Hope Is NOT The Answer.

(Neither is government spending nor business borrowing!)

     The old business adage, “NOTHING HAPPENS ‘TIL THE SALE IS MADE” applies more today than ever! I have noted here often that budget slashing, and save-on-expenses mentalities end up digging an even deeper hole because they divert energy away from what needs to be done to put the economy on a rebound and growth track.

     Economic recovery can ONLY happen when more businesses decide to make it happen. We have to blow off mainstream media’s efforts to drag the public into the maelstrom they’re busy creating in their relentless quest to sell more print advertising space and more broadcast commercial time.

     When businesses decide to focus on sales and entrepreneurial pursuits, we will see increased financial stability across the boards. Sounds simple, huh? Unfortunately, our own business-inexperienced government is essentially leading the blockade to progress on this front…token small business incentives don’t cut it!

     Add to the government’s misguided energy and maniacal spend and borrow and tax mentality the sad truth is that many business people have simply given up, and the saving-grace focus we’re talking about turns out to not be so simple after all. 

     Government spending and business borrowing? Digest this (following) quote made 5 days ago in a European Parliament speech by Daniel Hannon MEP who was targeting the English Prime Minister with some realistic advice:

You cannot spend your way out of recession,

or borrow your way out of debt!”

[See www.Hannon.co.uk for more.]

     If you are an entrepreneur or run your own business, you need to be resolute in your thoughts and actions. You need to be literally invulnerable in your convictions that hope may spring eternal, but it simply does NOT fuel or grow business in any way–never has, never will. ONLY sales do that.

     Like throwing two baseballs at equal velocity with both arms simultaneously, the most difficult task for any entrepreneur or business owner is to be running your business and selling your business at the same time. Yet that is what has to happen.

     This means, you must be willing and able to go the extra mile with customers, prospects, employees, vendors, your industry, your community, your family, and your own health and fitness. Dropping any one of these from the pursuit equation will collapse the energy around those that remain.

     Okay, HOW? you ask. By paying attention to having fun instead of feeling pressure (the feeling-pressure guys have already boarded up and left town). By paying more attention to exercise and eating and sleeping right, by laughing more, and by learning and using stress management techniques , by taking a yoga class, a jog, a walk, another walk, more walks. 

     As for help, what’s suggested here isn’t much, but–like everything else in life–suggestions are what you make of them. It’s always your choice about how to proceed. The rest of what happens is up to you.  

Good Night and God Bless You!  

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I Am So Happy To See Your

Smiling Faces (and avatars!)

Thank you all my Twitter friends, and welcome to my daily business, personal and professional growth blog. I look forward to more of your visits and comments. Have a wonderful week ahead! Hal

Good Night and God Bless You!  halalpiar     

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PR IS NOT

A SERIES OF STUNTS!

     If your goal is to attract attention to your business or brand, go stand on your head in traffic and eat watermelon, but don’t believe for even one minute that Public Relations is the answer. PR is not a series of stunts.

     Businesses that insist on misusing PR as a tool to take them on a promotional binge from one event to the next will soon lose enough credibility to cost them press release coverage at times when it counts most, and will end up hanging around, hands in pockets watching their blog sites go down the tubes, probably pulling their websites down along with them since search engine rankings are very much a function of blog activity.

     Why do PR-abusive companies create this downward spiral to start with? Because the public (whether it’s industrial trade, clients, patients, other professionals, or John Q. off the street) isn’t stupid. And media writers and editors, even less so…when careers are on the line, there’s a whole lot less tolerance of artificially-inflated newsworthiness tossed to the wind by overzealous organizations that are too preoccupied with day-to-day sales survival tactics to appreciate the need for strategic planning.    

     Effective PR is all about building SOLID relationships with the news media by consistently demonstrating the value of what it is that your product or service does and the value of whom you are in your industry, profession, and community.

     Why does the relationship need to be so emphatically “solid”? PR is a trade-off. For you to get free promotional mentions and news release and photo coverage (that, incidentally, research shows to be ten times more credible than paid advertising messages), you must be willing to perform at the whimsy of the editors and writers who decide on whether or not to accept what you provide them with.

