There are certain areas near the Equator, in both the Atlantic and the Pacific oceans, called The Doldrums. Sometimes, the trade winds within these areas just stop blowing for weeks at a time and any sailing vessel which ventures into The Doldrums will get caught there, unable to move until the winds resume once again. How many small business owners look at their company these days and feel just like the captain of one of those sailing ships trapped for the duration in The Doldrums? How many of these owners fail to realize that they have the power to "fill their company's sails" and move forward under their own power?
Why is it that even in difficult economic times, some companies continue to prosper and do well? Do these "survivors" know some secret that the rest of us don't know? Not really. In fact, some business owners succeed where others falter because they are still focusing on the same core goals that motivated them to start their businesses in the first place.
A successful company sets out to achieve much more than enjoying a healthy bottom line. In itself, that is certainly a legitimate goal. However,. A great company sets out to make a difference for its clients and customers... to make a real difference in the world. That might translate to helping customers to be healthier, to be more fit, to become better educated, to eradicating a terrible disease, to be able to get to work, for children to enjoy a clean and safe park or to be able to buy food that is safe and okay to eat.
Every company will define that set of core goals in the mission statement it writes for itself. That statement should constantly remind the company (and not it's customers) what the company wants to a accomplish. The mission statement is the best expression of what the company stands for and defines how the company wants to be perceived by it's customers. The most powerful mission statements challenge the business owner and his/her employees to stand out from the crowd, provide excellent goods and services and to set an outstanding example for others to follow. The wind that fills their sails is generated by an exhilarating sense that, every day when they go to work, they are doing something that really matters in the larger scheme of things and that they are changing the world about themselves for the better.
A great example: Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon.com, in a conversation with Ernie Manouse last night on PBS, explained one factor that has helped to make his company so successful. A central goal of Amazon.com's mission is to become the "Earth's most customer-centric company." Beyond that, because Amazon.com enjoys such large prominence in the business community, he hopes that his company will serve as a role model for other companies to emulate that value in their business models. Always remembering that has infused his company with a powerful sense of purpose and has kept his company on track, enabling it to enjoy extraordinary growth, according to Mr. Bezos.
When the business environment gets bumpy, what happens to a company whose owner and employees continue to be fiercely empowered by the clearly defined company goals? At minimum, it survives when other companies will falter or fail. In the best case, it will enjoy even spectacular growth, because everyone in the company continues to fully believe in their mission. In their minds, their individual job descriptions go far beyond that of being a salesman, office worker, truck driver or stocker. For them, failure is not an acceptable option, because they know that what they are doing is important and even critical to the larger success of the community they serve.
Among the most important responsibilities of a company owner, few rank higher than making certain that every member of a company team understands the core mission of that company. Every member of the team must be made to understand that his or her contributions are critical to the company's success. That means whether one sweeps the floors or one makes executive decisions, every man and woman on the team must be able to clearly identify and explain the most important goals that drive that company to greatness. Being able to do that will enable for them to feel invested in the success of the company for which they work.
The very survival of that company will ultimately be riding on the fact that they can do that... or they can't. In this matter, the buck stops at the owner's desk.
Friday, July 30, 2010
Monday, July 19, 2010
Positioning Your Company So That Your Customers "Get" What You Do
Is your company successful at getting your customers and your clients to understand what you do for them? Is your advertising message capturing the essence of what it is your niche market is demanding and expecting from your company?
You cannot expect this outcome to magically happen for your company. It requires more than putting a few buzzwords together into a catchy but random phrase. And to create that compelling favorable image of your company, you cannot turn the task over to a trendy PR firm. They do not know the core values and vision of your company half so well as you and your employees do. You will only discover the mantra... the phrase that captures the essence of your mission, in everyday, street language, only after you have invested a considerable amount of time in clearly defining what you want to say. When you can do that, than you par the message down to the minimum number of carefully chosen words.
Guy Kawasaki gives us some great examples of some major corporations have fielded this problem. Consider the following examples from his book, The Art of the Start.
Impersonal/Ineffective: "Reduce the size of the ozone hole.
Personal/Compelling: "Prevent you from getting melanoma."
Impersonal/Ineffective: "Dozens of airplanes flying in a hub-and-spoke pattern around the United States."
Personal/Compelling: "You are now free to move about the country."
Impersonal/Ineffective: "Increasing the mean test scores for children in your school district."
