6 Takeaways From Organizations With Phenomenal Company Culture Posted on April 20, 2017December 15, 2022 by Jonathan Herrick Company culture is about much more than free beer and fancy in-office gyms. America’s top companies see their culture as a major contributor to their success. And office perks aren’t always the way to your employees’ hearts. Google Google’s perks are famous, but they’re only one aspect of the company’s “work and play hard” culture. Google is careful to recruit people who are motivated by their culture and who will fit in with their team mission. Without the right people on board, Google’s company culture wouldn’t be the inspiration that it is today. Image Credit: Glassdoor Takeaway Ensure your employees are on board with your company’s culture and build your culture around your mission or purpose. When searching for the right team members include questions about attitude, lifestyle, and culture in your interview process to be sure new recruits mesh seamlessly with existing team members. AirBnB AirBnB’s professed company mission is to change the world through authentic travel and local accommodation experiences. Employee interviews concentrate on how the interviewee’s values align with the company culture of openness and honesty. AirBnB has weekly virtual meetings that every employee participates in. Notes from executive-level meetings are distributed to every employee within 24 hours. There are no secrets. Image Credit: Glassdoor Takeaway An open management style leads to employees who are more engaged and motivated. Set up systems that allow employees to be heard without feeling threatened. Make it clear that you need to know if there is something that could be done better at any level in your company. Be authentic. Keep every employee informed of every aspect of your decision-making. Warby Parker The founders of discount eyewear provider Warby Parker planned their company culture from the beginning. In the company’s collaborative culture, every employee is trained in customer care, marketing ideas can come from anyone, and no one is exempt from cleaning up the staff kitchen. There are weekly lunch roulette meetups between random employees to encourage everyone to get to know one another. Image Credit: Glassdoor Takeaway Be intentional about designing your company culture, rather than letting it develop randomly. Hold weekly meetings with all employees where everyone is encouraged to offer up new ideas and ways that your company’s operations could be improved. Zappos Retailer Zappos places a massive emphasis on customer service, aiming to offer the best choice of sizes, styles, and colors of any online retailer along with the shortest delivery times. The company only offers items for sale that are physically present in its warehouses, eliminating delivery delays due to supplier problems and creating a great experience for customers. Interviews for new employees at Zappos place great emphasis on cultural alignment. After all, they’re looking for people who will deliver a “wow” experience every time to their customers. And the passion for the customer doesn’t just end at the office. It’s common place in their culture for staff to carry their commitment to service through to their personal lives as well. Image Credit: Glassdoor Takeaway For new hires as well as current employees, set an example as a leader of how you live your company’s core values at work and in your home life. Make it clear that you view every employee as a company representative 24/7/365. Zingerman’s Zingerman’s is a food retailer that has made service central to its company culture. Service is taken to extremes, and the objective is to make customers and fellow workers happy. This is done by meeting their basic expectations and then going much further; not just making customers smile, but making them beam from ear to ear. Zingerman’s achieves this by making the company’s three bottom lines (great food, great service, and great finance) central to every aspect of its business. Every employee is given profit & loss statements, quarterly reports, departmental operating statements and cash flow reports. Takeaway Make service central to your company culture and adopt an open management system where employees see how their hard work impacts the overall finances of the business. Show your appreciation for each employee and set an example; make every person you meet glad they met you. Explain to employees how customers’ happiness is the crucial factor to boosting revenue and retaining customers. Red Frog Events Red Frog is an events management company where employees’ individuality and energy are highly valued. Happiness is part of the Red Frog culture, and there are many employee benefits that help remove employee stress: a pension plan, paid sick days, one month’s paid sabbatical after five years, a relaxed office environment and many more. New employees are only hired after completing a three to five-month internship, which guarantees the new employee is a team player who lives and breathes the company culture. Image Credit: Glassdoor Takeaway Have empathy and consider the stress level of your employees. Find ways for them to recharge the batteries and create an office environment that helps them excel. Consider an “internship period” for every new employee where they become ingrained with your culture and core values. Use this period to gauge how well someone not only performs but also fits in with your team and ethos. TL;DR Takeaway Creating a dynamic culture is one of the greatest assets you can have as a business. It impacts employee engagement and your team’s ability to deliver a great experience for your customers. Make core values such as customer service central to culture and align every employee to your company mission. When you give employees a voice and keep them informed of every aspect of your business, it allows them to flourish–taking your business to an entirely new level of success.
