You Make It Real

Today the topic is "You Make It Real". Do you know what it truly takes to achieve the success you desire? Well, in Rich Dad Poor Dad the famous Mr.

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Mobile Developers Find What They Need At Urban Airship (Adpulp)

PORTLAND--Dylan Boyd, VP of Growth at Urban Airship, gave me a tour of the
company's Pearl District digs last Friday and he helped me understand more
about the software products Urban Airship provides to thousands of customers
looking to optimize their mobile Apps. _See an image of the lobby here._
Coming in, I was wondering where Urban Airship fit in the fast-emerging
Portland mobile development scene--where Small Society and others firms are
making big names for themselves. Boyd said, "We don't build Apps, we support
indie developers." That support comes in the form of Push Notifications, In-
App Purchase and Subscriptions and Advanced Tracking and Reporting. "We
provide the tool kits that App builders can utilize," said Boyd. For a company
that's just one year-old, the numbers Boyd shares are staggering. Over 10,000
Apps in Apple's store use Urban Airship software. By extension these 10,000
Apps are loaded on over 100,000,000 iOS devices like iPhone, iPod and iPad.
Asked about this new space serving App developers, and what the competition
looks like, Boyd said, "Some people do some of the things we do, but none do
all the things we do." One of the ...

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Are you approaching your business like a hobby or career?

We've all heard that one of the most attractive aspects of MLM is the freedom we will finally achieve when we reach the land of "critical mass" so to speak in our business.

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Small Circus, Big Dreams

The contemporary circus movement is finding a growing audience in places other than under the big tent. Scaled-down, independently-owned troupes, which infuse elements of burlesque theater with traditional circus acrobatics, are beginning to showcase in clubs, parties, and notable corporate events. This growing trend is taking the circus from being a fringe spectacle to becoming a viable (and profitable) entrepreneurial pursuit.

"I think [it's] because of the rise of Cirque du Soleil and the desensitization of everything else," says Anya Sapozhnikova, founder, performer, and partner in Lady Circus in Brooklyn, New York. "Our society just keeps forcing everything to be more and more and more extreme, and circus is the most extreme form of performance art."

Allison Williams, the artistic director of Aerial Angels in Kalamazoo, Michigan, has noticed a shift over the last 15 years from the circus being a family business to something that anyone with skill and artistic vision can begin as a small operation. Williams also credits Cirque du Soleil for showing audiences that animals are not a necessity within the context of a circus performance. "Not having animals puts circus within reach of a lot of people," she says.

Timothy Mack, founder of The Imperial OPA circus in Atlanta, describes his "tangible" circus as the down-to-earth and approachable version of Cirque du Soleil. "We drop things now and then and we might not be super tight," he says. "We're trying to get better, but that's touchability." OPA, which consists of an ad hoc collective of 20 rotating performers, was founded in late 2009 after Mack, a seasoned street performer, completed a tour of duty with Cirque du Soleil as a photographer. They average one main production each month, plus an occasional scaled-down free show. Some of his performers were recently featured in an episode of The Vampire Diaries television series.

Like Mack, most of the entrepreneurs have a background in circus arts themselves. "You have to know what goes into every single aspect, from costuming to rigging to fire safety to how much floor space you need to choreograph a number. You have to have physically done all these things and know what it's about from [the performers] perspective before you start booking," says Sapozhnikova, herself an aerial performer.

Start-up costs for troupes are small in comparison to other industries. OPA's start-up funds, which Mack describes as being relatively minimal, were produced out-of-pocket, and he still holds a full-time position with the gaming company Thrust Interactive.

Most performers are also solo artists apart from the troupe and come equipped with their own props as a result. This alleviates circus owners of the financial burden of having to supply every performer with equipment during the start-up phase. However, reliable practice space is "probably the biggest challenge for anyone looking to start a company," says Williams, due to rental costs and insurance worries. For this reason, some companies collaborate with other groups to form symbiotic business partnerships. Aerial Angels is currently in residence at a gym in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where they have free access to training space in exchange for teaching classes. Lady Circus works out of The Sky Box, another venture in which Sapozhnikova is a founder and partner and, in this case, instructor to those outside of the circus who are interested in taking classes in aerial arts.

