How to Remix Your Online Business Ideas Seth Godin Style

I haven’t done a lot of Seth Godin Sundays in a while. I wanted to take things to the next level. I think the best way to honor Seth and be helpful to you the reader is to show you how to apply his ideas to your niche. After all I always have online business ideas all the time. Plus I constantly talk about how to develop them.

So I introduce you to Seth Godin REMIXED.

What I am going to do is a Seth Godin version of what I did with Miraculous Web Business Ideas in Minutes. We are going to take a few of his posts and put his online business ideas to use. Actually we are going to take it to the next level. So below are three of Seth’s posts.

One in a million and Failure, success and neither and I’m mad at everyone

And what we are going to do is make a

Post
email marketing e-course and
Great Product

Read all three short posts from Seth and you can get the jist of what each is about. One in a million is about opening your options instead of being so micro focused on one job. Failure, success and neither is about actually taking a chance to fail or succeed and instead do nothing because it is safe. I’m mad at everyone is about how he is mad at the “everyone” concept because you shouldn’t do what everyone does.

1. The Post

In this example my title would be “Create a Brilliant Success in (name you niche keywords here) with These Amazing Options”. Then I would create great content that would discuss in detail how to widen your vision. Also how to take action aka DO something, frankly anything vs. nothing. Last I would talk about how to STAND OUT by NOT doing what everyone else was doing.

2. The Email e Course

Your only creating this course IF people seem to show interest in your subject above. That way you have a chance for the highest success signups. In this example my e-course would be called “Weekly Options for a Brilliant (add your niche here) Success.”

This would be a weekly email that shared details every for instance Monday. Each email would be packed with options for creating a better….business, life,etc. What ever your niche is. The key though is that you have to deliver more than what you originally wrote in your post.

3. The Product

Combine the e-course and turn it into a product (of course add more great content). But a key thing to remember when gathering your online business ideas is to diversify your product, course or programs use. Make both written and audio and video if possible. That way they your customers get a combined experience. Also of course make sure you followup with them to help them actually apply your course.

“Darren how do I create all of this content from Seth’s posts?”

The answer to that comes down to your understanding of what he is writing in the posts. You should only use your favorite posts of his. The more you like it and relate to it the more you can elaborate.

Seth is great, his ideas are great. But even Seth’s ideas mean nothing if no one is doing anything to enhance and apply them. Go to his site and see what ideas you can come up with for your blog, email marketing, and product line.

07 Mar

Seth Godin Sundays Safe is too Risky

I think you will like this Seth Godin Sunday. We are talking about Safe is too risky which is a phrase he used in a recent reposting from his archives. This week I am doing some different things to shake things up. I am offering some things I have never offered before. What are you doing that you have never done before? Safe really IS too risky.

Here is something ELSE I want to share that Seth said and we as marketers should THINK about. Our price doesn’t always dictate the cost of creating the products or services we sell. So I am rethinking some of the products I am selling and how to provide more value and opportunities for people to use them. Here is where YOU come in. What opportunities are you providing that you can

Try something different?
Avoid the SAFE bet?
And provide a great low price?

28 Feb

Seth Godin Sunday Change Your Model

Today on Seth Godin Sundays I want to talk about how he did an interesting post today called Everyone’s model of work is a job. What I liked about it is that it basically follows a similar thinking of mine. I believe that anyone can become an entrepreneur but not everyone can become an entrepreneur. Because it is not in everyone’s DNA to be entrepreneurs. No more than it is in everyone’s DNA to work a 9-5 boring job.

In America the worlds most infamously resourceful country we forgot the importance of a real education. The type of education that lies in our ability to find out our passion and discover our talents. The more people that discover their passion, no matter what their profession. The more opportunities we will have to create a better global economy.

There is no one size fit all model for your life. If it doesn’t work change your model. If your miserable change your model. Because it not OK to be OK when God made you brilliantly remarkable in your own way. Find that way you will find yourself. Move that way and you will lead whatever industry your business is in. BE that way and you will change the world.

Thank you Seth Godin for reminding us of the simple things in the simplest ways.

27 Sep

Seth Godin Sunday: Writing a Book in the Internet Age

ANNOUNCEMENT: I have the Seth Godin Sunday listings now listed under categories so you can look at past postings. I recently was discussing with Seth a book I am writing and the best way to achieve this goal (publishing a printed book). His response was short and direct leading to this article he wrote some time ago. The smart thing here is that when ever someone asks him a question (I have started doing this also) he creates a post he can direct them towards.

Advice for authors

Always beware free advice. It is worth what it costs!

That said, I get a fair number of notes from well respected, intelligent people who are embarking on their first non-fiction book project. They tend to ask very similar questions, so I thought I’d go ahead and put down my five big ideas in one place to make it easier for everyone.

I guarantee you that you won’t agree with all of them, but, as they say, your mileage my vary.

1. Please understand that book publishing is an organized hobby, not a business.
The return on equity and return on time for authors and for publishers is horrendous. If you’re doing it for the money, you’re going to be disappointed.

