Small Business Success

Social Bookmarking Simplified

This next video from Common Craft explains "social bookmarking."

Social Networking Simplified

This next video from Common Craft explains "social networking."

Blogging Simplified

I ran across a great site called Common Craft. They create short and very easy-to-understand videos on a variety of online subjects such as blogging, bookmarking, social networking, etc.

I decided not to re-invent the wheel and instead provide you with a few of these videos here. If you'd like to see everything Common Craft has, head on over to their site and check it out.

This video gives a great explanation of blogging. If you're new to blogging or if you'd just like to see how a video slide show can explain what blogging is, here you go...

Networking and Schmoozing

I just read a superb post by Guy Kawaski, entitled The Art of Schmoozing. Guy makes several excellent points including:

1. The key is to establish a relationship before you need it.
2. A reference to what he considered the world's best definition of schmoozing: "Discovering what you can do for someone else."

I could throw some more praise out there on Guy's post, but a better recommendation is to head over and give it a read. I also recommend subscribing to his blog!

Enjoy!

A Simple Way to Recharge Your Executive Batteries

Now, I don't know what your routine work day is like, but if you spend a good deal of it on the phone or in front of the computer, you can get somewhat strained. Strained physically and mentally. You can feel almost "smaller" or "scrunched."

Here is a simple, but very effective remedy. In an earlier post, I gave one idea that has proven successful for many people. This idea is a variation on that theme.

Go somewhere where there are LOTS of people. A mall. Train station. Barnes and Nobles cafe (my choice). For 15 or 20 minutes just look at people. Now I didn't say "stare" — simply look at other people. Notice what they're wearing, notice when they smile or frown. Notice the flow of communication between people. Just simply observe other people. If you do this for awhile, you'll actually feel considerably less "scrunched." You may also feel better about people!

When your work environment is you and the telephone or you and the computer screen, you can develop a "scarcity" on other people. Real people, that is, not the people in the videos on Yahoo's home page. Going out and just observing other people can have a very therapeutic effect on remedying this scarcity. And your executive batteries may feel quite refreshed 15, 20 minutes later.

Try it...it just might work!

Marketing Online

There are millions upon millions of web sites out there. In an earlier post we talked about those remaining businesses that do not have a web site and what may be holding them back from having one.

But let's say you've got a nice web site up and running and not much is happening with it. You've spent some hard earned dollars to have it designed and you've tried a few things to get it producing new business for you, but so far not much joy.

What to do?

From the research I've done so far, there are a few basics to this game of marketing online:

1. Find out what your prospects/customers really need and want from you.
2. Make it very clear on your web site that you provide this.
3. Provide a healthy dose of helpful content on your site. A sales-only page may generate some immediate sales, but is it the type of web site that people will return to?
4. Offer a newsletter and collect the names and email addresses of people interested in the newsletter. Some people find it very successful to give something away free (perhaps an eBook or collection of articles) in exchange for the person signing up for your newsletter. I recommend AWeber as a web site to help you with automating the whole process of collecting email addresses, sending out newsletters, etc. And I recommend Alexandria Brown's materials to help you with creating and promoting a newsletter.
5. Get some kind of dialogue going with your prospects and customers. Provide some way for them to ask you questions, either through an online form, email, or even live chat. The more you are in communication with them, the more likely they will do business with you.

Those are some basic items. There are other things that you can do that are a bit more involved, but I'd prefer to keep it simple and basic for now:

• Find out what people want.
• Let them know you provide it.
• Give them helpful information.
• Grow a mailing list and mail to it.
• Start a dialogue.

Basics.

They always work.

The Fair Tax Updated

In an earlier post, the importance of the Fair Tax was discussed in some detail. That's a good post to read if you haven't seen it yet.

Cutting to the present, we are eight months or so away from a major election. Not just a president will be elected, but every seat in the House of Representatives is up for grabs as well as 33 seats in the Senate. Many governor and state positions are also on the ballot. This will be a huge election.

The idea of ALL forms of income tax being eliminated; with no IRS; no April 15th tax filing day; no preoccupation with how to do something in our lives based on how much tax we'll pay — the idea of ALL of this (and much more) being replaced with a fair national sales tax that will dramatically improve this country's economy — this idea has grown tremendously since The FairTax bill was introduced in Congress a few years ago.

With so much on the line, it is not a surprise that there are critics of this method of collecting taxes. It is my belief critics fall into one of two categories:

1. Those who have a vested interest in keeping the 67,000 pages of the IRS Tax Code around. They receive some kind of benefit keeping the current system in place.
2. Those who have not taken the time to find out exactly what The FairTax is.

For those who fall in the second category, read the first book that came out on this extremely important subject: The Fair Tax Book: Saying Goodbye to the Income Tax and the IRS. Don't listen to what I'm telling you. Don't listen to what others are telling you. Read and examine the information directly. Then come to your own conclusion.