Another important consideration is liability risks. "What is crucial for any troupe to have is workers comp, and that is expensive," says Guillaume Dufresnoy, artistic director of the legendary troupe Big Apple Circus that was the subject of the PBS series, Circus. Due to the expense, many troupes handle their liability risk simply by requiring their performers to sign a waiver of liability and assumption of risk prior to joining the troupe. Dufresnoy scoffs at the widespread use of waivers being used as the only protection for entrepreneurs in the industry. "I think they can easily and always be contested and defeated [in court]. We use them, too. I think it's a first line of defense, but they're easily challengeable," he says. Williams has another take on the financial risks involved. "The biggest defense we as small business owners have is that we don't own anything worth taking," she says. Sapozhnikova echo's Williams's sentiments. "I think the liability's not as much of a big deal as it seems. If you're really paranoid about getting sued, you probably shouldn't be a circus performer."

In addition to waivers, certain troupes mandate that artists carry performers insurance. Specialty Insurance Agency covers performers for bodily injury and property damage to the client for $210 annually. Kasumi Kato, an Atlanta-based aerial silks performer, has more comprehensive coverage through International Special Events & Recreation Association (ISERA) at a cost of roughly $2,000 per year, and requires that her co-performers also be insured. However, she has never been seriously injured during her tenure as an aerialist, which began at the age of four. Now 24, having recently received a degree in public policy from Georgia State University, she's embarking on a full-time career as a performer and instructor and working to form a company with two other aerialists. She also performs with The Imperial OPA on occasion.

An LLC may be the ideal structure for an up-and-coming troupe, due to the relatively simple formation structure and limited financial liability risks for the partners involved. Mack recently converted OPA into an LLC and has plans to seek 501(c)(3) status down the line. Williams also runs Aerial Angels as an LLC. Although Sapozhnikova and her partners operate Lady Circus as an LLC, the Sky Box venue is housed under the House of Yes corporation, co-founded by Sapozhnikova, that also incubates Make Fun!, a costuming and prop-making studio space.

Performers in start-up troupes usually receive their first payments through busking tips and donations, but steady gigs from paid clientele lead to the sustainability of successful troupes and the ability to take their acts on the road. The rates that circuses and individual performers charge varies greatly, and is mainly dependent upon the client's budget and the types of artists that will appear in the act. "You figure out a fair price with the context," says Sapozhnikova. "Let's say it's an upscale club and their budget is $1,000. I'm not going to give them more than two performers for that budget," she says. "But, depending on if one performer is stilt walking for two hours and another person has prepared, specifically, a tailored three-minute aerial solo, we [take that into account]." For solo engagements, Kato charges a flat fee of $350 that covers booking, costumes, insurance, rigging, and other nuances associated with a show. That initial fee is followed by a $100-per-hour performance rate. An elaborate costuming requirement may incur an added expense for the client.

As for Aerial Angels, whose clients have included corporate entities such as Citigroup, Williams pulls 10 percent off the top as a booking fee for both herself and her business manager, and pays the company the equivalent of the highest paid performer at the gig. "The girls who work for us full-time do anywhere from $25,000 to $45,000 a year," says Williams about her company of 11. The Aerial Angels performers are all independent contractors. Dufresnoy recommends that owners of up-and-coming circus troupes stay within the 1099 model because, "it's case by case, one show, two shows, then [the performers can] go away and do other things," he says.

Aerial Angels also scored a sweet deal in 2008 when they appeared on the Canadian version of the hit reality television show Dragon's Den. Their appearance netted the troupe a quarter of a million dollars to finance a large indoor show. Regardless of the win, Williams, a former theater professor at Western Michigan University, and other circus entrepreneurs are doing quite well for themselves both creatively and financially, and see plenty of room for growth in the future. "I like to tell people I make more money than I did as a college professor and I don't have to go to committee meetings," she says.