On the other hand, a book gives you leverage to spread an idea and a brand far and wide. There’s a worldview that’s quite common that says that people who write books know what they are talking about and that a book confers some sort of authority.

2. The timeframe for the launch of books has gone from silly to unrealistic.
When the world moved more slowly, waiting more than a year for a book to come out was not great, but tolerable. Today, even though all other media has accelerated rapidly, books still take a year or more. You need to consider what the shelf life of your idea is.

3. There is no such thing as effective book promotion by a book publisher. read more here

20 Sep

Seth Godin Sunday: The Master of ONE

sethgodin I have spoke about this under One Thing at a Time. Unfortunately some don’t “get it.” Multitasking means NOTHING if you can’t DO one thing at a time. International speaker and author Dr Wayne Dyer says “We can only do ONE thing at a time”.

People get confused (I was here once too) into thinking that multitasking is more productive. WRONG. Successful people FOCUS one step at a time. My wife Cara and I have been wondering what a Chai Wallah was since we saw the Academy Award winning film “Slumdog Millionaire” a incredible movie! Also the story below is similar point Seth made a year ago about Looking for the guy with a hammer. The point as focus on mastery. Remember my saying “A Master of anything does not have to do everything.”

Chai Wallah

It’s so tempting to do a little bit of everything. All the tools are there, a click away. You can be the designer, the copywriter, the head of customer service. Hey, you can even do the manufacturing or easily outsource it to a commodity producer. One benefit of diversification is that you can average out your risk.

Or you can be a wallah. Someone who does only that one thing.

An old colleague of mine calls himself a chai wallah. Perhaps he loves spiced tea, but I’d prefer to believe it’s a reminder that his success lives and dies on the performance of just one task.

When you go all in, it focuses your attention and effort, doesn’t it?

13 Sep

Seth Godin Sundays: Dangerous Digital Thoughts

sethgodin I have been doing a lot of building and interviews for the media lately since my Forbes gig and the BBC honor on one of my niche sites. totally scared the hell out of a group Thus little time until now to blog.

One of the scariest things I have introduced since my time away is a thought to my online music business students about FREE. One of the many sites our company has launched this year is called BIZ4DaSoul which is a site that teaches people who want to make money online with their music.

I asked what if you gave away 90% of your music? Sell the 10% at a low price but make that 10% premium stuff they can’t get anywhere else.

The 90% would be used to get more live gigs and concert ticket sales and create online sales of other types of merchandise. The prerequisite is that you need an actual following but besides that you are set. Like Seth said in the article below. I know your music is worth a price but here is another way to look at it. You could create a greater crowd on the front end. And a lot of FREE publicity/ word of mouth. The wealthy are wealthy because they did what their competition didn’t.

Sam Walton was building where Kmart wasn’t (little towns and rural area’s)

Like Seth said flip it. No matter what your niche or area of expertise you should flip it. In this current economical environment what have you got to lose?

Flipping abundance and scarcity by Seth Godin

I think it’s dangerous and often fatal to put free on top of an existing business model. Things fall apart.

People look at the free revolution and say, “oh, that could never work. If I gave x, y or z away for free, I’d fail.” They’re right. They will fail… If they keep the model the same and just give away stuff for free.

The way you win is by reinventing the model itself. So, for example, lululemon doing giant free yoga classes in New York. The more people come, the more clothes they’ll sell… it’ll become a movement. Or Crossfit, publishing their insane work outs online. The more people do them, the better the scarce part (private coaching, etc.) does.

We spent a generation believing certain parts of our business needed to be scarce and that advertising and other interruption should be abundant. Part of the pitch of free is that when advertising goes away, you need to make something else abundant in order to gain attention. Then, and only then, will you be able to sell something that’s naturally scarce.

This is an uncomfortable flip to make, because the stuff you’ve been charging for feels like it should be charged for, and the new scarcity is often difficult to find. But, especially in the digital world, this is happening, and faster than ever.

06 Sep

Seth Godin Sunday:If its Magic

I was reading the post below by Seth and immediately thought of Stevie Wonders “If it’s Magic” from Songs in the Key of Life. Seth makes a strong point about the job/ role of the online market (entrepreneur).

Fail Fast Forward is my credo! Corporate marketers get eaten alive on this side of marketing. Online marketing or entrepreneurship is not a game nor get rich quick scheme. Online endeavors takes time and attention. Magic it is not.

Magic beans, TV and the web

New media isn’t the perfect marketing medium, and it won’t be until we find the magic beans.

TV had magic beans for forty years. For forty years, anyone, even a complete moron, could make a lot of money using TV ads. Buy enough ads, don’t screw up, you’re rich.

The hard part was buying enough ads, but once you did that, victory could be declared.

On the web, there are countless marketers just standing around waiting for someone to hand them the magic beans. And that’s the problem.

Marketing online takes too much measurement, patience, creativity, technical knowledge, flexibility, speed and authenticity. It requires too much thinking and not enough going out for dinner with clients.

Perhaps there will never be magic beans again. Perhaps marketing is about to transition to a new kind of profession, one that requires insight, dedication and smarts.

Or maybe someone will find some magic beans.