     They will always be much more receptivity to what you provide when what you provide is professionally written and executed and followed-up on. My guess is that 80% of effective PR is follow-up. Ah, but that is what builds relationships, right?  

     And, by the way, effective PR will boost your branding efforts far beyond advertising for usually a fraction of the costs associated with advertising. A recent study finds this is particularly true for businesses connected with engaging and complicated product manufacturing and marketing processes.

     In fields like financial services, automobiles and consumer electronics, almost 30% of brand value is associated with solid PR performances that result in increased brand name mentions in print, broadcast and electronic news media. 

     What this means is that in economic downturns like the one we’re experiencing, it is wise to boost  your PR efforts and reduce your advertising expenditures. But that’s not to imply a straight exchange.

     It is to say that your PR efforts need to be professional, and your advertising needs to be more focused and more contiguous with your media relations efforts. There’s some delicate balancing and juggling acts involved, but you’re already a pro at that or you wouldn’t have your own business to start with, right?  

 Good Night and God Bless You!  halalpiar     

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READY . . . SET . . .

Security? Check. Employee I.D. badges? Check. Food and beverage service areas? Check. Trash pails? Check. Entertainment and sound system set-ups? Check. Parking? Check. Clean up? Check. Handouts? Check. Prizes for drawings? Check. News conference agenda? Check…

     Tonight’s grand opening of a new (years-in-the-making) BMW and Mercedes-Benz dealerships state-of-the-art-one-of-a-kind building sets the stage for an entire regional business community journey into economic recovery.

     But nothing about coordinating two diverse and highly competitive luxury car-makers interests under one single roof has been easy or accidental. Tonight’s event promises to host over 700 people. Many of the RSVP’s came from BMW and Mercedes-Benz owners who want to see the new sales and service center firsthand because it is such an exceptional facility.

     The owner/customers will get a better understanding of the fiber optics communication systems that allow this unique building to be in instantaneous purchase, service, and repair communication with car-maker headquarters in Germany.

     They’ll see the green process that recycles used car oil into heating the huge service-bay area. Building tours will also highlight owner observation windows and closed circuit TV system that allow owners to monitor technician work on their vehicles, among many other features.   

So what are you getting from this special event announcement? 

1) Businesses that plan ahead for better customer service capabilities AS they continue to manage day-to-day activities, eventually come to the day of reckoning, and economic conditions need not have and negative or delaying impact on that day, or days that follow

2) Regarding the invitations, keep focused on the truism that the best source of business is existing and past business, and continue to knock yourself out to please your past and present customers above all other marketing targets

3) If you think this kind of razzmatazz is only worthy of pursuit by abandoning other functions like customer service, think again. Cherishing and nurturing long-term customer and community relationships all the while is what makes it all work. 

4) When you have something new and exciting to bring to market, turn your tendancy to brag into a commitment to share and show appreciation to the community that supports your business. What goes around comes around.  

BOTTOM LINE? Don’t let exaggerated media reports get you so focused on business survival tactics that you start to overlook the need for planning. Planning needs to stay in the mix. It will give birth down the road to those big “15 minutes of fame” type moments when your business can step into the spotlight and get the boost it deserves. If you’ve dropped this ball because of economic woes, pick it back up and run with it . . . before your competitor recovers the fumble!  

God Bless You and Good Night!  halalpiar     

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It’s really okay to provide

customers with service!

      A town, the town I live in, that I transplanted to from a lifetime of neurotic urban sprawl, is–will wonders never cease– a town where total strangers smile and wave to you as you drive by at 25mph. People actually talk with you in stores, on line at the bank or post office (there are no elevators in this town, but if there were, I’m sure no one would be staring vacantly at the floor numbers).

     Other towns I’ve been in (try the lower half of New York, and virtually anyplace in New Jersey, for example), when you stop your car for a railroad crossing train to go through, the first move is to close your windows and lock your doors; the second is to watch nervously in your side and rearview mirrors. You know, for the boogyman!

