Many companies don’t do marketing for numerous reasons (budget being the primary reason). However, they do hire salespeople – to close sales, bring in revenue. That’s the job of sales – close deals. Marketing’s job is to develop qualified leads, generate interest in the product, and more.

Recently, my consulting business has seen an increase in interest in Product Marketing, especially for Hosted PBX. Here’s what Gartner says about Product Marketing: “Product marketing is responsible for messaging and positioning, segmentation, competitive intelligence, launches, deal support and many other critical functions.”

The Gartner post continues with marketing’s role in “Making Sales Enablement More Robust”. I did a fair amount of channel sales enablement last year on projects. “Considerable time and effort needs to be put in to ensure that sales can truly add value to their interactions with prospects.” The Value Statement, case studies, customer stories, positioning, and competitive analysis are all ways that marketing can add value to the sales process — or at least provide knowledge to the salesperson to use in sales calls (that are increasingly becoming on-the-spot interviews).

The noise in the market combined with all of the information on the Internet at any buyer’s fingertips 24/7 means that sales has changed. Have you?

September 23rd was a big day last year (2013). It was the day that HITECH privacy and security rules went into effect for the US Healthcare system. Not just healthcare providers and payers but their service providers must be HIPAA and HITECH compliant.

The new rules are from the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act, [pdf of Act] which was actually passed as part of the ARRA Recovery bill. These rules re-define what a Breach is; define what a Business Associate is; and explain how to be compliant on Privacy and Security.

One expert I spoke with, Tim Rearick at University of North Florida, said that these rules for privacy and security are nothing more than best practices for the industry that should have been in place already. Since many have not had to comply until now, many companies have not installed these practices, which include written policies and procedures; formal controls; and formal Disaster Recovery plans. The time, effort and expense to comply are nothing compared to the result of an audit by the Office of Civil Rights.

The OCR has fined Wellpoint $1.7 million; and Cignet Health of Prince George’s County, MD $4.3 million, just name 2 incidents.

The Security rules were written to address every size organization, says Rearick, from the one-or-two physician office to Mayo Clinic and Blue Cross. The had to be generic, technology neutral and scalable – and they had to be non-specific because technology changes fast.

What does this mean for you?

As a service provider, of efax, voicemail, data storage, or even file-sharing (like Sharepoint), you will need to be compliant with the HIPAA and HITECH rules plus supply a Business Associate Agreement to the healthcare company.

Huh? Why? eFax stores the document before it makes it a PDF – and usually after as well. Sharepoint and any document file-share or data storage service can have electronic PHI (protected health information). Voicemail also can contain ePHI. As a provider of such services, you have to be compliant and supply the healthcare org with a BA Agreement, that spells out the role and responsibilities of each party. HITECH extended this privacy and security responsibility to all service providers.

If you have questions, I suggest you speak with a healthcare compliance officer or a HIPAA expert.

Some good info: HealthIT.gov

HIPAA Survival Guide video

The new FCC Chair, Tom Wheller, let the new Chairman of Sprint (Clearwire, Softbank, Sprint, Nextel combo company) know that a merger with T-Mobile won’t fly. That leaves the door open for DISH Network to make a move on T-Mobile.

In E-Rate news, FCC doubled the money for school broadband to $2 Billion.

“FCC chairman Tom Wheeler said Wednesday he planned to issue a public notice on revamping the E-Rate program, including how to phase out low-band legacy service as the fund is migrated to a focus on high-speed connections….Wheeler said there was no bigger priority for the commission than to insure schools and libraries got high-speed connections, and gave commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel credit for being a leading advocate for focusing the program on speed.” Reports B&C mag.

I know quite a few service providers chasing E-Rate. At the FISPA meeting in Nashville on 2/19-21, there will be sessions and discussions about E-Rate. Also, don’t forget to chase Rural Healthcare as well.

” In August, US Metropolitan Telecom, LLC announced that it was acquired by Summit Vista Inc, a US based wholly-owned subsidiary of Cable Bahamas Ltd. Since the announcement, the company has merged with three other entities including Marco Island Cable, NuVu, and Summit Broadband of Orlando. Over the next 60 days the entities will do business under the brand name Summit Broadband.” That’s the summary. Summit used to be Orlando Telephone Company.

I have no idea what happened to the US MetroTel assets. The merger also explains why the fiber map is 404.

The press release explains more:

“Thursday August 15, 2013 (Bonita Springs, FL) – US Metropolitan Telecom, LLC is pleased to announce that FiberCon Holdings, LLC, the holding company for US Metro, has executed an agreement to sell 100% of the stock to Summit Vista Inc, a U.S. based wholly-owned subsidiary of Cable Bahamas Ltd. The transaction closed on August 15, 2013. This transaction comes just ahead of the proposed transactions where Summit Vista will acquire the stock of Marco Island Cable, NuVu, and Summit Broadband of Orlando. The three transactions will consolidate the Florida business operations of US Metro, Marco Island Cable, its affiliate NuVu LLC, and Summit Broadband to form a world-class provider of telecom, TV, and broadband services, doing business under the brand name Summit Broadband.

Marco Island Cable was the first cable operation in Collier County to deliver digital television, High Definition, and two-way broadband internet services. Under its NuVu brand, Marco Island Cable has been a technology leader with the first fiber-to-the-home solutions delivered by a franchise operator in Southwest Florida. The company provides services to nearly 15,000 households in Collier County alone.

Summit Broadband (formerly Orlando Telephone Company) is a facilities-based communications provider with over 25,000 telephone, internet, and cable television customers in the greater Orlando market. The merger of these entities, along with the backing of a strong public company like Cable Bahamas, will … blah, blah …. With over $112 Million in revenues in 2012, Cable Bahamas is well positioned for expansion into the Florida market. The company will support the merged US Metro, Marco Island Cable, NuVu, and Summit Broadband entities by initially investing more than $90 Million to connect and grow the first phase of its U.S. footprint.”

That explains a little about where some companies went. Gerard Sola and Frank Mambuca are still with Summit.

Last week, Mojo Marketing and I gave another session on Doubling Sales. Seven of those tips were recorded by TMC’s Carrie Majewski here.

Here are three keys to boosting sales.

Train. Get better at all facets of sales – from negotiating to prospecting to closing to networking. Learn about the products you offer. Talk to customers about how they interact with your products.

Know who benefits most from your products (target them). Flipside, know who profits least – and ignore them. A warm body is not the same a s a warm lead. Tell a story about your unique value proposition.

Too Little Time, Too Much To Do. Sales is a function of time. Put everything on your calendar – so you remember to do it and so that it gets done. There is too much to do today. Eliminate the waste where you can. Get better at closing and prospecting – and you will save time overall. It takes just as long to close a small sale as a larger one.

Inspired this morning by Nicholas Bates post.