30 Aug

Seth Godin Sunday: Meaning

The following is a brilliant thought by Seth. However I am not sure if you are doing it by heart or doing it by “training”. I think we all of us are so used to reacting a certain way that we often don’t STOP to wonder why.

Do me a favor. After you read below. stop and wonder why you are here. Is it for me, Seth, or you? Are you looking for something and if so what is it? As Seth said below is it obvious because it’s true, or true because it’s obvious.

The problem with doing it by heart

The following does not appear in the Star Spangled Banner:

“Babe Ruth through the night…”

When you do something by heart, it bypasses some of the common sense processing we use to navigate our day. Of course Babe Ruth wasn’t even a sparkle in Mrs. Ruth’s eye during the War of 1812, but if you’re singing by heart, you don’t think about it.

I walked into a cheap noodle joint in Soho last month and decided I wanted tofu with vegetables. They had a little plate on display (a special, I guess) and I asked for tofu, vegetables, no sauce. The cashier pointed to the display model and said, “like this?”

I said, “with no sauce,” because the gloppy stuff didn’t appeal to me.

So, after asking, clearly, twice, I sat down. Four minutes later, they called my number and handed me an identical copy to the display item, oozing with fluorescent sauce.

“I was hoping that there’d be no sauce…”

She didn’t miss a beat. She said, “that’s the way it always comes.”

She wasn’t being evil. She was merely doing it by heart. Just like the intolerant judgmental guy who can quote you chapter and verse from his spiritual book of choice but never thought about the meaning of the words inside or the status quo protecting technician who isn’t a scientist because she’s afraid of violating something that feels like a law.

The next time you or one of your people starts rattling off the obvious truth by heart, wonder about whether it’s obvious because it’s true, or true because it’s obvious.

23 Aug

Seth Godin Sunday: Different

Someone along the line of blogging said you should write a 7 top list

Someone told you to write lists long so people would bookmark them

They told you to write about how to’s

They told you to write about SEO

The told you to do a lot of the same.

What IF just IF you wrote to share something you loved?

What if you didn’t give a darn if it is more economical and practical to say what a conventional copywriter suggested and you wrote from your soul?

Being different isn’t a choice it is an acceptance. After all God made us all different. Seth wrote a blog about the long tale you should read.

16 Aug

Seth Godin Sunday: 2 Posts to Consider and Why

4 out of 4 Seth's recommend it !

Seth was ON FIRE this week as you will see in excerpts of the two posts listed. I am also adding two more posts about his week he really touched bases with me. I hope he does the same with you.

These two posts touch home with me because of the crazy comments I see on posts that people place just to get attention. But it’s the wrong type of attention. The attention isn’t based on knowledge. A lot of screaming opinions. Sound familiar my fellow entrepreneurs? LOL!

The second article is right on point with my thoughts about the incubator baby system. Start and test small then grow from there. Afterall how in the world would your business model run correctly as a airline when it doesn’t run correctly as a cab company?

Willfully ignorant vs. aggressively skeptical

Challenging the status quo is what I do for a living. Either that or encourage other people to do it.

But there are two ways to do it, and one of them is ineffective, short-sighted and threatens the fabric of the tribe. The other seems to work.

I heard someone screaming about death panels and how the government was not only going to kill his grandmother, but would take out Stephen Hawking himself if it had the chance.

The screaming is a key part, because screaming is often a tool used to balance out the lazy ignorance of someone parroting opposition to an idea that they don’t understand. (If you want to write to me about this post, please write to me about the screaming part, not about whether or not you agree with the facts or the science. That’s what the post is about, the screaming.)

If you want to challenge the conventional wisdom of health care reform, please do! It’ll make the final outcome better. But if you choose to do that, it’s essential that you know more about it than everyone else, not less. Certainly not zero. Be skeptical, but be informed (about everything important, not just this issue, of course). Screaming ignorance gets read more

Lessons from very tiny businesses

1. Go where your customers are.

Jacquelyne runs a tiny juice company called Chakwave. I met her in Los Angeles, standing next to an organic lunch truck. Like the little birds that clean the teeth of the hippo, there’s synergy here. The kind of person that visits the truck for lunch is the sort of person that would happily pay for something as wonderfully weird as her juice. And the truck owners benefit from the rolling festival farmer’s market feel that comes from having a synergistic partner set up on a bridge table right next door.

2. Be micro-focused and the search engines will find you.

My friend Patti Jo is an extraordinary teacher and tutor. Her new business, The Scarsdale Tutor doesn’t need many clients in order to be successful. This permits her to focus obsessively and that gets rewarded with front page results on Google. Not because she’s tried to manipulate the seo (she hasn’t) but because this is exactly the page you’d hope to find if you typed “scarsdale tutor” into a search engine. Could she do this nationwide? Of course not. But she doesn’t want to or need to. Living on the long tail can be profitable. read more you will love this!

09 Aug

Seth Godin Sunday: 10 Year Reflection of Permission Marketing

Do you know its been 10 years since Seth wrote the hit book Permission Marketing that has laid a foundation to countless companies and practices? Well I think it is still interesting that with a great book there are still people who are confused about what SPAM actually is and is not.