     In my town, passing trains actually prompt people to get out of their cars and walk around and say “Howdy! How you likin’ this weather?” or if your plates are from out-of-state, “Just passing through, are you? Need any help gettin’ where you’re goin’?” or if there’re kids in your car, “There’s a great hot dog place up ahead, near the ocean; kids all like goin’ there.”

     Here is a town where people hold doors open for other people behind them, even if they’re 10-15 feet back! In this town, when you dial a wrong number, the person answering is likely to say, well it’s nice talkin’ with you anyway, and you have a nice day now, y’hear?”

     Neighbors make time to stop and chat, but respect your schedule if you look like you’re in a rush. And none of this matters, by the way, whether you’re old, young, black, white, or purple with yellow polka-dots. By the way, we’re not totally in the sticks; we do have three traffic lights, and we are only half an hour from one of the biggest tourist cities in the U.S.

     The two square-block downtown is a hodgepodge of dilapidated remnant buildings, left over from zero variance days, so it’s not the manicured, symmetrical, organized, architectured, yuppy storefront suburb town with coordinated brick and mortar and smoked glass windows that mark increasing numbers of American towns. But you know what? It doesn’t matter because no one who lives here cares. And there’s only one “For Rent” sign.

     Folks still shop at Joe’s Hardware, creaking their way down wood-floored aisles hunting for a 19-cent cotter pin, and the local “dollar store” for bargains. Oh, don’t get me wrong, we all love the new BJ’s discount shopping club because prices are better and our friends all work there, but there are no chain restaurants unless you count a couple of fastfood stops on the outskirts.

     People here work hard, many on some kind of farm or in some farm or (being 15-20 minutes from the ocean) tourist-related business. And the bottom line is that businesses here are not suffering as much as most other places around the country.

     Why? A few hundred reasons. Here are two: 

1) People at work charge forward with their heads down and their eyes and minds focused on what’s in front of them doing the best they can “here and now” and doing what needs to be done, instead of dwelling on past upsets and injustices or worrying about working 30 seconds past 5pm, or tomorrow’s chores. And when they’re not at work, they’re busy being kind to one another.

2) People support one another in business and in life, even those they compete with in the marketplace. They share news, weather reports, births, deaths, celebrations and meals together. Businesses support the community and the community supports the businesses. Now, there’s a notion!

Need I say more? What could your business and your customer service efforts learn from this lifestyle, and this town? Give it a couple of minutes thought. You might surprise yourself!     God Bless You and Good Night!    halalpiar     

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Aloha Hal!

What better way can I say thank you for such an earnest and thoughtful response to my 3/11/09 blog post criticizing the U.S. Postal Service, than to reproduce the complete (as received, with no editing) comment… and extend my heartfelt appreciation to Postmaster Tom McCarthy? THANK YOU, TOM!

(Special thanks too to my good friend Judy Vorfeld for facilitating this exchange.)

Oh, if only our government could practice this kind of give and take which helps achieve both improved productivity and improved customer relations!    

Well, It’s good to see we have customers who care enough about the Postal Service to offer their ideas on how we can become better. [RESPONSE AND REFERENCE IS TO 3/11/09 BLOG POST BELOW, OR IN MAR ’09 ARCHIVES ON THIS SITE]

Here’s my spin—point by point.