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Start 2011 By Learning from Failure

The Start-Up Toolkit is above all a resource for start-ups and it is my intent to help them better manage, market, sell, protect their businesses, and prosper. Sometimes that means telling people how to avoid problems. For my first column of 2011, I have been privileged to speak to a start-up founder who ended 2010 by closing his business. We can all learn from the story of David Reinke and StyleHop. The key lessons are on the value of planning, the need to test your market, knowing who is going to pay you and focusing on them, and finally, the challenge of changing the way an industry does business.

Reinke had fifteen years of experience in brand marketing, sales and operations. While working at Liz Claiborne, Reinke had an idea about using the idea of crowd sourcing to help improve the merchandising assortment for clothing at major retailers. He presented it to his management as an idea for an internal venture, but they ultimately encouraged him to take the intellectual property and start the company on his own.

“I wanted to change the way buyers decide which dresses to order. Today, they use their own research and intuition, as well as the history and data they have. I wanted to improve their process by letting the crowd vote on which fashions they preferred, and see if that connected with actual sales,” said Reinke. He conceived a fashion-oriented Social Network destination with a back-end that would be relevant to the B2B market. He skipped a business plan, dove in and hired a CTO to start building out a fashion social network with user profiles, the ability to upload favorites, and affiliate feeds so users could rank new fashions and put them into wish lists. His idea was to build his network first and show it to potential B2B clients who would be the real customers.

“We did everything we were 'supposed to' – we built a successful and popular social destination - but by building the panel first, I created more market risk. I didn't have any paying clients. That market risk became clear when we wanted to raise money in October 2008. As an entrepreneur, you have to think about risk from your own perspective. If I could do it over, I would have started by validating this crowd source model with the large retailers.” It turns out the buyers in these companies weren’t ready to change the way they had always done their buying.

By January 2009, Reinke and his team had shifted their focus completely to getting clients on the retail merchandising side. By March they had their first client and it turned out that their model worked quite well. “After a season, on three classes of clothing, our panelists were 7 times more accurate on what people would like and what was actually sold.” The caveat is that merchants make picks way in advance, and companies argued the fashion panels wouldn’t be as accurate doing future predictions. “Merchant guesses see-saw all over the place, but our panelists had .75-.85 correlation - very consistent - which would help them predict better over time as we kept a network going and growing.”

The problem was that StyleHop was running on fumes. Even though they found a second client, they couldn’t price the service well enough to keep the destination running and service the retailer’s side. Meanwhile, the customer social site had gotten stale.

Reinke knows now he should have built the retailer’s side of the business first, and used Facebook, Twitter, Google, and other sources to assemble panels as needed. He would have had more of an online focus group and less of a network of fashion fans, but it would have entailed less risk and less cost, giving him more margin to build the network part of the vision later. Ultimately, he didn’t have the cash to pay or increase staff. If he had attracted B2B clients first and proved his model, he would have been much more attractive to investment.

Reinke’s third insight: “We had one major client and that highlighted the risk of having all my eggs in one basket. Our internal contact switched roles in the company, and we were set back to square one, trying to show our value.” He didn’t listen to advisors who told him fashion people always go on intuition even though he had solid data to back up his ideas. “I would have focused energy on the Board of Directors and CEO buy-in instead of the merchandising level. That would have provided executive approval and given people an ability to try something new.”

Reinke has moved back to an in-company role, but still feels he had a great potential business. “StyleHop was knowledge and methodology, not technology. Maybe we’ll get a chance to try it again in some form.”

Thanks to David for being incredibly open and sharing his story in hopes that others will learn from his company’s failure. Share your thoughts on this story and the lessons learned in the comments.

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My App Gap Posts for February 2011 (Portals and KM)

Here are my AppGap posts for February. I am also writing in another Corante
blog, FastForward (see right side bar for links), The AppGap posts began
toward the end of January 2008. Here, I am primarily doing product
commentaries with...