9 Reasons to Get Rid of the Annual Performance Review Posted on April 19, 2017July 12, 2018 by Erin Posey Are you considering finding a replacement for the traditional annual performance review? If so, you’ll be in good company. Accenture, Deloitte, Microsoft and General Electric are just four of the many US companies that have done away with the annual performance review. So, what’s wrong with the annual performance review? There are plenty of benefits associated with regular employee reviews. But reviews following the annual cadence leave a lot to be desired. Here are just a few of the drawbacks: 1. Why wait a full year? If you make employee performance reviews a recurring process, with frequent manager/employee interactions, you eliminate the “recency effect” where only the past month’s performance is evaluated and an entire 11 months of work is overlooked. Managers should provide feedback after each project. That way the employee knows that work is being recognized and understands areas that need improvement. 2. It focuses on the past instead of the present. An annual performance review looks at how an employee has performed in the past, rather than what he or she is currently doing. A better model would focus on current performance with a quick overview of past successes. Frequent assessment and feedback from managers builds a better picture of each employee and their impact on your small business. 3. It’s costly. The traditional annual performance review costs $3,500 per employee. This cost includes the 210 hours each manager spends on meetings, discussions and other activities relating to performance reviews. Frequent feedback meetings will inevitably be shorter, and each one is less comprehensive, so less preparation time is required. 4. It’s ineffective. Only 27% of HR professionals think an annual performance review improves employees’ skills, knowledge, and abilities. Put that another way; 73% believe they are a waste of time and resources. Ask your HR department to come up with a better way of working, perhaps focusing on identifying areas where employees would benefit from training. 5. It usually only includes one person’s opinion. Managers are rarely trained in the skills necessary to conduct a successful annual review. Most managers have been hired for their knowledge and expertise in particular areas, rather than their skills such as the ability to give critical feedback in a constructive manner. This results in widely differing standards and is a weakness that is inherent in the current system. An employee’s review depends on the opinions of one manager. Train your managers to be objective and to recognize any biases they may have. If you perceive a pattern of complaints about one manager, they should be addressed swiftly and productively. 6. Ranking employees is demotivating. Most HR managers believe forced ranking systems, especially those where the bottom 10% are fired, lead to conflict in the workplace. In companies where this type of annual performance review exists, employees are competing against each other and credit for ideas and progress is stolen. Categorizing employees into different groups can be demoralizing and alienating. Use an appraisal system that is more focused on helping people to overcome their difficulties and to become more valuable team members rather than calling out their inefficiencies. 7. It causes exceptional employees to be undervalued. Outstanding employees think outside the box. Their thinking is not limited by their job descriptions, nor by the format of an annual review. Their contribution to the company is rarely recognized by a standardized performance review. Stellar employees lose out if they fail to fit the mold that HR reviews attempt to force them into. Do you really want to fire employees who think creatively simply because they don’t fit into the typical mold? Ask managers to identify exceptional employees and set up a parallel appraisal system that recognizes the significant contributions these people make. 8. It puts disproportionate value on measurable performance. Employees contribute to your company’s success in many ways that are immeasurable. Not every employee’s role can be assessed in numbers achieved, pallets shifted or new customers obtained. These immeasurable functions can include tasks such as training other staff, preparing white papers or researching competitors. All of these are essential to your company’s health but can’t necessarily be measured with traditional methods. Identify roles where performance can be substantial without being measurable. Ensure your new performance review system takes account of this group of employees. 9. It decreases performance. Employees find the traditional performance review very stressful because they know their job is being scrutinized and potentially at risk. Their fear restricts creativity as employees focus on the aspects they know will be covered in their performance review interview. Shifting the emphasis from a ranking system to one of individual development will remove much of the fear employees have. Creating frequent informal feedback opportunities will also help.