1. Wasting time and money on surveys? Totally agree. We spend an enormous amount of money on surveys. However, the real problem is that we do not act on customers’ comments, or for that matter, lack of comments. For example: We have a Voice of the Employee survey that goes to each of our 650,000 employees every year. Although employees are paid on the clock to take the survey, I believe our response rate has never gone over 72%. Non-response says a lot.
2. Because most district managers have little-to-no background in sales and marketing, they fail to realize the other side of the budget equation—revenue generation. Most managers were promoted because of their ability to cut workhours. They really haven’t a clue about sales and marketing. Fortunately that mind-set changing. But we are so far behind that it’s going to be hard to catch up.
3. I’m not exactly sure what you are referring to about bad products. There are some products that not very popular, and the Postal Service is constantly evaluating them. Some customers feel we shouldn’t sell retail merchandise, that it’s a waste of time, and we should concentrate on selling stamps. But in 2007, Official Licensed Retail Products generated over $70 million. However, I will agree that often we fail to take innovation to completion.
4. I don’t know any FedX or UPS driver that has the time to market and sell. They constantly under the microscope. FedX even has wireless video tracking their drivers and making sure they are under a strict time schedule. A few years ago the Postal Service initiated Carrier Connect, Business Connect and Carrier Pickup. These programs encourage city and rural carriers notice what businesses use our competitors and then forward those leads to our Business Development Team, who will then contact customers to sell our products and services. A few years ago the Postal Service created the Postal Ambassador program. In each of our 80 districts across the nation, a select team of city carriers, clerks, and postmasters were sent to Chicago for intensive training in media, marketing and sales. I was fortunate to be selected as the Hawaii district Postmaster Postal Ambassador. The idea was to have districts take advantage of Postal Ambassadors to market and sell products and services to businesses, train clerks, and act as a public relations person for the media. But as you stated in #3, we failed to take it to completion and as a result, the program fizzled, mostly due to managers who could only see value in cutting costs.
5. Email delivery service sounds something like a service we offered years ago with fax. A customer could fax a letter to a post office, and then the letter would be placed in the customer’s mailbox. It didn’t do well, so the service got axed. But I certainly would like to hear your idea.
6. Social media is powerful but I can tell you this: Most postmasters are fried by the end of the day. We are micromanaged to the tenth degree. There is little room for innovation or creativity, and many must endure 2, 3, and 4 hour telecoms that are unbearable.
7. Customer service training is where we really fail. We desperately need sales training. But the powers that be see it as a huge expenditure. We actually have a number of web-based training, but for the most part, I feel they are useless. There is nothing that compares to real-life class situation with interaction and Q & As.
8. PO box in every box? Hmmmm do we charge double???
9. Recruiting community groups to garden and landscape sounds great until the lawyers look at liability issues that come with it—not to mention contract issues with employee unions. However, here in Hawaii we have had a post office on Kauai have a grammar school paint a beautiful mural on the post wall. But we needed all sorts of approval from higher sources.
10. I’m all with you on community events. It is one of the best ways to network and connect with customers. And here in Hawaii we do those type or activities. Many postmasters across the nation are involved in community events such as the American Cancer Society’s Relay for Life, Marrow Donor program, and many, many other events, including community fairs, parades, and business expos. I personally have manned marketing booths at conventions, Kona coffee festivals, Ironman World Triathlon Championship in Kona, and given workshops to coffee and mac nut farmers here on the Big Island of Hawaii. I know of many other postmasters who do similar kinds of sales and marketing in their communities.
11. Most of us would love to sell advertising space—especially on postage stamps, but we are regulated by the Postal Rate Commission, Postal Board of Governors, Congress, and some very limiting laws—lobbied no less by our competitors.
12. Same as above.
13. Every office should have some type of table for customers to rest their heavy parcels on. If your office doesn’t have one, I suggest you request the postmaster to install one. Tell your post office that if they can’t afford one, you’ll go to the competition—if nothing happens, write to the district manager. .
14. Music? Don’t you love hearing the clerks singing their song: Is there anything fragile, liquid, or perishable? Would you like to send it Express? Would you like insurance or delivery confirmation? etc, etc. Did you know that some offices have a television set to keep customers mind off the wait time in line. Many offices do have music but I’ve experienced situations where the customer complained about the music. Maybe we should hand out iPods while waiting in line to listen to your preferred music?
15. Our goal is to make it a positive experience. That’s why we hire Mystery shoppers and put a huge amount of pressure on offices who do not achieved the 5 minute wait time in line goal. There are all sorts of other things that an office is evaluated on, too.
16. A little note slipped into a mail box? I’ll tell you a story. One of my carriers had slipped a letter into a customer’s mailbox and the customer complained because there was no postage stamp on it. They said we were violating our own law—that anything in a mailbox must have postage on it. Strange but true. However, we have many carriers who very much care about their customers. I had a rural carrier who would deliver mail to one of her customers, and then after work go shopping for groceries for her, because the customer was elderly and could not drive or go outside. If you only knew the good and heartwarming stories, you’re thoughts would surely change.
17. Barter? That could become dangerous. Besides, we’ve got rules and regulations regulated by red tape regulators.
18. We do direct mail training workshops. You can also go online to our website and practically get a masters degree in mailing. We also have a small business development team in each district. Ask your postmaster for more information or go on usps.com website and search for direct mail….coffee not included.
19. We have over 7 million customers visiting our retail outlets every day. That’s real-time blog. And if you consider we have something in the neighborhood of a million hits a day on our usps.com website, that would be one big blog.
20. USPS.com has the whole spiel. If you want more information, ask your postmaster to give you the phone number for the business development team in their district. They’d be more than happy to help.
21. We have publications with direct mail information, rates, and tips on how to use direct mail to grow your business. I regularly order these pamphlets and place them in our business customers’ mailboxes.
22. For years Congress and postal laws had our hands tied. We could not give discounts. Fortunately, a few years ago, congress passed the Postal Reform bill. We now have more freedom to offer discounts and make special deals. Unfortunately, we are not moving fast enough.
23. This could possibly be under consideration. We do offer discounts for business customers who prepare their mail properly and comply with automation requirements.