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Destroying the Stigma of Direct Sales

Courtesy of  Karalee Craven
Marketing Communications Manager | doTERRA

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A Very Short Story (zeldman.com)

MY DAUGHTER sat laughing in the dark, her face and hands covered in blood.
Just a nosebleed but it aged me 10 years.

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Are Your Articles As Dry As A Popcorn Fart?

You do know what one is right! Unless you have never eaten any popcorn.

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Online Marketing's Best Kept Secret

Over the last few months we've been working with a number of our clients on establishing and growing their email marketing strategies. We helped one client send out an email for the first time and saw conversion rates that were 2-3 times higher than their Web site conversion rates. I mean conversions from subscribers to buyers which meant real dollars in their pocket.

As we start 2011 and face the hype over new tools and new ways to use "old" tools like Facebook, this is an excellent time for you to consider the importance of Connect with Maisha on LinkedIn Get notified of Maisha's new posts via email

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WordPress Blackberry App Releases New Beta (Blogging Pro)

The latest beta for WordPress for Blackberry is out and instead of launching a
slew of new features for users the team decided to concentrate on something
more important instead. Lots of changes were made under the hood and this is
the reason you haven?t seen any update for a while. We thought that security
[...]

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Designing For Start-Ups: How To Deliver The Message Across (Smashing Magazine)

Start-up organizations provide an extraordinary example of chaos organized
into manageable chunks. Perhaps more than anyone else, the individuals who
comprise a start-up team are required to understand their team?s goals across
a variety of disciplines -- research, marketing, design, development,
architecture, etc. -- as well as their own responsibility to move the
company?s overarching objective forward. Entrepreneurs must choose the
direction, designers must think through the options, and developers must cull
a functional product or service, all while giving feedback to and receiving it
from their colleagues.

At least, that?s the idea. Most **start-ups tend to take liberties** somewhere
along the way. Some start-ups begin with a novel business model, whereas
others begin with a beautiful design. Still others try to test things out
first with a functional prototype, even if it is a bit ugly. All of them --
regardless of their initial approach -- adapt their process over time in order
to create a well-rounded product or service. And for this reason, most of
today?s start-ups describe themselves as ?agile.?

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What are the Benefits of Visualization

What Are The Benefits Of Visualization?

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To Blog or Not to Blog

Outside of the fact that you happen to be reading one right now, I find that there are lots of smart, business savvy folks out there who when placed in the position of having to explain, strategize or build a blog (or decide if one should be built at all) are at a bit of a loss. Blogs are usually easy for most people to recognize but harder for folks to define.

When I hosted a free class on the subject (as I do from time to time) it "sold out" (in the way only free classes can!) the room filled to capacity.

Even those who can sort of describe a blog, often find it hard to understand when, why and how to create one so that it will actually create benefit for a business, organization, cause etc..

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Of course everyone who manages a successful blog has found themselves in a similar position at least once and gotten past it, so I thought I could impart a few words of advice.

First of all, what is a blog really?

A blog is just a Web site.

Let me repeat that for the non-believers — A BLOG IS JUST A WEB SITE.

But it's a special kind of Web site.

Let's start by looking at the different kinds of Web sites that exist. Many of the students of my in-person classes will recognize this.

According to my calculations and ruminations, there are essentially 4 kinds of Web sites you can build based on how your business attracts revenue:

Web Site Types

Branding
Examples: Coca Cola, Dove Advertising Revenue
Examples: Inc.com, Google.com eCommerce
Examples: Amazon, Zappos Lead Generation
Examples: messagemedium.com, razorfish.com

A branding site like Dove is working hard to immerse the viewer in the company's ethos. You can't actually buy any product from their site, they don't seem to sell ads, nor are they pushing hard for you to give up your contact information. Dove's site is all about convincing you of their commitment to improving women's natural beauty and self-esteem in the hope that this will generate an emotional affinity to their brand.