The funniest thing is to get a SPAM comment from someone who signs up to your email list. I mean an actual person who confirmed via their email inbox to receive your emails. But when they decided they don’t want the emails any longer they call you the spammer (laughing).

That’s like inviting someone over to your house and giving them a beer, the remote, and your favorite chair. And suddenly calling the police to report them for breaking and entering.

The reason I brought this up was that the person that accused me of this wa a so called “marketer”. I sent him a copy immediately (laughing).

When tactics drown out strategy

New media creates a blizzard of tactical opportunities for marketers, and many of them cost nothing but time, which means you don’t need as much approval and support to launch them.

As a result, marketers are like kids at Rita’s candy shoppe, gazing at all the pretty opportunities.

Most of us are afraid of strategy, because we don’t feel confident outlining one unless we’re sure it’s going to work. And the ‘work’ part is all tactical, so we focus on that. (Tactics are easy to outline, because we say, “I’m going to post this.” If we post it, we succeed. Strategy is scary to outline, because we describe results, not actions, and that means opportunity for failure.)

“Building a permission asset so we can grow our influence with our best customers over time” is a strategy. Using email, twitter or RSS along with newsletters, contests and a human voice are all tactics. In my experience, people get obsessed about tactical detail before they embrace a strategy… and as a result, when a tactic fails, they begin to question the strategy that they never really embraced in the first place.

The next time you find yourself spending 8 hours on tactics and five minutes refining your strategy, you’ll understand what’s going on.

02 Aug

Seth Godin Sunday: Be Nice on Your Island

For the last almost two weeks I have been talking with colleges about the Death Spiral! We live in a wonderfully amazing time. A time where anyone can start a business but unfortunately not everyone can start a business. And not everyone will agree with that thinking.

Welcome to Island Marketing

If you run a business on a small island, every interaction matters and every customer is precious.

There’s a finite number of people you’re going to be able to sell to, and every person you interact with knows everyone else, so you always have to be on your best behavior. You can’t say, “tough” and then go on to the next person. You can’t run ads that churn and burn through an endless supply of naive prospects. You only get one chance to make a first impression, and on the island, that impression matters.

Consider an airline in Chicago that can bully and bluster and greedify its way through an endless supply of business travelers, and compare them to a short hop carrier on Martha’s Vineyard. The Vineyard airline knows that people can always switch to the other short hop airline or the ferry, and they also know that the folks they serve have power, because there aren’t an endless supply.

As you’ve probably guessed, like most things in our ever shrinking world, all marketers are now on an island.

The island perspective is the Zappos model. Every interaction is both precious and an opportunity to delight. Marketers no longer have the money or the platform to harass and promote their way to success by burning through the market. Instead, we have to act like we’re on an island earn and the nurture a permission asset.

Through this lens, banner ads and various pop ups make even less sense than they used to. So does the insane act of outsourcing the random dialing of businesses to do telemarketing spam. We used up those resources a long time ago.

26 Jul

Seth Godin Sundays July 26th 2009

sethgodin I apologize for the late posting. I have been working a TON of projects lately. Please oh mighty Seth in all of your Godin goodness forgive me LOL!

I think Death Spiral really touched bases with me. I did a article called 5 Ways Corporate America Caused a Recession which I think really was in sync with the tone of Seths article.

In times of challenge you build not deconstruct your growth.

As I announced last week. Seth has been kind enough to let me create/ sell items to sell from his best selling book Tribes.

Tribes Collection
Great Merchandise from Seth Godin’s Bestselling book Tribes

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He’s doing his best

In fact, everyone is always doing their best under the circumstances. As my friend Al says, there’s no such thing as irrational behavior. That’s because in this moment, given the perceptions someone is holding, the way they behave is in fact the only way they can behave.

Consumers don’t make choices as much as they react and respond to the inputs and assumptions they have about the marketplace, their life and your brand.

If you don’t like the way someone is acting, understand you can’t change his behavior, you can only change his circumstances.

This makes it really difficult to vilify the recalcitrant consumer. It’s not that they’re stupid, it’s that you didn’t explain it very well. As Zig has said, “I can understand why you’re not interested. Other people who believed [insert belief here] weren’t interested either. But once they discovered [insert new fact here] they were eager to try it.”

Sure, people are willing to lie, break promises, willfully misunderstand, avoid responsibility and blame others. But why? They’re doing it because under the circumstances, it seems like the right thing to do. As marketers, we can often change the circumstances.

There’s an infamous scene in the Godfather where a movie producer turns down a ‘reasonable’ request from the Don. The Godfather is stunned. How could someone turn him down?

After the family kills the producer’s prize racehorse (and puts it in his bed), the producer changes his mind.

What changed? Before the intervention, the producer didn’t understand, didn’t believe, didn’t fear the Godfather. So he made what he believed was the best possible decision. Afterward, his worldview was forcibly changed and he made a different decision based on different facts.

Probably not a good idea to run around beheading horses, but it’s a useful lesson in changing perception.

