7 Word Origins That Might Surprise You

Deep summer is when laziness finds respectability. ~Sam Keen, author & philosopher I don't want to say I'm lazy, but I do want to take my foot off the gas a bit as we cruise through the summer. Instead of one of my normal "nose-to-the-grindstone" posts, I thought I'd be a bit more playful this month. And what would be more appropriate for a writer to play with than…words.

So today I'll take a look at a few words that we use on a daily basis and discuss their origin - which might be different than you think.

Friended

This is an easy one, right? We all know this grew out of the invitations we send each other on Facebook. When you accept, you've been "friended."

Not so fast.

The word "friended" was actually created a few years before Mr. Zuckerberg came on the scene - like 400 years before. The source: none other than the Bard himself, William Shakespeare.

He actually used it in several plays including this passage from Cymbeline:

"Frame yourself to orderly solicits, and be friended with aptness of the season."

Ipod

Some incorrectly claim this is an acronym for "portable open database." But according to multiple sources, as related in this article in Wired News, iPod is not an acronym. It's a name coined by a copywriter (yea!) named Vinnie Chieco.

The story goes that in discussing the new player, Apple founder Steve Jobs continually referenced Apple's digital hub strategy. The Mac was the hub for the other devices that could connect to it. Chieco then began thinking of the Mac as a spaceship and visualized a smaller connecting vessel as a "pod."  When Chieco first saw a white, plastic prototype iPod, he immediately thought of the famous line from the movie 2001, A Space Odyssey: "Open the pod bay doors, Hal!"

Supposedly the "i" prefix has a double meaning - both "internet," as in "iMac," or the first person: "I," as in me.

Broke

As in having no money. This appears to have originated in the 1700's in the banking industry. Customers who had good credit would be issued porcelain tiles - much like today's credit cards - which would list the borrower's name and available credit. The borrower would have to present the tile every time upon every withdrawal. If the credit limit was exceeded, the bank teller would "break" the tile immediately.

Threshold

This one comes from the Middle Ages when most huts had stone or dirt floors. People would scatter threshing - pieces of grain or hay - to warm the floor and make it less slippery. As people walked about the room they would shift the threshing around and ultimately push it out the door. A piece of wood or stone was then placed at the entrance to the house to "hold the thresh" in the room.

Curfew 

The French gave us this one. Literally from the french couvrir feu meaning to "cover the fire." Ironically, that's exactly the opposite of what we baby boomers understood when our edict was to come in when the streetlight CAME ON.

Slogan

We have the Celts to thank for this one. It's a combination of two Celtic words: "slough" which means "battle" and "gheun" which means "cry."

Write

Finally, what would a post on words from a copywriter be without examining the word "write."

The base origin is from the Old English writan "to score, outline, draw the figure of" and from the Proto-Germanic writanan meaning to tear, scratch." Other sources include the Old Saxon writan "to tear, scratch, write," the Old Norse rita "write, scratch, outline" and the Old High German rizan "to write, scratch, tear."

Scratching and tearing? That sounds about right to anyone who's sat in front of a blank piece of paper or computer screen and begged for the words to come. Usually the process involves scratching your head and tearing out your hair.

That's it for now. You'll excuse me so I can go back to "scratching" out a living.

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It's Spring! Time to Content-scape

Only a few weeks ago I sat looking out my window at a yard covered with several feet of snow. The white blanket has finally melted away but it's revealed a lawn beaten by a long, hard winter. It's not very appealing right now, but after a few weekends of cleaning, raking, and feeding, it'll be back to its familiar, green self. Unfortunately, you won't get a similar stark wake-up call when it comes to your content. But if you take a close enough look, you'll likely find things aren't quite as lush there either. Time to get to work on that too. 

Spring is a time for growth - an appropriate time to re-evaluate your business and make some positive changes. While you're getting ready to landscape your yard, plan to do some content-scaping as well. Both tasks can seem overwhelming, but they don't have to be. Take small steps now to make a big impact later.

Here are three things you can do to get started.

1. Evaluate your tools - Start with your basic tools. Thankfully I found my rake buried behind the snow blower. Good start.

How about your content marketing tools? Determine what you have for eBooks, white papers, case studies, and other engaging content that can attract leads and new clients. Begin with a simple inventory of what you have and what you think still works. 

2. Do a cleanup - The next step is a good cleanup. I need to pick up the leaves I missed last November and rake the dead grass that's stifling new growth. No worries. I'll just get the leaves this first weekend.

Same thing for your content. When was the last time you did a thorough clean up on your web site? Are you still showing that case study from four years ago for a product you don't carry anymore? Is your most recent blog post dated last August? None of that will help promote growth or be of interest to visitors to your site. Start small. Get rid of anything that's out of date, irrelevant, or would lead a visitor to think you haven't been paying attention.

3. Start planting - You reap what you sow and this is the season to seed and feed that lawn. That'll be the biggest payoff when it comes back to life in a few weeks.

Time to plant some new content as well. The cleanup was good, but if you don't replenish your site with fresh material, it's going to look pretty barren. Generate new content by posting a recent customer success story, a white paper on a hot topic in your industry, or an eBook that provides valuable information that your prospects can use in their businesses.