5 Reasons Clickbait Is The Worst (And How It Will Negatively Impact Your Business) Posted on April 17, 2017July 12, 2018 by Allie Wolff While “fake news” may be the scourge of the Internet in 2017, it would never have existed had clickbait not paved the path. A lot of marketers and savvy online readers resent clickbait now, and for good reason—the sensationalistic and vague style of headline writing, made famous by sites like BuzzFeed and Upworthy (“This Man Bought his Daughter an Ice Cream. What Happened Next Will Shock You”), created a style of web writing that enraptured curious readers audiences across the globe. But just as quickly as it arrived, it began feeling desperate and lame, and subsequently gave way to a more honest, detail-oriented style of headline writing. In this article, we’ll focus on why the old-school method died out, how following those protocols can do your brand more harm than good, and what lessons we can learn from clickbait to craft effective headlines today. Clickbait Will Attract the Wrong Visitors When growing a brand, you need brand loyalty. You need people to find your site and genuinely enjoy it, respect it and come back when they need your product again. Clickbait, based on vague adjectives and overblown promises, doesn’t do any of that. Its viral potential attracts mostly first-time audiences. As inbound marketing goes, shooting broad can draw all sorts of people, which could be good, but odds are most of them won’t really be interested in your brand—they just want to know what happened when Dad gave his daughter the ice cream. That’s because clickbait turns reading into a psychological game, forcing audiences to guess what the end result is and stringing them along to reveal the correct answer. Upworthy has long been the winner of this game; they used to be more aggressive with it, but even these days they tease out the story in headlines worded specifically to make you click: They don’t straight-up say “you’ll never guess what…” in the same way they used to, but the implication is still there: there’s something shocking about American politics that you don’t know, and you can only learn the answer by clicking. Clickbait Will Make Your Bounce Rate Soar, and Algorithms Hate You There’s a lot of debate about how much bounce rates really matter—because they’re so easy to manipulate, Google may evaluate a bounce rate far less than many people worry. But it’s still not a good look to have thousands of people visiting your site for five seconds and leaving, unlikely to return again. Facebook addressed this exact concern in a 2014 blog post on clickbait, also stating they would penalize writers relying on the often disingenuous model. Clickbait generally doesn’t denote deep, useful content, so visitors tend not to stay for too long. They might get a bad impression from your site, which does you more harm than good in the long run. That’s why Facebook began analyzing time spent on a page as a marker of quality—exactly why authoritative, long posts do well. You Will Probably Disappoint Your Audience with Clickbait Rarely does clickbait ever live up to expectations. This correlates directly with the above two reasons clickbait is a bad idea: disappointment leads to bounces, which lead to poor engagement and an inevitable loss of trust in your content. This is why the game has generally moved away from vague headlines and toward specific headlines that tell people immediately whether the article has the information they need. Take this example from Barnes & Noble: The headline is still grabby and the piece is still a tried-and-true listicle, but the details are there. You know right off the bat whether this article will appeal to you or not. If you’re a fan of FX’s show Legion, or a fan of graphic novels, or both, the article will be worthwhile; if none of that matters to you, you won’t click. If they had instead written something generic—“Fans of This Hit TV Show Absolutely Love These Little-Known Books”—lots of readers would have shown up, been hugely disappointed, and left immediately. Clickbait Will Muddle Your Site’s Important Data Let’s tackle this subject from an analytics standpoint, too. Let’s say you’re selling ad space on your website to specific clients—various long-term companies are helping you monetize your site. If you tell them you’re getting 50,000 hits a day, they might be initially impressed. But any ad agency or marketing specialist today would dig deeper: How long are they staying on your site? What are their demographics? Where do they live? When you rely on ephemeral clickbait, these crucial details get muddled. You’ll have a lousy average time spent on your page, and won’t be able to as easily mine your data for important demographic info that matters to advertisers. In short, you might get numbers, but those numbers will be useless. Clickbait Just Feels… Old What is this, 2011? Internet users are smarter than they were last week, let alone a few years ago. Clickbait was a fad grown from a nascent social media landscape, born of people trying out new ways of communication. It worked for a bit, and now it works less. If none of the above reasons convinced you, there’s this one simple aesthetic reason: clickbait sounds old and lame. You can glean some lessons about headline-crafting from it, but don’t rely on it. Be original, creative, clear and useful. What happens next will shock you.