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My favorite Seth Quote of the week

““Most of your competition spend their days looking forward to those rare moments when everything goes right. Imagine how much leverage you have if you spend your time maximizing those common moments when it doesn’t.“ -Seth Godin

““Change is a bear, but it’s better than death.“ -Seth Godin

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A few of Seth Godin Posts of the Week

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Death spiral!

You’ve probably seen it. The fish monger sees a decline in business, so they have less money to spend on upkeep and inventory, so they keep the fish a bit longer and don’t clean up as often, so of course, business declines and then they have even less money… Eventually, you have an empty, smelly fish store that’s out of business.
The doctor has fewer patients so he doesn’t invest as much in training or staff and so some other patients choose to leave which means that there are even fewer patients…
The newspaper has fewer advertisers, so they can’t invest as much in running stories, so people stop reading it, which means advertisers have less reason to advertise which leaves less money for stories…
As Tom Peters says, “You can’t shrink your way to greatness,” and yet that’s what so many dying businesses try to do. They hunker down and wait for things to get better, but they don’t. This isn’t a dip, it’s a cul de sac. It’s over.
Right this minute, you still have some cash, some customers, some momentum… Instead of squandering it in a long, slow, death spiral, do something else. Buy a new platform. Move. Find new products for the customers that still trust you.
Change is a bear, but it’s better than death.

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19 Jul

Seth Godin Sunday July 19th 2009

sethgodin This week on Seth Godin Sunday I noticed that Seth kind of related on a saying I have when he wrote “The law of the little shove”.

You may not always see it but I do some specific things. Outside people think I am everywhere. There is a finely tuned method to the storm. It is not about doing 5000 things but 5 things 1000 times.

As I announced last week. Seth has been kind enough to let me create/ sell items to sell from his best selling book Tribes.

Tribes Collection
Great Merchandise from Seth Godin’s Bestselling book Tribes

of his I liked this week and a video. I am also going to do something interesting this week so keep your eyes on this site!
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Facts always win, right?

If you’re selling a business to business service and you can prove that it’s better, that it delivers more value, that it’s cheaper or more durable or more efficient, shouldn’t that mean you will close every sale?

Even hard-headed business people end up buying the thing they want, not the thing they necessarily need.

The real danger of relying on facts to make your sale, though, is that when the facts are no longer on your side, you’re toast. The low-cost supplier gets hooked on the easy sales that come from acting like a commodity, and if that changes, you’ve got little room to maneuver.

Great brands and projects are built on real value and a real advantage, but great marketers use this as a supporting column, not the entire foundation. Instead, they build a story on top of their head start. They focus on relationships and worldviews and interactions, and use the boost from their initial head start to build competitive insulation.

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My favorite Seth Quote of the week

““Go, make something happen.” -Seth Godin

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A few of Seth Godin Posts of the Week

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Graduation day

True confession: I didn’t attend graduation from Stanford Business School. They mailed me my MBA instead. I hadn’t been on campus in months, I was already busy running a brand in Boston, learning more than I could have in school. A generous teacher made sure I got the diploma (and of course, they got the tuition, so it was probably a fair trade).

Today, though, I attended final graduation for my informal free MBA program. You can read some of the student recaps right here. The photo was taken just before I fell in the Hudson River.

I’m thrilled at the new friends I’ve made (for life, probably) and thrilled at how much they learned, how smart they are and what a difference they’ll make in the world. But most of all I’m thrilled that every single one of the nine realized that I had nothing much to do with their transformation, they did. Which means the opportunity is available to everyone, whether or not you get a cross country skiing lesson from me.

We didn’t have a fancy commencement with speeches (actually, we had pizza). What we ended with was the idea, “Go, make something happen.”

Four words. That’s not a lot, but all you might need.

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The law of the little shovel

If you want to dig a big hole, you need to stay in one place.

If you walk around town with a little shovel, you’ll just end up digging thousands of little holes, not one big one.

Call on one person ten times and you might make the sale. Call on ten people once each and you will likely get ten rejections.

The important thing to remember is that separate events are often separate. If you use the same ineffective approach on one thousand people, it’s not going to start working better just because you use it more often.

12 Jul

Seth Godin Sundays July 12th 2009 Happy Birthday Weekend!

sethgodin This week on Seth Godin Sunday in addition to the posts I am saying a happy birthday to Seth from his birthday July 10th. His request was for people to do a launch so I have launched a merchandise store that I know will grow.

Seth has been kind enough to let me create/ sell items to sell from his best selling book Tribes.

Tribes Collection
Great Merchandise from Seth Godin’s Bestselling book Tribes

Busking at the airport

I have no patience for bureaucracies that proclaim that they are unable to innovate. It’s not that they are unable to do so, it’s that they don’t want to do so.

The other day as I walked through SFO, I heard live music. Live! Looking over, there was Bart Davenport and his band, playing real good for free. Probably not for free, actually, but collecting plenty of tips in the box out front. They sold a lot of CDs too.

What a great venue. What a service (for Bart, for me, for the airport).

Go ahead, do something impossible.