Landscaping and content marketing can be hard work, but the rewards are well worth it. I'll be enjoying my lush, green lawn this summer and hopefully you'll be proud of a healthy crop of new prospects and customers.

So what are you doing to promote your growth? Could your content use a good spring cleaning?

Anatomy of a Meltdown: Lessons in Crisis Management

Have you seen my website lately? Neither have I. Actually it's back up now, but due to a massive crash at my hosting company - IX Web Hosting - my site was down from Sunday morning through Thursday afternoon. That's right. Four days.

In my prior life as VP/GM for a global supply chain company, one of the first things prospective customers would grill us on was our IT disaster recovery plan. Apparently IX didn't get the memo.

Don't get me wrong. I understand nothing in life is perfect and "stuff" happens, but to be down that amount of time in this day and age is mind boggling and inexcusable. Luckily only my site is on IX and my email is on a different service so my business was only marginally interrupted. Many other IX customers weren't so lucky, as the screams of pain on the IX incident status page illustrated.

Despite the angst - and thousands of dollars in lost revenue from many customers - there are valuable customer service and crisis management lessons to be learned from this mess. I'm not just talking about the technical aspects of proper backup hardware and an effective recovery process. That's a subject some one else can handle better than I can. I want to focus on the way IX handled the crisis from a customer perspective - not good to start, better near the end. Here are my takeaways from the event.

1. Communication is key - No matter how bad the situation, always be open and honest about what happened and what you are doing about it. To their credit, IX had people handling the irate messages on their status board on an ongoing basis. Unfortunately, for the first couple of days of the incident, it appeared management was simply pushing these poor people up out of the trenches and into the line of fire without any ammunition.

Customers wanted to know what was happening and more importantly, when they were going to be back on line. The only answer these unfortunate folks were armed with was "we do not currently have an ETA." After a couple of days of that response, angry customers were doing everything but marching on IX with pitchforks and torches.

Finally on Tuesday, two days after the crash, IX posted a schedule for when each server would be restored and a way to determine which server you were on. Mine was scheduled for Thursday at 3 pm. I wasn't pleased, but at least I knew where I stood. Telling people what was actually going on and how long it was going to take had to be painful for IX, but it let customers know the end was near. My site was actually up a couple of hours earlier than promised, so there's that.

2. Focus on the problem.  In the first hours following the crash, the IX folks got sucked into dialogue about compensation and arguments over up-time claims. That did no good for either IX or the customer base. The message needed to be "all our effort right now is on solving the current problem."

3. Be honest. Quickly.  IX eventually put up a pretty detailed explanation of what caused the outage, but until they did, people were spewing all kinds of sinister theories. Sabotage, terrorist activity, disgruntled employees, plagues of Egypt. The lesson here, despite what Colonel Jessep said in A Few Good Men, is that people CAN handle the truth. And if they aren't told the truth, they will invent scenarios and theories that would make the folks at TMZ blush.

4. Provide corrective action. The damage that this crash caused to IX's business will be enormous. They might be able to stem the exodus of customers if they quickly come out with a detailed plan on what they are going to do to prevent this from ever happening again. When we had a problem at our supply chain company, customers would ask, "How did this happen? You're ISO certified!" I would respond that indeed we were but that certification didn't come from the Vatican. We were not infallible. However, we would correct our processes and guarantee that the problem would never happen again. IX still hasn't explained this final step. Their incident status page simply says "resolved" and the latest on the company blog is a Happy Holidays post from December 26th.

My reaction during the outage was that I was going to move my site off of IX as quickly as possible. Now that it's back up, I'm not so sure. If IX can provide a clear, reasoned plan on what happened, why it happened, and what preventive measures they plan on putting in place for the future, maybe I'll reconsider.

Have you had to deal with a serious issue from either the customer or vendor side? How did you handle it?

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The Online Customer: 3 Issues To Consider

Consumers continue to use technology to grab more power in their buying experience. For a recent report on the online customer experience, LivePerson conducted nearly 6,000 interviews in six countries. Their findings reveal:

• A wide diversity of sophistication in the online buyer
• Empowered customers that want to leverage in-store and online channels to maximize their buying power
• A consumer that is demanding fast, easy help tools to solve their online buying issues

Here are three things from the report you should consider.

1.  Diverse Customer Sophistication. Only one in six online customer are considered "experienced" defined as "rarely needing help when purchasing online." More than half are "semi-dependent" and sometimes need help. A third are "dependent" with limited online buying experience and often need assistance.
2. Channel Blur. The lines between online and in-store shopping are being erased as customers now use both in the purchasing process. Almost 80% of shoppers often or sometime conduct online research before shopping in a store. One in four shoppers conduct research on their mobile device while in the store. Although impulse buying is most associated with in-store purchases, half of the respondents say they often or sometimes end up spending more than they planned while shopping online.
3. Demand for Help. Online shoppers are demanding speed and simplicity in response to their questions and issues. More than two-thirds want help within five minutes and a third want it IMMEDIATELY. Half will abandon the site if help doesn't arrive within their expected time frame. Half give up immediately when they are looking for help prior to an online purchase. They want multiple choices to get help for sales and customer service, but they won't use them all.