For those who fall in the first category, well, my asking you to read up on this may fall on deaf ears. Nevertheless, I recommend you read the follow-up book: FairTax: The Truth: Answering the Critics. If you give this book a thorough read and have a reason NOT to implement this tax system, please leave a comment here for all to see.

If you're familiar with the FairTax, you understand why I am posting about it on a blog entitled "Small Business Success." The advantages to a small business owner with the FairTax in operation are enormous.

You can also go to the FairTax web site and find out more. This method of collecting taxes will come about. It's only a matter of whether it's in time...

The Power of Your Vote

Voting is a statement that you care, that you choose to be involved, that you prefer responsibility over apathy. These happen also to be qualities essential to a successful business.

Seth Godin put together a nice post on this subject. I like a guy who doesn't pull any punches but doesn't pound you into the turf while doing so.

Get out there today and vote!

If You Don't Have a Web Site...

If you don't have a web site yet, you probably fall into one of the following categories:

1) You firmly believe your product or service would not be benefited by a web site.

2) You'd like to have a web site of some kind, but you're worried it'll cost too much or simply not be a good return on your marketing dollars.

3) You're a bit intimidated by the technical issues involved with getting a web site going.

I have to admit, there was a time I didn't think a local retailer would be well-served to invest in a web site. And then I started looking up some of my local stores, restaurants, etc. and I was much more inclined to do business with the stores that had some kind of web presence. So, for the purposes of this post, let's talk about the local retailer with a storefront.

What kind of web page should you have? Well, my local pizzeria had a few simple pages on its web site. The home page had a pleasing picture of a hot pizza (can you tell I like pizza?), it had the address and phone number. And a simple road map makes it easy to get there.

A couple of pages inside the web site listed the menu items. Very handy and good to know.

If they were having any specials that week, these would most likely be on the home page.

And in some cases, a request for your email address if you wanted to be kept abreast of specials or new menu items, that type of thing.

A web site of this kind is actually very easy to set up and should NOT cost that much. If someone wants to charge you thousands for this kind of web site, thank them and move on. You can find folks in your local area that will put together a simple site like this for a few hundred dollars.

The person who puts your site together could also educate you on how to make very simple changes to the site YOURSELF. Yes, you heard that correctly. No matter how technology-averse you may be, making minor text changes to a web site is very simple. So when you have new specials to promote, you don't need to call the web guy, you can do them yourself.

You might call over to the community college where classes are being given on web design and see if you can get one of the more advanced students to put your site together for a very reasonable price.

This is NOT rocket science.

You've got a shoe store? You're a mom and pop? A simple web site can be very helpful. You may not get customers rushing in directly from your web site, but having a web site is another method of being in front of your customer and prospective customer. As weeks and months roll by, more and more people go to the net to find out where they should shop.

If you're being asked to pay more than $15-20 a month to host this kind of web site, keep looking. (Hosting a web site is simply the place where all of the files are kept and displayed when visitors come to your site)

Here's another idea. Write down the names of 5 or 10 of the retail stores around you. Head to your computer and see if they have a web site. If you like the looks of their site, call the owner and ask him who designed the site and who do they use to host the site. Ask him if he's happy with the service and ask him what it cost. Almost always, owners are willing to help other owners.

All things considered, I definitely recommend you get a simple site up and running. It CAN be done inexpensively and it WILL be a positive point of promotion for your store.

Feel free to bookmark this post

Substituting Machines for People

As I type this, I'm on hold with Delta Airlines. When I first called, I simply wanted to talk to one of their reps and get a couple of fast questions answered about traveling over Thanksgiving.

You're given the option of speaking to a real person by saying the word "representative" into the phone, but before you can get to this person, you have to speak (slowly and clearly) where you're flying from, where you're flying to, what date of departure and what date of return. The machine mistakes my departure date for another month and comes back with they can't book my flight because it's not within the next 367 days (or some large figure like that). I try and try (by pushing "0" and saying the word "representative") and finally I'm moved on to a real person.

But not before waiting another 15-20 minutes.

Delta had the only non-stop flights for this trip I was considering, so I waited this out. If another airline had a non-stop flight, I definitely would not have waited it out and Delta would've lost a paid passenger.

All in all, I understand the big airlines need to cut costs. And of course having a machine (or a web site) handle their reservations saves them the expense of paying staff. And if most (or possibly all) of the airlines are using an automated system to deal with their most valuable commodity (their customers) then I can see how they would justify using it throughout. The logic goes from Delta execs: well, we're not really going to lose customers because of automating our interaction with our customers because the other airlines are doing it too.

And maybe that logic works for the big airlines and large corporations. But do you really think so? Who wants to be handled by a robot that sometimes hears what you say but often does not correctly hear you.

The moral of this story is simple. The less you interact directly with your customers and the more you put answering machines, automated tellers, automated phone systems in place to deal with your public, the more likely you'll see a percentage of your customer base erode away. You may think you can handle a much larger number of people with the automated approach and you may be right. But you may also be losing some quality customers who will not be eager to speak highly of your company and possibly just the opposite.