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An advertising revenue site like Inc.com has articles and information as its content. It is designed and organized into categories like "Business Advice" "Tech Startup" "The Internet Strategist" to display that content in a way that's easy for you — the reader — to find, read and pass along.

An Online Store like Zappos.com has products — shoes - as its content. So it is organized and designed to make it easy for you to find the kind of shoes you're looking for. One of reasons Zappos is so popular is it provides a variety of ways to find what you're looking for.

A service Web site like message medium has services as its content. So our site is organized to make it easy for you to find our services and also to find the things that make us a credible company to work with — testimonials, articles, client samples, news clippings etc.

As a business owner, more than likely you are not looking to spend millions of dollars on a branding Web site so let's focus on the other three.

So How do Blogs fit in?

Blogs are an interesting breed of Web site. In structure, they are most like Advertising Revenue sites. Like a newspaper, they usually publish content with some predictable regularity, and the content is typically arranged by date and/or by category so that it can be easily found by readers.

But what's interesting about blogs and has made them so ubiquitous, is that they, with all of their content and social elements, can be used very effectively to support an Advertising, eCommerce or Lead Generation Web site.

My blog "The Internet Strategist" is designed to fit within Inc.com's business model of generating revenue through advertising and things like events.

The blog of Tony Hsu, the CEO of Zappos, is designed to generate brand loyalty and increase sales of the products Zappos sells.

This blog also does double-duty, helping you the reader understand my areas of expertise as an Internet Strategist, which my company message medium hopes will help us generate more consulting, Web site design and construction, and Internet marketing clients as well as attendees in our classes.

So the first thing you have to identify when considering blogging is — what kind of business do I have and how do we stay afloat? How do we generate revenue? This will help you determine your ultimate blogging purpose.

Next time — I'll discuss "The Big Payoff" what can you expect a blog to actually accomplish for you?

Post Your Comment

Have a question? Got something to share? Something I missed?

Your feedback, comments, real world experience and tactical questions are an important part of the discussion. If you have a comment, question or feedback post it below.

Share:

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Handling Objections

                                &nbsp

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A Female Spin on Starting a Business

Normally I don’t focus on male- or female-specific entrepreneurial challenges, but having received two books by women entrepreneurs in the last few weeks, I thought it was a good time to review this topic.

Entrepreneur Susan T. Spencer grew her first business in the late 1960’s when her self-designed tennis dress caught on in popularity. A divorcee with kids to support, she took on a partner who drove her business into the ground – by selling too much!

“Cash flow and partnerships are key lessons I learned early. Don’t ever go into a 50-50 partnership if you don’t have a great lawyer and a clear understanding of where the business is going. In fact, you should probably never have 50-50 ownership. Come up with a list of responsibilities each is willing to take. If 99% are on one person’s side, and the rest are on the other side – that’s a problem with that partner – don’t do the deal.” Spencer’s partner, a man, refused to listen to her and the company was unable to supply the product to stores.

On cash flow, Spencer said “One of the most important things about cash flow, and I was in business for 4 years before I figured this out, is to know the terms companies are setting, what they’re going to pay you, and when. I didn’t know at the time that department stores paid net 90 days, and that sunk me.” Spencer’s book, Briefcase Essentials has a number of tips that women can use to leverage their talents and abilities to help them grow their own businesses or careers. Her site also has a link to some of her useful YouTube videos.

Spencer went on to a career as the first Woman General Manager of an NFL team, the Philadelphia Eagles (admitting that her dad owned the team and let her work up through the ranks.) From there, she bought and built up companies in the meat industry and the trucking industry, both stereotypically male fields.

Spencer told me “I think women have a need to understand that when they are in a business, they need to grow it, not baby-sit it. If you don’t grow, you don’t have power. When you grow, when you add employees and grow your bottom line, you get opportunity to do what you do well and let others do their work.”