One of the answers to this growing issue is Live Chat. According to the report, this interactive customer service channel:

• Meets the needs of speed and simplicity
• Garners high marks for customer satisfaction
• Increases the likelihood of a completed purchase
• Engenders customer loyalty
• Enhances brand trust

The study shows that although the online buying began as a self service model, it has now changed to a more interactive, collaborative experience. Customers want information and engagement. If you're a brand with both an online and physical store presence, that means you need to ramp up customer service to ensure you capture your share of the spend of this newly empowered customer.

What are you seeing from your online customers? How are you engaging them in meaningful and helpful ways?

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Content: The Key to Lead Nurturing

We've all heard the phrase, "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink." How about "You can lead prospects to your web site, but can you make them buy?"

We all know that the goal of  any Content Marketing strategy is to drive traffic to your site. That increased traffic needs to generate new leads which should ultimately propel converted sales.

How do you ensure that this happens?

One way is to establish a focused Lead Nurturing program.

In a white paper titled "The Importance of Lead Nurturing and Scoring," produced by The Association of Strategic Marketing, Lead Nurturing is defined as "building a relationship with eligible prospects regardless  of their timing with the aim to boost their business when they are prepared."

According to ASM, nurtured leads can increase sales by as much as 20%. Click through rates from Lead Nurturing emails are 8% compared to only 3% from general emails. Despite this increased sales potential, 69% of B2B marketers fail to use a Lead Nurturing system.

A Lead Nurturing program involves several components including Prospect Targeting, Lead Scoring and Ongoing Contact. But not surprisingly at the heart of it all is our familiar friend: content.

Here's why.

1. Content Establishes Credibility

As the ASM report points out, from the buyer's perspective, there is always fear and risk involved with any purchase. "The most important features a B2B vendor must have are trust and credibility," the paper states. "They have to build credibility and reputation by sharing relevant and valuable information."

2. Content Keeps You in Contact

According to ASM, the new generation of buyers tend not to commit to a sale until the last third of the buying process. Therefore, sales and marketing need to be involved throughout the sales process delivering "high quality content and information for prospects that is responsive, timely and relevant."

"The only way that they can maintain ongoing conversation with prospects" is with a comprehensive Content Strategy, the report asserts.

3. Content Helps Drive the Buying Decision

ASM states that 95% of prospects visit a web site for research purposes, but 70% will eventually buy from that company or from a competitor. Not using a content driven Lead Nurturing program is the #1 reason for poor lead conversion. Overall, 79% of marking leads are not converted to sales. However nurtured leads drive 47% more purchases than non-nurtured leads.

The ASM white paper concludes that Lead Nurturing is not about hard selling. Instead, the program involves establishing your credibility in the marketplace, presenting your solution as the most viable and ultimately convincing your prospect that you are the correct choice for them.

As always, the key to accomplishing that is through informative, well crafted and compelling content.

Are you nurturing your leads? Are you drawing traffic but not converting sales?

5 Resolutions for You and Your Business

It's that time of year. Everyone feels the need to start anew and begins penning resolutions for the New Year.

So I figured I'd jump on the bandwagon with a simple list of five suggestions that don't involve the words exercise or diet.

1. Create your own economy. We've all been inundated with talks about the sputtering economy and imminent dangers of the looming fiscal cliff. Do yourself a favor and don't be distracted by the noise. You are in command of your own economy. Yes, overall things don't look good, but an individual can make an impact for him or herself in any economic environment. The worst think you can do is give in to the gloom. find new domain As Henry Ford once said, "Whether you think you can or you can't, you are usually right."
2. Improve your skill set. If you are not moving forward, growing and learning, you are falling behind. This is a good time to commit to honing your skills. Take an online course. Read a good book in your area of interest. Attend a seminar or log in to a webinar. Go to a workshop. Anthony D'Angelo, Chief Visionary Officer of Collegiate Empowerment has said, "Develop a passion for learning. If you do, you will never cease to grow."
3. Break out of your comfort zone. One of my favorite quotes on breaking out and committing comes from Goethe. "Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. The moment that one definitely commits oneself then Providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred." Time to go for it.
4. Anticipate your customers' needs. Yes we need to listen to customers and have them tell us what they want. But the most successful businesses have been able to figure out what their customers need. The list of successful products and services that consumers didn't even know they wanted but now can't live without is long and storied. The iPhone. FedX overnight express. Email. No one was asking for those, but once they became available, they quickly became indispensable. Find out what your customers need and give it to them.
5. Join the conversation. The world is buzzing with two way conversations. If you don't join in, you'll be left behind. Twitter and Linked-in are becoming essential business tools. Blogs are valuable vehicles to share your thoughts and ideas. And it won't end there. Before the new year is over, there'll be new ways to facilitate the critical back and forth communication between customers and providers. Stay up to date. It's not an option if you want to make it in the increasingly wired world.

What are your resolutions for the new year? How are you going to improve yourself?