I do realize we're moving ever closer to machines doing more and more of our work. But when you put them between your company and your customers, especially new customers, I think the downside is greater than most people can immediately observe.

If someone wants to speak to a real person at your company, I recommend highly you make it VERY, VERY EASY for them to do so. And FAST.

Feel free to bookmark this post

A Legitimate Solution to the Steroids Problem

Today I wrote a letter to the Commissioner of baseball, Bud Selig. I sent a copy of the letter to Don Fehr, the Executive Director of the Baseball Players Union. I also sent a copy to various media points.

In this letter, I give a real and legitimate solution to baseball's steroid problem, a problem that is also prevalent in other sports and apparently at all levels (college, high school, even earlier).

This letter is about solving a problem in baseball but it also presents a concept that could have application in any size business. I'll comment on this after the letter itself.

Reciprocal Marketing

You scratch my back. I'll scratch yours. A time-honored philosophy that very definitely applies to marketing your business.

If you're a retailer, place some brochures on your check-out counter for other retailers. They of course will have your brochures on their check-out counter. Or maybe you have a bulletin board for this kind of thing.

If you send out monthly invoices, include a promotional piece for another business that you would like to send your clients to. You've arranged with this business to do the same with their monthly billings.

Then there's simple word-of-mouth. If a customer comes to you and needs a product or service that you do not offer, tell them to go see "so and so" and ask them to tell "so and so" that YOU sent them their way. Whether you have a reciprocal relationship formally in place here is not necessarily crucial. Doing this enough times should and often does bring new business to you.

An example of this came to me today via email. A blog that reviews other blogs sent me a link to their site in which they wrote a nice review for the blog you're now reading. I was asked to link back to them and after looking at other reviews on their blog, I agreed.

Helping others out isn't just a morally correct thing to do, it makes very good marketing sense.

Not My Responsibility!

Every so often, I like to spend an hour or so at my local Barnes and Nobles or Borders bookstore. I can be seen enjoying a mocha or caramel Frappacino while typing away at my laptop. Okay, if you must know, I'm at one of these fine establishments 4-5 times a week. Now I am an author, so I do browse around the bookstores to see what's new and exciting in both the fiction and non-fiction world, so that justifies the numerous trips, right?

But the purpose of this post is not to confess the number of iced coffees I'm having (although I do feel better having done so). The purpose of this post is to relay to you an experience I just had at one of these bookstores. As I come inside, I see some papers flying around on the sidewalk just in front of the bookstore. I look to the right and there's a trash can overflowing with trash. The tiniest bit of wind is blowing the trash off of the top and onto the sidewalk. Two other customers on their way inside notice the trash and are not all that thrilled with trash blowing around them while they enter the store.

Now, me being endowed with large amounts of care for other business owners, I do the only thing I know should be done here: I go inside and find the Information Desk to report this matter to the staff. There are three staff there at this time. I mention the problem and the first response comes from one of the guys: "It's not our problem. The complex handles it." A few seconds later, one of the other staff says: "No way our problem!"

I look at both of them to see if they are kidding me. Once assured they aren't, I simply say: "Oookay." (yes the "o" part of the "okay" was drawn out somewhat, thereby communicating a slight degree of disbelief)

I walk over to the cafe, order my caramel-flavored iced coffee (quite delicious), and now I'm bloggin' on this interesting tidbit.

Yes, I understand "THE COMPLEX" is responsible for taking care of the trash just outside of the bookstore. I get that. But when two staff tell me (both fairly assertively) that it's NOT their problem that trash is blowing around right at the entrance to their establishment, they are essentially telling me that it's not their problem if customers are presented with an immediately negative experience just as they enter the bookstore.

If you're thinking that this incident wouldn't even have made it into Customer Service 101, you're right. This is just simple common sense. People have two choices in this town: Barnes and Nobles and Borders. They are pretty darned similar, with slightly different "rewards" programs and different brands of coffee in their cafes. With all things pretty equal, some folks just may not like to have trash flying around on their way into a store. They may not like to see trash overflowing ESPECIALLY if it's still overflowing when they come out of the store.

Too be completely fair, one of the staff did also say: "I guess I could go out there and pick up the trash." So, let me go and check. Hmm. The trash can is still overlfowing.

Okay, here's the basic bottom line on this: If this was a store with a small business owner and I had made it known to the owner that trash was overflowing and flying around the entrance to his store, he very well might be upset that "THE COMPLEX" wasn't doing their job, but he also would've most likely said to me: "Thanks for letting me know. I'll take care of it." And he most likely would've taken care of it in five minutes or less.

The difference? One response displays a missing "care factor" and the other response includes that quality of caring what people are experiencing, REGARDLESS OF WHOSE RESPONSIBILITY IT IS.