Carol Roth, business strategist and author of the The Entrepreneur Equation, isn’t a fan of having women-only networking (or women-only business books.) “Women shouldn’t have a league of their own,” said Roth. “What we’re up against is an old boys network in a new digital age. Look at the Web 2.0 company boards, and there are no women, even though it is widely quoted that more women than men participate in social media. The concept of women’s groups can be damaging for your career as it singles out women as a “special needs” group. It’s like sitting at the kids’ table during holiday dinner. Instead of joining the women’s group, don’t be afraid to grab your seat at the men’s table, even if you are the only women. You need to establish those relationships if you want to play in the same league.”

Having played in the real big leagues, Spencer would definitely agree with that last point. “Do not try to be a man. It’s not effective and it wastes your talent,” Spencer told me. “If you do homework and you’re disciplined and detailed, you’ll succeed with male suppliers and customers. When you’re the expert, men will come to you for information and will rely on you for it.”

Roth’s book drops on March 22nd, and Spencer’s book was supposed to be on sale next week (but I see it listed as available via several online book sites.)

What do you think would be helpful to women starting businesses? Let us know in the comments.

A note: I’m doing some interesting stuff this week over on Twitter and increasing my interactions on my Facebook Fan Page – are you following @HowardGR?

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Top Twitter Techniques (or 9 Good Excuses if you want to Ignore Twitter)

In my view Twitter, like many marketing and social media tools, is basically a stage. How you present yourself upon it depends on what talents you have and what you're trying to accomplish.

Below, I've outlined 9 methods of interacting on Twitter. This list should either allow you to comfortably ignore Twitter because none of these methods of interaction are feasible or meaningful for you, or recognize an opportunity for yourself or your business.

The Personality
This applies both to actual celebrities, and people who are building a brand that can be clearly defined as having a "voice". People like Perez Hilton, Oprah Winfrey and Tony Hsieh of Zappos immediately come to mind. All of them have Twitter feeds and each of them has a very distinct voice. "In waiting room at doctor's office. In addition to magazines, they should offer a selection of paint so people can watch it dry." A recent post from the CEO of a company with projected 2008 revenues of $1 billion. People follow these feeds for a variety of reasons but mainly because they receive something emotionally satisfying from the postings.

The Guide
The Guide is typically a person or people assigned to seek out messages posted by people who have a question related to your business, products or services. Here is a great case study of a company who did just that and has shared their results. Note that to maximize their efforts they have someone spending 30 minutes per day on Twitter in this role.

The Brand Watchdog
Someone proactively seeks out mentions of their company name or product name and responds personally to each post. Two companies that immediately come to mind are GeekSquad Founder Robert Stephens (thanks @DanielRiveong and @britopian) and ComCast's Director of Digital Care Frank Eliason @ComCastCares. Companies can win big brownie points by having very senior staff members respond to customer service questions. The idea here is that by providing direct access to someone who really knows what they're talking about, companies can prevent damage to their brand from disappointed customers.

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The Customer Support Rep
Very similar to the Brand Watchdog, this too is focused on watching for and responding to customer service questions. But while I would put Frank Eliason in the Brand Watchdog category, this category is usually filled by the unsung Twitter heros (Twiroes?). They are likely handling questions in other (non-Twitter) venues and have added Twitter to the ways they communicate. The catch here is that the expectation is that Twitter customer service reps will actually help you resolve your issue. We'll see how long that lasts!

The Publisher
People and companies will often use Twitter as a way to simply feed followers information about their area of influence. A lot of news is now breaking on Twitter before it hits major publications. But you don't have to be first, just relevant and somewhat consistent. A really interesting take on the publisher model is The Brooklyn Museum who is monetizing their social content and their community by offering memberships to a "socially networked museum membership" for $20 per year.

The Promotion Channel
Unfortunately I think both spammers and ecommerce sites fit into this category. But the ecommerce sites I've seen use Twitter in interesting ways to do promotion and inform customers about products they are interested in. Take a look at Amazon on Twitter. Their feed is a little bit all over the place in terms of content and they don't have an individual person that followers can connect with (which limits conversation and can limit your follower numbers) but they've still managed to collect almost 4,000 followers as of this article. Contests, Twitter only discount codes, free giveaways are all part of the promotion channel arsenal.