The Science Behind a High Converting Landing Page Posted on April 14, 2017November 16, 2018 by Jeanna Barrett If you spent time and money creating a compelling offer for new prospects, you want to maximize the number of conversions from this offer. But what is the best way to ensure the most amount of people who visit your landing page, convert? Building a successful landing page is like a science — and much more complex than popping a form and offer on a page. We gathered some of the best advice and case studies across the web from the industry-best landing page tools and brands to help you understand the periodic table of landing page conversion: Pl (People) 37Signals increased signups by 102.5 percent for their Highrise product — just by adding a picture of a person. They did a number of A/B tests, including testing long-form pages vs. short-form pages, pictures of customers vs. no picture, and changing the picture of the customer. They concluded that: Big pictures of smiling people/customers work It doesn’t necessarily matter who your person is (male, female or ethnicity) Short-form pages with a picture of a customer outperformed long-form landing pages Takeaway: People trust other people’s opinions. Add a picture and testimonial of a customer to your landing page, and you could see skyrocket conversion rates. Cta (Call to action) Black & Decker made a six-figure impact by testing simple CTA button copy such as “Buy Now” vs. “Shop Now.” Through A/B tests of copy on their product buttons, they thought that ‘Shop Now” would be more successful because it sounded less committal, but they actually found that “Buy Now” was more successful — to the tune of 17 percent more conversions. Takeaway: Even small words matter — test the copy you’re putting on conversions buttons, and it could make a big difference. Fl (Flow) Underwater Audio experiences a 35.6 percent increase in landing page conversion — just by moving a block of text from right to left. Why does this matter? Because there are studies that show that the human eye naturally follows an “F” pattern when reading either online or print copy. (Top left to right, then down and left). In this case, the block of text they moved was a customer testimonial. Perhaps having their prospects read this before seeing the CTA button provided the social proof they needed to convert. Takeaway: Placement of copy, buttons and images can affect how messages are digested by your prospects, so test moving elements around the page. Mb (Mobile) Walmart Canada boosted online conversion by 20 percent — just by ensuring their had a mobile responsive design. Walmart discovered that their mobile design did not look good, and it took forever to load. They launched a new mobile responsive design and A/B tested other elements such as removing a button that said, “View Details” when you couldn’t purchase the item online. Overall, these changes gave Walmart a conversion boost of 20 percent on all devices and mobile orders went up by 98 percent. Takeaway: Check out your device traffic in Google Analytics to understand how much mobile traffic your website receives, then test how your site looks and performs on your mobile phone. If you have less-than-perfect performance and a good amount of mobile traffic, it’s time to invest in a mobile responsive design — and fast. Vp (Value Proposition) Sims3 was able to get 128 percent more people to register for their games by improving the value proposition they included on their landing page. They changed their A landing page, which didn’t feature a value proposition, to a B landing page version that highlighted their game was free, plus the free inclusions visitors received by signing up. Takeaway: Tell your visitors the value they’ll receive by signing up for your offer — and never hide the fact that you offer a free product or trial version for signing up. Remember these important elements to a landing page — people, CTAs, flow, mobile and value proposition — and you’ll be well on your way to understanding the science of a high-converting landing page. Testing these types of elements in A/B tests within your marketing automation software or landing page software will help improve the ROI of the offers you create for your customers, increasing revenue for your business.