What IS the responsibility of everyone working in a business is HOW the business is perceived and doing whatever can be done to improve the experience of every prospect and customer. When that level of care is present throughout a business, all kinds of good things happen.

Good Manners — A Lost Art for Some

It seems I forgot to pick up a couple of shirts at a local dry cleaner. I still had the claim checks, though they seemed like they might be from a few months back. So I headed over and presented my two claim checks. The lady behind the counter told me my claim checks were NOT from their dry cleaner. Another lady working off to the side looked at the claim checks and assured me, "these are NOT our claim checks."

I went home and threw the claim checks away, but noticed the number 9066 on one of them. This was last week.

Yesterday, there's a message on my home answering machine: "We've been doing some inventory and there's a shirt here from you. We've had it for quite awhile. Come on in and get it. The number is 9066."

I now realize I've thrown away the other claim check and I didn't know its number. So I call and explain that I was in last week with THE claim check that corresponded with the message left on my machine. That I was a bit upset because I had come by with that same claim check and was told it was NOT one of theirs. And that I had another claim check and now that was thrown away.

Her response floored me: "We just don't keep the same claim checks for very long. Do you know how long it would take to find one item on our rack of clothes? We have every right to throw a shirt away after 30 days."

After a barrage of how they knew what they're doing and my coming by and presenting THEIR claim check didn't mean anything to her, I concluded I was lucky that one of my shirts was found and that I needed to end the call and move on.

And we all know the outcome to this story: I'll be looking elsewhere to take my dry cleaning business. They lose a few bucks next week when I don't bring in my next order, but over the span of a few years considerably more.

How much does effort does it take to drum up a bit of good manners? Sometimes the make and break of a lost customer or a client that doesn't come on board is simply that: good manners.

More Lessons from the World of Sports

I love sports. I loved playing baseball, football, basketball, even soccer. When I was a bit younger, I was pretty good. But I still immensely enjoy watching a Stanley Cup playoff, some March Madness, a really tight World Series.

I enjoy many of the things most spectators enjoy: the competition, the intensity, the passion to win, and of course watching extremely talented people do incredibly talented things.

But I also enjoy other key aspects of the game. I like to pay attention to the fine points of winning, the small details. What is very intriguing is watching how two or more players will work together to make something happen (score a basket, a goal, etc.). For example, in sports like hockey, basketball and soccer, a great deal of importance is placed on the ability to PASS the ball (or puck). There are players who derive greater satisfaction from a precisely-delivered pass than from actually scoring. Seasoned basketball fans are awed by the combination of a fantastic pass culminating in a score. I certainly am.

A game is played to win. In order to win, individual players blend their skills and their actions with other players. Teams made up of JUST individuals, even those highly talented, often fail against teams composed of people who work hard on working together.

The next time you watch a well-played game, observe the degree of teamwork on both teams. Look for the subtle details and you'll see some really exciting give-and-take that you might not ordinarily see.

The more a group of people works together as a team, the more that group gets done and the easier it is to get things done. This is true in sports and of course is true in the business world.

Knowing the Score Can Make a Big Difference

In an earlier post, I mentioned a book by John Naisbitt: Mind Set! Reset Your Thinking and See the Future. In reading his book, I recall agreeing wholeheartedly with his love of sports.

At the end of the game, it's absolutely clear who won, who lost and you can look over the boxscore and see how everybody did. This guy got two hits and struck out once. This guy scored a goal and was involved in two penalties. This player had 18 points and 12 rebounds. I apologize if the sports terminology I'm using is not understandable to everyone, but the main point is this: you can tell exactly what happened. There is really not much left to opinion. The big star either came through and scored a lot of points or he didn't.

In a business, one certain way to weaken your chances for expansion and success is to rely solely on opinion. When an employee comes up to the boss and tells her that "Bob isn't really getting his job done" and the boss operates on that information, that is a recipe for disaster. Check out Bob's area very carefully. He may be getting an awful lot done, but perhaps he stepped on a couple of people's toes while doing so. If you manage a business on opinion alone, you can end up getting rid of productive staff and rewarding other staff who are not very productive.

What's the best way to manage WITHOUT relying on opinion? Statistics. Figure out what each position should be producing and then measure that production with a statistic. At the end of every week (or whatever period of time is significant for your business) collect up these statistics. Post them so everyone can see them. And then manage the business on what people are ACTUALLY producing.

Give this a try.

If you'd like some help on managing your business on statistics, email me.

Reducing Stress at Work 101

Do you work for hours and hours without a single break from the action? Do you have your lunch brought in so you can eat it at your desk while checking your email? Have you been seen with a phone in one hand, the mouse in the other AND wishing you had a third hand?

Well, first of all, let me say I admire your intensity and desire to be incredibly productive. And here's a very simple tip to help you stay at top speed day in and day out:

Take a break.