Personal/Compelling: "Ensuring that Johnny can read."
Why is the second statement, the Personal/Compelling statement so much more effective than the first one in each set? The second statement succeeds because it overcomes the "So what!" attitude on the part of potential customers. The first statement makes a bland, uninteresting explanation of what is being done by the company. The customer may well say, "Okay. So what!" The second statement lays out in unequivocal and 100% understandable terms what a company's products/services will mean to the public or to the consumer of that service or product.
Now, when I am watching television or reading a magazine, I study these carefully worded phrases that have so effectively enabled major companies to positively position themselves to keep and expand their market share.
On television, Hyundai runs an ad in which folks who have never driven a Hyundai give one a test drive and are wowed by the cars handling and performance. Their testimonials attest to the wonderful qualities of the car. Hyundai frames all of these positive response to their product under the heading of: "Hyundai: Uncensored." As Joe Friday, from the early TV show, Dragnet used to say: "Only the facts, sir. Only the facts." If as clients we hear something we can accept as factual, as the truth about a company and it's products, that company has crafted the specific psychological cue that will turn potential clients into actual clients.
AARP ran a television ad in which a series of over-60's people tell the audience what they are going to do when "they grow up." One wants to start a rock band. A woman wants to take her 1 year old grandchild on his first flight. These are people who clearly feel like they have a lot of living yet to do. Retirement is not even on their radar yet. AARP's carefully crafted phrase is: "Together, we will figure out what comes next." That message will certainly resonate with the over 60 crowd.
The First Lady of the United States, Michelle Obama has worked to create a national campaign to combat childhood obesity by encouraging more physical activity and a better diet, among today's kids. That campaign has been aptly named: the Let's Move national campaign. Two words which cut to the chase, imply fun, get the job done and effectively get across exactly what it is she is trying to do for these kids. (WebMD magazine, Mar-Apr 2010, page 80.)
Why are these position statements successful examples of what works out there in the world? Why do they get the message out for these causes and these companies in a compelling way?
You cannot expect this outcome to magically happen for your company. It requires more than putting a few buzzwords together into a catchy but random phrase. And to create that compelling favorable image of your company, you cannot turn the task over to a trendy PR firm. They do not know the core values and vision of your company half so well as you and your employees do. You will only discover the mantra... the phrase that captures the essence of your mission, in everyday, street language, only after you have invested a considerable amount of time in clearly defining what you want to say. When you can do that, than you par the message down to the minimum number of carefully chosen words.
Guy Kawasaki gives us some great examples of some major corporations have fielded this problem. Consider the following examples from his book, The Art of the Start.
Impersonal/Ineffective: "Reduce the size of the ozone hole.
Personal/Compelling: "Prevent you from getting melanoma."
Impersonal/Ineffective: "Dozens of airplanes flying in a hub-and-spoke pattern around the United States."
Personal/Compelling: "You are now free to move about the country."
Impersonal/Ineffective: "Increasing the mean test scores for children in your school district."
Personal/Compelling: "Ensuring that Johnny can read."
Why is the second statement, the Personal/Compelling statement so much more effective than the first one in each set? The second statement succeeds because it overcomes the "So what!" attitude on the part of potential customers. The first statement makes a bland, uninteresting explanation of what is being done by the company. The customer may well say, "Okay. So what!" The second statement lays out in unequivocal and 100% understandable terms what a company's products/services will mean to the public or to the consumer of that service or product.
Now, when I am watching television or reading a magazine, I study these carefully worded phrases that have so effectively enabled major companies to positively position themselves to keep and expand their market share.
On television, Hyundai runs an ad in which folks who have never driven a Hyundai give one a test drive and are wowed by the cars handling and performance. Their testimonials attest to the wonderful qualities of the car. Hyundai frames all of these positive response to their product under the heading of: "Hyundai: Uncensored." As Joe Friday, from the early TV show, Dragnet used to say: "Only the facts, sir. Only the facts." If as clients we hear something we can accept as factual, as the truth about a company and it's products, that company has crafted the specific psychological cue that will turn potential clients into actual clients.
AARP ran a television ad in which a series of over-60's people tell the audience what they are going to do when "they grow up." One wants to start a rock band. A woman wants to take her 1 year old grandchild on his first flight. These are people who clearly feel like they have a lot of living yet to do. Retirement is not even on their radar yet. AARP's carefully crafted phrase is: "Together, we will figure out what comes next." That message will certainly resonate with the over 60 crowd.