Try These Creative Incentives to Motivate Your Sales Team Posted on April 13, 2017April 12, 2017 by Tricia O'Donnell No matter how driven your sales team is, it never hurts to show them how much you care about their efforts to bring in new business. Selling requires a lot of energy and stamina, and giving your salespeople even a small boost can go a long way toward helping them power through the rejection that comes with the job. That’s especially true in a small business, where salespeople can’t necessarily ride on your brand name to get prospects to take their call or meet with them, as they might in a Fortune 500 company So how do you keep them excited and engaged? Here are some creative ideas for motivating your sales team: Say it in pictures. Highlight your top seller of the month to your audience each month. Feature them in a blog post and post their picture on your social media sites. Not only will it give a nice nod to your salesperson, but it can even help your clients and audience recognize and get to know your top performers. Send out a press release. Many local publications like to get news about movers and shakers in their community for columns they run. When your sales stars win an important award or get promoted, send a brief press release to your local news source to show your sales team how important they are to you. Not sure how to write a press release? Type “press release template” into a search engine. There are many free and inexpensive ones you can find online. Help them blow off steam. There’s no better way for your sales team to recharge their energy than a fun, fitness-related activity. Many fitness businesses now offer inexpensive mini-memberships, where you can give someone the gift of, say, five classes. Make sure you tailor the fitness gift to each sales person’s interests. For instance, if you know one of your salespeople does yoga at the local YMCA, why not treat him or her to a few sessions at a local hot yoga studio? Similarly, someone who does Crossfit might appreciate a chance to try another facility in town to see what it’s like. Break the routine. Instead of treating your sales team to the usual drinks for hitting a big goal, look for a fun new experience you can all do together—whether it’s paintball or learning from the chef at a local restaurant how to cook a popular dish. Sites like Groupon can be a great source of ideas for inexpensive experiences you can try. Make sure to take plenty of photos and share them on Instagram or your Facebook page! Pretend you’re at Google. The search engine giant is famous for letting its employees spend 20% of their time on a passion project they feel will most benefit the company. You can mirror this approach with your sales team by giving your highest performers a day or two this month to work on the business development project of their choice. Maybe they’ve been meaning to research an intriguing new client or play golf with a particular prospect but never have the time. Give them the opportunity to do so without worrying about other work and you’ll be surprised at how their productivity soars. Make parking easy for them. If you live in a congested area, your top salespeople will no doubt appreciate a break from parking hassles. Assuming your company has a parking lot with private spots for customers or visitors, consider allowing your top sales performer to use one of those spots for a week. There’s nothing like pulling right into an empty spot to start the workday off right. Allow them to plan your next celebration. Invite your best performing salesperson to choose the menu for an in-office party the next time your sales team hits a big goal. Whether your sales star opts to bring in the best burgers in town or a locally brewed beer for a tasting, it’ll be a fun way to bring some personal flair to the celebration.
