two weeks later.

Financial Accounting: Welcome to the balance sheet. Let’s analyze financial statements. What equations can you use to determine pension costs, lease costs, inventory costs and taxes. Don’t forget these adjustments to the income statement.

It was sink or swim. About four of the group decided to get out of the water.

Organizational Theory and Behavior: This was a course about organizational cultures, leadership, team-building and business values. It was also a not-so-subtle message about how the entire cohort could tolerate one another for the next year and a half.

Teams faced off in debates, like whether or not electronic monitoring of employees’ activities was necessary or ultimately harmful. The presentations were also a chance for each student to be critiqued on his or her public-speaking skills and annoying mannerisms.

After five weekends and some tough exams, it was over. For those of us returning to school after a spell, it was time to dig in for the long haul or figure out ways to get by.

Statistics: The math-phobic in the class didn’t get a break in the second trimester. Everyone learned about populations, samples, standard deviations, probabilities, distributions, multicollinearity, linear regression, and, of course, the null hypothesis.

Fortunately, these terms were also explained through business examples.

Marketing: The “non-financial” course for the first winter was good ol’ marketing. For some it was new; for most it was a review. A highlight was a simulation game in which each team applied product, staffing and distribution strategies over a two-year period.

It was also during this trimester that yours truly was featured on the Channel 12 News as an “older worker heading back to school.” (Search “carey mba”)

The spring also brought the opportunity to attend a three-day seminar put on by ASU’s Center for Services Leadership. It was, naturally, focused on customer-relationship-building and service mapping.

Managerial Economics: For much of the cohort, this third-trimester class, taught by Professor Bill Boyes, was a highlight of the MBA experience. In a sound, simple manner, Boyes explained centuries of free markets, the voluntary exchange of goods and services, and individuals acting – rightly — in their self-interest.

He also addressed market failures, when citizens (usually through government) jump into a market because they don’t like the outcomes (someone “wins” and someone “loses” and it’s not “fair”). Of course, he showed how this attempt at control actually hurts markets, breeds inefficiencies, and demotivates individuals.

The irony – and value – of course was that these lessons were being taught during a time in which the federal government voted for the massive stimulus, approved taking over GM and Chrysler, and began debating government-run health care.

Managerial Accounting: The third numbers course, using some of the learned financial-statement and statistical concepts. Cases were focused on cost drivers, activity-based costing, and determining in what processes the organization is making money or losing money. Is there a way to re-engineer a system to make it more efficient? Should certain functions be outsourced or eliminated?

Building a website

Awareness of other programs offered at ASU led to my participation in the New Media Academy, offered by the Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication.

Over 10 summer Saturdays, various instructors provided hands-on guidance in website development, the uses of social media, video and sound editing, and photography.

The writer posing after a dinner at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C.

Business and Public Policy: After a two-month break, the MBA program continued in July 2009 with two special sessions about business and government, taught by Professor Gerry Keim.

The first classes took place at the Arizona State Legislature, to explain how constituents and advocacy groups affect the direction of legislation and government spending. The week included a simulation in which each student played a role in the passing of a state budget. One student was Speaker of the House, another was President of the Senate and a third was the Assistant to the Governor. Others played representatives and senators, as well as lobbyists.

As many people might believe, the big winner will be, in the end, the lobbyist. This occurred with our exercise, as the public affairs manager for the Arizona Chamber of Commerce collected the most “points” in the game. (That person was me.)

Two weeks later the class traveled to Washington, D.C. for another set of classes and visits with elected officials and lobbyists. In the “belly of the beast,” much of what we had discussed in prior classes became more apparent. The takeaway? If you’re not there, it’s your ox that gets gored. Or, if you’re not at the table, then you might be the meal.

That’s why Microsoft now has the most prominent building closest to the Capitol.

The Second Year

Be prepared to work harder, graduates of the Class of 2009 warned us. They were right. (And I ended up taking an additional class!)

