This blog has finally reached modern day. Wow, I covered 50 years in 2 weeks – the web is really quick.
So here we are with a web based mall of nearly 700 of the nation’s best retailers including over 100 great gift card merchants. In fact, we seem to have built the largest mall on the internet…an accomplishment we are quite proud of.
On the other hand, we at BSP Rewards also understand that we have a long way to go. Although we have built over 50 branded malls for a variety of clients; we did so following the normal rules of engagement - Start with the small and build towards the large with an eye on selling the enormous.
The small was not as easy as it sounds as even the diminutive companies ask the right questions and require answers that they feel will help them grow. Happily, our research and model were on target and sales commenced. Over the following year, we managed to get in front of some larger companies and organizations that “got it” and helped us progress to the middle of the second tier. (You can see a sampling of these branded malls at (www.bsprewards.com.) Just click on the “BSP Network” tab.
You are probably asking what I mean by the statement that we have reached the “middle of the second tier”. Of course I am going to tell you even if you were not curious. It translates to, companies and organizations of nice size that have the “potential” of producing meaningful transaction volume through the mall. Clients like ADP, AIG and member provider organizations such as the AME Church and 5 network marketing companies, additionally we are being layered onto payroll cards for companies such as Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse and Staffmark.
These are all great companies and organizations and are great additions to the smaller companies we work with. These programs have been, or just recently been, launched. The initial results are gratifying but a program of our magnitude takes time, marketing and seasoning to reach the results we stand on our toes for.
The wheel is now cranking and we should be seeing enhanced results by the 4th quarter of this year. When that happens, combined with the successful culmination of new agreements in the pipeline, we will have attained the top rung of the intermediate ladder. That is when the fun begins as we then shoot for the “enormous”.
But again, that is a story for another day.
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Tuesday, August 21, 2007
About Martin Berns.....continued
Before I skip to modern day, I guess I ought to fill in a few blanks of the 40 years that passed since the ‘60s.
I am proud to tell people that I am a CPA. They somehow mistake that for Certified Public Accountant but I immediately explain that CPA stands for Certified Peddlers of America. Nothing happens in this country until something gets sold and it is my lot in life to guide marketing and sales program down the path of triumph.
Being of sound mind in those days, I immediately moved due south from Chicago until I reached South Florida, where I have happily resided ever since. Chicago is still my favorite city on earth and I visit it at least 10 days a year……but never in the winter.
When I moved to Florida in 1959, I opened a Dad’s Root Beer plant with my brother and after 2 years realized that I loved the soda but disliked the life of a bottler. My love was advertising, marketing and “peddling” so I went to work at a radio station selling advertising time. You can imagine how long ago that was. Larry King was one of the local radio personalities and a member of our weekly card club.
After a few years of on the job training I took a position with a small NY advertising agency that wanted to open a branch in Miami. It was my first education into the world of “real advertising” and it was very exciting for a young, would be executive. But after a few years, my entrepreneurial spirit again rose like a Phoenix and I got the notion that I would, and could, open my own little advertising agency. I soon found out that I knew a lot about advertising and marketing but little about business. Luckily, my largest client, a large real estate developer and builder loved the job I had done for him and he asked me to roll my agency into his company and become vice-president of sales. That’s when I really received my active combat training in the world of business.
After doing my time in that industry I again had the urge to branch out on my own and into marketing consulting. Consulting was an easy business to enter if you had a briefcase and an important looking business card. So I became an independent contractor and offered my sage advice to companies involved in a variety of fields ranging from real estate to water conservation programs for rental properties, to network marketing companies, to small corporate America...and then some.
About 7years ago I was introduced to cyberspace and the world of the internet. It was (and is) the most interesting industry that I have ever been involved in. It made me excited just to get up and run to the office (I can not tell a lie, I actually drove). I started consulting and then made the decision to become corporately involved. I founded a web based company that built small (actually miniature) portals for companies who wanted to build traffic and pretend to the world that they were larger than they were. As I pointed out to them, on the web…perception is reality.
During all of that time I never lost the mental link back to the 60s and the loyalty stamp business. I fell into the natural progression of researching the state of the rewards industry and related internet based programs. So about 4 years ago we commenced our quest. We researched, studied, and dissected that which was and was not being addressed in the marketplace. We approached the task from 4 directions- (1) Consumer, (2) Merchant, (3) Membership Organizations and (4) Debit/Credit Card issuers. There were a multitude of companies in the space but no one that fulfilled all of the needs and desires of the 4 participating groups we felt would most guide the market.