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My favorite Seth Quote of the week

““On my birthday, it would make me really happy if people started a project, launched an idea or engaged in a difficult interaction that made something good happen. Make a difference day.”” -Seth Godin

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A few of Seth Godin Posts of the Week

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What should I do on your birthday?

On July 4, birthday of the USA, we’re supposed to blow off fireworks, eat hot dogs and buy a Chevrolet.

On Columbus Day, birthday of an early imperialist, we’re supposed to shop and march in a parade.

On Martin Luther King Jr. day, marvelously, we’re supposed to participate in a national day of service.

So, what should we do on your birthday?

With all due respect to Hallmark, the idea of sending people cards and presents on their birthday seems both selfish and small-minded. It seems to me that we could think bigger.

On the birthday of your company or brand, what would you like your customers to do?

On your birthday, what should your friends do? Let’s say you have a shoe buying fetish. Perhaps on your birthday, your friends could buy shoes–for themselves, not for you. Share the joy, right? Or perhaps buy shoes for their friends?

“On my birthday, it would make me really happy if people started a project, launched an idea or engaged in a difficult interaction that made something good happen. Make a difference day.”

What’s your story?

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The fan chasm

How big is the gap between customer and die-hard fan? In other words, between engaging and loving, between attending and craving?
For World of Warcraft, it’s huge. It’s very difficult to spend just an hour or two. There’s a chasm between encounter and enjoyable experience. Tetris was oriented in precisely the other way–everyone who tried it instantly became almost as smart as an expert.
If you want to be an insider at the Four Seasons restaurant, you might have to go thirty times and spend $3,000 over time. There’s a barrier to becoming an insider.
For Star Trek, not so much. After one TV episode, you might not know a Tribble from a Romulan, but you’ve probably figured out the whole Vulcan thing. Much more approachable, much easier to fake your fanhood.
There are very few products, services or organizations that are simultaneously easily approachable and quite deep. That’s an opportunity for you if you can figure out how to be both, but choosing just one is a more likely scenario. So, which are you?

10 Jul

Seth Godin Weekend! Happy Birthday Seth!

sethgodin39 Seth ‘s birthday is today! So instead of our weekly Seth Godin Sundays it will be a Seth Godin Weekend! Happy Birthday Seth! All weekend I will be posting Seth quotes, thoughts, writings, and other surprise goodies.

Seth said several days ago that in celebration to his birthday he wanted people to do a launch of something. So in honor of that wish I am going to launch something simple yet………………..different.

Why live life in a conventional fashion? I especially ask here because of the nature of this site. Sure it has my name on it but the truth is that short of the quotes I seldom actually write about ME. This site is not about me. It’s about entrepreneurship online which is ANYTHING but conventional!

05 Jul

Seth Godin Sundays July 5th 2009

sethgodin This week on Seth Godin Sunday in addition to the posts of his I liked this week and a video. I am also going to do something interesting this week so keep your eyes on this site!
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My favorite Seth Quote of the week

“If a lens makes a penny or a nickel or a dime a day, it doesn’t seem like much until there’s a million of them.” -Seth Godin

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A few of Seth Godin Posts of the Week

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What should I do on your birthday?

On July 4, birthday of the USA, we’re supposed to blow off fireworks, eat hot dogs and buy a Chevrolet.

On Columbus Day, birthday of an early imperialist, we’re supposed to shop and march in a parade.

On Martin Luther King Jr. day, marvelously, we’re supposed to participate in a national day of service.

So, what should we do on your birthday?

With all due respect to Hallmark, the idea of sending people cards and presents on their birthday seems both selfish and small-minded. It seems to me that we could think bigger.

On the birthday of your company or brand, what would you like your customers to do?

On my birthday, it would make me really happy if people started a project, launched an idea or engaged in a difficult interaction that made something good happen. Make a difference day.

What’s your story?

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There’s always room for Jello

This is one of the great cultural touchstone slogans of our era. A culture where there’s so much to eat we need to try to find a food that we can eat even if we’re stuffed.

Often, we’ll decide that something is full, stuffed, untouchable but then some Jello shows up, and suddenly there’s room.

Think about your schedule… is there room for an emergency, an SEC investigation, a server crash? If you took a day off because of the flu, is your business going to go bankrupt? Probably not.

So, if there’s time for an emergency (Jello), why isn’t there time for brilliance, generosity or learning?

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The risk/reward confusion

It’s easy to to adopt the policy of avoiding risk at all costs, that whenever possible, the products you launch or the engagements you have should be flawless and without downside.

Here’s the problem: in most endeavors, a small increase in risk can double the reward. It’s the second doubling of reward that brings serious risk with it. But the first leap is relatively painless.

In the chart above, notice that going from point A to point B brings almost no incremental risk. It might feel scary, but rationally, it’s not. Doubling reward again from B to C, though, brings significant incremental risk. It’s this second doubling that gets you through the Dip, that leads to a breakthrough, that makes you remarkable.

But I’m not even talking about that. I’m just hoping you’ll warm up by making the tiny leap of avoiding all risk. Riskless is hardly worth your effort.