Managerial Finance: Professor Tom Bates had a lot of material to get through in five weekends, and he made sure we did. If you were struggling, you were encouraged to get additional help outside of class.

The topics were valuable: Time-Value-Money, financial forecasting, the cost of capital, evaluating project costs, valuations and capital structure. After the first accounting class and statistics, Managerial Finance brought all of the concepts together in a way you would expect an MBA program to do. Some classmates are still having nightmares about cash flows, net working capital, betas, and weighted average cost of capital.

Operations and Supply Chain: This half-class – only five meetings – looked at processes, parts, people, planning and plants. Whereas Managerial Accounting urged managers to assess what activities to do and ones not to do, this class looked at doing all processes more efficiently.

Legal and Ethical Issues in Business: This second half-class was presented by inimitable Professor Marianne Jennings. Like the initial Strategic Decision-Making class, this section showed students a model to consider ethical dilemmas in business. Jennings presented in class – and through voluminous readings! – the types of ethical dilemmas everyone faces, the rationalizations we use to avoid them, and structured approaches for resolving ethical dilemmas.

Some of her “pearls:” Never trust people you cheat with; if management is for it, company directors should get an outsider to look at it; and the probability of an unethical outcome increases in direct proportion to the amount of money involved. Plus, no lyin’, no cheatin’, no killin’.

Supply Chain Management: This supply-chain class addressed logistics and network planning, sourcing, and demand forecasting. An interesting dimension was the application of supply-chain principles to areas like health care, information and humanitarian efforts.

Strategic Impact of Information Technology: For the uninitiated, this class was a blur of jargon and analytics. The focus was how to use data (and the SAS program in Excel) to drive decision-making. The potential for using information technology technologies for collaboration and monitoring was discussed. Finally, the class looked at disruptive technologies and how performance changes over time.

This trimester also afforded me the opportunity to take a class in the Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication.

Business partners John Wolfe and Bailey Mosier

Advanced Projects in Digital Media Entrepreneurship: Over the entire trimester, a partner, Bailey Mosier, and I conceived and developed an idea for a website for publishers. We crafted a plan, investigated alternatives, and honed the functionality we sought. We were taught to think like an entrepreneur – look to ease others’ pains and provide pleasure through your business. This was a nice complement to the MBA instruction.

Doing Business in Chile and Peru: The second trimester of the second year began a bit late – in December – with the focus being preparations for the cohort’s upcoming trip to South America. This class mixed history of Chile and Peru with their current economic climates, including products and exports. The key lesson was the advantages of free markets over state-controlled economies. Whereas free markets have been common in the United States for two centuries, recent history in both Chile and Peru involved socialist governments, totalitarianism and protectionism.

This is perhaps why economists in recently freed economies like these and ones in eastern Europe are more critical of the U.S. government’s recent actions than many American thought leaders.

Our international practicum team at ESAN University in Lima, Peru

Valuation of Businesses in Emerging Countries: Our cohort’s international practicum involved travel to Chile and Peru in February. The real lesson – as emphasized by visiting professor Luis Pereiro of Argentina – was that there is no substitute for putting your “boots on the ground.”

From a classroom in Tempe, teams contemplated various import scenarios of Chile and Peru products. It was not until we were there that we could identify challenges to our plans, including infrastructure, production and distribution limits. Unfortunately, we also underestimated the potential for a natural disaster to crimp our plans. This became apparent a week after we left when a devastating earthquake hobbled Chile’s commerce.

Pereiro showed tools to assess the value of businesses in foreign countries in which you make some assumptions about risk in Crystal Ball in Excel. It was an incredible experience.

Strategic Management: At last, the final trimester! This course, led by Professor Trevis Certo, was the capstone of the program. In addition to studying elements to consider in designing the direction of a company – i.e. governance, internal and external environments, strategies and growth – this class involved a “live case.” The teams were to act as consultants to a local health-services provider and, at the end of the semester, present recommendations to management.

The gathering of information about the firm, including its leadership, culture, financials and industry, was the most interesting element of the class.