PRESS RELEASE: Hatchbuck Reveals a Bold New Brand Inspired by Self-Made Business Owners Posted on April 12, 2017April 12, 2017 by Guest Author This press release was originally published on PR Newswire. ST. LOUIS, April 12, 2017 /PRNewswire/ — Hatchbuck, an innovative and easy-to-use sales and marketing software for small businesses, today reveals a bold new brand identity and messaging that puts the hero of the brand, the self-made small business owner, front and center. Hatchbuck’s new visual identity coincides with the latest release and reimagination of their product, Hatchbuck v4.0. The rebrand is the first major redesign for Hatchbuck since its conception in 2012. With the redesign, Hatchbuck steers away from the app-centric lowercase wordmark – a prolific style choice in their software category. The new logo, an uppercase wordmark paired with the diver helmet emblem, captures the adventurous and self-sufficient spirit of the small business owner. Hatchbuck’s Co-Founder and CSO/CMO, Jonathan Herrick, shared that the new brand identity will help the company tell a more compelling story. “The hero of our story isn’t sales and marketing software. It’s the small business owner,” said Herrick. “They are the creators – creating jobs, innovation and a legacy to leave behind. The iconic diver helmet logo is a direct nod to them, their willingness to take risks and propel their business forward.” To complement the new logo, Hatchbuck is trading in their mild teal and coral color palette for a bold red-orange and slate blue palette augmented by bright blues, magenta and yellow-green accent colors. Incorporated throughout branded materials are a mix of nautical icons that give a playful nod to Hatchbuck’s ability to help small business owners travel great depths to seize every opportunity. The rebrand has given Hatchbuck the opportunity to revisit their tagline and messaging, again shifting the focus from the product as the champion to the small business owner as the hero of Hatchbuck’s story: Self-made business owners go to depths that others won’t to capitalize on opportunity. We get it. Hatchbuck makes small business sales and marketing software for you – the adventurer, the risk taker. When it comes to your business, it’s sink or swim. You can’t be anchored down by bulky software. So we promise that no solution is as easy to use or as effective at propelling relationships into sales as Hatchbuck. Hatchbuck. Seize the Opportunity. The new tagline, “Seize the Opportunity,” reflects the willingness of the self-made owner to take every advantage they have and turn it into success for their business. The attitudes and needs of the self-made owner have made their mark on Hatchbuck’s newest version as well. A complete redesign of the app includes critical features and enhancements to improve usability, provide actionable insights, and increase productivity. “The new release fits nicely with the rebrand because both are about championing the small business owner and helping them to take sales and marketing to the next level,” said Hatchbuck Co-Founder and CEO, Don Breckenridge. “We put our user at the center of everything we do, so it’s awesome to see that effort unfold in the new brand and app.”
PRESS RELEASE: Hatchbuck Empowers Small Business Owners with Version 4.0 Posted on April 11, 2017April 11, 2017 by Guest Author This press release was originally published on PR Newswire. ST. LOUIS, April 11, 2017 /PRNewswire/ — Hatchbuck, an innovative and easy-to-use sales and marketing software for small businesses, today announces the launch of a new version, Hatchbuck 4.0. This latest release will empower small business owners to take control of their sales and marketing process, easily manage contacts, provide seamless follow-up with prospects and customers, and seize every opportunity in their sales and marketing pipeline. Hatchbuck Co-Founder and CEO, Don Breckenridge, says that the new version will help small business owners move from cumbersome spreadsheets and batch & blast email marketing systems to an all-in-one sales and marketing tool. “The new version of Hatchbuck was built to champion our core user – the small business owner,” says Breckenridge. “Hatchbuck 4.0 is making it simpler for small businesses to be more personal in the inbox, convert more opportunities into customers, and streamline their sales and marketing process. It’s energizing to know that we’re helping them to take their sales and marketing to the next level.” Hatchbuck 4.0 includes critical features and enhancements to improve usability, provide actionable insights, and increase productivity, including: Quick Insights A robust dashboard offers a real-time snapshot of the overall sales and marketing process. Hatchbuck customers now have an instant pulse on their sales and marketing activity and insight into specific areas where they drive sales. Comprehensive Views Custom list views and powerful search tools make it fast and easy to find, segment and filter down to a complete and accurate list of contacts. Simple Email Tools Busy