Fred Wilson at A VC has a post about how some businesses are making money with free services.

Definitely worth a read, and be prepared to do some thinking once you do read it.

I don’t envy the PR folks at Verizon this week.  Their CEO seems to be a clueless wank who says something like this in an interview with a major newspaper:

"Why in the world would you think your (cell) phone would work in your
house?" he said. "The customer has come to expect so much. They want it to
work in the elevator; they want it to work in the basement."

Oh, where to begin. 

groI’m half way through the first day of the Sales Intelligence Summit and I have to tell you that it’s one of the best business events I’ve been to in a while.  You know it’s a good show when the guys taking a bio-break sing its praises over the urinal divider.

The keynoter was Jim Dickie of CSO Insights.  If you are at all interested in sales, the sales process or what differentiates great companies from the rest in terms of sales then you need to check this guy out.  It really was one of the most informative keynotes I’ve heard in years.  While his core audience is people running big Fortune 1000 sales machines, his lessons are of great value to even the smallest company.  He’s also a very good speaker.

Also heard from Dennis Chapman of the The Chapman Group and Dave Roberts of Siebel Systems Users Services.  While both focused on the importance of sales intelligence and the sales process, Dennis spent alot of time on how you can take the subjectivity out of the sales process (make it more measurable) and Dave focused on how you can use sales force automation tools to help your average sales people improve so that they perform more like your star sales people.

Favorite line of the day came from Dave:  "A fool with tools is still a fool."  Of course Dave’s British.

More later.

I’m in Park City, Utah for a couple of days attending the Sales Intelligence Summit.  They were overbooked in the Park City Marriott so they sent me and a couple of other people over to their premier property, Summit Watch, in the heart of town.  And the hotel picked up the tab!

So please hear me when I say this isn’t a complaint.  I mean how can I complain as I sit here in front of a fireplace, in the nicest hotel business center I’ve ever seen, and a view of the mountains to boot?

So say this is an observation that I would gladly share with Mr. Marriott if I were to ever meet him.  I think it’s silly that you’re charging your patrons $20/week for Wi-Fi.  It is so cheap and easy to do that I’m not sure what is gained by it.  There may very well be a good reason, but I have to think that some of the guests feel a little nickle-and-dimed.

Still, what a view!