Applied Financial Management: The first half-course of the last trimester was about a subject I had thought would be more prominent in an MBA program: Markets and risk. Professor Werner Bonadurer, a Swiss investment banker, explained how to manage risk in deploying capital, through hedges and tools. These could address currency changes, interest-rate changes, inflation and volatility.

Once again, the discussions were timely, as we studied credit derivatives, swaps, and credit spreads – legitimate, functioning tools of a market – just as representatives in Washington were looking to outlaw them.

Whereas Wall Street is often blamed for the current economic mess, the roots of the problem began with a policy of encouraging home ownership among citizens who couldn’t afford the commitment. Their loans were seemingly backed by the rising equity in their homes, which was being created by the demand of new homebuyers. Prices became inflated, values overestimated, and additional debts taken on. Banks were complicit in granting loans to unqualified buyers. Loans were bundled as investment tools and, in the heady days of low interest rates, capital looked for any investment that would outperform a Treasury note.

Too much money to invest, inflated prices, clever products and, yes, greed all led to the meltdown.

Intellectual Property and Innovation: The final half-class! At this point, it’s safe to assume that most of the class was more focused on graduation than applying law in the workplace. But the classes did provide interesting information on patents, licenses, trade secrets and copyright, along with employment contracts.

The take-away: Like with public policy, businesses need to acknowledge this side of operations, even if it doesn’t directly impact sales and revenues.

So there is it: the last 21 months of my life. Thank you, classmates and professors and Carey support staff. It was worth the investment of time and money.

Mom would have been proud!

Speaking at the Economic Outlook event at the April 22 Economic Club of Phoenix luncheon were, from left, Arizona State University professors Dr. Lee McPheters and Dennis Hoffman and John Arnold of the Arizona Governor’s Office.

If the challenge of improving Arizona’s economy was analogous to a hike, we would all be at the bottom of the Grand Canyon and looking to climb out.

The state began to see the downturn in December 2007, 28 months ago, Dr. Lee McPheters told a crowd of 200 at the April 22 Economic Outlook luncheon held by the Economic Club of Phoenix at the Arizona Biltmore.

“On the way down, all of the economic indicators – like employment, GDP, corporate profits, retail sales, consumer confidence — are falling,” he said. “When you get to the bottom of the canyon, the recession is over — but you still have a long way to climb to get back to where you came from.”

By his account, the recession in Arizona is just about over. But now there is a two- to four-year recovery ahead.

Of some concern is lagging consumer confidence and a number of foreclosures for 2010 that will exceed 2009′s.

“The No. 1 driver is unemployment,” the JPMorgan Chase Economic Outlook Center research professor said. “Jobs are the key driver to propel the economy forward but we are not seeing growth.”

He estimates that the United States has lost 8.4 million jobs in the last two years.

“2010 will be ugly,” he said in his remarks. “2011 will be homely.”

Dennis Hoffman, the director of L. William Seidman Research Institute at ASU, said this is Arizona’s first “real” recession. Other downturns have ended in two years, he said.

In 1990 Arizona faced a similar challenge with a collapse of the housing market. There were problems at the federal level and state officials raised taxes. Fast growth followed.

But, Hoffman noted, consumer spending in the state is back to 1998 levels, which is not good for state tax revenues.

As for the national picture, the jobs situation is a big concern.

“In 2001 there was not a deep slide in job losses but there was still a ‘jobless recovery,’ which took four years,” he said.

In his presentation, Hoffman compared the current recession to the Depression. The most significant difference was, in 2008-09, the nation did not see the drop in consumption that occurred in the early 1930s.

Also, in 2008-09, the federal government jumped in and backed the banks. It also used its spending to keep the economy from collapsing.

“In crises, debt-to-GDP ratios jump,” he said. “The concern should be: What is the strategy to have the economy grow faster than the debt load.”

The two economists were joined at the luncheon by John Arnold, director of the Governor’s Office of Strategic Planning and Budgeting.