Not a long one. But a real one. LEAVE the office. Go for a walk. Visit a local store or two. Go to a bookstore in the middle of the afternoon. Simply breaking off and extroverting your attention onto something (almost anything) NOT work-related will actually make it easier for you to maintain that very high level of non-stop action at work.

This break could be ten or fifteen minutes or even longer. Taking your attention OFF of work for a brief spell and putting it elsewhere will help you keep your attention intensely focused for long periods of time. You may be thinking to yourself: WHEN does this guy think I'm going to find 10, 15 minutes or more in the middle of my packed work day? Well, we both know the answer to that one. Every one of us decides what we're going to do with our time, every single minute of it.

Give it a try for a few days. Take some time off in the middle of the work day and put your attention on something OUTSIDE of work.

This could work wonders for you.

Customer Evangelism — When It Works, It Really Works!

I'm reading another very interesting book: Creating Customer Evangelists: How Loyal Customers Become a Volunteer Sales Force. The authors tell us something we've known for awhile, but perhaps haven't really taken full advantage of:

"The marketing world has changed dramatically since the advent of the 21st century. Technology has leveled the playing field to make quality less of a competitive difference. ...product and service levels have nearly evened out, as have price advantages. We're drowning in a sea of media and information overload. In a world with so much choice, how do people make decisions? By relying on trusted friends, colleagues, or family members."

The book goes on to show how various businesses of different sizes have expanded tremendously by the actions of their CUSTOMERS. Some of this we know of as "word-of-mouth." But in some cases, it went far beyond word-of-mouth to a "customer evangelism." In these cases, you have customers promoting the living daylights out of your business. They'll do it a variety of ways, but they are so in love with what you do and how well you treat them, they take customer loyalty to the max.

Are your customers going out of their way to promote you and your business? If not, whatever time you spend helping this activity along is time very well spent.

Good Clients and Bad Clients...

Now that's a bit of a strange title for a post. If a client is a client, then how could there be a "bad" client?

Perhaps using the adjective "bad" is not quite appropriate, but when you have a client that makes unreasonable demands on your time, who rarely follows the advice you provide, complains about a variety of things (most or all quite petty) and then doesn't pay on time, this is not a "high-quality" client.

This kind of client doesn't follow your advice because they have extremely "special" circumstances that need inordinate amounts of personal attention and even then, things just don't work out. At times like these, you may start doubting your ability to produce a good result. You decide to try even harder with this client, because you have a high level of integrity and you want everyone you work with to succeed.

Let me offer another viewpoint: this client (and others like him/her) are making it more and more difficult for you and your staff to deliver to others. Your time AND attention gets locked up in these apparent failures and you have less time AND attention to devote to other clients. I emphasize the word "attention" because that's exactly what happens. Business owners have just so much attention available in a given production day and when a good chunk of that attention is fixated on a very small number of people who are very difficult to work with, well, the bottom line suffers.

What would happen if you let those clients go, phased them out, perhaps even gave them their money back and then had all kinds of time and attention available to creating a more ideal client? You may find yourself with many more ideal clients than before. Ideal clients are clients you WANT to work with: they listen, they follow your advice, they pay on time, and yes, they want you to succeed too. More ideal clients not only add up to a more profitable activity, they also bring a breath of fresh air and sanity for you and your staff.

John Jantsch, in his new book Duct Tape Marketing: The World's Most Practical Small Business Marketing Guide, goes into this subject of an "ideal client" in much more detail.

I'm not advocating you just outright dismiss clients who are challenging to your business. I'm suggesting you look around and see if you have a handful of clients (customers, patients, etc.) who just take up way too much time and energy and therefore reduce your ability to promote and deliver to others. They also seem to drain the life out of you and/or your staff. If that's happening, then consider the option presented above. It just might work...

A Couple of Excellent Books

Two books I'd like to recommend:

Leadership by Rudy Giuliani

Mind Set! Reset Your Thinking and See the Future by John Naisbett

Rudy Giuliani of course was the Mayor of New York City from 1994 to 2002. And John Naisbett, you may recall, authored the bestselling "Megatrends" back in 1988.

There is a very interesting similarity in both of these books. In "Leadership", Giuliani details out how he accomplished significant positive change in New York City during his eight years as Mayor. Giuliani considers his implementation of an 'accountability system' an essential element in this positive change. To break this down to a very simple statement: virtually every department of city government was given a set of statistics. These stats were then plotted, analyzed and important management decisions were based on these stats.

When you make business decisions using statistics, you push aside rumor and opinion, both potential business destroyers.

John Naisbett's new book lays out eleven different "mindsets" that he believes give you the best chance of understanding current events and predicting what will happen in the future. Fascinating stuff. One of these mindsets he simply calls "Focus on the score of the game." And what he means by this is KNOW what the actual facts are in any given situation. Don't be swayed by hype or rumor and opinion. He gives a number of examples of how important events in our lives can (and have been) distorted and how this leads to making very bad decisions.

