How Come Martine Makes More Money Than Me?

How to properly utilize local search in small to midsize business

Our company is growing, and that's a good thing. But some parts of the enterprise seem to be growing faster than others. Some departments get new computers while others do without. Some boardrooms are catered, while other kitchenettes go bare - my best friend Kyle just noticed that some floors of the building are not cleaned at night.

Perhaps the whole fiscal structure of our company is warped; every dept must take care of their own expenses and supplies. The divisions that aren't making money, like pay-roll, distribution and building maintenance are ignored by management - these utilitarian subsections of the overall machine don't get much of an operating budget for perks or rewards. But the salesmen and account managers however, and even those slippery bums in the marketing department seem to have unlimited funds. They hold bingo games with real prizes in the lobby every Friday, and host a VIP invitation only boat cruise every summer.

I've seen the numbers; at the heart of the whole mystery is a woman named Martine. She started working here three days after I was hired - we were both recruited from the same college program. But now, two years after we both attended the same training and orientation seminars, Martine is taking home twice as much pay as me! How is this possible? For two years I've worked very hard for this firm, and any such pay check discrepancy seems very unfair to me.

And because I just had to know the answer, I asked a Senior Account Manager.

'How come Martine makes more money than me?'

My boss's boss looked me square in the eye and said, 'Martine does the job of three people. They talk about her in the President's office.'

'Huh?' I stammered.

'She makes the company money.' And then he walked away like that was all the explanation I required.

A few days later I found a memo in my cubby hole that was a copy of a typed report recommending Martine for advancement, again. Page two of the brief was a personal history chronicling in some detail Martine's amazing achievements with our firm - it was an official list of all the incredible things she's done.

Okay, I'll admit her catalog of accomplishments is quite impressive; Martine single-handedly organized a wide variety of new training systems, and instituted some cost saving practices. Basically the woman wrote down or somehow documented everything she ever did at work, and that's good advice for any employee.

But last week I trespassed on the third floor to get paper for our photocopier (because our supply room is barren of course), and I saw Martine in the hall by the elevators. Dressed in a pant suit, she was leading an orientation for a half dozen new recruits. And she smiled at me politely as I passed by...

For some reason I got angry and I walked past the third floor photocopier and its stack of virgin paper, past the well stocked boardroom and the gourmet coffee in their office kitchenette, right past Martine's unguarded cubicle. Of course I would have walked in and looked around, but I could hear her tour coming, and I could hear Martine herself discussing her patented methods of securing merchandise. I listened as they passed...

Martine explained to the new recruits how she uses Poynt, a local search service spawned by Multiplied Media for instant messaging platforms. Poynt is available on the Microsoft® Windows Live™ Messenger platform in Canada and the United States. Poynt is powered by Yellowpages.ca™ for Canadian listings and by Superpages.com® for American listings, with movie listings powered by CinemaSource. This super efficient geographic business data lets Martine accomplish so many things at once (Later I got to the bottom of this mystery at http://www.mypoynt.com. Here's where I learned exactly how she does the job of three people everyday, and how she always comes off looking like such a superhero.

Martine uses one courier to pick up several items at once - this saves time and money. She sends ready made lists with detailed maps and directions to one lucky courier. Because that courier company's invoice only calculates distance traveled, Martine lists the mileage between pick-ups, and the total mileage of the entire trek. This is something that's easy to do with Poynt, and it removes any chance of being over-billed.

I couldn't stop listening, and I soon learned why Martine started hosting Friday afternoon bingo games last year - and how and why this event caught the imagination of the lunch crowd in the neighboring office buildings. To make the marketing event more successful, she used Poynt to find other nearby businesses that would benefit from donating goods and services to the party. More specifically, she uses yellow pages data to get phone numbers, and then calls each proprietor tempting him or her to donate a prize on Friday in exchange for exposure in her weekly Monday newsletter.

Last but not least, I discovered that Martine also uses Poynt to make geographically specific business requests and invitations. Now I know why the much coveted boat cruise invites are always graphically supported by a Microsoft Virtual Earth maps of the harbor. Microsoft Virtual Earth is the map service that Poynt harnesses to cartographically illustrate selected results. Martine modifies the accompanying map to pinpoint exactly where each event is being held, where to park your car, and the closest subway station etc, and it's very slick. This annual boat cruise invitation (and everything else Martine does with poynt@live.com on her MSN contact list) has helped her get promoted twice... no, make that three times!