Arnold said Arizona saw a 30 percent decline in revenues, to $6.2 billion, for 2010. Even by keeping spending at 2008 levels, the state will seen shortfalls going forward, like the $2 billion gap for 2010 (despite federal stimulus money).

Why not just cut more program funding from the budget? Well, Arnold said, if there state were a household, this would be “like losing 40 percent of your income and adopting three kids.”

Schools are spending at 2004 amounts but there are 112,000 more pupils, he said. The Medicaid rolls – services to low-income families – surged by 202,000 in the last year, to 475,000 recipients.

The state also has more prisoners, he said.

Arnold said it’s not like the state is not being proactive. It has increased eligibility requirements for Medicaid, eliminated mental health programs, reduced welfare assistance, eliminated services under KidsCare, reduction spending on education and state universities, dropped payroll through a hiring freeze and 5 percent salary reductions, and reduced the number of prison beds for out-of-state prisoners.

The governor’s office is projecting a 2011 budget with a structural deficit of $1 billion.

The state will present to voters a temporary sales-tax increase of 1 percent to the current 5.6 percent to close the gap.

Proposition 100 proposes that two-thirds of the revenues generated would fund K-12 education, with the other one-third going health and human services and public safety. The sales tax would be automatically repealed on May 31, 2013.

The election will take place on Tuesday, May 18, 2010.

The alternatives are additional budget reductions, additional state debt and various transfers and rollovers, Arnold said.

“If it fails, we will need to find $850 million in cuts – in K-12 education, higher education, public safety, health care and human services,” he said.

Infusionsoft CEO Clate Mask explains the difference between Email Marketing 1.0 and 2.0 to about 100 members of the Arizona Internet Marketing Association April 13 at the Tempe Mission Palms hotel.

For some small businesses, email marketing is essentially a special-sale “blast” sent to all of its accumulated customers once a week or once a month.

The problem is, that type of marketing isn’t efficient, can annoy recipients and doesn’t take advantage of available technologies to “build” and cultivate relationships.

There is a better way, according to Clate Mask, CEO of Infusionsoft.

In an April 13 talk titled “Email Marketing 2.0″ to the Arizona Interactive Marketing Association, Mask described how his firm helps small businesses market themselves like larger corporations, even if they have only a handful of employees.

There are three key elements to remember:

1. Email and CRM: Feeding the right message at the right time to your customer. A small business can learn how to do this by tracking its customers’ behavior – what the customer clicks on at the website, what motivates the customer to click on a link, what purchases the customer makes. There is a lot of information that a small business can use to enhance its customer relationships.
2. It’s more than just email: Think of all of the other communication tools at a small business’s disposal — direct mail, text, voice messages, faxes, Twitter. You need to use an array and “vary the message,” Mask said.
3. Smart automation: Today’s technology allows even small businesses to personalize its contacts with a customer. Instead of using one “auto response” for all inquiries, for example, a company now can use specific responses based on the type of inquiry and the customer’s characteristics. A business can then develop a flow chart for follow-up contacts so that a customer never falls through the cracks.

Infusionsoft, based in Gilbert, was launched in 2001. It now has more than 5,000 customers and 135 employees. It has grown 800 percent over the last three years.

One success story is All About Spelling, a husband-and-wife business in Eagle River, Wisc. Mask said Infusionsoft worked with the new e-publisher to launch the business and manage its customer contacts. The automated system worked so well that the business didn’t miss a beat, even after the wife was hospitalized for three weeks.

Mask said small businesses can use a “segmentation” approach that in the past would have been too labor- and time-intensive.

He told a story of how the Toledo Mud Hens, a Triple-A baseball team, used such an approach with great effectiveness.

The team’s marketers realized that it had three available suites for an upcoming game. It also had a database of 25,000 emails.

Did they send out a blast advertising the special? No, Mask said.

“How do you sell higher-priced stuff, like suites?” he asked the audience. “By having target audience sets.”

The marketers used a grouping of 25 businesses that had purchased suites in the past. They sent out an email to those 25 with a special deal.