The First Lady of the United States, Michelle Obama has worked to create a national campaign to combat childhood obesity by encouraging more physical activity and a better diet, among today's kids. That campaign has been aptly named: the Let's Move national campaign. Two words which cut to the chase, imply fun, get the job done and effectively get across exactly what it is she is trying to do for these kids. (WebMD magazine, Mar-Apr 2010, page 80.)
Why are these position statements successful examples of what works out there in the world? Why do they get the message out for these causes and these companies in a compelling way?
- They are positive statements. They speak to what is possible. These days, people are desperately looking for such positive statements of encouragement.
- They focus on your customers. They address what your customers have told you what is important to the market niche they occupy.
- They are empowering to your customers. For your customers, the message reinforces the sense that the customer base can accomplish their goals and can be be successful utilizing your product or services..
- They are self-explanatory and very specific. The message is clearly stated and very specifically zeros in on hot-button attitudes and issues of your core market.
- They convincingly speak to what you do best as a company.
- They express a message that has a long shelf-life and will be as relevant fifty years from now as it is today.
- What you are saying is fresh and clearly stands out from all the other positioning statements in the marketplace.
- It works to firmly establish/solidify your firm's presence within the market niche in which your company has chosen to focus its advertising efforts.
Which people in a company need to understand how that enterprise is positioning itself? Everybody in the company from the CEO or the owner all the way down to the janitor who sweeps the floor. At one point another, every employee of the company will be the "face" of the company to a customer or a supplier and how they conduct business in the name of the company must be consistent with the way the positioning statement is laid out to the public.
Positioning a company emerges as a critical endeavor for any commercial enterprise. Those charged with doing this must do so intelligently and craft the message with great care, so that the company's positioning statement they create will serve the company well and bring about increased client loyalty and continued company growth.
Business NewsBytes - July 19, 2010
>>>Health Insurers pushing plans to limit choices of personal physicians. As the battle to shape the new national health program heats up, major health insurers are repackaging their insurance policies to limit access to physicians outside of the networks of medical providers for that company. They are floating the idea as a way to cut their own costs and to lower premiums, giving them a market edge. Americans were assured this would not happen. But in this case, it is anyone's guess as to what shape the final bill will take as the details are hammered out by all the key players. (Hou Chron, A10, Sunday July 18.)
>>>Volunteering your time/skills a great way to give back to the community. The Hou Chronicle of July 18th, listed some great volunteering opportunities in our area The local food banks could use our help to sort, sack groceries at distribution sites. Another agency could use local graphic artists to make greeting cards for institutional shut-ins in connection with various holidays throughout the year. A health initiative needs Spanish speakers. Contact: Volunteer Houston at 713.965.0031, M-F 9am to 5 pm or go to www.volunteerhouston.org, for more opportunities.
>>>Kudos to the Blue Willow book store, 14532 Memorial Drive, Hou.Wife of former Houston Mayor, Andrea White picked Blue Willow book store, one of Houston's lesser known treasures, as the best store in town for kids. "Blue Willow, which she calls a community hub, specializes in children's books. 'Last Christmas, I took some friend's kids to get holiday gifts there, and we had a blast." Editors note: A great place for adults as well with a carefully selected offering of fiction and non-fiction. (News courtesy of the Houston Chronincle, The Good Life, page 1, July 18, 2010)
>>>Pearland shaping up to be potential focal point for business ops. Pearland has grown by leaps and bounds. Since 2000, the population has tripled from 37,500 people to 96,000, with another 40,000 living just outside it's borders. Affordable housing, a short commute to Houston, greater medical services, new shopping venues, restaurants. Forbes magazine rated Pearland the 34th fastest growing city in the US. Looking to grow your business? Put Pearland on your radar. (Exerpted from the Hou Chron, Sect. G, p. 1)
>>>Major Banks to raise customer fees to offset declining revenues. The word on the street is that major banks like Bank of America are being pressured by stockholders to shore up declining revenues. One of the options on the table is to institute fee increases for basic banking services, including using the services of the bank teller behind the counter to conduct business in person. It will be interesting to see how all this plays out.
