Don't Judge a Book by its Cover

Particularly when it's a draft and it's ugly. 

Every once in a while, I write a newsletter that's true, but a bit on the lighter side.  About things like weenies, hype, and hamster-ware. Sometimes I write articles that address serious issues in a whimsical way, like 10 dirty secrets, where have all the marketers gone, and the parallels between top performing sales teams and the Oakland A's baseball team.

Well, it's August, and I've reached the 2/3 mark in writing my book.  As promised, I'm giving you another content excerpt...  but this isn't one of those dull chapter snippets.  This time, I want to give you a different way of seeing what's in store...
or what will be in stores...

DO Judge a Book by its Footnotes

In a best-practices book on Sales Force Automation from a major publisher, things are supposed to be serious.  But that doesn't mean it has to be dry.  I've been sneaking in as much fun as I can into the nooks and crannies where editors don't look carefully.  At some point, they may catch me and chop out some of the fun ... but so far, so good.  For example, in the footnotes I've been able to squeeze in some goodies.  I'll let you imagine what's going on in the main text that has footnotes like these:

• Their sales reps hate me when I say this.
• Their sales reps love it when I say this.
• Awards for adoption metrics that are meaningless are about as lame as the ones for “tidiest office cube” or “most recycled coffee cups.”
• You should be so lucky if this is what the sales reps are actually doing.  The browser history of sales folks – particularly those who work from home – represents a freak-show that you really don’t want to know about.
• “Buy now or we break-a you face” does not count as subtle.  Except in the NY/NJ area.
• You don’t want to create duplicate species do you?  What kind of creation would that be?
• You don’t want to do the flood all over again.  Learn from Yahweh’s mistakes, would you?
• This, of course, is the ultimate lightning rod for Sales reps who are worried about being micromanaged, caught at the strip club, or both.  The only way to allay these fears is to clearly and consistently demonstrate that you’re not micromanaging them or trying to catch them at the strip club – no matter how much you might want to.
• Not even if somebody dies?  NOT EVER.
• To my international readers, I apologize for this slight against the citizens of Bologna, Italy.  But you have to admit that Bugati, Maserati and Lamborghini – the city’s most famous marques – have been about as reliable at forecasting as they have at manufacturing.
• This cannot be accomplished without a good deal of magic provided by consultancies, the best of which professional decorum and modesty prevent me from naming here.
• Although I try to be gender-neutral in this book, knuckleheads are always male.  Ditz is the female form, but I haven’t found a situation to use that in this chapter.
• Sounds dirty, doesn’t it?  Wipe that from your mind.
• The BPM purists are sure to object to this line of discussion, but let’s face it – they’re boring.  The author believes that their books are much duller than this one.
• Visits by SEC investigators are not happy occasions.
• In the immortal words of Brian Biles, "This new product has a number of advanced features -- zero is, after all, a number."
• Generally speaking, the difference between marketing and sales people is their relative strength of IQ vs. EQ.  Marketers love to think (about selling) for a living.  Sales people love to actually sell for a living.
• Sales folks are good at hiding information from the customer, their subordinates, and most of all the boss.
• This is cleaning up the Cuyahoga river so that Lake Erie can be brought back to life.
• Some people might say they’re lazy, but we’d never put that in print.

If that's what's going on in the footnotes, imagine what's happening in the text.  Actually, you don't have to imagine.

You can get the "rough cut" version of the book right now at this Safari link.  If you sign up to the rough cut program, you get access to the content months before anyone else, and you get a nice discount off the printed book when it ships next spring.  Here are the chapter titles (the first five are available now, the next five in a few weeks, and the last bits in December):

1. Planning Ahead -- making the buying decision and getting resources allocated
2. Reports and Data -- designing the user interface and the data model
3. Preparing your Data -- data cleansing, conversion, and migration
4. Implementation Strategy -- using Agile methods to deliver business value fast
5. People and Organizational Readiness -- introducing the SFA Maturity Model™
6. Working the Politics -- success means handling the political and people issues
7. Products you will Need -- what AppExchange products will your SFDC system need?
8. Improving Business Processes -- SFDC can streamline and automate key workflows
9. Best Practices in Sales -- from the sales admin to the VP, what's the best way?
10. Best Practices in the Executive Suite -- key behaviors for corporate success
11. Best Practices in Marketing -- for field marketing, product marketing, PR, and the VP
12. Best Practices in Customer Support -- optimizing the post-sale processes
13. Best Practices in Legal and Finance -- contracts, controls, and compliance
14. Best Practices in IT -- yes, the IT department does get involved in SaaS applications

We hope you enjoyed this month's excerpt, and will get back on a more serious track next month.

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Chapter Excerpt -- coming in September

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