We envisioned and built a proprietary platform that included the basics we saw in others, but then added a bevy of additional features and functions that others had not. We tested, tweaked, changed, tested and tweaked again over a period of 2 years. After 2 years we had developed a unique and more robust platform than any other we viewed. Additionally, we could private brand and administer the platform for a fraction of the cost of other companies in the industry. BSP Rewards was thusly born and launched in stealth mode. It was important to stay under the radar until we were in a position not only to complete, but to win the competition.
But again, that is a story for another day...
I am proud to tell people that I am a CPA. They somehow mistake that for Certified Public Accountant but I immediately explain that CPA stands for Certified Peddlers of America. Nothing happens in this country until something gets sold and it is my lot in life to guide marketing and sales program down the path of triumph.
Being of sound mind in those days, I immediately moved due south from Chicago until I reached South Florida, where I have happily resided ever since. Chicago is still my favorite city on earth and I visit it at least 10 days a year……but never in the winter.
When I moved to Florida in 1959, I opened a Dad’s Root Beer plant with my brother and after 2 years realized that I loved the soda but disliked the life of a bottler. My love was advertising, marketing and “peddling” so I went to work at a radio station selling advertising time. You can imagine how long ago that was. Larry King was one of the local radio personalities and a member of our weekly card club.
After a few years of on the job training I took a position with a small NY advertising agency that wanted to open a branch in Miami. It was my first education into the world of “real advertising” and it was very exciting for a young, would be executive. But after a few years, my entrepreneurial spirit again rose like a Phoenix and I got the notion that I would, and could, open my own little advertising agency. I soon found out that I knew a lot about advertising and marketing but little about business. Luckily, my largest client, a large real estate developer and builder loved the job I had done for him and he asked me to roll my agency into his company and become vice-president of sales. That’s when I really received my active combat training in the world of business.
After doing my time in that industry I again had the urge to branch out on my own and into marketing consulting. Consulting was an easy business to enter if you had a briefcase and an important looking business card. So I became an independent contractor and offered my sage advice to companies involved in a variety of fields ranging from real estate to water conservation programs for rental properties, to network marketing companies, to small corporate America...and then some.
About 7years ago I was introduced to cyberspace and the world of the internet. It was (and is) the most interesting industry that I have ever been involved in. It made me excited just to get up and run to the office (I can not tell a lie, I actually drove). I started consulting and then made the decision to become corporately involved. I founded a web based company that built small (actually miniature) portals for companies who wanted to build traffic and pretend to the world that they were larger than they were. As I pointed out to them, on the web…perception is reality.
During all of that time I never lost the mental link back to the 60s and the loyalty stamp business. I fell into the natural progression of researching the state of the rewards industry and related internet based programs. So about 4 years ago we commenced our quest. We researched, studied, and dissected that which was and was not being addressed in the marketplace. We approached the task from 4 directions- (1) Consumer, (2) Merchant, (3) Membership Organizations and (4) Debit/Credit Card issuers. There were a multitude of companies in the space but no one that fulfilled all of the needs and desires of the 4 participating groups we felt would most guide the market.
We envisioned and built a proprietary platform that included the basics we saw in others, but then added a bevy of additional features and functions that others had not. We tested, tweaked, changed, tested and tweaked again over a period of 2 years. After 2 years we had developed a unique and more robust platform than any other we viewed. Additionally, we could private brand and administer the platform for a fraction of the cost of other companies in the industry. BSP Rewards was thusly born and launched in stealth mode. It was important to stay under the radar until we were in a position not only to complete, but to win the competition.
But again, that is a story for another day...
Friday, August 10, 2007
Martin Berns - About
Martin Berns Blog Number 1 8/10/07
Hey, I never blogged before so this should be interesting. I will undoubtedly start out at novice 101 and after many months graduate all the way up to Beta 1.0.
I am not sure how this blog will evolve but my first thought is to just recite a little history as to how I arrived at this place known as MediaNet Group Technologies and BSP Rewards. (With the emphasis on our operating division BSP Rewards).
My family was in the soft drink business (my father was a founder of Dad’s Root Beer) so I naturally became driven to be an entrepreneur myself. Forgoing an explanation of my initial forays into business (and the lessons learned the hard way) my education lead me into the world of marketing consultancy.
