<html lang="en" xml:lang="en" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xmlns:cctd="http://www.constantcontact.com/cctd"> <head> <title>A big year coming up</title> </head> <body bgcolor="#FFFFFF" style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #FFFFFF;MARGIN: 10px;"> <div align="left" bgcolor="#FFFFFF" style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #FFFFFF;MARGIN: 10px;"> <img alt=" " height="1" src="http://rs6.net/on.jsp?t=1101160157869.0.1011338752048.0&o=http://ui.constantcontact.com/images/p1x1.gif" width="1"/> <table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="TEXT-ALIGN: left;" width="600"> <tr> <td colspan="1" rowspan="1"> <font color="#000000" face="Verdana,Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif" size="2" style="FONT-FAMILY: Verdana,Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;FONT-SIZE: 10pt;COLOR: #000000;"> <table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="600"> <tr> <td align="center" colspan="1" rowspan="1" valign="bottom"> <img align="right" alt="$Account.OrganizationName" border="0" height="60" src="http://www.customerreferenceforum.com/nav/logo.gif" vspace="2" width="154.2"/> </td> </tr> </table> <div>_____________________________________________________</div> <font color="#000000" face="Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="4" style="FONT-FAMILY: Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;COLOR: #000000;FONT-SIZE: 16pt;"><font color="#FF3300" face="Verdana,Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif" size="3" style="font-family:Verdana,Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:12pt;font-style:italic;font-weight:bold;color:#FF3300;">Reference Point</font></font> <div> <font color="#000000" face="Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2" style="FONT-FAMILY: Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;FONT-SIZE: 10pt;COLOR: #000000;FONT-WEIGHT: bold;">a newsletter for customer reference professionals</font> </div> <font color="#000000" face="Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2" style="FONT-FAMILY: Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;FONT-SIZE: 10pt;COLOR: #000000;FONT-WEIGHT: bold;"><font color="#000000" face="Verdana,Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif" size="1" style="font-family:Verdana,Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:8pt;font-style:normal;font-weight:bold;color:#000000;">DECEMBER 2005</font></font> <div>_____________________________________________________</div> </font> </td> </tr> <tr> <td colspan="1" rowspan="1"> <font color="#000000" face="Verdana,Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif" size="2" style="FONT-FAMILY: Verdana,Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;FONT-SIZE: 10pt;COLOR: #000000;"> <br/> I want to wish you the happiest of holidays. Normally I'd take a month off from the newsletter this time of year, but next year is going to be a big one for customer reference programs and the professionals who run them. Here's why: <p> 1. Net Promoters is set to take off. <br> 2. Project Knowledge Exchange will give reference professionals ongoing access to their peers in the reference community. <br> 3. Our Next Event will take place in mid-March. <p> <p><b>1. Net Promoters? is set to take off.</b></p> <p>And this is huge, because customer reference programs can naturally play a central role in implementing Net Promoters, as SAP's Coleen Kaiser showed at our last event in Boson. Why do I say that Net Promoters is about to take off? Two of the biggest reasons are: </p> <p>(1) Net Promoters guru Fred Reichheld is coming out in February with his long anticipated and definitive book on the subject. It's called "The Ultimate Question.Ó </p> <p>(2) General Electric, perhaps the most widely admired company in the world, has embraced the concept all the way to the top. ÏThe best customer relationship metric I've seen,Ó says GE CEO Jeff Immelt. </p> <p>For those of you w ho want to get your reference program on the radar of senior management, and position it to start making substantial, strategic, measurable impact on firm performance, you need to grasp this concept. We'll show you how, at our next event and throughout the year. I just received a galley proof of Fred's book and will provide a review in our next issue. </p> <p>To see what SAP's reference program is already doing to implement Net Promoters, along with links to previous newsletters I've done on the subject, <a href="http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?t=nveferbab.0.0.qbmzh7n6.0&p=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.customerreferenceforum.com%2F08-05.html">please click here</a>.</p> </p> <p> </p> </font> </td> </tr> <tr> <td colspan="1" rowspan="1"> <font color="#000000" face="Verdana,Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif" size="2" style="FONT-FAMILY: Verdana,Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;FONT-SIZE: 10pt;COLOR: #000000;"> <br/> <b>2. Project Knowledge Exchange will give you ongoing access to your peers in the reference community.</b></p> <p>This is a program we've just kicked off to give reference professionals ongoing access to the incredible knowledge and experience in our growing community of your peers. If you're struggling with a difficult or time consuming issue, we can get fast answers and support for you from our Knowledge Exchange community. This formalizes something we've been doing informally and ad hoc for several months. </p> <p> <p><a href="" name="mark1" style=""></a>Following are examples of how references professionals are saving time and resources, and preventing frustration. </p> </p> <p> <p>One participant wanted to develop marketing collateral using customer references that met certain criteria. In particular, she needed a format that would "give brief descriptions showing how customers use [our] company's solutions. It would be very concise and eye catching. It would have just one customer per page, and the descriptions would be brief and to the point. An electronic version might link to more detailed descriptions. The idea is to let customer references tell the story of what the company does." Rather than spend valuable time and resources developing this from scratch, we forwarded this request to our community of reference professionals, who provided more than a dozen examples of such materials. The result was to dramatically cut the time and cost to develop the collateral.