>>>Volunteering your time/skills a great way to give back to the community. The Hou Chronicle of July 18th, listed some great volunteering opportunities in our area The local food banks could use our help to sort, sack groceries at distribution sites. Another agency could use local graphic artists to make greeting cards for institutional shut-ins in connection with various holidays throughout the year. A health initiative needs Spanish speakers. Contact: Volunteer Houston at 713.965.0031, M-F 9am to 5 pm or go to www.volunteerhouston.org, for more opportunities.
>>>Kudos to the Blue Willow book store, 14532 Memorial Drive, Hou.Wife of former Houston Mayor, Andrea White picked Blue Willow book store, one of Houston's lesser known treasures, as the best store in town for kids. "Blue Willow, which she calls a community hub, specializes in children's books. 'Last Christmas, I took some friend's kids to get holiday gifts there, and we had a blast." Editors note: A great place for adults as well with a carefully selected offering of fiction and non-fiction. (News courtesy of the Houston Chronincle, The Good Life, page 1, July 18, 2010)
>>>Pearland shaping up to be potential focal point for business ops. Pearland has grown by leaps and bounds. Since 2000, the population has tripled from 37,500 people to 96,000, with another 40,000 living just outside it's borders. Affordable housing, a short commute to Houston, greater medical services, new shopping venues, restaurants. Forbes magazine rated Pearland the 34th fastest growing city in the US. Looking to grow your business? Put Pearland on your radar. (Exerpted from the Hou Chron, Sect. G, p. 1)
>>>Major Banks to raise customer fees to offset declining revenues. The word on the street is that major banks like Bank of America are being pressured by stockholders to shore up declining revenues. One of the options on the table is to institute fee increases for basic banking services, including using the services of the bank teller behind the counter to conduct business in person. It will be interesting to see how all this plays out.
Saturday, July 17, 2010
A Man Out Walking His Dog... Random Insights Into Business Life
While my Yorkie, Spike, was still alive, it was our habit to take a walk just before going to bed. What I remember most about those walks was that the world was quiet. No noise of traffic or jackhammers breaking up the street. I could hear myself think and in rare moments I could think through some issues with greater clarity than I could when the world was noisy and I was busy. Hence the title for this new feature of The 610 Business Journal. Welcome To AMOWHG (A Man Out Walking His Dog.)
Not Thinking About It
Those of you who have followed this business journal know that I had written at some length about the need to establish a balance in one's life. I have wrestled with what that means. On one level, it means making the choice to do just that and following through. But that begs the question of we have to do to work towards that state of balance, so that our lives are not dominated by our jobs and our work.
Maybe, the answer is and always has been a very simple idea. Maybe the main thing we have to do is give ourselves the permission not to think about what we do at work or some client we need to take care of by such-and-such a date. Nothing more than that. On the weekends and at the end of the work day, just give ourselves the permission not to think about work and to focus in on our family, our hobbies or our friends.
I am not going to say that this is going to be an easy thing to do for anyone in business, because I know that for a lot of us that will run against the very grain of who we are at the moment So perhaps the first decision we will have to make is to institute some major changes in our thinking about how we live our lives, figure out what we have to do and then just do it. It isn't an easy thing to do. Ingrained behaviors are never easy to modify. But then again, this whole notion is a no-brainer and this is not a complicated proposition.
Allow me to be the one to set an example for anyone who wants to do this. Effective immediately, I am making it my goal to put my actions where my mouth is. I am choosing to make this paradigm shift in the way I live. Wish me success. I will keep you up to speed as to how well I am doing.
Kindest regards,
Howard Fireman
Editor and Publisher
The 610 Business Journal
Not Thinking About It
Those of you who have followed this business journal know that I had written at some length about the need to establish a balance in one's life. I have wrestled with what that means. On one level, it means making the choice to do just that and following through. But that begs the question of we have to do to work towards that state of balance, so that our lives are not dominated by our jobs and our work.
Maybe, the answer is and always has been a very simple idea. Maybe the main thing we have to do is give ourselves the permission not to think about what we do at work or some client we need to take care of by such-and-such a date. Nothing more than that. On the weekends and at the end of the work day, just give ourselves the permission not to think about work and to focus in on our family, our hobbies or our friends.
I am not going to say that this is going to be an easy thing to do for anyone in business, because I know that for a lot of us that will run against the very grain of who we are at the moment So perhaps the first decision we will have to make is to institute some major changes in our thinking about how we live our lives, figure out what we have to do and then just do it. It isn't an easy thing to do. Ingrained behaviors are never easy to modify. But then again, this whole notion is a no-brainer and this is not a complicated proposition.
