February 16th, 2010
Free is fiscal anarchy. Free in it’s purest form is just bad for business. Free is a poor man’s game and ultimately unsustainable.
You will rarely see free without strings attached, and that’s a good thing. You as the consumer may not directly feel the tradeoff for free but be sure that someone else will. Free for you means someone else has to pay. Free in it’s purest form means the giver has to pay.
Free is a myth. Nothing is truly free. Someone always has to pay. This is a universal law, the law of reciprocation. When you take something from one place to give it to another something must replace where the item originally was. In the physical world when an object is moved air rushes in to fill the void. The same goes for the economic world. Something must eventually fill that void.
Free* is your best friend as a businessman. See the asterisk? That denotes that something must be paid by someone somewhere in order for it to exist. Even when you give your time and energy away to a project most are looking to benefit from their increase in reputation, experience and perceived value.
As a creator of wealth it’s your duty to figure out how free* can best benefit you:
- Start writing a blog and give your knowledge away.
- Create a targeted curated online resource package for your customers that will show them your personal value to them.
- Give personalized customer service and feedback that speaks to each individual on a hypertargeted micro level.
- Give suggestions of other products, services and businesses that may be of relevance. This will also go far if you recommend local businesses or other affiliates in your network.
The free* that you can give that will ingratiate people with you isn’t stuff, it’s you. Giving things only satisfies the right now. When you give of yourself, your knowledge, you end up sharing a piece of yourself that stays with someone much much longer than the one time encounter. People want a story and they want a journey. Give that to them.
Tags: economic world, personal value, purest form, reciprocation, resource package
Posted in business, featured | 5 Comments »
February 13th, 2010
Social media is an amazing medium that has allowed businesses of all kinds to connect with customers in a direct targeted real way. While it’s great it’s not a panacea. Social media isn’t a band-aid.
Social media is only as helpful as you are. What do I mean by this? As an addition that amplifies your original business efforts and customer service it is amazing. Once it starts taking center stage over your original efforts that’s when you run into problems. That’s socialwashing.
The icing on a cake may taste amazing but if the actual cake part is horrendous no one is going to eat it regardless of how tasty the icing is. If your business operations are shoddy and your customer service is flagging there’s only so much social media can do. There’s also only a certain amount of time you have to fool people that everything is alright with your sleight of hand magic tricks.
The danger comes into play when your original supporters – your evangelists – abandon you because you become too obssessed with social media and lose sight of your most important customers needs. It’s a sad day when you as the customer realizes that you must part ways with what has come to be a good friend.
A good friend isn’t someone who ignores their friend’s basic needs and is only cares about fun. That’s a fairweather friend. That’s exactly what socialwashing is.
Tags: business efforts, business is business, fairweather friend, sleight of hand magic tricks, taking center stage
Posted in business, featured, social media | No Comments »
February 10th, 2010
A node is a point where many points meet. While this may seem like a linchpin, a supernode connects seemingly disparate topics and brings those groups together in a new group.
Supernodes can be found in many different areas – people, places and things. One place that’s a supernode is Rice.
Rice is a small chain restaurant in NYC known for their varied dishes. All of the dishes center on – you guessed it – rice. What makes this important is that instead of focusing on the traditional way of dining based on a culture (Italian) or a food (cupcakes) they unify multiple cultures around a single ingredient.
What comes from this is a new and unique experience. Your taste buds are allowed to intermingle many different flavors at once that they may have not been privvy to before. The conversation that’s created around the supernode is priceless. That’s what a supernode does.
A supernode is a trailblazer more often than not. A supernode also may take center stage because of the sheer fact that it is center and a point of congregation. What the supernode does best naturally is act as a conduit for many different streams to converge. It allows the different nodes to be on center stage and come together because it is by nature the center.
So what does all this mean to you? These supernodes are changing reality. We’re all more enriched and emboldened because of them. They turn the impossible into I’m possible.
Tags: flavors, linchpin, sheer fact, supernode, taste buds
Posted in analysis, business, featured, life | No Comments »
February 9th, 2010
Limitations are just a poor excuse for not doing something. Granted the natural laws of man (gravity, speed of light, transforming into a Liger etc) impart their own limitations on us – but that’s not what I’m talking about. The limitations are in your mind not in what you find.
Limits aren’t just embraced by the downtrodden; they’re especially loved by the ruling class. We were all born of the same blood and flesh. Many of us have risen to greatness despite or in fact BECAUSE of the obstacles. Most think they can’t do something because they only factor in themselves.
Che Guevara was a solitary man who was passionate about something he believed in. It doesn’t even matter what it was. What matters is that he believed that he could make a difference. Others believed in him because he believed in himself. His actions ended up becoming revolutionary.
Before you get hung up on the fact that he became legendary and revolutionary realize this: he reached that status by being lifted up by many many others. He may have been a man with a vision but it took many others to get there. The next time you say you can’t just think of all the others who believe you can and then you can.
Tags: che guevara, poor excuse, ruling class, solitary man, speed of light
Posted in featured, life | 2 Comments »
February 8th, 2010
We only think of failure as a bad thing when in actuality it couldn’t be better. Failure is what drives us to reinvigorate, reinvent, renew, refresh, restart. The only true failure is if you choose not to try again. Failure is what allows us to take our game to the next level. The only way you can turn failure into a positive experience is if you have a winner’s mindset.
Winning isn’t everything. In fact, it’s only a very small percentage of everything. Winners have to go through a lot of failure before “it” happens. Winners are not made over night; they’re made over many nights.
What do I want to do? Fail hard and fail spectacularly. I’d rather not have my wins come easy to me one after another. Savoring the glorious victory isnt as sweet without the experiencing agony of defeat.
Tags: actuality, agony of defeat, glorious victory, mindset, next level
Posted in business, featured, life | 1 Comment »