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PS did you get my favorite book of the year TRIBES??
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28 Jun

Seth Godin Sundays June 28th 2009

sethgodin Well we are into the fourth Seth Godin Sunday yay! This is weekly Sunday post that I dedicated to Seth Godin because he is one of my most favorite bloggers and mentors on the face of the earth. So again each Sunday I am discussing something that will be equally as creative! Also make sure you follow me on twitter today because I am tweeting a lot of Seths quotes and links to many of his articles.

My favorite Seth Quote of the week

“The only way your organization is going to make an impact is to market in the way only you can. Not by following some expert’s rules or following the herd, but by doing it in the way that works. For you” -Seth Godin

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A few of Seth Godin Posts of the Week

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Find your voice

Marketing (in all its forms) is unlike everything else an organization does, because it’s always different. There’s no manual because everyone does it differently, and what successful marketers have in common is that they are successful.

The only way your organization is going to make an impact is to market in the way only you can. Not by following some expert’s rules or following the herd, but by doing it in the way that works. For you. Don’t worry about someone else’s invented standards for new media, invent your own. Avoid obvious mistakes, don’t follow obvious successes.

Find your voice, don’t copy someone else’s.

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Circling the big domino

Clay taught me a good lesson about making things happen with your brand.

Envision the events that might happen to a brand (shelf space at Walmart, an appearance on Oprah, a bestseller, worldwide recognition, a new edition, worldwide rights, chosen by the Queen, whatever) as a series of dominos.

It turns out that if you start with all of them at once, you’ll fail.

And if you start with the big one, you’ll fail.

But if you line up all the dominos one by one, in the right order, you may just have enough energy to push over the first one. That one, of course, adds momentum so that when you crash into the second one, that one goes too. All the way to the Queen.

Wait! cont.

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Learning from Singer

At one point, the Singer Corporation had more than 12,000 people working in a single plant. They were selling more than a million sewing machines a year and had hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue. By any measure, it was one of the most important manufacturers in America. It was fun while it lasted.

Back then, it was easy to believe that Singer represented everything that was right with our economy, and that our future was intrinsically attached to the company’s.

When as the last time you even thought about Singer (or a sewing machine for that matter)?

The cycles are far shorter now than they were during the century that Singer was a shining light for corporate success. More now than ever, success today is no guarantee of success tomorrow. Cont.

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The difference between strangers and friends

Strangers are justifiably suspicious.

Friends give you the benefit of the doubt.

“Friend” is more broadly defined as someone you have a beer with or meet up with to go on a hike. A friend is someone who has interacted with you, or who knows your parents or reads your blog—someone with history. If you’ve made a promise to someone and then kept it, you’re a friend. If you’ve changed someone for the better, you’re a friend as well.

We market to friends very differently than we market to strangers. We do business differently as well.

Thanks to social networks and the amplification of stories online, we have far more friends per person than at any other time in human history. Nurturing your friends—protecting them and watching out for them—Cont.

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Magicians, sausage makers and transparency

Does everything have to become completely transparent?

One of the ideas du jour online is the rush to make things transparent. To tear down the barriers and raise the blinds on the way organizations do business and to expose as much as possible.

Does Apple become a more exciting or profitable company if they share their sketches, their plans, open source their new designs and engage the company fully? Does Steve Jobs have an obligation to tell his fanboys in advance that he’s fighting to stay healthy? One journalist says he does because it will help raise money for research, another says he does because it’s a public company, while many of his fans say he does because they demand to know.

What about the Star Trek sequel? Should we be able to read the script now, a year before they start filming? Cont.

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PS did you get my favorite book of the year TRIBES??
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21 Jun

Seth Godin Sundays June 21st 2009

sethgodin Well we are into the third Seth Godin Sunday yay! This is the Sunday post that I dedicated to Seth Godin because he is one of my most favorite bloggers and mentors on the face of the earth. So again each Sunday I am discussing something that will be equally as creative! Also make sure you follow me on twitter today because I am tweeting a lot of Seths quotes and links to many of his articles.

My favorite Seth Quote of the week “The problem is that convenient approaches rarely break through or generate extraordinary returns.”

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A few of Seth Godin Posts of the Week

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How big is your farm?

If you own a lot of acres but just have a few bags of seed, you might be tempted to spread out what you’ve got and cover as much territory as you can. Farmers tell me that this is wasteful and time consuming. You end up with less yield and more work.

Marketers face the same dilemma………..cont.

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Ruby slippers

If you could make one thing come true that would change everything for your project, do you know what the one thing would be?

One breakthrough client, one technical advance, one testimonial? One achievable change in the world?

For Google, the one thing was a big thing, “we need to be the place people come to search.” But for many sites, many companies, there isn’t a thing. They can’t articulate it. They have no wish. If you have no wish, how can it possibly come true?