Allow me to be the one to set an example for anyone who wants to do this. Effective immediately, I am making it my goal to put my actions where my mouth is. I am choosing to make this paradigm shift in the way I live. Wish me success. I will keep you up to speed as to how well I am doing.
Kindest regards,
Howard Fireman
Editor and Publisher
The 610 Business Journal
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
Baseball Is More About Losing
Tonight, PBS aired the episode, Sixth Inning of Ken burn;s series, Baseball. For Ken Burns, baseball and the happenings in the sport during the period from 1941 to 1947 are iconic of what was going on in America during those significantly eventful years. One observation about baseball especially stuck in my mind. The narrator said that most people think that baseball is mostly about winning. He continued, they are wrong. Baseball is more about losing.. Batters are able to hit the ball only a third of the time. Major league teams usually lose more games than they win. But just because a batter may strike out, he doesn't quit the team. Just because a team loses a game, the team doesn't withdraw from the league in disgrace. They just try to do better the next time.
Lately, a lot of things which never grabbed my attention very much seem more compelling subjects to think about. Baseball certainly falls into that category, a subject not hugely interesting to me until now. Ken Burn's series on baseball changes how I perceive it now because he has made the people and the events in baseball powerful metaphors for the day-to-day realities we have to eventually face. Especially this notion that baseball is a lot about losing.
Why is that? Well, the real question confronting us is: Which experience transforms us more, winning or losing? The answer is losing. Playing baseball, living our lives or being in business are mostly about the journey, rather than specific things that happen to us. For better or for worse, we learn how to make our way in the world by trial and error. Sometimes the things we do work and sometimes they don't. If something doesn't work, we figure out what we could have done better and work on what we will do the next time. Over time, if we are focused and committed... if we are serious about putting in the best effort which we are capable of doing, we might even become really great in our field. But in truth, it is not about being great. It is about always getting better at what we do, than we are today.
When we finally achieve a notable victory in our life or in playing baseball, that moment of success is a milestone in our life. But the real story which needs to be told is about all the times things which did not work out for us leading up to that victory. In business, it is the sales we did not make or the jobs we did not get. It is about the mistakes we made which cost us a deal or caused us to lose a valuable business connection. It is mostly about what we learned from our mistakes as we honed our skills, until the day that we finally got good enough to seize the day.
Everyone knows that sales is a numbers game. One will get one sale out of "x" number of presentations. So is getting a job. One will have to go through so many interviews before some company will make a job offer. In the case of making sales presentations, we test out our presentation on the first few potential customers. And we refine our presentation and refine our selling skills. We get better at making the presentation and in closing the sale. We make a sale. We have our milestone. To make the next sale takes fewer presentations, because we have become a more effective sales person.
But winning a game or making the sale is not the end of the story. That victory is just one event in the journey. Not only that, a certain truth comes into play. In fact and in the way we will be perceived by others, we are really only as good as we are today. Even if we were doing great things yesterday, we must now focus on doing the best we can do today. Tomorrow, we will face the same challenge all over again, whether or not we succeeded today.
In reality, we are always living in the moment. As such, our focus and our commitment must be on what we are doing this day, this hour... this very moment. Whatever we are doing, we should be looking to do our best and to realize our full potential. Hopefully, we will enjoy some level of success in business today and get the sale or the contract. All things being equal, we will complete a project on schedule and the client will pay us in a timely manner. And ideally, we will make some kind of difference in the world.
But there will never be guarantees that we will win today's battle. Odds are we are likely to lose more times than we win. So in business, it is also mostly about losing the battles, but still holding our own in spite of it. So we can borrow from Ken Burn's analogy of baseball to grow as individuals and to become more competent in business with each passing day. We can use this thought to build our businesses better and stronger. We just have to remember that every time we don't win, we are really just one step closer to getting our next client or making the next sale.
Lately, a lot of things which never grabbed my attention very much seem more compelling subjects to think about. Baseball certainly falls into that category, a subject not hugely interesting to me until now. Ken Burn's series on baseball changes how I perceive it now because he has made the people and the events in baseball powerful metaphors for the day-to-day realities we have to eventually face. Especially this notion that baseball is a lot about losing.