Moving along to the early ‘60s I became intrigued with the rewards and loyalty industry. That was at the height of the era whereby licking and pasting stamps in books was all the rage. I was a young marketing consultant at the time looking for niches that might offer opportunity to spread my “I want o be in business” wings.
I was driving in Chicago one day when I came to an intersection that featured service stations on all 4 corners. 3 of those stations gave stamps as a reward and incentive but the one with the Dinosaur logo (Sinclair) stood alone as the sole non-participant. A friend of mine knew a top executive at the company and I asked him to try and ascertain their reasoning for not joining the trend. He came back with a very simple two word answer, “too expensive”. It seemed that they did not want to be involved in a program that was a straight cost with the only verifiable benefit going to the stamp issuer who both sold the stamps and was the redemption center that made the sale and profit. By the way, this is the same ‘upfront cost” redemption and breakage model used today by many rewards and incentive programs (think air miles and catalog/gift card providers).
I then had an epiphany (Of course in those days I had never heard of the word). I then asked my friend make an appointment for me with his oil company executive friend as I wanted to propose something to them that I thought might fit their model. He called and said he had set up the meeting and when I arrived I was shocked to find I was to present to their entire Board of Directors.
I explained the plan. They would give stamps but they would also become the redemption center where the books could be exchanged for their gas and products. They would turn the redeemed books back to us and we would pay them cash for the value of each book. In other words, they became the redemption center, made the sale (at their normal margins), benefited from the redemption traffic and of course up sold additional gas and services to the redeemers. I explained an additional feature of offering the program to local merchants surrounding their stations, again making the stations, along with the local merchants, official redemption centers.
It was the quickest sale I ever made. They immediately understood the benefits and the cost reduction – and possible new revenue and profit generating- and value of becoming a give and redeem merchant/redemption center for the program.
How that evolved into the modern BSP Rewards Mall platform is another story for another day.
Hey, I never blogged before so this should be interesting. I will undoubtedly start out at novice 101 and after many months graduate all the way up to Beta 1.0.
I am not sure how this blog will evolve but my first thought is to just recite a little history as to how I arrived at this place known as MediaNet Group Technologies and BSP Rewards. (With the emphasis on our operating division BSP Rewards).
My family was in the soft drink business (my father was a founder of Dad’s Root Beer) so I naturally became driven to be an entrepreneur myself. Forgoing an explanation of my initial forays into business (and the lessons learned the hard way) my education lead me into the world of marketing consultancy.
Moving along to the early ‘60s I became intrigued with the rewards and loyalty industry. That was at the height of the era whereby licking and pasting stamps in books was all the rage. I was a young marketing consultant at the time looking for niches that might offer opportunity to spread my “I want o be in business” wings.
I was driving in Chicago one day when I came to an intersection that featured service stations on all 4 corners. 3 of those stations gave stamps as a reward and incentive but the one with the Dinosaur logo (Sinclair) stood alone as the sole non-participant. A friend of mine knew a top executive at the company and I asked him to try and ascertain their reasoning for not joining the trend. He came back with a very simple two word answer, “too expensive”. It seemed that they did not want to be involved in a program that was a straight cost with the only verifiable benefit going to the stamp issuer who both sold the stamps and was the redemption center that made the sale and profit. By the way, this is the same ‘upfront cost” redemption and breakage model used today by many rewards and incentive programs (think air miles and catalog/gift card providers).
I then had an epiphany (Of course in those days I had never heard of the word). I then asked my friend make an appointment for me with his oil company executive friend as I wanted to propose something to them that I thought might fit their model. He called and said he had set up the meeting and when I arrived I was shocked to find I was to present to their entire Board of Directors.
I explained the plan. They would give stamps but they would also become the redemption center where the books could be exchanged for their gas and products. They would turn the redeemed books back to us and we would pay them cash for the value of each book. In other words, they became the redemption center, made the sale (at their normal margins), benefited from the redemption traffic and of course up sold additional gas and services to the redeemers. I explained an additional feature of offering the program to local merchants surrounding their stations, again making the stations, along with the local merchants, official redemption centers.
It was the quickest sale I ever made. They immediately understood the benefits and the cost reduction – and possible new revenue and profit generating- and value of becoming a give and redeem merchant/redemption center for the program.
How that evolved into the modern BSP Rewards Mall platform is another story for another day.
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