I heartily recommend both books. They both provide intriguing new perspectives on running a business of any size.

If You're Using a Mac, Then Here's a Great Tool to Reduce Spam

I've been using Macs for over 20 years. I could go on and on why I think so highly of them, but right now I just want to let you know of a software item that can GREATLY reduce the amount of spam you get.

It's very easy to install and use. You do a bit of "training" to let it know what's good mail on your system and what's not, but after that it is VERY powerful in getting the spam out of your life.

Click here to get more info on this item. It costs a whopping $30 and it's registered to each user so if you've got 2 or 3 (or more) Macs, you can use it on all of them. I do not receive any commission for referring this product to you and, at $30, I'd prefer the author get the full amount anyway.

This is a very, very helpful software item.

Enjoy!

Don't You Make the Same Mistake

Over the last few months, I've had to call a variety of places to get a question answered about an account or a little tech support, something along those lines. In the vast majority of these calls, I was immediately presented with the automated: "If you need help with billing, press 1; if you need tech support, press 2." Now, if it were that simple, I would NOT be writing this post today. After pressing 1 or 2 or 5 or 7, I was given another round of choices and then another and then another.

After several minutes of wading through automated, robotic, impersonal voice menus, I MIGHT get to where I wanted to go. And mind you, I wanted to get to that place fairly quickly. And, most importantly, I wanted that place to include a PERSON who would talk to me and help me quickly resolve whatever concern I had.

Now, I know these automated systems can save many companies a good deal of money, but are they really improving each company's actual bottom line? How many customers get so frustrated with the tedious menus and lack of personal attention that they just decide to go elsewhere? I'd really like to see some statistics on that. I know I've just hung up several times and made a mental note to consider an alternative to continued business with the company that I just hung up with.

I did find out one interesting trick in this whole thing. If you press 0 (zero) regardless of the menu choices you're being given, sometimes that takes you right to a live person. And here's another really interesting tidbit: sometimes you press 0 (zero) and you're told "We're sorry but we don't recognize that choice" and then you press 0 (zero) again or perhaps two more times in a row and THEN you're given a live person. I've had that work several times.

What does that tell you? That these companies are not so completely disconnected from their customers that they're willing to have an "unpublished" way of reaching a live person. I'm also thinking that it's a crazy way of doing business to KEEP your customers away from live contact with your company.

I recommend you never make the same mistake.

Recent Election Results

As I type these words, the Democrats have taken "control" of the House of Representatives and depending on the outcome of the Senate race in Virginia (awaiting voter certification) could also take over the Senate.

First of all, I'm not really sure I understand this concept of a political party having control of one of our two legislative bodies by having a "majority" of simply one more person on board from that political party. In other words, we're told that the Democrats (or the Republicans) will have control of the Senate if either party had 51 of the 100 Senators. The same idea with the House of Representatives.

But this begs the question to any sane thinking person: how does just one more person from a political party equal "control?" Are you telling us that politics in our country are so partisan and so one-sided that most (possibly all) of the key issues will simply be decided by which party is in power? Our elected leaders just aren't that locked in...are they?

Well, that was one thought I had one day after a very interesting election. But the real reason I wrote this post is to let you know that WHOEVER is in "power" in Washington or your state or your city — Democrat or Republican — it matters not to the success of your business. Yes there could be influences down the road or influences you're already experiencing, but the bottom line is and ALWAYS will be:

YOU are the one in control of the success or failure of your business.

You make the decisions to promote to whom and how much. You make the hiring decisions. You decide how to price your product or service and you know how to sell it or how to get someone under you to sell it. I could go on, but you get the picture. The moment you decide someone else or something else is responsible in ANY way for the success (or failure) of your business, to that degree someone or something else controls your business.

Anyway, I didn't want this to be super serious post after a super serious day of voting, just wanted to remind you who's in control of your show.

Simple Ideas Often Have Powerful Results...

If you have the phone number of your customer (or patient, client, etc.) here's a really simple idea:

When they leave your office or store after completing some service (or having purchased from you), have someone give them a call the next day. Your purpose for calling is to simply find out if they're happy with the service (or product) and to see if they have any questions or concerns.

VERY FEW businesses do this kind of thing and this demonstration of care from your end will be appreciated by the vast majority of those you call. If you get their answering machine, simply leave a message along those lines:

"Hi. This is Alice from the dental office and I'm calling to see how things are going. If you have any questions or concerns about your service yesterday, please give us a call."

Try this for awhile and see what kind of feedback you get.

Secrets of Online Success Revealed...

I've had my web sites online for a number of years. I've had this blog up and running for about 6 months. My experience online has been interesting, educational, and even somewhat profitable.

In an effort to make this online activity more valuable, I've probably read a thousand (or so) pages of "how to be profitable online".

There are a ton of "experts" out there who promise all kinds of things — just buy their stuff and you're on your way. Well, I bought a good amount of that stuff and while there have been some very helpful pieces to the puzzle, the whole picture has never really crystallized for me.