Well, there it is. And I agree. It would be a terrible waste of assets, resources, and some super-nice people if we don’t listen to our customers and become better at what we do.

Thanks again for your thoughts.
Tom McCarthy tmpm@mac.com
Postmaster
Holualoa HI 96725

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Having grown up a mailman’s

son, maybe I’m just sentimental

(or simply as stupid as the PO?) 

     On top of their idiotic, money-wasting, survey last December [Click on December Archives in right column and go to DEC 15 “NO MORE ROOM FOR “SNAIL MAIL – Gutless, Incompetent, Greedy, The US Postal Service” for the ugly details], the amazing U.S. Postal Service management team has been making some astonishingly whacko business decisions.

     Since revenues are off, they’ve cut back hours, increased postage prices, increased their elaborate sample mailing campaign to entice more small businesses to do more mailings with (you guessed it) stuff that’s prohibitively expensive to the typical small business to even think about mailing anyway.

     I’ve received two personalized t-shirts, a metal hinged and color-labeled box filled with expensive die-cut printing samples, and the list goes on. And now. Now they’re pulling the blue drop boxes off the sidewalks!

     How utterly brilliant! Hey, nobody’s using them, so take them away. How many things can you think of that those boxes could be used for if YOU had them for YOUR business? I’ll bet there are at least 10,000 ideas.

     Okay, here’s where I’m stupid. I’m going to give away my consulting expertise for free to the U.S. Postal Service. Right here. Right now. Think they’ll take it? Not a chance, but I’m going to put it out there anyway just because they are chewing off their own arms and legs and I hate to just stand around watching them self-destruct.

SO… Here’s what the U.S.P.S. needs to do:

1. Stop wasting time and money and effort on useless dumb surveys. Just listen to your customers!
2. Stop with the radical cost-cutting methods and ideas that only serve to prevent future sales and revenue streams. You can’t make money by turning off lights! Only sales make money!
3. Stop throwing good money after bad with products and services no one wants. Stick to your knitting, and remember innovation is taking an idea all the way to completion! 
4. Take some pages from FedEx and other competitors who train their drivers to go beyond being just drivers and to become account managers– as responsible for promoting and selling and customer servicing as for driving and delivering.
5. Start an Email delivery service (Call me for details!).
6. Learn how to use and promote via social media options. Visit Twitter for two hours!
7. Initiate customer service training at ALL levels. When was the last time anyone got a thank you note from the U.S.P.S. when it wasn’t a thinly-veiled give-me-a-tip-for-Christmas card?
8. Put a P.O. Box in every P.O. Box (Call me on this one too!).
9. Recruit community groups to garden and landscape your ugly buildings (inside and out).
10. SPONSOR community events; get out there and mix with your customers! They don’t bite! Show them you’re (like State Farm) a good neighbor! 
11. SELL AD SPACE ON THE INSIDE OF EVERY P.O.BOX DOOR!!!! 
12. SELL AD SPACE ON STAMPS!!!!
13. Provide shelves for the poor souls with heavy packages standing on lines waiting for the incompetent counter clerks to finish their coffee. 
14. PIPE IN SOME MUSIC!!!
15. Make it “A POSITIVE EXPERIENCE” to go to the post office!
16. How about an occasional (NON-Christmastime) slip in empty mailboxes that the carriers sign that says: “I noticed you didn’t get any mail today, but I wanted you to know I was thinking of you anyway. Have a great week!” 
17. Barter some direct mail advertising for media time and space… other services! 
18. Run direct mail training sessions for small businesses in P.O. lobbies – serve coffee for free! 
19. START A REAL BLOG that actually addresses real customer situations on a daily basis! (If you actually read this far, definitely call me on this one!)
20. Teach small business owners/operators how to tie direct mail to website and other ad and promotion programs.
21. Offer (Put in all business P.O. Boxes) detailed info on direct mail programs with package rates for use of postcards and self-mailers, with sizes and deals and discounts and coupons!
22. Offer quantity discounts!
23. Offer and arrange shared delivery discounts (to same office or building, for example).

     NUTS, huh? Well, I’ll tell you what: If you continue the course you’re on, YOU’RE NUTS BECAUSE YOU WILL END UP KILLING YOURSELF and that would be a terrible waste of assets, resources, some super-nice people who work for you and bring about the demise of a still much-needed service.

     God Bless and Good Night!  halalpiar     

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Survey this, doubters!

(GRATEFULNESS, LIKE FLATTERY,

WILL GET YOU EVERYWHERE) 

I know there’re places in Maine with 9-10 feet of snow. But they know how to deal with it up there. Here, the “near blizzard conditions” that dumped 4-6 inches of immobilizing snow on America’s second biggest peninsula (unless you count Florida as a peninsula, which I suppose…) has given me cabin fever. And when you read the results of some of my phone calls this week, you may think I’ve gone completely off the deep end. But here goes: my unofficial telephone survey shows —

     9 out of 10 business owners from 9 different industries in 6 different states who I’ve spoken with in the last three days (including one with 50 locations, and another with 400 employees, and yet another with three employees) have ALL said the most important thing about the bad economy is that it has made them “grateful” for what they have. 

     All 10? Yup, all 10. They all said the word, “grateful”? Yup, all 10. In fact, in each discussion, gratefulness was underscored as a dominent factor in keeping business growth steady while neighboring businesses were crumbling.

     Hard to believe, right? I thought so too, but the more I probed, the more that I was reassured of the importance of being eternally appreciative on a day-to-day basis as a leading factor in keeping associate, employee, vendor, and customer attitudes positive. And positive attitudes beget positive business!

     “When I look around me at other companies in our industry, I’m really grateful to be where we are right now,” is the kind of comment I heard over and over. “I’m grateful to have such loyal people working for me!” and “We’re grateful to our customers that they trust and support us during these tough times,” and “I can’t tell you how grateful we are to the bankers in this town who have stood shoulder-to-shoulder with us and are helping us to get through this recession.”

     SO, take a good hard look at yourself. Go ahead. Go to the bathroom mirror if you need to; lock the door if you need to. Look yourself in the eye. Have you been appreciating what you have? Can you act, think and talk more grateful?

     Maybe you can’t relate to the millions of people without food or clothes or a roof or healthcare because they’re not in your neighborhood, or on your street, or in your back yard . . . because the success you’ve had has served to insulate you from the anguish, poverty, hunger, and ill health.

     But it’s out there, and you need to be grateful that you are not. You need to be grateful that you have managed to be in the right places at the right times and have kept your life and your business on track. It didn’t happen by itself. It didn’t happen by chance.

     It happened because you built a reputation for trust and integrity by demonstrating trust and integrity. Be grateful you had the good sense and judgement and abilities to follow that path.          

     Appreciate who you are and what you have. Appreciate your self!                    halalpiar

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Is Trust An Evasive Quality?