Within 15 minutes the suites were sold – and the Mud Hens had a waiting list for future suites.

“They received more revenue, they built relationships and, perhaps most importantly, they didn’t tick off 24,975 customers with a stupid email they wouldn’t respond to,” Mask said.

Just firing off an email blast doesn’t build relationships, he said.

Instead, consider asking your customers how often they would like to hear from you.

By customizing the choice of responses, a business can learn which customers want to be contacted every day, every week or once a month. Regardless of which field the customer clicks on in the query, the preference falls into a database – and the small business has three groups of customers to target with appropriate messages.

“Emails can be conversational,” Mask said. “People would rather hear from people, not companies.”

Ford President and CEO Alan Mulally poses with a photo of ASU W.P. Carey School of Business students following his April 1 speech as the Dean’s Council of 100′s Executive of the Year.

Speaking to the Dean’s Council of 100 of the W.P. Carey School of Business April 1, Ford Motor Co. President and CEO Alan Mulally presented the automaker’s story as if it were a case being taught in a management class.

It’s September 2006. Ford is struggling. It’s a global company but a regionalized one, with little synergy.

In its home country, Ford was simply producing large trucks and SUVs. It couldn’t make a car profitably in the United States.

Its competitiveness had slipped on quality, fuel economy, safety and value. The U.S. economy was weakening.

Ford was losing money on every vehicle it built, and it was “running out of cash,” Mulally told the crowd of 250 at the Camelback Inn in Paradise Valley.

Ford’s board brought in Mulally, an outsider who had risen over 37 years to become executive vice president of Boeing, to take the reins of the company. On his first day, he drove into the garage below the corporate headquarters in Detroit and didn’t see one Ford. There were Jaguars, Aston Martins, Volvos and Land Rovers, produced by Ford’s sister manufacturers.

Everyone associated with Ford wanted to know: What was this guy going to do?

Mulally, in town to be honored as the Dean’s Council 2010 Executive of the Year, launched a five-step plan.

“First, we had to decide what we wanted to be,” said Mulally, a Kansas native with degrees in aeronautical and astronautical engineering.

He went back to the company’s roots and found a quote from Henry Ford in 1925: The Ford vision was “Opening the highways to all mankind.”

“We needed a plan and we needed hope,” Mulally said.

To do anything would first require drastic action. Ford cut $14 billion from its budget and was determined to match its capacity to actual demand. The payroll would eventually be cut by 47 percent.

Next, Ford would accelerate development of new vehicles. That was its core competency and it would create vehicles that appealed to consumers.

Third, Mulally urged employees to build vehicles that would be the best in their class. They needed to excel in design, fuel economy, safety and value. It created a hybrid, the Fusion, that would outperform the Toyota Prius by 41 mpg to 33 mpg.

The fourth step was Ford “needed a home improvement loan.” The company needed resources – he thought $10 billion would suffice – and presented a new business plan to 500 bankers. In two weeks he had commitments of $23 billion.

Last, Mulally – who has a master’s degree in management from MIT – pulled together everyone in Ford. He told them, “We need to work as one global company. One Ford.”

“We need to be market-driven and customer-focused.”

How does this all look now, three and half years later?

Ford is on a roll.

Its market share in the United States has gone up 17 of the last 18 months. It has paid back $10 billion in debt. Unlike GM and Chrysler, it didn’t need a government bailout in 2009.

“We will be solidly profitable in 2011,” Mulally said.

When he asked the table of Ford dealers in the room, “How are you feeling?,” there was enthusiastic applause.

To turn things around required the efforts of everyone associated with Ford, he said.

As he had seen at Boeing, Mulally instituted a business-plan-review meeting at the executive level for every Thursday that required leaders to use stoplight colors – green, yellow and red – to reflect how initiatives were proceeding. He was stunned when, at one of the first meetings, virtually every sign was “green.”

“Folks,” he recalled saying. “We just lost $14.6 billion. Is there anything not going well?”