The Conversationalist
Many of the most popular "tweet"ers are those who actively engage with their followers. In essence this is what really makes Twitter unique as a communication tool, although it's also what scares the bejeezus out of small business owners. Being the Conversationalist can be very time consuming, but the rewards are high in terms of building a loyal following and truly connecting with people who are interested in what you have to offer, from whom you are interested in learning and with whom you can build strategic relationships. We're talking several posts per day many of which are directed at specific people.

The Curious
There are many people who don't post to twitter at all. They use it as an information resource, watching the "twitter trending topics" to "crowd source" their news or following people they find interesting or informative. This can be a great way to use Twitter and learn a thing or two. The key here is to be careful about who you follow — you want people with a high signal to noise ratio usually with far fewer posts but each post is a gem.

The Entertained
Again here it's not about posting information but consuming it. There are many feeds on Twitter (The Onion is one of my favorites) that are purely about entertainment, putting a smile on your face or making you think.

As you'll no doubt notice, some Twitter strategies combine these methods.

The Conclusion

If you are not interested in any of the 9 methods above then Twitter is probably not for you. But really the best way to find out is to use it. Sign yourself up - it takes only a couple of minutes to sign up and if you're looking for somewhere to start, start following me and then look at other people who follow me. You don't have to know someone to follow them. You can even sign up under what I like to call an "incognito name" — a name that won't be associated with you or company so that you can experiment without worrying about making an embarrassing mistake. After a few weeks drop the incognito account and sign up with accounts branded for you and/or your company.

The Future?

On a more serious note, I can't help noting how many meaningful events have occurred in the last few weeks, and the very different way we experienced them. I am struck with the realization that every real moment can be played out near real time on a global scale.

These little 12-17 inch screens and keyboards we've become so intimate with, that bring close the lives of far away friends, over the last two weeks opened up a world of individuals sharing their grief, and made a political maelstrom that might before have seemed "far away," personal in a way many of us have never experienced.

As people, we know instinctively that how the world makes it's way into our lives is changing, dramatically. And not just how it reaches us, but where it comes from, who filters it (if anyone), how we seek it out and find it, that we can share it, comment on it, alter it and then pass it along. As people we struggle with concepts like authenticity while trying to grasp the ever-slipping confines of the personal within the ever-growing realm of the public.

And while those lines are being blurred and redefined, as businesses we must be careful not to loose sight of the very human, once personal context in which we're operating more and more. I think it's keeping sight of this context which in part keeps us authentic and relevant - regardless of the tools we use. While some debate whether or not Twitter is useful, others are simply putting it to work, filling a need, and reaching an audience they would never have reached before.

I thought something I read recently put it well:

"Asking when Twitter will end is like saying, 'When will the cell phone fad end'?...The value of cell phones can't end, it only can be replaced by something that provides the same value and more. Once we have a capability, we never want it taken away from us." -- David Spark, founder of Spark Media Solutions

While you definitely can learn from how others are using tools like Twitter both successfully and unsuccessfully, keep in mind that a) the communication is still yours b) the content is still yours c) everyone is still figuring this stuff out so don't be afraid to dip your toe in the water and don't be afraid to make a few mistakes d) do try to remember that there are humans on the other side of that message. There is something they probably want and want from you. What is it that they're looking for?

Related Articles:

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Link Building - What to Do

So now that we know that Link Farming is bad and reciprocal links may have limited value, how do we convince other Web sites to link to us without linking back to them?

One Directional Link Sources

First - where can you get these one directional links? Great places include:

Industry directories — sites that are directories of other sites in a particular industry

About.com — often has directories and provides information about a wide variety of industries and specific, niche topics

Event Sites - for events you are hosting or where you are a sponsor or speaker

Online PR — PR sites, or sites that have an article written by you or about you

Library sites — if you have content that is relevant to a particular topic and for a wide range of people libraries often offer great directories and resource lists

Blogs — if you have a product or service that is exciting and you can get a blogger to write about it.