</p> <p>Another customer reference professional needed to come up with a fresh approach to how her program incents customers to participate in the firm's reference program. We put her in contact with the reference manager at another firm who has done exceptional work in developing a customer reference "value proposition" that has dramatically increased the number of their reference customers. As of this writing, they have had one meeting and have another one set for this week. </p> <p>Project Knowledge Exchange is currently helping another one of our participants develop a customer awards and recognition program.</p> </p> <p> </p> </font> </td> </tr> <tr> <td colspan="1" rowspan="1"> <font color="#000000" face="Verdana,Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif" size="2" style="FONT-FAMILY: Verdana,Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;FONT-SIZE: 10pt;COLOR: #000000;"> <br/> <b>3. Our Next Event: mid-March 2006</b></p> <p>Project Knowledge exchange will go live as we provide many ways for you to access and interact with dozens of your peers in the customer reference profession, through round tables, workshops, panels, brainstorming, "ask the group" sessions and more -- in addition to the many networking opportunities we'll provide. And that will be in addition to straight presentations from top leaders in the profession.</p> <p>Here's an early heads up. </p> <b>When: </b>Mid-March, 2006<br> <b>Where:</b> West coast<br> <b>Theme: </b>Project Knowledge Exchange Real Time<br> <p> To access the event website and stay abreast as our Spring 2006 event develops, <a href="http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?t=nveferbab.0.0.qbmzh7n6.0&p=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.customerreferenceforum2006.net">please click here. </a></p> <p> <p>Happy holidays to you all and see you next year!</p> <p>Warmest regards,</p> Bill </p> <p> <font color="#000000" face="Verdana,Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif" size="1" style="font-family:Verdana,Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:8pt;font-style:normal;font-weight:normal;color:#000000;"><i><b>Reference Point</b></i> is a Customer Reference Forum newsletter about reference programs and how to improve them. To subscribe, please contact me (contact information is below or just respond to this email). To unsubscribe at any time, just reply to this email with "unsubscribe" in the subject line. This email list and your name will never be made available to anyone else, not even to others on the list, unless by mutual request and agreement.</font> </p> <p> </p> </font> </td> </tr> <tr> <td colspan="1" rowspan="1"> <font color="#000000" face="Verdana,Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif" size="2" style="FONT-FAMILY: Verdana,Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;FONT-SIZE: 10pt;COLOR: #000000;"> <br/><br/> <font color="#000000" face="Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2" style="FONT-FAMILY: Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;FONT-SIZE: 10pt;COLOR: #000000;FONT-WEIGHT: bold;"> Contact Information </font> <div>_____________________________________________________</div> <div> email: <a color="#000000" href="mailto:bill@customerreferenceforum.com" shape="rect" style="COLOR: #000000;">bill@customerreferenceforum.com</a> </div> <div> web: <a color="#000000" href="http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?t=nveferbab.0.0.qbmzh7n6.0&p=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.customerreferenceforum.com" shape="rect" style="COLOR: #000000;">http://www.customerreferenceforum.com</a> </div> <div>_____________________________________________________</div> </font> </td> </tr> </table> </div> <br/> <table bgcolor="#ffffff" padding="0" width="100%"><tr align="left"><td><table bgcolor="#ffffff" width="595"><tr><td colspan="2"><font face="verdana,arial" size="1"><b><a href="http://ui.constantcontact.com/sa/fwtf.jsp?m=1011338752048&ea=bill@lee-communications.com&a=1101160157869&id=preview" style="color: #0000ff;" target="_blank">Forward email</a></b></font><br/> <br/> </td></tr> <tr><td><font face="verdana,arial" size="1"><FooterContent><a href="http://ui.constantcontact.com/d.jsp?p=un&m=1011338752048&ea=bill@lee-communications.com&t=1101160157869&lang=en&reason=F&id=preview.1011338752048" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="http://img.constantcontact.com/letters/images/safe_unsubscribe_logo.gif"/></a> <div>This email was sent to bill@lee-communications.com, by <a href="mailto:bill@customerreferenceforum.com" style="color:#0000ff;">bill@customerreferenceforum.com</a></div> <div><a href="http://ui.constantcontact.com/d.jsp?p=oo&m=1011338752048&ea=bill@lee-communications.com&t=1101160157869&lang=en&reason=F&id=preview.1011338752048" style="color:#0000ff;" target="_blank">Update Profile/Email Address</a> | Instant removal with <a href="http://ui.constantcontact.com/d.jsp?p=un&m=1011338752048&ea=bill@lee-communications.com&t=1101160157869&lang=en&reason=F&id=preview.1011338752048" style="color:#0000ff;" target="_blank">SafeUnsubscribe</a>&#8482; | <a href="http://ui.constantcontact.com/roving/CCPrivacyPolicy.jsp?id=preview" style="color:#0000ff;" target="_blank">Privacy Policy</a>.</div></FooterContent></font> </td> <td><font face="verdana,arial" size="1"><FooterLogo><div>Powered by</div><a href="http://www.constantcontact.com/index.jsp?cc=news01"><im g border="0" src="http://img.constantcontact.com/letters/images/cc-logo-color-sm.gif"/></a></FooterLogo></font> </td> </tr> <tr><td colspan="2"><font face="verdana,arial" size="1"><br/>Customer Reference Forum | 5665 Arapaho Road | Suite 331 | Dallas | TX | 75248</font> </td> </tr> </table> </td> </tr> </table> <br/> </body> </html>