small business owners, experienced marketers, and every skill-level in between now have the tools to build eye-catching, professional looking emails – without the need for coding. The email drag & drop builder has been rebuilt to make the process of designing emails seamless. User Level Security Larger teams, especially those with more than one sales person, will appreciate the ability to keep data private and secure with added user level security. Email Integration With new IMAP integration, customers can easily track conversations happening in their personal email client without leaving Hatchbuck. Smart Campaign Timing More control and flexibility over campaign timing is helping Hatchbuck customers to improve engagement and increase response rates with their prospects and customers. The new software release coincides with the unveiling of a bold new logo and brand identity. “We’ve been passionate about helping small businesses from the beginning, and through our product research, we’ve uncovered a powerful profile of the business owners we connect with, and wanted to unearth a brand that reflected that,” says Jonathan Herrick, Co-Founder and CSO/CMO of Hatchbuck. The new logo depicts the Hatchbuck wordmark paired with a diver helmet icon. The logo symbolizes the path of the self-made small business owner, willing to go to depths that others won’t to embrace opportunity. Additional Resources Schedule a live demonstration of Hatchbuck at http://benchmarkcrm.com/live-demo/. See full release notes at https://hatchbuck.freshdesk.com/support/solutions/articles/12000027964-hatchbuck-v4-0-release-notes. Learn more about Hatchbuck’s new brand at www.benchmarkone.com/blog/hatchbuck-rebrand/. Like Hatchbuck on Facebook. Follow @Hatchbuck on Twitter. About Hatchbuck Hatchbuck is easy-to-use small business sales and marketing software that propels relationships into customers. With Hatchbuck, small business owners no longer need to duct-tape together clunky tools, like email and spreadsheets. The all-in-one suite includes a simple CRM, user-friendly email marketing tools and the power of marketing automation to nurture prospect and customer relationships and grow sales.
Hatchbuck Version 4.0: What’s New? Posted on April 10, 2017April 10, 2017 by Don Breckenridge Today we’re thrilled to introduce you to the all-new Hatchbuck v4.0. In designing this new release, we first and foremost wanted to be sure that our platform serves its most important purpose: you, the small business owner. We took into account the past and future of our company alongside extensive customer feedback, and we’ve created our best version yet. At its core, Hatchbuck is still the same easy-to-use, effective sales and marketing software that you’re used to. But we’ve added (and optimized) several features that we think you’re going to be excited about. Let’s dive in. More Actionable Insights The dashboard now offers a real-time snapshot of your sales and marketing in one place. Paired with our re-designed activity feed, the dashboard now gives you an instant pulse on your sales and marketing pipeline so that nothing falls through the cracks. Fine-Tuned Global Search and Filter Our custom list views, powerful global search tools and customizable filters make it easy for you to find, segment and filter down to your desired list of contacts. Hatchbuck v4.0 streamlines your workflow with our easy-to-use task manager to keep your team members on the same page. For larger teams, we’ve added user-level security so you can easily assign permissions and keep data private and protected. Enhanced Email Builder and IMAP Integration We’re so excited for Hatchbuck customers to experience our new and improved email builder. We’ve done an overhaul of our Drag and Drop builder to make email creation seamless for all skill levels. You’ll now be able to build eye-catching, professional looking emails without code. Our template library also includes 60 professionally pre-designed email templates that you can make your own to help you reach more customers in a more creative way. Additionally, Hatchbuck v4.0 now offers IMAP integration for Google-hosted email accounts so you can keep track of personal emails without leaving the platform. Rest assured that we’re working hard to open IMAP integration up to other email clients. Smarter, More Flexible Campaigns Campaigns are now cleaner and more streamlined, and we’ve added additional flexibility in campaign timing and scheduling. Our new campaign formatting will allow Hatchbuck customers to improve engagement and increase response rates with their prospects and customers. Say Hello To Company Modules In addition to our traditional contact module, Hatchbuck v4.0 enables you to track companies in order to drive more account-based sales through company modules. We hope you’re excited as we are to experience Hatchbuck v4.0. You can view our full release notes here. If you have any questions about the launch, check out Hatchbuck Help Deck for more information or reach out to our support team at support@benchmarkone.com.