Review Sites — if you have a product that can be reviewed.

If your site has a lot of free and useful content you will have a much easier time getting incoming, one directional links.

How to Ask for a Link

Also if you plan to reach out to other sites to link to you, make sure you use the right approach.

Consider "deep linking" - invite linkers to link to a specific page of relevant content rather than linking to your home page. This is usually far more appealing for bloggers and other content sites.

Make the contacts personal — avoid sending blanket emails to sites. Write personal emails or consider calling. Consider establishing a relationship over time. The extra time it takes you to do this will force you to be more selective in the sites you choose to reach out to.

Choose carefully — getting a link can be a lot like pitching a story to a magazine or even like cold calling. Make sure you have done your research and confirmed that your content is right for the site you're contacting. The last thing you want to do is create bad will by blanketing sites that have no interest in what you do.

Have something noteworthy and specific to offer — remember that in general, noone cares about your latest product or your newest client. I know that sounds harsh but it's unfortunately true. You have to find a reason for them to care. Find something interesting, unique, exciting, personal or noteworthy that would make people want to link to you.

Related Articles:

Getting Good Rank: Search Engine PrimerSearch Engine Optimization in 3 Easy? Steps10 Tips to Avoid the Biggest SEO MistakeThe 9 Places to Put Your Keywords for SEO PowerLink Building -- What Not to Do

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The Power of Thank You

I wanted to use my last column of the year to discuss the value of "Thank You." Many start-ups and small businesses survive and thrive via referrals and word of mouth. I'll use a personal example today to show how one business keeps its word-of-mouth pipeline full.

Earlier this year, our home air conditioning system failed during one of the hottest periods of the summer. We called our regular air conditioning and heating service, and they dispatched a technician who could not fix the problem. Seems the fan motor was bad, the unit was old, and they could not remove the fan blade from the motor. It was going to be at least a week to find a new fan and motor part, get someone out there, and get us some relief. And to add insult to injury, it was going to cost north of $600 in addition to the current service charge.

At that point, angry, frustrated and very, very hot, I went searching for an alternative. I contacted the company that makes our air conditioning unit, and they referred me to a web page with authorized local techs. A small independent shop answered my call, and the owner himself came out to fix the problem the next day (incredible in that heatwave). Somehow, he was able to remove the fan from the motor, and he had a spare motor in his truck that was a suitable substitute. In addition to the quick fix he provided, he was courteous, quick, and paid attention to small touches like removing his shoes before coming in from outside where the cooling unit is located. As a bonus, his work cost was about half our regular company's quote. As the air conditioner started to cool our house, we were very satisfied customers.

As a small business columnist, I always like to talk to owners about business and challenges. My technician works in a family-owned business that has a very small staff, and he does most of the repair and contracting work himself. He does little marketing, but told us that a way to thank him was to refer him to other customers - most of his business comes from word of mouth.

Fast forward a week or so later, and I'm commuting to New York on a train, when I see a neighbor. He told me he was having an air conditioning system issue. I referred our new service tech, and my neighbor hired him. A few weeks later the neighbor told me the tech had replaced their entire unit. The cost was in line with what he had expected, work was done professionally, and he was quite happy with the way things turned out.

I might have forgotten this whole incident until this week, when I received a holiday card from the technician with a hand written thank you for the specific referral and a Home Depot gift card encouraging us to keep passing him to other who might need air or heating work done.

Now, I don't need to be bribed to refer someone who does good work, but this showed me how this tech keeps his pipeline full. He uses the power of "Thank You" to keep people thinking about him. There are so many different ways to do this, from gifts to notes, emails, and especially to referring business back to those who sent you work.

I hope you can benefit from this quick lesson in the spirit of the holidays. I also wanted to take a moment to thank you for spending time reading this column, commenting, passing my writing on, connecting with me on Facebook and Twitter, and most of all, working hard on your start-ups. You inspire me every week and keep me working on this column.

I wish you much success in the new year!

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