A fictional exchange—–  

• “Listen, Dr. J.M., it was like pulling teeth here to get my manager to get this deal done for you today; we don’t usually…”
• “Trust me, Mr. Ripsuoff, you don’t ever want to pull teeth!”
• “Hey, why should I trust you?  You’re a dentist.  I only trust dentists when I’m in the chair!  Ha!  Ha!”
• “Well, why should I trust you?  You’re a car salesman.  I only trust car salesmen when they’re at home asleep!  Ha!  Ha!”

                                  ___________________________________

     Trust does seem to be an evasive quality these days, but –simply for that reason– it IS what customers, clients and patients want most.  In fact, it’s surprising but true that with most people buying into media exaggerations of economic woes, that more customers are actually in search of trustworthy businesses and sales reps to do business with than they are in saving a few dollars.

The bottom line is that the most desireable commodity a business can offer in today’s low trust-dominated industrial and consumer marketplaces, is high trust!

      Okay, this is not a huge problem for long-established companies, say 50-100 years old.  But because high trust has a lot to do with reputation, high trust pursuit is clearly an issue for young and new companies.

     So you’re young or new, whaddaya do?  [Sorry, the poet surfaces occasionally.]  First, you forget everything you ever knew about bending over backwards for customers, clients and patients because now you need to go one better and virtually stand on your head for them.  It’s possible, but unlikely you could ever over-communicate with them.

     I’m not talking about running your mouth; I’m talking about using frequent website updates, and blogs (because blogs attract increased search engine rankings which attract website visitors and interaction which attract sales), and emails, and telephone follow-ups and “how goes it?” calls.  And, by the way, NOTHING beats a personal handwritten note!

     In its heyday, IBMs motto was that

“The sale begins after the sale is made!” 

     Service.  Good service enhances reputation.  Voila!  Reputation unlocks the high trust treasure chest.  Who cares?  You should.

    “The demand for transparency,” says online publisher Angelique Rewers, “is at an all-time high.”  No longer, she says, do we have the luxury of communicating different messages to different audiences.  The instantaneous mindset of the social media revolution has changed this landscape, probably forever.

     As a young or new business, this means speaking the truth with a single and consistent voice to all customers –internal as well as external– ALL of the time, without exception.

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Hal@Businessworks.US

“The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson]

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals. God Bless You.

Make today a GREAT day for someone! 

Dwelling on the past

…is emotionally unhealthy, but a short visit there

can help your future planning and present focus!

     Let’s go back to this past Friday for a minute.  [See Friday, 2/13/09 blog post below for details]. 

     A number of you have asked whether my Twitter-contact talk-radio host Dan Gaffney in his Friday morning broadcast of my situation (with a children’s book manuscript I edited and my lost contact information for the author) actually produced anything. 

     Well, as most everyone who knows me knows, I am not often in praise of the media (though it’s mostly  “mainstream” media I’m critical of for taking advantage of human frailties and emotions simply to stir up sales by using disparaging and exaggerated reports that are totally subjective, often completely false and –more frequently than not– highly manipulative).  There.  Had to say that.  I feel better now. 

     Now on to “The Good Media.”  Most local media (though it certainly is not beyond also being misguided) at least tends to feature on-air and technical professionals who –to me– always seem to be warm, endearing, concerned, community-minded, straightforward and engaging local personalities. 

     And whenever they do have political axes to grind, they at least approach the task with a sense of care, compassion, and craftsmanship that we would never see from major media moguls.

     Anyway, Dan Gaffney is one of those good media guys.  And his loyal listener base, I have discovered is as responsive as it is huge.

     After my not being able to locate my promising, estranged, young author since Thanksgiving, Dan Gaffney produced the “lost” author’s business name and cell phone number, and put it into an email for me within an hour after he finished his show. 

     I called the number.  The author and I had a joyful telephone reunion (I got his home number too this time) and we’ve scheduled a meeting Wednesday evening.  Thank you all for the nice and encouraging comments and inquiries.  And thanks again, Dan for the assist. 

Why can’t network TV and big-time newspaper people have some of these fine qualities?  It’s called being authentic.      halalpiar      

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