When one manager reported a “red” on a project, he wasn’t run out of the meeting and transferred to Toledo. He was praised by Mulally. Pretty soon the managers were more concerned about the company’s success and less about praise or blame. “The color charts began to look like a rainbow,” he said. Candor and cooperation replaced fear.

About 70 percent of those Ford executives still work there, although he noted that 80 percent of those are probably in different positions.

“You’ve got to get the right people in the right positions,” he said.

Mulally was also adamant that Ford needed to become more competitive on costs.

“We’re fighting for the soul of America’s competitiveness in the global economy,” he said. “And it will only be OK if we’re competitive on our cost structure.”

The number of employees, wages of $75 per hour, union contracts, healthcare benefits and retiree benefits were preventing that, he said.

“I shared Ford’s vision and (told the unions) this is what we need to do to be competitive,” Mulally said. “If things didn’t work out, we would need to leave (and manufacture vehicles overseas).”

The straight talk worked.

Ford and the union agreed to a restructuring that reduced hourly wages from $75 to $50 per hour, while also introducing entry-level wages of $14 to $16 an hour. The UAW also took retiree health benefit liabilities off Ford’s balance sheet.

“I have a lot of respect for (UAW president) Ron Gettelfinger,” he continued. “We trusted each other.”

Ford began manufacturing the Taurus sedan in Chicago.

“We can be competitive in the car market,” Mulally said. “We agreed that we both wanted profitable growth for all.”

Ford, with operations around the globe, is the seventh-largest corporation in the world. Henry Ford espoused a philosophy that each country’s plant could improve business in that country, Mulally said.

The problem was, Ford was too decentralized. Mulally took steps to reduce the number of Ford nameplates from 97 to 20.

One car, the Fiesta, is the No. 1 seller in 19 of 20 European countries. It will become available in the United States in June. It is generating a lot of buzz through a social-media campaign led by 100 sponsored bloggers, a $14,000 price and advanced electronics like an iPod dock.

“Seventy-four percent of the U.S. knows the Fiesta is coming, and that it is a cool car,” he said.

The Ford Fiesta, which is being made in Mexico, will become available in the United States in June.

And I don’t know much about the Droid or the Palm Pre.

I have a Storm, and I can’t imagine a cellphone that can beat it.

First, it’s a good phone. The Verizon network is tops.

Second, its camera is solid (as long as you use the high-quality setting) and photos can be easily and immediately emailed or posted to Facebook or Twitter. The videocamera lacks a zoom but is satisfactory for short interviews.

Third, its music program is compatible with iTunes. I’ve got 500 songs and, by playing them without earphones, theme music when I walk around. J

Fourth, the Internet browser is solid.

Fifth, the email works.

Sixth, the keyboard is easy to ease for Twitter comments and Facebook posts (but not really for longer pieces L).

Seventh, the WordPress app allows me to compose posts for the blog whenever I want.

Eighth, the Microsoft programs – Word to Go, Excel to Go, and Slideshow to Go (for PowerPoints) – work great. PDFs can also be read.

Ninth, I just loaded the app for Sirius XM radio. Music, news and sports now available on the go.

Tenth, I still have room for about 30 apps – among them YouTube, Poynt, WorldMate Live, ScoreMobile, the New York Times and its Media Decoder, the Wall Street Journal apps, Bloomberg, Opera Mini, Viigo and Yippidu. I have eBay but haven’t used it yet.

Eleventh, I can send texts, call people and create notes through voice-recognition technology using Vlingo.

Twelfth, I just downloaded a BB scanner app that allows me to listen in on police and fire chatter, if I’m curious about local sirens.

Last, it’s a global phone. I used it as my “convergence” device (instead of a laptop) in the UK, Germany, Chile and Peru.

I’m a fan.

How has Peru changed over the years?

One man who could offer a credible explanation spoke to Arizona State’s Executive MBA class during a visit to ESAN University in Lima.

Pedro Pablo Kuczynski, a former prime minister and economic minister for the nation, has seen it all in his 71 years.