Why is that? Well, the real question confronting us is: Which experience transforms us more, winning or losing? The answer is losing. Playing baseball, living our lives or being in business are mostly about the journey, rather than specific things that happen to us. For better or for worse, we learn how to make our way in the world by trial and error. Sometimes the things we do work and sometimes they don't. If something doesn't work, we figure out what we could have done better and work on what we will do the next time. Over time, if we are focused and committed... if we are serious about putting in the best effort which we are capable of doing, we might even become really great in our field. But in truth, it is not about being great. It is about always getting better at what we do, than we are today.
When we finally achieve a notable victory in our life or in playing baseball, that moment of success is a milestone in our life. But the real story which needs to be told is about all the times things which did not work out for us leading up to that victory. In business, it is the sales we did not make or the jobs we did not get. It is about the mistakes we made which cost us a deal or caused us to lose a valuable business connection. It is mostly about what we learned from our mistakes as we honed our skills, until the day that we finally got good enough to seize the day.
Everyone knows that sales is a numbers game. One will get one sale out of "x" number of presentations. So is getting a job. One will have to go through so many interviews before some company will make a job offer. In the case of making sales presentations, we test out our presentation on the first few potential customers. And we refine our presentation and refine our selling skills. We get better at making the presentation and in closing the sale. We make a sale. We have our milestone. To make the next sale takes fewer presentations, because we have become a more effective sales person.
But winning a game or making the sale is not the end of the story. That victory is just one event in the journey. Not only that, a certain truth comes into play. In fact and in the way we will be perceived by others, we are really only as good as we are today. Even if we were doing great things yesterday, we must now focus on doing the best we can do today. Tomorrow, we will face the same challenge all over again, whether or not we succeeded today.
In reality, we are always living in the moment. As such, our focus and our commitment must be on what we are doing this day, this hour... this very moment. Whatever we are doing, we should be looking to do our best and to realize our full potential. Hopefully, we will enjoy some level of success in business today and get the sale or the contract. All things being equal, we will complete a project on schedule and the client will pay us in a timely manner. And ideally, we will make some kind of difference in the world.
But there will never be guarantees that we will win today's battle. Odds are we are likely to lose more times than we win. So in business, it is also mostly about losing the battles, but still holding our own in spite of it. So we can borrow from Ken Burn's analogy of baseball to grow as individuals and to become more competent in business with each passing day. We can use this thought to build our businesses better and stronger. We just have to remember that every time we don't win, we are really just one step closer to getting our next client or making the next sale.
Thursday, July 1, 2010
Seminars and Business Mixers for the Week of August 9, 2010
InHouston Events
Click on the dates on the main page for the specific events. You will get a page with a listing of additional events throughout Houston on that day. For event details, go to the link below.
http://inhouston.ning.com/
HNN Events
For event details go to the link below
http://www.houstonnetworkingnews.com/
BNI - Katy
7 am to 8:30 am
Crown Plaza Hotel
Hwy 6 at I-10
Cost: $10.00
BNI - Grand Parkway Chapter
7 am to 8:30 am
Vida Loca Mexican Restaurant
21810 Kingsland Blvd
Every Wednesday
For more information: www.gpbni.com
SCORE Houston
Schedule of Events for 2010. For information of events this week, go to the link below. http://www.scorehouston.org/workshops/
UH Small Business Development Center
2302 Fannin, Suite 200
For Registration to all seminars, go to: www.sbdc.uh.edu.
Click on the dates on the main page for the specific events. You will get a page with a listing of additional events throughout Houston on that day. For event details, go to the link below.
http://inhouston.ning.com/
HNN Events
For event details go to the link below
http://www.houstonnetworkingnews.com/
BNI - Katy
7 am to 8:30 am
Crown Plaza Hotel
Hwy 6 at I-10
Cost: $10.00
BNI - Grand Parkway Chapter
7 am to 8:30 am
Vida Loca Mexican Restaurant
21810 Kingsland Blvd
Every Wednesday
For more information: www.gpbni.com
SCORE Houston
Schedule of Events for 2010. For information of events this week, go to the link below. http://www.scorehouston.org/workshops/
UH Small Business Development Center
2302 Fannin, Suite 200
For Registration to all seminars, go to: www.sbdc.uh.edu.