That has now changed.

Enter Alexandria Brown.

Alexandria Brown promotes herself as "The Ezine Queen." I've been getting her weekly ezines (online newsletters) for about a year and her information has been extremely helpful. After figuring out how to produce a very profitable ezine for her business, she put together a simple program so that others could do the same. For more info on this, click here.

Alexandria Brown is a very sane, ethical and smart lady who has been through MANY of the pitfalls of building up a successful online business. She discarded what doesn't work and kept in place (and expanded) what does work. The end result is an observable system that has produced for her a tremendous amount of profit and free time! Not a bad combination.

She recently put about 20 people through a very thorough two and a half day workshop. She walked everyone through, one baby step at a time, how to put this thing together and truly make it work. I didn't attend this workshop, but I did purchase the unedited audio CDs. I consider this purchase to be my best purchase of Internet-related marketing materials (and I've purchased a good deal over the past several years).

Anyway, enough of the praise. I highly recommend you listen to these unedited CDs. Here's the link to obtain more info.

New Free eBooks from Seth Godin

Seth Godin, a very bright author and marketer, has two new eBooks that are currently being given away at no charge. One gives helpful info on web sites and the other on blogs. Get them here (while they are still free).

Supporting a Winner Versus CREATING a Winner

The following is an article I wrote a few years ago that was published in the sports section of The Tampa Tribune. After reading it recently, I saw how it also applies to business owners...

Fans express themselves in two very basic ways. One is to support a winner and the other is to CREATE a winner.

Many fans will come out and support a winner. They’ll cheer madly, they’ll proudly wear the team merchandise, and they’ll boast to out-of-town friends about how great their team is.

But what happens if the team performs poorly? What if the team performs poorly over a long stretch of time? Some of these supportive fans now become not so supportive. You start to hear boos. They call in to talk shows complaining about the players, the coaches, the strategies, the playing styles. Some complain with incredible vehemence.

Now let’s turn to the fan who is intent on CREATING a winner. This fan does not boo the home team. Interview any professional player and they will tell you there is nothing gained when their own fans boo them. Many will tell you that it actually undermines them, as they often count on the "home team fan" to be the extra player. Home team advantage is not a mere theory … it is a statistical fact. But the home team advantage erodes when more and more “fans” boo their own players.

Each and every fan has a part in creating a winning team. That may sound farfetched, but just as each member of a family or each member of a group contributes to the survival of that family or group, so it is with fans and their local team.

Creating a winner. What does that mean? Let’s take an example from everyday life. Let’s say you’re a salesperson and you’ve just put a tremendous amount of effort into closing an important deal for the company. Closing it means that you’ll get a excellent commission and your company will have a ton of business to deliver over the next 6 months. But something goes wrong and the sale doesn’t close. You come back to the office and your boss meets you at the door and says: “You crummy piece of dirt! I can’t believe you didn’t close that sale!” You walk down the corridor and an associate sees you and yells: “Thanks for nothing!” The rest of the day goes pretty much like that.

Now, I’m sure there are a handful of people on this planet who just love to be criticized and they do their best work when people spit on them, but my observation is that people perform best in a different type of environment. The more positive and the more encouraging people are around you, the better you do. People just accomplish more when that’s what others around them are intending them to do!

That last line is very important. When people around you are intending for you to succeed, your likelihood of success increases. When people shift from supporting you to criticizing you, you are less likely to succeed.

Does a fan have the right to boo? Of course. And I guess your associates have a right to make your life miserable if you don’t get something done well at the office. But you certainly appreciate it an awful lot more if your associates show you some understanding and then keep right on intending that you’re going to get the job done right.

Should a fan keep completely silent and never voice his displeasure with a team that is under-performing? No and yes. There are different ways and different forums for that. But when your team is in the heat of battle and they don’t complete a first down or get a key basket or goal, that is the last place to voice it.

When the players sense, really sense, that the fans are really, really behind them, the majority of players will up their intensity level and play like crazy to win.

Yes, we have other factors permeating professional sports these days: money, free agency, unions, strikes—all of these contribute to a scene that can make the “old days” seem a long, long time ago.

And if the home team has very little talent or if the team owner doesn’t really care if his team wins or loses as long as he makes a profit, then the prospects for success are dramatically affected.

But this article is simply about how you can play a part in creating a winner. You can support the home team when it wins or you can help create the home team into a winner. As a fan, you make a big difference.

Where NOT to Go For Advice

Let's say you've got this great new idea for a business. Or you've come up with a new and exciting way to accomplish something with your current business. And you'd like to get some advice on this. If you go to people who have "been around" for quite some time and their advice is how it can't or shouldn't be done, acknowledge them and move on. Yes, there are times when it's wise not to move forward with an idea, but too often the people who advise you NOT to do something are folks who couldn't get it done themselves or after years of losses and dissatisfaction have lost the desire to excel and, sadly, do not wish to see others excel. Don't let that rub off on you.