The son of a German émigré, Kuczynski studied in Peru before heading to Oxford University in England. He put his economics background to use with the World Bank in the 1960s, on Wall Street and in Washington in the 1970s, and then as the minister of energy and mines in Peru in the early 1980s. Then it was back to Wall Street and investment banking, along with foundation work, until 2000.

That was the year a professor friend at ESAN, Alejandro Toledo, ran for president of Peru, won, and made Kuczynski his minister of the economy. He held that post and the position of prime minister at different times during Toledo’s six-year term. Since then he has contributed to non-profit work in Peru, lectured and continues to write on national issues.

What is Peru’s biggest challenge?

“Poverty,” he told the class.

Of Peru’s 29 million citizens, one-third live in poverty. It creates a problem like a three-wheeled ice cream cart with one flat tire, he said. “It’s a drag on the others.”

Poverty in the country has never been a secret. From the military coup in 1968 to 1988, Peru was a state-run enterprise. Land was confiscated, industries taken over, promises made. There was no progress.

“Locust years,” Kuczynski said. “Per-capita income fell.”

1990 brought a radical change, with the democratic election of Alberto Fujimori. There was privatization, 300 separate taxes were eliminated and the economy bounced back.

But the administration was corrupt and Fujimori was eventually jailed.

When Toledo was elected, the poverty rate in Peru was 55%.

President Toledo and Mr. Kuczynski reduced import tariffs to boost trade and sought to simply the tax structure, to bring more businesses into the “formal” economy, and away from the black market.

They also cut Peru’s debt, from 55% of GDP to 25-30%. (Kuczynski chided the U.S. government for the spending binge it’s been on since 2008; the country is getting dangerously close to the edge, when the debt equals 100% of GDP. Like it or not, the U.S. has to cut entitlements, increase but simply tax rates, and raise interest rates.)

Kuczynski would like the government, now led by Alan Garcia, to keep its eye on reducing poverty. He believes it starts with education (holding students to higher standards and paying teachers more), encouraging investment and growth, and addressing the country’s infrastructure.

“The water systems don’t work,” he said. “No one pays, there are no bills, and pipes break.”

He wants to see the water system privatized, like the country did with the phone system and electricity.

“(Private managers) oversee things better,” he said. “The (Lima) airport was privatized. Ten years ago it was a slum.”

Kuczynski said formalizing the economy will make a big difference. Without it, people pay in cash and there is no tax revenue.

“We need to give incentives to companies to become formal and play by the rules,” he said. “For employees this will mean social security and pension funds.”

If government stays focused on limited spending and encouraging free enterprise, Peru should grow at 7-8% a year for the next 20 years, he said.

“One, there’s a demographic bonus,” he said. “We have few old people, not too many kids, a rapidly growing workforce, and fewer births.”

“Second, China is our second-biggest market after the U.S., and it is growing.”

The one threat, however, is social unrest.

“Peru is potentially unstable because of poverty,” he said. “It’s not the distribution of wealth. It’s the poor population.”

Author Bill Hunt, right, talks with Roger Willis of SEO.com after the Feb. 24 SEMPO AZ talk.

Ever use Google?

Ever end or change your search after scanning the first page of results?

Thought so.

The Search Engine Marketing Professional Organization (SEMPO) is into that stuff, and the Arizona chapter recently hosted a man they introduced as “the father of search,” Bill Hunt.

Mr. Hunt, who lives in Connecticut, spoke at the SEMPO Arizona’s Feb. 24 event at SkySong in Scottsdale. The “semi-retired” 46-year-old author of “Search Engine Marketing, Inc.” offered an easy-to-understand how-to on the intricacies of search marketing. (See more at www.whunt.com)

The appeal of search marketing is simple: It can connect you to “intent-driven” prospects. Prospects are telling you what they want, he said.

So how do you get your name or service from page 134 (or page 5,378) from that Google search to the front page?

The trick involves the keywords you use and the links you have.

Popularity

Mr. Hunt offered this analogy:

Remember when you were a freshman in high school? You didn’t know many people, and most of the school didn’t know you.