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You matter

When you love the work you do and the people you do it with, you matter.
When you are so gracious and generous and aware that you think of other people before yourself, you matter.
When you leave the world a better place than you found it, you matter.
When you continue to raise the bar on what you do and how you do it, you matter.
When you teach and forgive and teach more before you rush to judge and demean, you matter.
When you touch the people in your life through your actions (and your words), you matter.
When kids grow up wanting to be you, you matter.
When you see the world as it is, but insist on making it more like it could be, you matter.
When you inspire a Nobel prize winner or a slum dweller, you matter.
When the room brightens when you walk in, you matter.
And when the legacy you leave behind lasts for hours, days or a lifetime, you matter.

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Circles of Convenience

Allan points out that Warren Buffet and Benjamin Graham invested in Circles of Competence. The idea is to buy what you know.

Too often, organizations confuse this with circles of convenience. They stick to the tactics, products, people and channels that they are comfortable with, instead of rethinking what the market demands.

When Amazon offered the New York Times millions of dollars in affiliate revenue a decade ago, the paper turned them down because they feared losing Barnes and Noble as an advertiser. This is a convenient decision, but clearly not a smart one. cont.

PS did you get my favorite book of the year TRIBES??
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14 Jun

Seth Godin Sundays June 14th, 2009

sethgodin This is the Sunday post that I dedicated to Seth Godin because he is one of my most favorite bloggers and mentors on the face of the earth. So each Sunday I am discussing something that will be equally as creative! Also make sure you follow me on twitter today because I am tweeting a lot of Seths quotes and links to many of his articles.

Seth Godin Posts of the Week

Harvesting

“Why am I here?”

Tough!

Guy #3

Direct and useful project feedback

Should Hugh swear so much?

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“Why am I here?”

This is a simple mantra that is going to change the way you attend every meeting and every conference for the rest of your life.

You probably don’t have to be there. No gun held to your head, after all. So, why are you spending the time?

Do you have an agenda? It might be to change the agenda, or meet someone who will become a client or to learn something that will help you at work tomorrow.

Well, if that’s why you’re here, tell me again why you’re just sitting there? If the only reason you came was to avoid the office, you need a new office. Quick, before the boss decides that for you.

Surely you have a question you can ask the speaker. Surely you have something interesting to say to the person sitting next to you. Surely you can do more than just sheepishly hand someone a business card they have no reason to save or remember or use.

If there isn’t a good reason, go home. If there is, then do something. Loud, now and memorable. Productive too, please.

PS did you get my favorite book of the year TRIBES??
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07 Jun

Seth Godin Sundays June 7th 2009

This is the Sunday post that I dedicated to Seth Godin because he is one of my most favorite blogger and mentors on the face of the earth. So each Sunday I am discussing something that will be equally as creative!

TED tribes video

Saying ‘no’

If you’ve got talent, people want more of you. They ask you for this or that or the other thing. They ask nicely. They will benefit from the insight you can give them.

The choice: You can dissipate your gift by making the people with the loudest requests temporarily happy, or you can change the world by saying ‘no’ often.

You can say no with respect, you can say no promptly and you can say no with a lead to someone who might say yes. But just saying yes because you can’t bear the short-term pain of saying no is not going to help you do the work.

Saying no to loud people gives you the resources to say yes to important opportunities.

PS did you get my favorite book of the year TRIBES??

31 May

Seth Godin Sundays May 31st 2009

sethgodin This is the Sunday post that I dedicated to Seth Godin because he is one of my most favorite blogger and mentors on the face of the earth. So each Sunday I am discussing something that will be equally as creative!

A Kreative Seth Godin Sentence

Once upon a time I discovered the panhandler’s secret to opening acts and rock star. I found out that there was a myth of big salaries (it’s all marketing). All the hype turned out to be nothing. You see I don’t fall for national hype week. Because I know the difference between PR and publicity and the business rules of thumb.

Challenging convention

The smart guys at Contrast came by the office to talk about their thesis of abandoning conventions. It’s the intent of changing what we expect when we use something. Obvious things like the design of a cell phone or subtle things like the design of a door knob. There are terrific benefits to successfully coming up with a solution that invents and leverages a new convention.

I’d argue that there are four things to keep in mind when deciding to challenge a convention. You should incur the costs and hassles of inventing a new way to do things when you can are prepared to deal with all four. The costs can be huge, because a new user convention can slow people down or turn them away. A new financing convention makes it harder to raise money. A new hiring convention causes some people to avoid you…

Notice it. When you make a new way to do something, people are going to notice it. We’ll notice it when the volume knob on the radio doesn’t work the way all the other ones do, or when the navigation on your website isn’t where it ‘should’ be. Is your creativity about the convention? For example, if you make a stereo that sounds better, it’s not clear you should also change the way the volume control works. Noticing the shift in interface doesn’t help sell your concept of better sound.
Talk about it. Often, a new convention leads to conversations. People need to teach other about the ideas in your product or service, or complain about it or debate it. Again, no point changing the convention unless what you want is people to talk about your new convention.
Leverage it. Does the success of the new convention in the marketplace actually help you? Sure, you could invent a new kind of handshake or a new pricing structure. But if it catches on, do you win? Is it at the core of your business model? Which leads to the last one…
Protect it. Once the convention catches on, does the new way of doing things reinforce your position in the marketplace and lead to long-term benefits?

PS did you get my favorite book of the year TRIBES??