Why The Rebrand? Meet The New Hatchbuck. Posted on April 10, 2017April 10, 2017 by Jonathan Herrick Why the change? We know that change isn’t always easy. Especially when it comes to business. But at some point in almost any business, change is necessary for growth. And so, we’ve done it. We took the plunge on an all-new Hatchbuck, and we’re pretty pumped to tell you about it. As we were taking stock of where our business has been over the last five years (and where it’s headed), we found a common thread. You, the small business owner. You are the hero of our brand, and we wanted to make sure that Hatchbuck 4.0 represents and serves you in every way. No longer is sales and marketing software the hero of the Hatchbuck story. You are. Today, we present you with the all-new Hatchbuck. Our Research Before our rebrand and redesign of the Hatchbuck platform, we did exhaustive research into who our radical buyer is and what it is that they want. We wanted to be sure that we were creating something that would not only bring us more buyers but also meet the needs of our existing ones through the right functions and features. Through the use of Hatchbuck data, social media, website analytics and a large customer survey, we have successfully pinpointed Hatchbuck’s most common promoters (and detractors). Here’s what we found: Hatchbuck’s Ideal Buyer Our radical buyer, Chris, is a self-made small business owner. He (or she) interacts on a personal level with clients and customers and deeply loves building relationships. Our radical buyer strongly prefers owning a small business (rather than working for a large company). Through our customer survey, we discovered that our radical buyer overwhelming agreed that Hatchbuck should focus on a few important and robust features rather than the gamut of fancy tools. Those surveyed claimed to use less than 25% of the features in Hatchbuck’s already pared down platform. Many agreed that they hope to grow their business without scaling (with the help of CRM and marketing automation). Messaging We’ve never wavered from our mission or company values, but this rebrand and our research helped us to more clearly define what it is we do for small businesses. We refocused our story to focus on the small business owner rather than sales and marketing software. We revamped our messaging to connect the small business owner with the Hatchbuck brand. Self-made business owners go to depths that others won’t to capitalize on opportunity. We get it. Hatchbuck makes small business sales and marketing software for you – the adventurer, the risk taker. When it comes to your business, it’s sink or swim. You can’t be anchored down by bulky software. So we promise that no solution is as easy to use or as effective at propelling relationships into sales as Hatchbuck. Hatchbuck. Seize the Opportunity. Logo Our rebranding journey took us to many different corners of the branding universe. We looked at loads of illustrations and logo options until we landed on the Diver. We wanted the new Hatchbuck brand to be completely unique, just like your small business. We also wanted to be sure that our wordmark matched our bold new messaging so we went from the lowercase hatchbuck to a bold new uppercase HATCHBUCK. Color Palette We’ve traded in our mild teal and coral color palette for a bold red-orange and slate blue color scheme augmented by bright blues, magenta and yellow-green accents. Our energetic, vibrant new palette more closely reflects the Hatchbuck brand and story. Nautical Pattern Throughout our branded materials, we’ve incorporated a mix of nautical icons that give a playful nod to Hatchbuck’s ability to help small business owners travel to great depths to seize every opportunity. The App Along with our fresh new brand, we’ve launched an all-new version of the Hatchbuck platform: Hatchbuck v4.0. We dive deeper into our all-new features in our webinar, new features blog post and release notes. Much like our new brand and messaging, we wanted to be sure that the redesign of the app was done with the small business owner in mind. We’ve built an enhanced dashboard and interactive activity feed so you can see all of your sales and marketing statistics at a glance. We’ve also added 60 new professionally pre-designed customizable email templates and 15 start-from-scratch email template options for improved customer communications. The Website You may have noticed that our website went through an overhaul as well. We couldn’t leave the little guy behind in all of the exciting changes. Our site now focuses heavily on the small business owner and how Hatchbuck can help solve sales and marketing pain points. Our homepage now features a real-life Hatchbuck customer and self-made small business owner, Todd Iserman, Owner of STL Rent-a-Box. We’ve carried the new branding through the entire site as well as through all of our resources (email courses, ebooks and templates). In the end it is more than just a rebrand. It’s a renewed focus on our mission: To help you, the self made, make the most of every opportunity. It’s been quite a ride for the Hatchbuck marketing team, and we’re so stoked to hear your thoughts on the all-new and improved Hatchbuck.