News You Can Use, Thursday, July 1, 2010
SOCIAL NETWORKING
10 Best Social Networking Tips for Business http://blog.taragana.com/index.php/archive/10-best-social-networking-tips-for-business/
Simple Tips to Be Successful in Twitter http://socialnetworkingrockstar.com/2010/06/simple-tips-to-be-successful-in-twitter/
Networking Within Your Blog Niche - 7 Essential Tips for Bloggers http://www.doshdosh.com/networking-within-your-blog-niche-tips-for-niche-bloggers/
Editorial -Thank God I am an American... And a Texan
Have you ever asked yourself why people look to this country as the land of opportunity? Why do people from all around the world keep coming here to make this country their home? And in particular, why Texas? I thought about these questions today and realized just how amazing a place this is to live and work.
When this country was imagined and created, a group of extraordinary men and women set out to build a nation like the world had never seen before. What our forefathers set out to do, at the time, had reverberations as far away as France and Russia. This small group of visionaries possessed a revolutionary outlook on such notions as the role of government, freedom, the rights of men and the idea that every person should enjoy the opportunity to realize his or her full potential as a human being. It has taken a couple of hundred years to pretty well translate that vision into what is now one of the really great countries in the world..
And we Texans have quite a heritage all our own. The spirit of Texas is audacious and bold. As Americans and as Texans, we live big and we dream big. That is the heritage that each of has inherited.
And yet, the news media only paints a picture of a people who is desperate and has lost the capacity to hope or even dream of a better future. We learn about major institutions like banks, whose greed has endangered the financial well-being of this great country. That is the reality that the newspapers and the television news anchors blast out day after day.
Well, that is not what I see. And the people with whom I am doing business with these days are hanging in there. They are optimistic and look ahead with confidence and hope. In this country, there are approximately 25 million small and medium sized businesses. For most of these companies, their doors are still open. They are still in business and fully intend to remain so. Why isn't anyone speaking out about this side of the coin. Listen well, because that is just what I am doing now.
Let's open our eyes to what good things are really happening in this country. We need to take a moment and give recognition to every business owner who has taken a stand that even this downturn is not going to defeat him or her... who is refusing to give up on his or her dreams or aspirations to create a great company and provide great products and services. Ladies and gentlemen, the American Dream (the real one) is alive and well right now, right here where we live.
People in other countries who aspire to make the USA their homeland easily see the full scope of opportunities here, even now. Many Americans, second and third generation Americans, have lost the ability to do that. Too many of us only see the problems and the contentious issues that divide us now more than they bring us together. Too many people sit and wait for someone else to create opportunities so that they can have a job too. As a businessman, I find this reality really distressing.
I own a small business that is thankfully growing. As I market my services and go to network mixers, I witness what can be accomplished when we take the initiative and create a new business... and therefore a job, for ourselves. Given that working for someone else is no more secure than working for yourself anymore, it now makes a lot more sense to strike out on your own and build your own company. It is a very challenging proposition, to be sure. But for a lot of unemployed people out there, it sure beats the alternative. And there is no better place to do that than right here in the USA, in Texas and in Houston.
The first Americans possessed great courage and were hugely self-reliant folks. Early on, the great Americans possessed great initiative and a strong work ethic. Back then there was no social safety net. You either worked or you essentially starved. They were innovative, focused and committed to the great idea of what this country represented in a world dominated by monarchs and despots. These values and these qualities are our most precious legacy.
Approaching life with a despondent attitude today, as a people we risk squandering this inheritance. Individually, we face the challenge of rediscovering these qualities and values in ourselves. Our challenge is to reincorporate these very ideas into our own thinking and our very being.
Let us cease being essentially professional consumers. Join me now. Let's set out to become more self-reliant, taking full responsibility for our own lives and our future. Let's live big and dream big once again. Let's dig deep down into ourselves and find the strength and the grit to take the initiative to put ourselves back to work, sooner than later... even if it means starting a business of our own. No matter how one slices the cake, life is going to be full of risks and uncertainties. In life, we get no guarantees of anything. But I can guarantee you one thing. If you own your own company, you are going to do everything humanly possible to be successful and the last thing you would ever do is to fire yourself.
If you had to live and work anywhere in the world today, there is still no better place to do that than right here in the United States of America. With all the problems this country has, the USA remains a place of hope and a place where there are infinite opportunities to realize one's potential, if one is willing to do what it takes to succeed. We still live in a place where one can pursue great dreams. I feel absolutely fortunate to be an American, a Texan and a Houstonian.
I hope all of you have a memorable 4th of July.
Kindest regards,
Howard Fireman
Editor and Publisher
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