You might have played soccer, and been pretty good. But no one knew it. There was another kid who was a little bit better, who seemed to have a few more friends, and who might have even gotten the attention of some upperclassmen.

You decide to seek some attention, and bring a bunch of pizzas to the lunchroom one day. Everyone comes to your table, even the upperclassmen, and you look popular.

But the next door you don’t bring pizza, and no one stops by your table. You’re back to being a lowly freshman.

That’s today’s marketing. Here today, gone tomorrow.

In a Google world, your company’s reputation is the midpoint between what your brand says and what the world thinks of you.

What the world says is best represented in its links to you – your Google profile, your industry, the friends of your friends. Connections to the right people in the marketplace in the context of search create “linkages.” Multiple linkages represent popularity – just like high school.

Professionals in brand management need to work extra hard to make sure – on a technical level – that the service or product is on the search radar screen. An analogy is having an amazing interior to your store, with great products, but no sign out front to get customers in the store.

It’s not just maintaining a website. It’s not just sending out press releases. It’s not using Twitter. It’s not just picking out keywords to use in a paid-search campaign.

It’s actively engaging other people, who will become the “links” that boost your popularity. If your website is vibrant and fresh, it moves ahead. If the company engages bloggers or news sites in that industry, it moves ahead. If it has a presence in social media – among “fans” or “followers” at Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter or YouTube – it moves ahead. If the company actively manages keywords it wants to “own” – like generic product segments, specific product names or locations – it moves ahead.

All of these aspects create “popularity.” Guess what happens to the brand in the search world?

“You want to ‘own’ the playing field,” Mr. Hunt told the audience of about 100. “Have a plan to ‘own’ the shelf.”

Create a central theme

To be effective, the marketing team needs to include the product-development group and any new “social media” division, he added. Google algorithms will gather around keywords. If the product messaging side isn’t working with the content distribution side, too many descriptors may be diluting a central theme.

But if the team identifies what keywords will be most effective in influence search engines – and everyone is focused on relentlessly repeating those words across all media – the brand rises to the top.

Mr. Hunt shared an example. Geico’s search-engine analysts realized that customers used the word “quote” in their searches, like using “auto insurance quote.” Among insurance companies, guess which company was the only one to include the word “quote” at its website?

Some companies promote their food products as “infant nutrition.” But they fail to understand that customers search for “baby food.”

Tide believed its detergents could be found by people searching “stain removal.” But with a little more scrutiny, its marketers realized that it should be linked to searches for “carpet stain removal,” “lipstick stain removal” and even “blood stain removal.”

DuPont saw an opportunity to market its products through customer searches that began “how to … .” It decided to produce a series of videos to help customers, like “how to care for stone countertops.” With DuPont products, of course.

But this also shows that companies need to be more vigilant in protecting their brands. If some customers start linking the company with the word “sucks,” the marketing team needs to take action. Mr. Hunt said that his testing showed it takes 87 clicks on a link to move it up the Google search.

Understand the customer journey. Know their buying habits. Take advantage of periods of increased relevance, created by seasons, storms, personalities, big events or crises. Each new product you offer knocks a competitor’s product off the shelf.

Next up: Geographical targeting

Mr. Hunt noted that search is evolving, and it could have an impact on companies’ marketing campaigns. For instance, more search will involve “geographical targeting” which could give local entities an advantage.

He said some companies that have Spanish-speaking customers are exploring setting up micro-sites in specific countries of Latin America and Europe to serve 27 different dialects and provide local relevance.

Another trend will be more “activity-based” search by people using cell phones in stores or at restaurants.

Finally, Mr. Hunt urges companies to use trial-and-error to hone their strategy. They can reverse-engineer the websites of competitors above them to analyze what’s working for them, create new websites with new keywords or contexts, or change designs like header words.

Jeff Pruitt of Acendant, who is a member of the national SEMPO board, talks with Dylan Downhill of Elixir after the presentation.