The End of the IRS...The End of Income Tax...Are These Things Really Possible?

When all forms of income and payroll tax are eliminated, when the IRS is no more, when a national sales tax becomes the central instrument for financing the US government, when all of these things become a reality, the amount of positive economic and political change that will ensue will be ENORMOUS.

Billions of dollars and billions of man-hours spent on income tax related matters will instantly free up. Companies of all sizes will instantly have greater resources to satisfy their customers. Millions of Americans will treat April 15th as another wonderful spring day and will never again have to worry about filing a tax return.

And yes, all of this is possible. Not decades down the road, but conceivably within the next few months.

Radio talk show host Neil Boortz and Congressman John Linder wrote a book entitled: The FairTax Book. Their book was Number 3 on Amazon’s best seller list BEFORE the book was released (about 2 weeks ago).

In this book, they have made all the key issues clear and understandable. They've even spelled out where the opposition will come from. Vested interest groups will try to derail the Fair Tax bill which is currently before Congress (H.R. 25). Can a small group of well-financed lobbyists outdo millions of Americans who UNDERSTAND the ins and outs of this incredibly important issue? Not if those millions make it known to their congressional representatives that they WANT this and they want it NOW.

A few years back, a very similar bill was introduced into Congress. It had a small handful of sponsors. This current bill has 54 co-sponsors. Not enough yet to see it through, but this could change with a few minutes of your time.

Mr. Boortz and Congressman Linder have asked us to not just read and understand the book but to take action on it. If you do and this thing wins the day, look forward to very positive changes in your personal and business life! Your country will be much stronger as a result of it. Our founding fathers will rest a lot easier, and you will be giving your children and grandchildren the best possible financial future with ONE SWOOP OF THE CONGRESSIONAL PEN.

In my humble opinion, this book is one of the most important books of the 21st century because it represents so much future sanity on SO many playing fields, on so many levels.

Get a copy of it. Read it. And then buy a few more copies. Give them to friends, family, co-workers, your doctor, give them to anybody who has the remotest desire for America to be stronger, healthier, saner, freer.

Yes, the impact will be felt most immediately on a personal basis with people investing more, saving more, having more hope for their futures, for their retirement, etc. etc. But the impact this will have on our country and the health of our economy can NOT be overstated.

We've got a real chance with this book and with this Fair Tax to do something special. Let's not waste this opportunity.

Harry Potter Reminded Me of a Lesson

I recently finished reading Book 6 of the Harry Potter series. J.K. Rowling (the author) had created another great book that I thoroughly enjoyed and I'm looking forward to the final book in the series.

Being an author myself (with two published and three in progress), I went to Amazon.com to see what kind of reviews J.K. was getting for her newest Harry Potter book. Most of the reviews were rave, but some of the reviews expressed disappointment and were critical. I read through a bunch of these reviews and I realized something...something that hits me almost every day.

It's perfectly all right to be critical, but some folks criticize simply because they feel compelled to do so. Sometimes a co-worker or friend or spouse offers "constructive" criticism and even then it doesn't always come across very well.

I think there are two basic ways to approach people. You can make less of them or you can make "more" of them. It's not very difficult to make less of someone: you simply point out their flaws and weaknesses. You can do this to their face or behind their back. You can do it overtly or covertly. But the net effect of all of this chatter about someone's faults and shortcomings is you've simply made less of them. Do this long and hard enough and there will be "less" of that person.

To make "more" of someone is not always as easy and sometimes requires a bit of patience. But you're essentially emphasizing what's right about the person: their decisions, their actions, even their appearance. I'm not talking about insincere flattery here, I'm talking about acknowledging a person when they've done something well, when they've demonstrated competence, when they've worked a bit harder or longer than usual. Even in the small things, this kind of acknowledgement can go a long way.

When an employer is sure that a particular staff member is not going to perform well, you've pretty much cinched the deal: that staff member is not likely to perform well. Isn't it up to that staff member to perform no matter what, to deliver the goods regardless of what other people think? Yes...and no. Your intention that this staff member WILL perform well, WILL get better at it, WILL be a real asset to your business—YOUR intention here can play an enormous role.

It's all about making MORE of someone so that at the end of the day there is MORE of that person there. Because that route leads to increased willingness to get the job done, increased competence and an increased ability to take the losses in stride. Continuously making "less" of someone just quickly heads in the wrong direction.

Once again, I'll add the disclaimer here that I'm not talking about ignoring completely someone's errors or mistakes in the workplace. I'm not talking about taking an airy-fairy view of people. I'm talking about an approach to people (employees, co-workers, friends and spouses) that will bring you an improved scene. You are essentially putting yourself in the position of creating an environment of willingness and competence instead of slowly eroding what willingness and competence was already there.

It's not always easy, but concentrating on one approach will start the ball in the right direction.